PS2 playing thru tv w/o being hooked up?

[shardian]

I just remembered about this and meant to post to see WTF was going on. Anyways, I had a friend tell me that he could get the PS2 in his bedroom to show up on his TV, even though the ps2 was just sitting there and not hooked up to the TV. Of course, I figured he was full of it or missing something. I was at his house one day and he showed it to me. Sure enough, the A/V cables were just dangling there and the PS2 load screen was there on the tv plain as day, but with a bit of fuzziness.

My question to the electronics gurus is what happened? Is the PS2's cables acting as a sort of antenna and being picked up by the TV's tuner??

[ChadTower]

My question to the electronics gurus is what happened? Is the PS2's cables acting as a sort of antenna and being picked up by the TV's tuner??

Hell no... turn that PS2 off and watch the screen remain.  He'd have to be using RF to have any slight theoritical hope for that to happen AND have the TV on channel 3 AND have his underwear in his mouth.

[shardian]

I believe it was using a RF converter box. I'd have to ask to verify.

[shardian]

Ok, it is a older Sanyo TV, and a Mad Katz rf converter box. The PS2 is hooked to the converter, and the converter just sits on top of the TV without being hooked up to the TV at all. There is nothing plugged into the coax connection of the TV. There is full audio and video. In fact, he has even watched movies with this setup.

I tell you, I would have NEVER believed him if I hadn't seen it myself.

[ChadTower]

I wonder if the device is malfunctioning and sending out radio waves.  You know how you always see on the back of electronics something like "this device must not create harmful electromagnetic interference and must accept all interference it receives"...

Something in this area.

[hypernova]

That was an invention I came up with about half a year ago.  Wireless hookups.

I just don't have the money, time, resources, and knowledge to fashion one up.

[Samstag]

Yeah it's physically possible to have an RF converter so noisy and a TV so sensitive that when you put them together you'll basically get "broadcast" TV.

Add an amp to the converter and you've got a new local station.

[NiN^_^NiN]

Its the mad katz box the way they are made the shielding they use actually works as an antenna thats why you can get a signal its strong enough for the tv to pickup

If anyone has one of the mad katz ones try it and it should work i know some tv's might be better than others (who knows what the tv has it might have an internal antenna aswell altho i wouldn't think that would work too well)

[ChadTower]

Of course, that's actually against FCC rules, isn't it?  That would fall under the category of emission of harmful interference.

[Samstag]

Depends on the range, really.  The FCC really doesn't care about little stuff like this unless it causes a complaint.  If your neighbor starts seeing games on his TV and calls the FCC, then you've got a problem.  But considering that the converter isn't designed to broadcast over the air (even though it operates at over the air frequencies) it operates on a no-harm, no-foul license.

Read the manual for one of those things and you'll see an FCC class B statement that says something like: "The device will not cause harmful interference".

[Ed_McCarron]

Read the manual for one of those things and you'll see an FCC class B statement that says something like: "The device will not cause harmful interference".

It also says "And must accept any harmful interference, even if it causes undesirable operation."

Didn't stop me from getting a pink slip when my 2 meter rig walked all over my neighbors $1.39 telephone...  The FCC just listens to who complains the loudest.

[ChadTower]

When I was a kid we lived in an apt for a while above a guy who used to get on his CB at night, hammered off his skull, and profanely taunt truck drivers for fun.  Pre-innernets troll, I guess.  We could hear it all clear as day through our television with a stronger signal than the show itself.  Took my mother a year to figure out you could get an RF filter to prevent that.

[shardian]

When I was a kid we lived in an apt for a while above a guy who used to get on his CB at night, hammered off his skull, and profanely taunt truck drivers for fun.  Pre-innernets troll, I guess.  We could hear it all clear as day through our television with a stronger signal than the show itself.  Took my mother a year to figure out you could get an RF filter to prevent that.

Damn, you had audio commentary tracks well before DVD, you lucky dog!

[ChadTower]

"See kids, that's why you don't play in traffic."

"Breaker 1-9, breaker 1-9, my dick is hard and I'm lookin' for fat trucker love, over"

"gee, thanks, Duke!  I almost did follow the kickball into the street.  That would have been dangerous!"

"So, yeah, this is GiantFatEffinTruckDriver, is your skank ass whore mom around tonight or do I have to rustle up $5 for your daughter?  over"

"Now you know.  And knowing is half the battle! Yo Joe!"

[Ed_McCarron]

"See kids, that's why you don't play in traffic."

"Breaker 1-9, breaker 1-9, my dick is hard and I'm lookin' for fat trucker love, over"

"gee, thanks, Duke!  I almost did follow the kickball into the street.  That would have been dangerous!"

"So, yeah, this is GiantFatEffinTruckDriver, is your skank ass whore mom around tonight or do I have to rustle up $5 for your daughter?  over"

"Now you know.  And knowing is half the battle! Yo Joe!"

Cool.  GI Joe was on at night where you lived?

[ChadTower]

3pm, IIRC.  Transformers at 3:30.  I used to haul ass home from school to catch it.  Surprisingly enough dude didn't have a job and drank during the day too.

[Samstag]

When my PC is otherwise silent and a plane passes overhead I get to hear them talking to air traffic control.

[ChadTower]

Pity you can't talk back to them. 

Striker, have you ever flown a multi-engine plane before?   ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---. It's a ---gosh-darn--- waste of time. There's no way he can land this plane.  

[NiN^_^NiN]

we never had pesky FCC stuff like that we use to have a RF Video sender that we got from kmart when i was 14 or so in australia it sent a signal strong which had to be strong enough to send it up to the roof to our antenna so we could tune in on our tv's and they always where powerful enough to send to our next door neighbours house aswell and it was all legal too

Now we have the 900mhz units so no1 else can see the video through a standard set whatever happened to sharing hehe

BTW altho the mad katz rf converter has a flaw its still not powerful enough over a few feet i believe if he went back to his friends house and moved the box away he would see the signal would be lost pretty soon