One of my mates has his Gamecube hooked up to his monitor through some sort of contraption. The picture quality is terrible. Fuzzy it is. Is there not some sort of converting a RGB Scart signal to either VGA or DVI so that it doesn't look rubbish?
(For you Americans, SCART is the main way we plug our equipment up, and RGB SCARTS provide the best signal by splitting up the R, the G and inded the B signals. Surely that can't be too far from how a VGA signal works anyway?)
Posted by Balaam Xumucane (Member # 419) on :
RGB SCART and VGA are similar, but VGA uses RGBHV (separate H- and V-Sync), so conversion between them isn't effortless. Now, Lik-sang sells a bunch of VGA boxes that do just that, but unless your mate has a Cube with digital video out, the image quality will still be mostly shite.
(Also, old-generation consoles shouldn't be hooked up to a monitor ever.)
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
Hmm. They're a bit on the expensive side.
His monitor is a fancy LCD Sony one. Will that make a difference (and would plugging it up through the DVI socket be better?)
Ooh, I've only just noticed that digital video out. Exactly what is that used for, anyway? And if the answer is "for plugging up to your monitor, stupid", where can you get leads that use that?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
I like when you talk like Yoda. "Fuzzy it is, see clearly, you will not..."
Why are you trying to play Gamecube games on a monitor instead of a TV?
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
I'm not. I have a big TV. But the lad who is only has a monitor in his bedroom and he doesn't want to waste space by putting a TV in there as well.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
So porns not good enough for your uppity friends, eh? They gotta have escapist games as well as escapist sex?
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
His monitor is a fancy LCD Sony one. Will that make a difference (and would plugging it up through the DVI socket be better?)
No, because if he's sending a VGA signal to his monitor, then that signal is already being converted internally, so a VGA to DVI connector wouldn't help.
Ooh, I've only just noticed that digital video out. Exactly what is that used for, anyway?
Older Cubes (those produced prior to may 2004) had a digital A/V port for connecting a (HD)TV with a Component or D-Terminal cable so you could play games in 480p mode, but Nintendo thought the added manufacturing costs were too high for the number of people using it, so they "revised" the Cube's design. The greedy dogs.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
That you know this is bizarre.
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
I have detailed files. B)
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
There's nothing in them, of course.
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
Isn't that just like when Sony removed that port on the back of the Playstation that was used for nothing apart from that Gameboy emulator?
Is there not a way of somehow using the digital A/V port and the DVI socket to produce visual goodness?
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
No. There are, however, mods of the D-Terminal cable around that let you plug one end of them directly into a VGA socket, but regardless, you really, really don't want to feed a 480p signal to an LCD monitor. Tell your mate to get a CRT for that, or he will gouge out his eyeballs.
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
So a CRT monitor would actually be better than an LCD one in this case?
Posted by Balaam Xumucane (Member # 419) on :
Unless, say, the LCD monitor has a vertical resolution of 480. In which case your friend just needs to spend some money on real displays. Fixed resolutions suck when it comes to that.
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
Is there some reason why he couldn't plug the Cube into his VIVO socket on his graphics card and then output through his computer to his monitor? And if not, why not damnit?
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
Because the "I" part of VIVO only accepts RCA or S-Video signals, and S-Video is only slightly less pleasant to your eyes than dropping pure acid in them is.
Posted by Topher (Member # 71) on :
Buh? They keep on touting S-Video as the ultimate in picture quality around here...
Posted by Mucus (Member # 24) on :
If here is Canada, then both component and HDMI would be available here and both should have better picture quality than S-video.
Posted by Balaam Xumucane (Member # 419) on :
I suspect Cartman may have been exaggerating. A little. S-video is OK, but a pretty far cry from "ultimate." I have no experience with the quality you'd get using S-Video through VIVO. But I expect it wouldn't be that much difference from what he's using now. It does have the advantage being very inexpensive.
Since the PAL video his gamecube is sending is 720 x 576, and his monitor is presumably so much more than that, the video is going to be scaled. Which isn't even getting into interlacing. Maybe his VIVO is superawesome and will make it work perfect.
Here's a little story: I bought a ViewSonic N6 (the ViewSonic N4 is very similar) Video processor a year ago to use with my Barco bigscreen (the VGA port being the only one worth using). It takes standard video and upscales it to a usable resolution for computer monitors. In my case it took whatever I fed it (even 480p from PS2/X-box/DVD) and upscaled it to 1024X768 at 60Hz. Now fortunately the Barco is ancient and a little fuzzy (CRTs mind you), but it looked great, and for a little more than 200 dollars I had myself a 68" bigscreen. (Until a fuse blew on it and I can't even sort out where that might be on the blasted thing.) Of course for the money you'd spend on a ViewSonic, you could get a smallish TV. But if he's dead set on not wanting another screen, it might be a way to go.
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
The problem isn't with the scaling or anything like that. He's playing Paper Mario and their are just weird swabs of colour all over the place. It's like the difference between using a RGB SCART lead and a bog standard lead minus a million. I'll try and take a picture and see if anyone can see what might be causing it.