SVideo on TV any good?

[WhereEaglesDare]

Does a TV with an SVideo Input from a PC look good enough?  Does it look close to what an arcade monitor is suppose to look like?  I think I may be bale to get my hands on a 27 inch VGA CRT Monitor which I know has to be better, but if I can't.... I know this has been posted before, but thought I'd pose the question again see what I get.

[Smoker]

its the best your going to get without component inputs. As for if it looks any good, plug it in and judge for yourself. Quality of the cable and Tube makes a world of difference.

[DJ_Izumi]

It looks a far cry better than composite, that's for sure.  Set up a test and compare the two, if the tube is any good you'll see a noticable improvement.

[Malenko]

text is hard to read in windows, but works well for games in MAME, much better then composite but not nearly as good as component.

[crashwg]

much better then composite but not nearly as good as component.

You know I was actually wondering something about this...  I picked up a broken rear projection big screen a little while back and fixed it up.  It has component input but with the little testing that I did (hooking up an XBOX and trying different outputs) I've come to the conclusion that even through the component input it will only do 480i.  You read that right, it won't even do 480p!  I didn't have a whole lot of time to examine it further so I'm not sure how much better it is (vs S-Vid that is) so I'm just wondering if there really will be much of a difference.

[XCVG]

much better then composite but not nearly as good as component.

You know I was actually wondering something about this...  I picked up a broken rear projection big screen a little while back and fixed it up.  It has component input but with the little testing that I did (hooking up an XBOX and trying different outputs) I've come to the conclusion that even through the component input it will only do 480i.  You read that right, it won't even do 480p!  I didn't have a whole lot of time to examine it further so I'm not sure how much better it is (vs S-Vid that is) so I'm just wondering if there really will be much of a difference.

My 27" tube TV that I use for gaming is like that. I've never even thought of trying it with a PC though...

[DJ_Izumi]

I think you'll find that the vast, vast majority of SDTVs with component input only support 480i.  Though a projector is suprising, assuming they're LCD projectors they're almost always primarily progressive rather than interlaced.  ...Which is why interlaced signals don't look none too good on them.

[Malenko]

I tested all 3 inputs on my SDTV thats in my KI2 cab. the component let me run 800x600 480i otherwise

[Epyx]

I think you'll find that the vast, vast majority of SDTVs with component input only support 480i

True, I had this on my 27" Sony Wega but it still looked *much* better than S-Video on the same tv.

Imo S-Video looks terrible and is only passable if you haven't experienced anything else. If you have nothing to compare it against sure it looks *ok*...but honestly against anything better its pretty terrible.  If my only choice was S-Video or Composite I would just go with an LCD monitor and D3D.  

[DJ_Izumi]

I don't think S-Video is that bad.  I'm on S-Video on my 27" Trinitron right now because my SDTV digital cable box only supports S-Video as it's best output.  Though the Xbox is on component inputs instead.  I think S-Video is vastly better than composite and is pretty passable, though component is superior.  At least both lack the uglyness of 'Composite Dot Craw'.

[Jakobud]

For Mame, S-Video looks great.  IMO its the closest thing you'll get to an arcade monitor w/o an arcade monitor.

[Epyx]

For Mame, S-Video looks great.  IMO its the closest thing you'll get to an arcade monitor w/o an arcade monitor.

I respect your opinion. Just to make sure, you are saying that to you S-Video looks closer to arcade quality on a tv than component or RGB (DB15)?

I suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder but on my Sony 27" S-Video (Mame) was noticeably worse than component, as in not even close. But again, I respect your opinion.

[ahofle]

Don't forget that there are also vast differences in the TV-out circuitry quality in video cards.  I've seen horrible looking S-Video from one card and pretty damn good from another.  It's been a while, but I had better luck with ATI/Radeon cards.

[leapinlew]

What about clipping? On my 32" TV, the picture is larger than the image and the sides are cut off in some games. Anyone else notice this or have a fix for it?

[GameOver]

For Mame, S-Video looks great.  IMO its the closest thing you'll get to an arcade monitor w/o an arcade monitor.

Agreed.  Also agree with other posts - it will also depend on the TV & the vid card.  I've been running my cab thru s-vid since day one.  No complaints & I also think it presents a pretty authentic classic arcade experience.

The bottom of my cab page (link in my profile) has several screen shots of my cab using s-vid for a reference if you wanna take a look.

[Epyx]

Agreed.  Also agree with other posts - it will also depend on the TV & the vid card.  I've been running my cab thru s-vid since day one.  No complaints & I also think it presents a pretty authentic classic arcade experience.

The bottom of my cab page (link in my profile) has several screen shots of my cab using s-vid for a reference if you wanna take a look.

My main point was in comparison to Component. On its own without component to compare against, S-video can look *ok*...have you compared the two yourself? Just curious.

Don't forget that there are also vast differences in the TV-out circuitry quality in video cards.  I've seen horrible looking S-Video from one card and pretty damn good from another.  It's been a while, but I had better luck with ATI/Radeon cards.

As for Ati/Nvidia...I compared both on my Sony TV and the S-Video quality wasn't much different to the eye...but the component on both of the same cards was much better than either S-Video signal.  The main difference was colour separation. The colour separation most approximated the RGB from the arcade.

I still have all the hardware from my original configuration: The Sony TV, The video cards, break out cables etc. I should do an updated comparison with my HDTV camcorder to highlight the differences. I could show them from Composite through S-Video, Component and finally Arcade. I know there are static pictures but maybe the footage will highlight what differences I see visually.

[TOK]

Maybe it varies by video card and TV.

On my 27" Toshiba, component looked way better. In fact, the only way you wouldn't notice how bad s-video looked was if you hadn't seen component. Reds and blacks are much more vivid and solid.

My video card does both, if I can get some side by side pics later on I will.

[BadMouth]

I'm using the S-Video on two systems and I'm happy with it.  It's useable.
Component does look a lot better, but I have an old Act Labs light gun that uses S-video, so I use that input.

The key thing here is cost.  There are a lot of 25-27" CRT TVs out there for free or close to free.

[DJ_Izumi]

On my 27" Toshiba, component looked way better. In fact, the only way you wouldn't notice how bad s-video looked was if you hadn't seen component. Reds and blacks are much more vivid and solid.

The blacks should be the same quality on S-Video or Component, S-Video uses two lines, one for color data and one for black and white image data.  Component does the same but uses two seperate lines for color and the third for black and white.  Both basically have the same bandwidth and signal type for the greyscale image, it's only the color that you'd see improved.

[trencej]

I honestly dont get this whole thread. If your playing old arcade games on nice sharp screens, Your just not playing PROPERLY!

I mean, i can only talk for my own experiences, But i like to recreate the arcade feel of when i was a kid.

So my perfect cab would have colours that are slightly off, a different type of stick for each player, random coloured buttons, cracks in the panel and ---Bad words, bad words, whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do when saint censors you?--- burns. (ciggarette burns for our friends across the pond). Oh and being able to change character mid fight with the start button (sf2 rainbow FTW!)

(Typical, Take our language, Ruin it, Then Ban one of the most commonly used, and completely Non derogatory words, Am i right, UK Guys? )

[Epyx]

I honestly dont get this whole thread. If your playing old arcade games on nice sharp screens, Your just not playing PROPERLY!

True to a point, but also a bit of a contradiction. Those 15khz screens we played on as kids/teens displayed sharp progressive RGB pictures (sharp for CRT). The picture through S-Video is not nearly as sharp and defined as a true RGB picture.  Colour separation, interlacing etc all contrast starkly from an RGB arcade picture.

Bottom line imo, is if you are happy with S-Video go for it and enjoy the hobby for what it is. It is perfectly playable and you could even make an argument that they are close in a horseshoes and hand grenades kind of way but I don't think anyone with S-Video would turn down a better picture if it was available as a no added cost upgrade.

[WhereEaglesDare]

You can use a VGA Breakout cable to get component right?  That is what people do?

I always thought that VGA and the NTSC standards were different.

[DJ_Izumi]

Those 15khz screens we played on as kids/teens displayed sharp progressive RGB pictures (sharp for CRT).

Uhh, interlaced, not progressive.  Very few arcade monitors at all were progressive untill about ten or so years ago.

Really, arcade monitors were no better than TVs of the same era it's just that TVs didn't come with nice RGB connections.  (At least not in North America, stupid SCART people! D:)

[ahofle]

Those 15khz screens we played on as kids/teens displayed sharp progressive RGB pictures (sharp for CRT).

Uhh, interlaced, not progressive.  Very few arcade monitors at all were progressive untill about ten or so years ago.

Really, arcade monitors were no better than TVs of the same era it's just that TVs didn't come with nice RGB connections.  (At least not in North America, stupid SCART people! D:)

No they were progressive -- approx 240 horizontal lines usually.  The only time they would be interlaced is if you ran a 640x480 game on one (there were only a few interlaced games).

What about clipping? On my 32" TV, the picture is larger than the image and the sides are cut off in some games. Anyone else notice this or have a fix for it?

I think you have to find a service manual for your TV and fix it there.  Those controls usually aren't available in the regular menus for whatever reason.

[Epyx]

Andy's Arcade Monitor FAQ has a section that goes into some good detail:

TVs
We said earlier that arcade monitors were originally based on TV designs. So why can't you just use a TV and plug into the TV-Out connector on a VGA card? Well you can BUT you will not get an arcade-real picture. If you use a TV-out what you are actually doing is letting the VGA card re-sample the picture into a fixed TV resolution of 525 or 625 lines interlaced, then encoding into the NTSC or PAL colour standard, then pumping it out into the TV which decodes it back again into RGB and displays at this fixed resolution. This gives a picture that could not be further removed from an arcade game screen! There is no chance of ever displaying any game at it's native resolution. Everything runs at 525 lines and you need hardware stretching to get the game screen the right size. Definitely not advisable.
But there is one way we can use a TV very satisfactorily, which is going in via the RGB pins on a SCART connector (US readers look away at this point, SCART is a European standard!). This actually turns the TV into an arcade monitor because it by-passes all the signal-degrading PAL or NTSC decoder, We can even run native resolutions providing the TV is happy with non-interlaced screens. Beware of RGB "dongles" which attach to some VGA cards. When fitted these tell the VGA card to always use a TV-out fixed resolution so our chance of driving the monitor at the native game resolution is lost.

[DJ_Izumi]

I'm glad that most of the arcade games I play are newer and nativelly ran at 525 lines.   Some even doing 31khz 640x480.

...And some running at HD in the arcades even. o.o

[Epyx]

Aye and that is why I love the combination of ArcadeVGA with the WG D9800 so much as I get non-interlaced all the way up to 800x600 (with tri-sync utility). So not only the classics with a 240p picture but the modern games with 480p as well.

[MaximRecoil]

IMO, S-video looks bad compared to component, and MAME over 480i component looks bad compared to RGB + native resolution (though component + running the game in its native progressive resolution would probably be damn close to RGB; but difficult to accomplish).

Uhh, interlaced, not progressive.  Very few arcade monitors at all were progressive untill about ten or so years ago.

All classic arcade games that I know of were progressive scan (in the 240p range for the standard resolution ones).

Really, arcade monitors were no better than TVs of the same era it's just that TVs didn't come with nice RGB connections.  (At least not in North America, stupid SCART people! D:)

That's true, but the RGB connection makes a huge difference in terms of picture quality.

BTW, ordinary TVs of the same era could do progressive scan as well. The original Playstation usually generated a 240p signal for example.

Standard resolution TVs/monitors just want ~15 KHz; they don't "care" if it is progressive or interlaced. 480i (30 Hz) and 240p (60 Hz) are both ~15 KHz. You can also drop the refresh rate below 60 Hz and use a higher number of progressive lines (e.g., 288p @ 50 Hz).

I'm glad that most of the arcade games I play are newer and nativelly ran at 525 lines.

Examples?

I honestly dont get this whole thread. If your playing old arcade games on nice sharp screens, Your just not playing PROPERLY!

I mean, i can only talk for my own experiences, But i like to recreate the arcade feel of when i was a kid.

So my perfect cab would have colours that are slightly off, a different type of stick for each player, random coloured buttons, cracks in the panel and ---Bad words, bad words, whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do when saint censors you?--- burns. (ciggarette burns for our friends across the pond). Oh and being able to change character mid fight with the start button (sf2 rainbow FTW!)

How old are you? I played on a lot of new or nearly new arcade machines when I was a kid. For example, I was playing Punch-Out in 1984, the same year that it came out. The machine was like new. Have you ever seen the picture on a new Sanyo 20-EZV? They are definitely "nice sharp screens", and the colors are not even remotely "off".

It sounds like your childhood may have been during the SFII era; in which case you were playing mostly on conversion machines. For example, if you are playing SFII on a ~10-year-old (at the time) Defender machine with its original monitor, it probably isn't going to look so great.

[DJ_Izumi]

I'm glad that most of the arcade games I play are newer and nativelly ran at 525 lines.

Examples?

It seems to me by that in the last 10 years arcade resolution came up a lot.  A lot of games running console based or related hardware to PC hardware came to run at full 480i or better yet 480p.  A lot of Sega Naomi cabs ran 480p monitors too and plenty of later ones did.  Of course these games also RENDERED at higher resolution than 240p as well.

[WhereEaglesDare]

Okay what if you are gonna play a lot Console/Emulator games with it?  NES, Genesis, SNES, Playstation...  What then, will it still appear bad?

[Epyx]

Okay what if you are gonna play a lot Console/Emulator games with it?  NES, Genesis, SNES, Playstation...  What then, will it still appear bad?

This is going to vary by emulator. Many of the emulators supported  non-interlaced 240p modes so the emulator on a tv via S-Video will not look as good as the original did on a tv. I know you are using a TV but this can be addressed by using an arcade monitor. For example, paired with Soft15khz or an ArcadeVGA card you can run (depending on if the emulator supports the lower 240p resolutions) them at their native progressive resolutions.

Again it is certainly passable and without an arcade monitor to compare it against (or the original hardware on a tv) you will likely be happy...but for the best look it would have to be emulator with an arcade monitor or hardware on a tv.

[MaximRecoil]

Okay what if you are gonna play a lot Console/Emulator games with it?  NES, Genesis, SNES, Playstation...  What then, will it still appear bad?

S-video will always look bad compared to RGB + native resolution. However, with the consoles you mentioned, it will be potentially as good or better than what you would see if you were running the actual consoles, since all of them you mentioned offered RF and/or composite connections by default. The SNES, Genesis, and PS were capable of RGB output, assuming you had the right cables; though few people in North America ever played them that way.

[MaximRecoil]

but for the best look it would have to be emulator with an arcade monitor or hardware on a tv.

The best would be the original hardware hooked to an arcade monitor; which is possible with pretty much anything from the NES on up (the NES needs the right PPU from certain PC-10 or VS. Unisystem games, plus RGB amp circuitry).

[Epyx]

The best would be the original hardware hooked to an arcade monitor; which is possible with pretty much anything from the NES on up (the NES needs the right PPU from certain PC-10 or VS. Unisystem games, plus RGB amp circuitry).

Yes absolutely, I meant that but didn't state it...it goes without saying Providing you have the cables etc. 

[Epyx]

@WhereEaglesDare

Here is an example of running an emulator at native resolution on an arcade monitor. As an example, I took Castlevania on Nestopia (256x240). Compare these to some S-Video on your configuration (if you have the parts already) to give you an idea of the comparison.

[WhereEaglesDare]

Thanks, that does look really sharp... So what are the options for a CRT to have RGB and not be a arcade monitor and be around 25"??

Has to be CRT for me to use GunCon2...

[Epyx]

Sony Trinitrons are good like the  KV25XBR etc

Do a search on Craiglist or Ebay etc.  You can likely find one for $100 bucks or so with Component and VGA.

Craigslist


Interesting article on an RGB mod for this TV which i am reading now:

XBRAmigaRGBMod

[DJ_Izumi]

Personally, I'd opt out of a TV that had it's manufacture in the mid 80's. :X

But agian, my prefered games date from like 1996 and up and run at higher resolutions than the older stuff.

[Epyx]

Here is one last comparison. I found a component picture (one I took on my first cab after I had switched from S-Video to Component) and took the same shot of the same game (Rygar) on my Arcade monitor in native RGB.

First of all the component picture is noticeably better than the S-Video one (ill try to get one up on a separate thread). Notice the differences though even between Component and RGB when people say component is as good as it gets in North America when you don't have RGB you realize just how drastic the differences are:

- Much better colour saturation
- Image isn't compressed (TV out image is compressed horizontally)
- Colours are much sharper and more vibrant (yellows and reds in particular)
- Text is crisper
- Sky actually looks like a blue sky
- Cliff shading isn't washed out and the mountain in RGB looks much better
- Look at the range of green in the RGB from the left grass/trees to the right now look at the component

Again this is component compared to RGB not S-Video...with S-Video there is even more contrast.  This is the only reason I brought up my initial reply, not to be an arse but to question the people who make statements like "S-Video is almost as good as RGB"...sure just like horseshoes and hand grenades are both items you can throw.   Ok...THAT was an arse statment

Component Rygar


Native RGB Rygar

[lizzyjakers]

There is a big difference on a TV-out circuitry quality in video cards. The video cards could accelerate the images, and it produces a higher quality of the media. You should always be reminded of these ideas.