Quesion on playing Visual Pinball on a TV screen

[lordsub]

i am the middle of building my cab, and i decided that i want to use a tv instead of a monitor for the old arcade look.  However, i totally forgot about this up until now, how bad will visual pinball look on a tv?  I really like that program and i plan on puttting flipper buttons on my cab, but if the graphics on a TV are ver bad, i may have to rethink this.  Anyone have any experience with this that they would like the share..thanks

[BobA]

If you can display windows at 800x600 with a clear image on your TV then you will be happy with Vpin on your TV.  If you cannot then you will probably not like it.  Vpin was not designed as a video arcade emulation but a pinball emulation and needs quite a bit of detail to render the tables properly.

Just my personal opinion.

BobA

[Xiaou2]

 The new ati cards are capable of 1024*768 and have enchanced methods of getting Extreme clarity.

  Its unfortunate... cause its too clean for me.  I might have to downgrade to my older card... as it seemed to blend the colors a bit better.

  The pic is also dependant on your tv itself.  The 27" panasonic Ive got has a sweet picture.   Stay away from sharp or zenith - poor quality = less color depth and overall lasting performance.

[Howard_Casto]

If you can display windows at 800x600 with a clear image on your TV then you will be happy with Vpin on your TV.  If you cannot then you will probably not like it.  Vpin was not designed as a video arcade emulation but a pinball emulation and needs quite a bit of detail to render the tables properly.

Just my personal opinion.

BobA

In my opinion this is definately not true.  800*600 isn't a high enough res to display Vpin properly, especially on the more complicated tables.  But as Xiaou2 said most cards now display 1024*768, which is a big difference.  I couldn't stand vpinball on my old ati with 800*600 out, but my new radeon that does 1024*768 does a great job.  

But there is another issue.  Vpinball pretty much displays a static render.  Tv's are not designed to display static images, period.  That's why, for example your windows desktop may look a little blinding, but quake 3 will look great.  This is also why dvd menus usually have animated backgrounds. (and you thought it ws just to look pretty)  What I'm trying to say is even on the best tv prolonged viewing of any static image (including visual pinball) is murder on your eyes.  So if you wish to play for hours on end then a tv might not cut it.  However as most people just play one game at a sitting then you should be ok.  I know it gets the job done for me.  

[RandyT]

In my opinion this is definately not true.  800*600 isn't a high enough res to display Vpin properly, especially on the more complicated tables.  But as Xiaou2 said most cards now display 1024*768, which is a big difference.  I couldn't stand vpinball on my old ati with 800*600 out, but my new radeon that does 1024*768 does a great job.  

Err... I'll admit, I haven't made the comparison, but I have to question this.

A standard TV has to have everything scaled to a resolution below 800x600 for it to even be displayed.  

Even at 800x600 you aren't viewing the true resolution of the source, but something that has been downsampled to fit the 720x486 native resolution of the TV.  Unless there has been some major developments in the scaling process, I find it hard to believe that it would look that much better at 1024x768, as the final result is still at the native resolution of the TV.

But I'll hold final judgement on this until I compare it myself.  

BTW, Vpin looks just fine to me at 800x600 but as stated before, not at 640x480 as it is under the native res of the TV.

RandyT

[Howard_Casto]

Unless there has been some major developments in the scaling process, I find it hard to believe that it would look that much better at 1024x768, as the final result is still at the native resolution of the TV.

But I'll hold final judgement on this until I compare it myself.  

There have been some major developments in the scaling process, thus the difference.  Also game programmers use forced down scaling all the time... it's the hardware way of getting a nice, subtle, blending, which belive it or not actually enhances contrast.  (I know it sounds like it would do the opposite with all the "blurring")  Many xbox games run at 1024*768 for example.  

Besides that it's not as much a matter of actual pixel resolution, but desktop area....  at 800*600 the scoreboard takes up far too much space, fonts on some tables are too big (even though they are supposed to scale) and other issues.... all tables are designed to be displayed at 1024*768.

[lordsub]

Sooo, what would be a decent graphics card to get that could do this?  I saw a Raedan (sp?) 7500 for $90.  I can afford that.  it had TV out.

[Lilwolf]

btw, looks GREAT on my 640x480 27" EYGO monitor.  But I have to change the settings on each game to make the mame display smaller.  

[Howard_Casto]

Sooo, what would be a decent graphics card to get that could do this?  I saw a Raedan (sp?) 7500 for $90.  I can afford that.  it had TV out.

I have a 7500 in my pc... it runs GREAT. No hassles and it's even powerful enough to run modern 3d games and 3d emulators.  

[Darkstalker]

The Raideon 7500 I got also came with an RF remote for mouse controls, so I will have an easier time switching between apps in Windows.

MAME and NeoRageX games looks great, but Windows is a big blurry mess.  The TV is one of those Apex ones from CompUSA (Nice picture, good sound output, no auto s-video when you turn it on   ).  No questions I would stick to an ATI card for TV output, so the 7500 is a safe bet IMO unless you wanted better PC game performance.