Success with NES Composite to RGB SCART cable -> CSY2100 -> Component LCD HDTV?

Hi all,

I got a CSY2100 clone (CVS2087) recently and a composite (red,yellow plugs) to SCART (Assuming it's RGB SCART?) cable for my PAL NES from eBay. My goal was to get "RGB SCART QUALITY VIDEO" (that everyone seems to rave on about) out of the NES and onto my 40"+ LCD HDTV. Little did I know that it wouldn't work once I had set it all up that the NES outputs 240p and that my LCD HDTV doesn't automatically upscale the video to 480 or 720.

What a waste of money that was! Has anyone had any luck without buying a upscaler? I don't want to waste more money and I want to avoid using a CRT TV (honestly because I just don't own one anymore).

Thanks!

 

You can't take a composite signal and expect to get clean RGB out of it, not even if you have a composite-to-RGB converter of some kind. Composite represents an irreversible (and significant) loss of quality compared to RGB. It's like pouring a litre of water into a half-litre glass. Once you've lost that second half, you can put remaining water into whatever size container you like (in this case, converting back to RGB, upscaling to 1080p, whatever), you're still stuck with half a litre of liquid.

I'd guess that the reason you aren't seeing anything is that your CSY box expects RGBS and at the moment you're just feeding it the "S" (composite video is often used as sync). Without the R, G, and B signals it won't display anything (assuming it won't take composite as a video source on its own, doesn't sound like it from a quick search). There's no easy way around this on the NES. You have two options: buy a Famicom Titler (expensive, large, heavy and Japan-only piece of kit, has native RGB out) or modify your current NES with a PPU from a NES-based arcade game/board, called a PlayChoice. Expect plenty of hassle with the latter and plenty of cost with the former, should be details on Google if you're curious.

All that said, a lot of people don't see much improvement on a digital set going from composite to RGB, and mainly this is the fault of the set's internal scaler, hence external upscalers... but that's a different issue.

 

Thanks for such an awesome and clear-to-understand reply!

So the cable isn't actually outputting RGB through the SCART. Instead it is just composite over SCART. So, the CSY2100 wouldn't recognise the signal anyway!

I guess the only way for RGB is as you said - modding it. I may as well get rid of the SCART cable and use composite as it's as good as it's going to get right now.

 

People confuse SCART with RGB, Peritel or SCART as it is more commonly known is a connector made by the french so that they could plug in other devices that didn't support SECAM into their TVs. SCART at a basic level only supports composite video, however most TVs nowdays will support RGB (although not all the SCART sockets on a TV will support RGB) it can support S-Video and Component as well but these are less common as not all TVs will support this.

The NES (PAL) can not support RGB (you can try but you will find a number of games don't work correctly), the Famicom and US NES can be modified to RGB but it requires finding a specific chip from a Playchoice 10 cartridge and soldering it into a machine. Some French NES machines did output RGB but it was going from composite video to RGB so you did not gain anything.

 

I don't often say this, but yeah. Composite is really the only choice unless you're prepared to invest lots of time/money for RGB and at that point you would want an external scaler like the XRGB series to make that effort worthwhile. It seems like a lot of the people who are RGB modding their NES consoles get other problems as well, like darkened vertical bars over the image... I think there was speculation about bad caps commonly being to blame, not sure if there's a guaranteed solution yet.

Was that the original standard, no RGB? Haven't heard that before.

True about the French NES systems though, it's a shame really. I would've thought they'd have been better off using the Titler's RGB PPU rather than adding an RGB->composite chip on top.

 

The original peritel did have RGB as it was one of the few ways for PAL/NTSC units to work on the godforsaken SECAM system. However what I meant was that if you have a TV with a SCART socket then the only input you can gaurantee will work in monophonic composite video in the correct video format for the country the TV is sold in.

 

Someone could find a batch of those Playchoice 10 chips I'd find a batch of US NESes here and start exporting them to the UK tomorrow...

 

Easier said than done, the PPU bit at least. Wish it wasn't.

 

I thought I read someone that a certain circuit could be used instead of a PlayChoice10 PPU. Any truth in this?

Sort of want an RGB Famicom / US NES.

 

Er none, unless the circuit is basically a copy of the French circuit to convert composite video into RGB, which as explained before is a waste of time. The PPU only outputs a composite video signal, so you need the certain Playchoice 10 PPU to output an RGB signal but you still need a circuit to convert the RGB signal to a format that is compatible with SCART, even then some games will have off colours.

 

I don't get why everyone's so obsessed with this. The PPU's hardware palette corresponds to a hue and brightness format which selects premodulated waveforms of composite video colors. It takes a lot of hardware to make a correct RGB palette (a 512 x 9 bit ROM at least) which simulates the NTSC colors and Nintendo didn't do it properly (they used something like a 64 x 6 or 7 bit ROM). The colors are off. Effects which make use of a special feature which darkens specific colors are not simulated at all in the RGB palette, and this breaks numerous games. Some games were also specifically designed to be viewed with composite artifacts because they incorporate dithering techniques somewhat analogous to the rainbow effect in Sonic, this doesn't make it through a RGB palette no matter how accurate the colors are. OK so all those things suck, but having a RGB NES makes you special right? Wrong, tons of people have already taken part in the genocide of naturally RGB NES hardware and the majority have to delude themselves into thinking it's a significant improvement over composite every time they play. The RGB mod is like giving your NES fake boobs.

 

I've seen shots of NES RGB and it looks great, even with the caveats you mention. I'd rather have a crisp image with a screwy colour palette than put up with composite.

 

I take it you've never played or seen an RGB NES in action? I have played close to all of the 400+ physical carts I own on my RGB NES and the difference is black and white. I will never knock composite though, I switch back occassionally to get the original old school vibe. But take it from me, Bboy, RGB will give you astounding detail you've never seen before. Especially on newer HDTVs, you will see very rich colors, no more color bleed, no more blurry text, etc... exact pixel-for-pixel presentation.

Color palettes swapping/changing is found in just a handful of titles (less than 5% of the library I'd venture to say) and unless you know and have played one of those specific titles religiously, you would never even notice. It's not like it just up and turns the whole game upside down. For example, it's as minute as the hair of Kid Icarus changing to a lighter reddish brown compared to just "brown" or the background sky of Totally Rad changing from white to black. Of the 400+ carts I own, only one of them is not RGB compatible, which is Felix The Cat (a gorgeous game with great music btw). There are maybe only 3 or 4 other carts that are also not RGB compatible. As far as composite "effects", you can achieve those with simulated CRT scanlines with units such as those in the X-RGB series by Micomsoft.

Granted, to achieve RGB is an expensive and arduous ordeal. I experienced many road bumps and failures, but for me, it was quite a journey. The thrill of the hunt to find and acquire what you need keeps it interesting. I made a lasting friendship with the gamer/modder who helped me put it all together. The PPU and a good RGB upscale/upscan unit are what is going to cost you, but if you really want it, it's something to save up for and work at. Unlike the NES, you can enjoy RGB natively and with hardly the headache on other systems as well like SNES, Genesis, Saturn, etc...

Bboy, if you need any advice or have any questions, I'll be glad to help you out! Just let me know :thumbsup:

 

Nope, I've never played a RGB NES, unless you count Vs. Super Mario Bros at Disneyland as a kid. I have however been using emulators for 13 years and over that period have tried nearly every NES and Famicom game in existence not only in RGB, but scaled to twice the resolution or more. Oh and from time to time I work on a hardware NES clone with a RGB palette accurate within 1 or 2%. Most of the time I still play it via composite (using the same scheme as the real PPU) because it's still more correct. And I know it isn't what you mean, but palette "swapping/changing" is used in every single game. And no XRGB scanlines aren't an analogue for composite dithering, that can only be achieved through the composite PPU and a NTSC decoder.

 

Interesting. Could you tell us more about that project?

How do you feel about PC Engine RGB? I'm assuming the same way? I can't speak for the NES but I can say for damn sure that, to my eyes, PC Engine games look way nicer in RGB. Composite is just fucking nasty.

 

It's just a standard NES SoC written in Verilog, they're becoming an increasingly popular project. Mine seems to be unique in that I target the least capable hardware as possible and do lots of "no-nos".

I really don't think PCE composite is that bad, but sure there are benefits to RGB. The PCE at least has a native RGB palette and while it's not my area of expertise but I don't know of games with composite effects; they probably exist but most games seem to be designed for an ideal-ish display.

 

That helps me understand your position, so it's basically the colour palette that bothers you most about the NES RGB solutions? Each to their own.

The only project like yours that I ever heard of was Kevin Horton's. That was a long time ago and never seemed to amount to anything (I should probably check out Nesdev more regularly, thinking about it)... is anyone making these into a product?

There are PC Engine games which have that dithering effect that looks weird on RGB, incidentally, but I can't remember any off the top of my head.

 

I've played every console in RGB, even Neo Geo. PC Engine looks incredible, Alchy. Pros vastly outweigh any cons you can through at RGB modification. To have not even played or experienced an RGB mod and say it's crap to someone who's asking about it... Where's the credibility? It's the only reason I stepped into this thread.

You could argue RF is the only "correct" way to experience an NES since that was the sole included connection when originally sold. Arguing "correctness" is for the birds and a waste of time, especially when talking about old school gaming.

I'll sum up our story real quick. We, like many people, have opinions. You see black and it's hideous, I see white and it's beautiful. The End.

 

Thanks for such a helpful post Loogs. RGB NES sounds incredible!:thumbsup:

 

I really dislike the colors (I can't really argue with people about color since I bet many people here will have/even prefer their sets adjusted out of reason) but I most dislike not having the option of playing every game! While there may be a handful games broken out of the US library (and many more semi-broken), there's also the Famicom library to consider; Just Breed (!) is completely broken and that shouldn't be acceptable.

Also people arguing for RGB's detail (luminance bandwidth), composite has the *same* bandwidth for most low resolution games (~320 horizontal pixel ones), thus it has the same detail. It's the crosstalk from harmonics that causes the video information to be wrong. I'm not trying to say the sky isn't blue, just challenging this stupid notion that games must be played in RGB to be fully appreciated, with facts. When I play in composite it's apparently not as bad as when RGB zealots play in composite.

I don't think so yet. There are ~10 people who have publicly posted they are working on a hardware clone, but I think Kevtris is the only person with a fully working one (he has posted that he plans to sell it eventually). Some other people have said theirs will be open source once in a better state, so that might come about faster than Kevtris' multi-console thing.

That's just how it goes, I don't mind a little video artifacting in order to enjoy dithering effects put there to be seen. It would be awesome to have the best of both worlds but you can't (without emulation and a video filter overlay which selectively dithers specific game objects).

Yeahhh, refer to the 6th post above... On a side note, for TRULY astounding detail, get an emulator, maybe try some enhanced graphics hacks while you're at it.