XMD s-video output for the Genesis/Sega CD/32x

I tried this out a while back and I'm not too sure whether I prefer the more detailed (lego like?) look through the XMD box, or whether the output via composite is more natural looking.
I took a couple of comparison pics of a Sega CD game- Flashback.
Top pic is via composite, bottom pic via the XMD s-video.










What do guys think?

 

personally i like the second pic. and i love flashback.

 

Why does it look all blocky? Mine doesn't look like that at all. Where are your scan lines? I have the XMD-2 for Mega Drive 1 and XMD-3 for Mega Drive 2 and neither look like that.

By the way, I think the top picture is awful. Blurry and bleeding everywhere.

Yakumo

 

Could be because the pics were taken off of my Sony HDTV?
I'll plug everything into my old CRT and see what type of quality the XMD output gives me.

 

I use a JVC HD CRT but it doesn't look blocky. Seems yet another downfall for Retro on the new HD screens

 

The S-Video will look a good bit better on a regular SD CRT TV. HDTVs will look pretty poor just about always with old consoles.

 

my hdtv running my snes at the correct aspect ratio makes games look like the second picture.

 

true but I'm using a HD CRT (up to 1080i) and that doesn't turn everything in to a block feast. Must be down to the scan lines?

Yakumo

 

The 2nd pic looks great, much nicer than the 1st one.

 

no,

CRTs are by nature capable of producing many real resolutions, unlike LCDs that have a fixed number of pixels and hence need to scale the image to fit the panel. CRTs have, in theory, unlimited scanlines and are able to represent everything up to their max resolution, if at the correct hertz rating, in the way they re intended to be.

 

Makes you wonder if we haven't gone backwards in tech then if a LCD is limited to resolutions. Do you think that one day in the near future we'll ever see a LCD screen that can display lower resolutions correctly via a good scaling chip? I sure hope so but I can't see it myself

Yakumo

 

LCDs though are fine for modern systems. It's just anything that can't do 480P will suck ass. Keep your good CRT around for classics.

 

I used to have a Philips CM8833-MkII monitor hooked up to my SNES and Megadrive. For a 14" monitor, it gave a fantastic picture as the dot pitch is a lot finer on these than a standard portable TV, and it could sync at 60Hz. These even had their own speakers built in :love2:

These were primarily designed for use with home computers like the Amiga, and of course video games consoles. We had lots of them at school hooked up to Acorn A3000's. Anyone who went to school in the UK around the early to mid-nineties will probably have used one of these.

 

HD screens really turns everything 2d very blocky, I only use regular CRT tv to play old games

Yakumo, it's strange that you are using a HD crt and it's not blocky, I already tried mega drive on philips HD crt and image looked very poor like lcd screens but I'm was using av connection, not s-video

I need badly this xmd adapter!

 

With the cost of the XMD you might as well just get RGB as it's the best you can get. Either way even a shitty old CRT with composite video will look better than a LCD with S-Video from the XMD.

 

Would I be wrong in saying that it's blocky because that's what the resolution the device is running at? It always seemed to me that it looks "better" but not necessarily desirable.

 

No, not at all blocky, the image just looks F*ing awful. I'll take a photo if you'd like to see how bad the image through the XMD S-Video looks compared to normal composite.

My TV can display "normal" and "progressive" images. Or I'd say interlaced and progressive. Some older machines such as the saturn look better in Normal mode since in Progressive mode some horizontal lines seem a bit jagged or thicker at some points than others. It's most notacible on energy bars or text.

Stuff through progressive scan though can't run in "normal" mode such as DVD in component, DC via VGA or Wii when running games in 480p. I also tried a friends Blue ray on it which looked great in 780p (is that right) and pretty much the same to me in 1080i.

yakumo

 

Aw man, I'd love to get my hands on an XMD-3. I've never seen one on eBay, though I don't search for it all that often. Anyway, I prefer the bottom picture as well. Though really, it would depend on the game.

 

They do appear on ebay from time to time. But they aren't really that cheap. You could probably build your own SCART RGB to Component Video adapter for the same price and it would be better. Also for around the price that they go for, I bought an RGB monitor.

 

I think with FED displays you can use multiple resolution, since they use a matrix consisting of 3 cathode ray tubes for each pixel.
And also, Flashback is an amazing game, I have the genesis ver which is shorter than the PC ver (which I also have). That game is still amazing to me even today, the cinematic cutscenes was something impresive back in the day, and they could even do it on limited storage capacity! (According to the box of the game, Flashback is a 12 MBit game). Thank you for reminding me of an awesome game :thumbsup:.