Heavy's Sandvich
Member
Got an official RGB scart for Xbox - yeah definite upgrade for sure.
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Retro AV Club Thread 2: Classic Gaming Done Right!
- Thread starter Mega
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Barrel Cannon
Member
Played Halo 1 yesterday at 480i over component on my PVM. The black levels are so ridiculous on it(probably like this on most CRTs I guess) that it helped elevate that old feeling of how I remembered Halo 1's dark and mysterious atmosphere being.
Side Note: The visuals of the remake were completely different in tone, and the more I look at it now, the more I feel like that this was probably due to the developers trying to "update" the visuals based off playing the PC port on some poorly calibrated monitor and trying to re-envision it based off that. I would hope they revisit the Halo 1 port again one day but as it is now I'll be happy to play it as is on my PVM.
Thanks for the informative post Mega. It's stuff like this that makes me consider getting a OSSC. Still going to wait and see how things pan out between OSSC and the FM successor.
Side Note: The visuals of the remake were completely different in tone, and the more I look at it now, the more I feel like that this was probably due to the developers trying to "update" the visuals based off playing the PC port on some poorly calibrated monitor and trying to re-envision it based off that. I would hope they revisit the Halo 1 port again one day but as it is now I'll be happy to play it as is on my PVM.
Thanks for the informative post Mega. It's stuff like this that makes me consider getting a OSSC. Still going to wait and see how things pan out between OSSC and the FM successor.
It doesn't look like removing every odd line, but more like merging them together and adding thin black space between every pair? It doesn't remove information either way but it results in much thicker scan lines so that it doesn't mess up the picture completely.
I tried removing every odd line on a 21" computer CRT to make a 200p line-doubled image look like "pure" 200p at a 400p resolution, but the resulting visible scan lines were so thin and probably accentuated the flickering, giving me a headache. Definitely not good looking.
RadarScope1
Member
Those pics look great, Mega.
Barrel Cannon
Member
Glad to see that solved your problem! Do you happen to have your xbox soft-modded? If you are into emulating older stuff it's pretty handy. I played AvP yesterday as well and it looked amazing for me. I need to get my phone settings down and take some photos for this thread
Consider moding if you haven't already to remove the filter and really get more bang for you buck.
Interesting, though I still have some reservation, mainly due to some questions I still have about line multipliers feeding into scalers. After a multiplier does its job and sends the doubled up vertically image to the TV or scaler, I assume its up the scaler to get the correct width of the frame back by scaling horizontaly according to the aspect ratio you've chosen? So do we end up with doubling vertically and interpolation horizontally for correct aspect ratio?
speedlolita
Member
Oh, got a link?
For moding or removing the filter? Unfortunately I have neither on hand. This stuff is burried in derelict websites from the early 2000's and my own "tools" are burried in boxes from a move I did in October.
Barrel Cannon
Member
Yea I remember you or someone else mentioning it in the read before. I'll have to dig into it. I had an old XP build lying around that I trashed because I thought I was done with FTP-ing stuff to my OG box's and had no more use for it. Shame considering how I went into the CRT rabbit hole and now want to get the best out of my OG Xboxes.
It does remove every other line. It may not seem that way because I compromised and set scanlines to 31%. If you do 100% black, it gives an ugly muted picture that can only be fixed by significantly boosting brightness and color saturation on the display. I'm not doing that because I'd have to keep changing it back for regular TV and video games. I prefer partially dark lines anyway... looks a little more natural and sort of mimics the variable width, blending and glow of real lines on some CRTs. This is the closest I've gotten to the 480p CRT look on my HDTV.
CRT: http://i.imgur.com/1LlU2iN.jpg
HDTV: http://i.imgur.com/hFin6xx.jpg
Monitor's fault? That's unfortunate. I've gotten good 200p CRT results on the MiST and DOSBox (400p with scanline filter). Aesthetically no different than scanlines on native 240p games.
The OSSC also handles horizontal size to be in proportion with the line doubling. I don't know if the process is literally horizontal doubling so I won't call it that, but that's effectively it. And with some settings (240p Line 3/4/5x), you can adjust the aspect ratio, so that NES 254x240 comes out to 320x240 times whatever line multiplication you selected.
My experience with this is limited to the Wii, but there it's not an issue. The console is SD but it was made to play on widescreen HDTVs. Set it 16:9 mode, you get a 720x480 output with in-game graphics that will always scale to the correct proportions when blow up to the full horizontal and vertical size of a typical HDTV. This includes with our without the OSSC.
As you know I have the additional scaler hardware to maintain the exact line-doubled output: 1440x960 in a 1080p frame. This is the exact 4:3 aspect ratio. I have to play at Wii's 4:3 menu setting because at the 16:9 setting I have no way of doing a 1.18x horizontal scale to correct the skinny proportions: 720x480 -> 1.185x H scale -> 853x480, the correct proportions. Same as if the Hi-Def NES mod was lacking the Horizontal scale feature to fix the 4x/5x scaled 256x240 raw output. I don't mind... 4:3 mode is sharper and has less artifacts.
speedlolita
Member
Information on removing it, if possible. If not I'm sure I could rustle something up via Google.
PumpkinSpice
Banned
There's an option in UnleashX (and I assume other dashboards) options somewhere to turn off the flicker filter and other junk.
So in essence, given a perfect integer maping and if the OSSC is doubling on both axes on the screen, you are getting: 1 pixel from frame = 4 pixels on screen? So wouldn't adding scanlines sorta ruin that interpretation of a 4:1 pixel? Cuz it seems you're re ending up with a vertically segmented and horizontally stretched image like this, and in a sense, are cutting off the new 4x pixel.
I've never seen it in the UX dash, but mine could be out of date. BTW, is there an easy way to update without deleting everything?
speedlolita
Member
My Xbox is stock.
The monitor may simply too high res for this sort of resolution (its max res is 2048x1536). Here is what I get with winuae in 512x384 fullscreen, with the scan line filter or line doubled like a DOS game.
The scanlines are even thinner in reality, I suppose the exposure makes them thicker or something. I know nothing about photography.
And while I may get used to it in games, using Workbench and reading stuff is just painful. I'm pretty sure using a real Amiga on a TV would be a much better experience than scanlined on a VGA CRT. Or I need to get the old 14" from the attic, which would probably be better suited for such low resolution.
[edit] I'm so sorry about that vertical convergence artefact, it has been solved now. #shame
PumpkinSpice
Banned
I don't have access to my Xbox right now but I think they're also off by default on component/480p.
There are lots of tutorials on how to softmod in 2017, but the basics are that the easiest way is with a gamepad port to usb adapter + a compatible usb stick + an exploitable game. I think for you installing a modchip would also be pretty easy, and there are classic ones still available and I saw someone on assembler made a modern one.
It's pretty worthwhile to mod an xbox for a lot of reasons.
There are lots of tutorials on how to softmod in 2017, but the basics are that the easiest way is with a gamepad port to usb adapter + a compatible usb stick + an exploitable game. I think for you installing a modchip would also be pretty easy, and there are classic ones still available and I saw someone on assembler made a modern one.
It's pretty worthwhile to mod an xbox for a lot of reasons.
You need to mod that Xbox, I did to mine and it was worth it!
speedlolita
Member
I dabbled in modding the original Xbox well over a decade ago. Playing games from a HDD is sweet but I'm happy with my 1.0 box being completely stock now, I don't use it for anything beyond playing my retail discs anyway.
Well, let's hope the disc drive is good, because that console does have bad disc drives that fails to read games that are clean even.
Triforce141
Member
Wonder if that means Voultar's N64RGB Board Install service will have the updates like De-Blur and compatibility with every N64 model Tim Worthington's board has?
Right or wrong, here's what I observed:
One would think so, but it visually doesn't work out that way. The lines are thin and the eyes just fill in the gap, minus large jaggy steps from not using scanlines. If this did look wrong, I wouldn't have bothered.
I think it's the same principle as with a 3x (720p) NES upscale. Every pixel blows up to 3x3 pixels. Add a black line to one of the pixel rows and you won't have square pixels; each pixel becomes 3 wide x 2 tall... or even 3x1 if you want BVM-like black lines. Same uneven split for 5x NES upscale, which looks awesome. It doesn't skew the image due to what I guess is our eyes' ability to fill in the missing information. I *think* Wii pixels are also supposed to be slightly wide but I'm not sure this plays any role.
I think those look fine, similar to the pic I posted if you view the full size version, unless your pic really is misrepresentative of the line quality like you said.
I think I'm gonna go ahead and disagree that doubled 480p should have scan lines. I think adding scan lines is maybe too much of an alteration. It might add some smoothing but you're changing the brightness and color range of the overall image. In contrast, a 240p game might have compensated for it. I mean sure, when you blow up an image, it looks more jagged, but doesn't this principal also apply to 480i CRTs of various sizes? I think increassing the size of a raster should have expected consequences, which I can live with.
Maybe "should" was too strong a statement. But I've always said 480p games on my HD CRT have visible black lines and that's on a smallish 17" screen. They're in every 480p photo I've posted over the past year. Turning on the OSSC scanline filter brings the games closer to how they look on that CRT. It's plainly more like the CRT PQ than raw output.
CRT:http://i.imgur.com/r0EMikA.jpg
OSSC (scanlines): http://i.imgur.com/wMwm3HI.jpg
OSSC (without): http://i.imgur.com/DvnE248.jpg
All games with full scanline filters on a HDTV have some reduction in brightness and color that alter the picture. That includes 240p games: the Ultra HDMI N64 mod has scanlines but they make games very dark, therefore it has a gamma boost feature to compensate. Even so, the full blacklines filter is too much (a partial transparent filter works better).
Perhaps you aren't too off the mark considering that even on progressive images and screens, CRTs had more visible separation between pixels than flat panels. Albeit, that they didn't cover or alter the dimensions of the source pixel like this. Hence why you perviece more relation to CRT image quality. Which is valid if you're chasing after that sort of thing. Personally, I don't feel the need to chase it with respect to non-240p material.
As for scanlines on an HDTV, in my experiments, I've felt like games intended to display progressively need adjustment, either in the thickness and darkness of scanlines or in the brightness settings of the TV, to bring back things from looking too dark, but they never look quite right. Meanwhile 240p games meant originally for CRTs seem fine as is for the most part. Not that I've done this extensively to compare.
i updated my OSSC and, while none of the line multiplier modes are visible on my TV (this TV is super finicky it seems), at least it can show 240p images with passthrough so that's one victory. it was annoying when something was in 240p and i couldn't see anything.
edit: uh, something seems to have got weirder with this update. with 0.75, i could boot up the Wii fine through bootmii and HBC but with the 0.76 firmware, it's broken. the OSSC's refresh rate goes crazy when the console switches resolutions for second and it fails to show an image or shows a super stretched image. i ended up rolling back to the previous firmware since no options i changed seemed to correct this.
i wonder if anyone else is encountering this..
edit: uh, something seems to have got weirder with this update. with 0.75, i could boot up the Wii fine through bootmii and HBC but with the 0.76 firmware, it's broken. the OSSC's refresh rate goes crazy when the console switches resolutions for second and it fails to show an image or shows a super stretched image. i ended up rolling back to the previous firmware since no options i changed seemed to correct this.
i wonder if anyone else is encountering this..
Here's a closer look. Disregard slightly different "e" proportions of the CRT version... I took the pic at a different angle months ago.
480p JVC CRT - OSSC w/ scanlines on Panny plasma - OSSC w/o scanlines
Yeah, I definitely see what you mean here. It's not bad even though you can see that the "pixels" are shorter on your plasma with lines. Not something I can live with knowing, but yeah, it does look closer to CRT.
PumpkinSpice
Banned
I'm late but I wanted to add something here.
I'm not aware of the exact sample rate used by the OSSC but the standard for 240p/480i is 720 samples per analog line. This does not mean that 256 pixels the NES/SNES/others output gets scaled to 320 and then scaled to 720.
I really think the best thing is to assume once anything hits an analog wire, you no longer have pixels. You had 256 pixles but they have been output to (appx) standard NTSC timing to fill a 4:3 frame. Since we're digitizing it, we just take 720 samples of that line, giving us (except in cases of garbage implementation) a "perfect horizontal scale" (literally resampled) at 720 samples.
You never have "320x240" from a 256x240 console, excluding some horrific implementation.
For 240p you get 720 samples of each line with 240 lines. For 480p you get the same 720 samples of each line with each line duplicated for 480 lines (unless the OSSC is using the 640x480 mode, I guess). For the other higher modes you would either have 720 pixel line resampled digitally or you would sample at a different rate to account for the output at those resolutions.
Kawika
Member
I am on the waiting list for the OSSC. I have a 20" BVM and a Framemesiter.
Issue 1 20" BVM is still really small compared to my tvs so as much as I like it, its really a bulky thing that doesn't fit in anywhere in my house, save the closet I have stuffed it in. Basically, I can't sit on my sofa and I have to use an office chair to sit near where I have it set up.
Issue 2 I like the XRGB but the scan-lines look a little weird in 1080p but the IQ is really nice for 240p content. Using the 240p test suite I am getting somewhere between 30 and 50 ms of input lag (not good).
So those who have access to a xrgb, bvm/pvm and the ossc would you say its worth making the compromises to IQ to get no added input lag from the scaler on a hdtv/pc monitor?
Have they integrated the audio yet? I don't use a receiver anymore so I don't know how I would be able to use the OSSC on my set up without pushing the sound into my hdmi input.
Barrel Cannon
Member
hmmmm I have UnleashX on my one modded console. I'll have to dig through the settings and see if my version has it.=
Bad drives is one thing but the more prominent issue I find is that discs get scratched easily and finding games that aren't scratched becomes harder and harder unless you get sealed copies of old games. I have multiple retail copies of Halo 1/2 that I picked up over the years but its unfortunate that many of them are pretty scratched up from the previous owners. As a result the load times are sort of trash. Having stuff on the HDD just makes stuff load sooo much quicker. I was playing Halo 1 this past weekend on my unmodded xbox and I really felt the difference in the load times
speedlolita
Member
I've only had to replace one disc so far (Burnout 3 - which had to be done immediately because it is so damn good) which luckily only cost £1 to replace.
I did buy Jet Set Radio Future the other day that had some hairline scratches and appeared to play fine in my 360 but I haven't tried it in the OG yet.
I did buy Jet Set Radio Future the other day that had some hairline scratches and appeared to play fine in my 360 but I haven't tried it in the OG yet.
Kiddy Dong
Member
I'm not sure if unleashx applies the flicker settings to games though, only the dashboard. XBMC does patch the games however.
davidwhangchoi
Member
Here's a closer look. Disregard slightly different "e" proportions of the CRT version... I took the pic at a different angle months ago.
480p JVC CRT - OSSC w/ scanlines on Panny plasma - OSSC w/o scanlines
oh cool =)
theSlacker
Member
The most important thing is your own personal enjoyment. A friend of mine has an RGB monitor and cables for their setup but still takes time to play some things in composite just for the nostalgia.
In my experience the only way to play with filter and soften options are by using XBMC to launch the games. And it is totally worth it, looks much better.
I didn't mean to imply the NES hardware itself outputs 320x240. Although I did mix up the OSSC's "scaling" (advanced timing settings) with how digital hardware like the HiDef mod grab the raw output and scale pixels.
davidwhangchoi
Member
i need to join this waiting list for OSSC
edit: just signed up
edit: just signed up
Nice! I gamed the ps2/xbox gen on that TV (silver 27" via s-video too).
kingbean
Member
Yeah man. It looks better than I remember as a kid. I played almost everything on RFU because the TV on my room as a kid was from the 80s.
So s-video looks very, very good on the snes, but a little too muddy on the dreamcast.
Weirdly enough, my copy of Garou on dreamcast doesn't have scanlines, but KOF99 Dream Match and all my Capcom fighters do. Either way Garou looks really good even compared to the PS4 release.
Playing Super Metroid and Megaman X3 on s-video has been pretty legendary feeling though. I'm excited for the rest of my ebay haul to come in. I've already got most of the good stuff from the local game exchanges and flea markets.
Yeah, the specs sheet on it makes it seem like its a good CRT. I'm not sure what the hell 600TVL means, but its got that. Seems to mean something about lines on the screen. It also has component in. I might try and find a way to run the dreamcast into component to get the best out of it I can. Who knows though.
If you signed up because of the recent conversation, just be aware that mega is using additional hardware to achieve a perfect pixel map of various integers on his plasma. The OSSC may also not play nicely in all modes with your TV.
davidwhangchoi
Member
oh! hmm... i'm so ignorant bc i have a BVM that i don't know differences between 4x-5x talk since i never used it on a hdtv.
i guess i better do some more research and not impulse buy. thanks!
i really wanted your xm29 a while back =)
speedlolita
Member
>tfw 1920x1200 monitor for perfect 5x map
1080p is such a stupid resolution
1080p is such a stupid resolution
As someone who took a trip down the Framemeister route, left disappointed and decided to buy a CRT instead - You made the right decision.
NormalFish
Banned
Asus monitors seem to be consistent in taking more or less everything.
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