Sweet little upscaler, great for Saturn.

Ok this isnt really a hack or mod per se, but I think think this thread should still go into this forum.

So I was having a a little trouble with my current setup for playing old school games. I cannot afford an XRGB or comparable product so I bought a scart to YUV converter, like in this listing:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-SCART-R...855?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3362ac0577

and a CGA to VGA converter, as listed here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Arcade-Game...350?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4cf9a60c16

I used them in conjunction and got a fairly decent picture for my retro consoles. Not perfect but better than just using AV cables. It was a little disappointing ,however, because the colors weren't as vibrant going into the VGA input of my TV; not using the (cga to vga) scalar made the image less clear but with more vibrant colors. The TV would not even display anything from the SNES (NTSC model 1) if I was going directly from the scart to YUV converter directly to component.

Last week I stumbled upon this:
http://www.amazon.com/Component-vid...N49Y/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1316637363&sr=8-1

A VGA/Component to HDMI converter with upscale. Normally I would not go for such a thing but it had ok reviews and thought "what the hell". I got it in the mail today and what very pleasantly surprised by the quality...especially with my Saturn games. My SNES titles looked much better, cleaner, and more vibrant. The N64 games were ok....but it is hard to tell sometime because so many games have muddy textures anyway. I will test it out on Turok 2 and Yoshi's Story later. The Saturn games are what really popped out, especially the 3d games. Many games like Panzer Dragoon, Virtua Fighter 2, and especially Burning Rangers were crisper and cleaner. Usually when I use the Saturn on my setup, games tend to look "pixelly", even the 3D ones. This cleaned things up a bit. I have not tried it with any other systems but I am very pleased with the results.

Here is the way I have things setup. Keep in mind, I have an inexpensive 32" Vizio lcd tv.

game console =>scart to YUV => cga to VGA => vga to hdmi conveter

The converter does have component in but when I tried going

game console => scart to YUV => component to hdmi converter

the colors were a little washed out. Not sure why the the cga to vga works better. It may have something to do with the component to hdmi conversion.

I have not had much time to play with it today but here are a few things I noticed.

1) Sometimes there is a screen doubling effect. If the cga to vga is set to 640x480, this happens....but not all the time. I just set it to 800x600 instead.
It happened when I connected my dreamcast via VGA to hdmi converter as well.

2) I noticed some weird ghosting/color distortion when playing my N64. Zelda:TooT and SM64 were the worst....but then it went away. I don't think I had the VGA switch all the way in the correct position on the hdmi converter.

3) Some of the added enhancement comes from the adjustable settings on my TV's hdmi source settings, something that is surprisingly absent from the VGA source settings.

Overall I am very pleased with the purchase. If anyone has any questions, I will do my best to answer them.

 

any display lag from upscaling?

 

None that I noticed but then again, I am no expert. One thing I did notice was that it seemed like everything played a little smoother while using the converter...but that may just be a trick because the colors are so much better. I dunno. Sometimes when I was using the old setup, things felt a little sluggish. I noticed it the most on the the N64....especially DK64. Everything seems to be just a hair smoother now.

 

???

I don't know that pics from a digital camera will do much good as I do not own a video capture device but I'll see what I can manage before I head into work tomorrow.


****update*****

So I took some pics but mostly due to the fact that I am using a digital camera and not a screen capture, you cant really tell much because the differences are subtle. To get a better comparison with a digital camera will take a bit more time than I have at the moment.

 

I can imagine this lags like shit.

 

1 frame of lag tops.

So no.

 

1 frame for every 2? 1 frame for every million?

 

I'd assume 1 per second (video is at 25fps or so, depending on pal/NTSC)

 

Actually the OPs setup probably is pretty laggy, this is a better solution.

http://mmmonkey.co.uk/console/other/rgb2vga.htm

 

He's is using that.

 

Adding HDMI into the equation though.

 

Ok, so if there is lag, how do I tell? I don't notice it and if I did, i wouldn't have bothered with the unit or posting in the first place. Granted, I have become accustomed to playing on an LCD for quite some time but if there was (noticeable) lag from the any of the devices, it would probably bother me to the point of annoyance. Minor color differences are what prompted me to pick this thing up in the first place so I am kinda picky (within monetary reason) about how I play my retro consoles.

Anyway, I just wanted to share a cool and ,IMHO, a worthwhile find. It may interest those that may not want to throw down the cash on a XRGB unit atm or have some quality issues with their tv. For my setup it cleans up the signal a little from the cga to vga.

 

There's probably 1 field of lag for progressive content, 1 frame for interlaced (if it even supports interlaced) = 1/60th or 30th of a second = imperceptible. Lag isn't the problem with these cheap converters, it's the video quality; they probably have 8-bit ADC, no termination and gain control, underwhelming sample rates and unknown DSP quality and performance. I think a good test would be throwing CPS/CPSII video at it.

 

I can perceive lag down to the frame level as something "being off". Saw it happen today at a Costco but lord knows what they use as a video source or if it was being upscaled or not.

Video quality tends to drive me insane, particularly with my new glasses.

 

you should put the rgb directly into cga/ega converter, using the scart to YUV youre degrading the signal and adding lag.

try this method Segata posted

 

Yeah, originally I tried that but I could never manage to get it to work. :shrug: Not really sure why.

Since about a week ago I have been using an Xrgb2-plus and notice a difference in lag... rather lack of. And I may be chided for this but I am still using the vga to hdmi converter but now in conjunction with the Xrgb 2 plus. It really does help the picture quality but I am not sure how much lag it brings so I am trying to get an old crt monitor so I can test it out. Hopefully it will be it will be in the next week or so.

 

Interesting to read your thoughts on these devices. I was looking for a SCART to HDMI converter a couple of weeks back, and good information is hard to find. (I hadn't even found this site yet). I ended up getting one of these:

http://www.js-technology.com/store/product.php?id_product=15

I'm still waiting for it to arrive. And look at that... it's dropped another 14 quid since I bought it. Bugger!

 

hmm.. looks very similar to our little converter here, but in a project box with the necessary outputs. Can you take some pictures and write your impressions when it arrives?

 

Absolutely This is my first foray into running true RGB from old consoles, so I'm no afficionado. But I'll do what I can.