Consoles are supposed to be the simple 'plug and play' alternative to the complexities of PC gaming, yet one Xbox owner was left feeling like an 'idiot' after they realized that they'd been using their device incorrectly for years.
One of the biggest benefits of consoles from manufacturers like PlayStation and Xbox is how simple they are to use, to the point where pretty much anyone can get the most out of them once they figure out how to turn it on.
While you might not be able to take advantage of the enhanced graphics and performance that playing on PC can get you, the supposedly hassle-free experience more than makes up for it when it comes to most gamers.
That idea suddenly starts to fall apart though when certain settings are implemented incorrectly, and one Xbox fan felt plenty of regret when they realized that the experience they'd had for years was inferior.
How were they using their Xbox wrong?
As shared on the r/xboxone subreddit, one user created a post to express their own embarassment and hopefully save anyone else that might have been in the same boat as them.
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Branding themselves an 'idiot' in the title for using their Xbox 'wrong' for years, the post details:
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"My resolution has been on 1280x720 for years, and I was so unsatisfied with how games looked, and I tried calibrating my TV and messed with the settings so much and just couldn't fix it so I gave up.
"Today, I noticed my TV said 1280x720 and I thought, 'wait a minute...'. I went to the display settings and went to video output in the settings, and I took off auto detect resolution, then turned it into 640x280 or something like that and it looked terrible so I went back to auto detect and left it at 1280x720."
They then realized that upon disabling auto detect resolution, they could then head back to the previous menu and choose between a number of different resolutions, which vitally included 1080p.
"I facepalmed so f***ing hard. I'm an idiot lol."
Why was this an issue?
If you're not tech savvy you might be wondering what the issue here is, and it all relates to the output resolution of your device, which when set to a lower number results in a worse image.
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While 720p is still technically considered a high definition output, it absolutely pales in comparison to 1080p, with the latter offering a total pixel count of over 2 million compared to the former's roughly 900,000.
While gaming has moved far beyond the limits of 1080p, with modern consoles offering support for 2160p (4K) and 1440p (QHD) resolutions, this jump from 720p to 1080p would have made a world of a difference nine years ago when this post was originally made.
Furthermore, this mistake could still easily apply to new consoles as they could just as easily be accidentally set to 1080p or even lower when your TV is more than capable of outputting a higher resolution.
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"Welcome to true HD lol," wrote the top comment underneath the post, with another adding that "the first thing you are supposed to do when you get a new system (and game) is go into every imaginable settings menu and look at every option."
Most modern TVs thankfully do correctly set the resolution automatically, but it's still definitely worth checking before you jump into your next gaming sessions, and that few seconds you spend could save you years of headaches.