Is it possible to get a 1080p quality video fro a 720p source?

[nidany]

I tried to use DVDFAB converter in order to convert 720p mkv into 1080p, and I defined maximum quality settings (high quality 2 pass and maximum bits/pixel).
I certainly got a much larger file.
But did I really get a higher quality video than the original source?
I am interested in getting a qualified answer - not just a guess or opinion.

[MrVideo]

You can never get a higher quality video when going from 720p to 1080p. You are trying to create something from a source that doesn't have said information, i.e., you are attempting to create 360 lines that do not exist in the source. Plus, every time MPEG video is recoded, quality is lost and some MPEG artifacts are introduced.

I would not bother doing an upconvert. Let the display device do the upconvert.

[nidany]

Thanks

Thanks for your comprehensive reply.
Seems logical enough

[MrVideo]

There is plenty of information on the net regarding working with MPEG video.

Working with MPEG-2 video is like working with a JPG still image file. Every time you save a JPG as a JPG, there is quality lose. Even at the highest quality setting, there are issues.

Same thing blowing up any digital image. Take a 1920x1080 still and reduce it to 1280x720. Save the reduced image uncompressed. Read that image back into the program (Photoshop for example) and blow it back up to 1920x1080. Compare the two images and notice the differences (photoshop can do that for you).

Every time you recode a MPEG-2/4 video, there are quality issues. The rule of thumb is that whatever bitrate you choose to recode at, the source should at least be 2:1. If going from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4 (H264), you want 4:1, since H264 is twice as good as MPEG-2.

DVDFab9 violates the rule of thumb a lot when shrinking BD50 to BD25, as the reduction is normally less than 50%. What helps is that H264 is a better codec. What also helps is the much higher bitrate to start with. If you look hard enough, you can sometimes find issues.