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I've been trying to make sense of what exactly is happening to my color space in my setup, however it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

Signal chain is Steam Deck, PS3, 360, Switch, Wii U, into an Extron DSC 301 HD, into an HD Fury 3 flashed with the latest 3X firmware, into a Loewe Planus HD CRT via VGA.

What I'm running into, is that the color space doesn't seem to change at all when toggling the HD Fury between full and limited range. This would make me think the TV only supports limited range. However, if I switch the Extron to limited RGB, I get a washed out image, this is the same regardless of how the HD Fury is toggled. With the Extron set to full, I would expect black crush when I set the HD Fury to limited, this doesn't seem to be the case, the image looks correct regardless of if the Fury is set to full or limited.

On the input end, 360/PS3/Wii U are all set to output limited range, and this looks correct only when the Extron is outputting full RGB, if I match it to limited it's washed out. If I set them to full RGB, with the Extron outputting full RGB, I get black crush, if I set the Extron to limited I still get black crush but now it's washed out. The Steam Deck is an oddity, because it only outputs full RGB, now the odd part is the Steam Deck has a bug where it will incorrectly report limited RGB in certain resolutions, the output of the Deck isn't changed. When the Deck is reporting limited, I will get black crush on all settings with the Extron, when it is reporting full range, everything looks perfect. The Switch RGB toggle has absolutely no change whatsoever, this makes me think perhaps the Extron is performing a conversion, and when the system reports it's RGB range correctly it has no issue with either limited or full, and that there is something with the way 360/PS3 handle their limited/full range that simply isn't working correctly when toggled to full.

I'm fairly positive this TV does support full range over VGA. I also think the HD Fury 3 color space toggle, just doesn't work. What I don't understand is what could be happening that makes a correct image occur with a system outputting limited, into the Extron outputting full, and the Fury outputting full; yet incorrect when the systems output full. And furthermore a correct image with the Deck reporting full, and the outputs all full.

This reinforces my theory that it's something with the way the Extron is handling these inputs, I can't confirm by bypassing it due to resolutions supported. Any thoughts on this incredibly convoluted post I've made?

If it was me, I would abandon that setup. Get one quality video processor with a native "built in" DAC and analog output to handle everything.

If I was going to doubt one of your machines, I'd be heavily scrutinising that HDFury before the Extron. Obviously, Extron has been selling pro gear for decades. On the other hand, HDFury is a Chinese "consumer enthusiast" firm that sells mass market stuff. Extron is the company with a reputation to maintain and they have tough competition from other companies like Crestron and Barco. So, I'd look at the HDFury first. Extron deals to pros that notice this kind of thing; HDFury sells to plebs. I own a few HDFury machines and they work well for me, but I don't believe they have the engineering staff or organizational desire in management to match Extron on quality.

What I think is happening personally is the 360, and ps3 incorrectly report color space and the extron translates accordingly, so the extron thinks it's receiving limited range while these consoles output full.

This would explain why the switch looks the same regardless of setting, and the steam deck which is a known bug misreporting rgb as limited while outputting full on certain resolutions exhibits the same behavior as the 360 and ps3.

I think the tv expects full range on the vga regardless, so the hdfury and extron output are likely doing their job.

To summarize my latest theory is the end result of the signal chain is outputting full rgb properly, and the extron can handle either with ease however only if the system itself is outputting this color space correctly. I can find old reports of color space oddities with both ps3 and 360 as well though they're not clear.

Not sure if my theory makes sense? It looks correct given these combination of settings, so the setup does work, it's just me trying to make sense of why as the results don't match my expectations.

I haven't used the 301 HD very much, but I recall it had user presets. Sounds like manually changing the preset is as good as it gets, if that solves the issue. When the source misreports the range, there's really not much you can do besides manually adjusting it.

There's also some randomness to HDMI. I tested out a beamer not long ago that incorrectly detected Windows as limited range half the time. Power cycling the projector multiple times (while leaving the computer on and connected continuously) delivered full range sometimes and limited others. Had to force full range on in the projector menu. I always have my PC drivers manually forced into full range.

Ya I really like the 301, I suspect it can handle just about anything and this is just an issue with the consoles themselves. It has tons of options for output, but nothing to do with color space for input unfortunately.

The only system I cant work around too well is the steam deck because of the bug, only 16:10 resolutions work correctly.

Misreporting or flagging of limited/full range RGB in HDMI signals seems very common. It may well be the auto-detection on the receiving end as well, who knows, but when I had similar annoyances in a previous similar setup I ended up just setting every source to auto (limited) and every receiver to auto, which seems to either correctly detect or assume limited as the default. Seems like they just want us to live in a limited world, which is fine I guess since it makes no difference for all video content anyway.

I just did a bunch more testing and determined it's something with the Extron scaler. My guess is it always expects a limited source.

I couldn't test anything that doesn't output 480p/1080i, however both the 360 and my PC give the expected image if connected directly to the HD Fury. If I set output to full, I get a nice balanced image, if I set it to limited, I get washed out, just as expected.

With the Extron, The 360, PS3, PC, Steam Deck (in 16:9 ratios), all give a crushed image if set to full. If I set them to limited it looks exactly as it did when connected direct to the HD fury on full. So I've come to conclude the Extron is seeing the vast majority of these consoles as limited, including my PC which I'm surprised by. The Switch is the only one that looks the exact same in limited or full, which means the toggle doesn't work, or it is the only one the Extron is detecting correctly. I do not believe the toggle is faulty, as the Extron does lose a signal every time it's toggled.

Unfortunately I don't really see a solution for this, it's extremely frustrating as the 301 HD has performed flawlessly outside of this slightly major issue. It only seems to give options for specifying RGB range for the output, not the input, I think the intention is it does a color space conversion based on EDID on the input, and outputs whatever you select. This isn't something I can calibrate out either, because it's crushing it on the input, regardless of how I tune the image the range just doesn't exist.

Anybody have any other thoughts? Including recommendations for devices if I absolutely cannot get this to function in this setup. Thanks again.


Maybe a firmware update will fix this... I need an Extron insider account though, we use their equipment at work perhaps I can obtain one. I'm currently on firmware 1.20, gonna try 1.26 as the files are available on here. Does anyone have insider access and could pass on release notes for 1.25-1.28 (and maybe the latest 1.28 firmware...)
EDIT: Tried 1.26 to no avail. And there are no extra settings via the PCS compared to the front panel unfortunately.

The Extron likely expects limited range for all SMPTE resolutions and full range for all VESA ones.

If your sources support it, then the solution is to set them to YCbCr 4:4:4 instead. This takes this guess work out of the equation. It equals limited range RGB.

The input EDID can be changed as well. You can use Extron's EDID manager to create one and use PCS to "install it". Not sure though if this can help solving the problem. PCS 4.7.1 is the last one to work without an Insider account and an online connection.

Thanks I think you're probably correct! The only thing that seems to work in full and limited with 16:9 res is the Switch it seems. The EDID manager seems like a nice thing to give a shot, I found an older download of it I can give a try after work today. The Steam Deck is the only one that has no output options other than full RGB. It's a pretty minor issue for this system since I'll mainly be using it for Streaming which I can do in 16:10 with the source letterboxed then stretch it back out via the Extron, but it would still be nice to get it working mainly for the UI in 16:9.

EDIT: Got insider access through work so I can test all the latest and greatest and see if there are any new options

Be careful with your tests with the HD Fury.
I have an old thread talking about that a few years ago when I was searching for a device that could expand or reduce the range of RGB.
What I founded is that the toggle on the HD Fury only work for YCbCr sources. For RGB sources the HD Fury assume it's full range and the toggle do nothing.

Did you do a test with your PC set to output RGB 4:4:4 full range ? A lot of graphic card nowadays output YCbCr through HDMI by default, instead of RGB like with DisplayPort or DVI.

Ya I've also found that, I brought it to their support attention and got an incredibly short non technical answer saying "nou". The toggle does absolutely nothing with an RGB source.

Everything does look as intended through the HD Fury, it's the Extron that seems to default to limited range on the input and try translating it to whatever I set the output to. Which is why if it's already providing a full range signal it causes issues. It only allows you to change the output. I don't think it's entirely an Extron issue, the Switch with all resolutions on full or limited, and Steam Deck with 16:10 resolutions operate perfectly, my PC with a 3080ti, PS3, 360, are all incorrect and have to be set to limited. Not surprised with the 360 and PS3 because I don't have a lot of faith in how the do full range, but the PC I'm surprised.

I feel like there has to be something with EDID manager I can set to correct this, but it doesn't really seem like it. I've confirmed what I originally thought was just the Steam Deck is universal, 16:10 res is all detected as full RGB as expected, 16:9 are expected to be limited.

might not be as trivial as that. There are timings differences between SMPTE 1080p59.94 and VESA 1080p60 and it's possible that the Extron reacts differently to both.

Ya it's hard to test with the deck honestly since it's so buggy in how it detects available resolutions. It often gets stuck between EDID modifications despite rebooting a bunch, then will randomly update. It also seems to have a bunch of defaults that will display regardless, and it will display 59.94hz as 60hz in the selection menu. This is all kind of trivial at this point because for the most part everything is fine now that I understand what to expect. The only limitation is the deck is stuck at 16:10 for menus and games installed on it, not a big deal since there is no scenario that a game will be a better experience running native on the deck vs streaming from my PC 10 feet away. I also barely use the thing it's one of my least utilized systems.

Are you downscaling to feed a progressive signal to your HD CRT? A DVDO iScan has a manual RGB range toggle for both the input and output. It also has a built in DAC. Future readers of the thread should consider one of those, instead. With one of those, users can solve this issue by picking up the remote control. A few clicks and it's done. (Instead of walking across the room to the DSC 301 HD or using a control app on a computer/phone). The DVDO chroma subsampling probably won't matter much when downscaling and the natural blurryness of a CRT would likely also obscure detail. I bet the final image looks similar or identical with less lag and less hassle.

I'm downscaling to 1080i actually. Usually from 1080p, though I find some systems look better scaling 720p. The DVDO hardware I've seen recommended for a very long time, the issue has always been availability it seems. I've never actually came across one for sale when I'm looking for hardware. The DSC remembers presets for input resolutions at least, so I don't have to go and change anything whenever I'm using 1920x1200 with the Steam Deck. I've basically settled on just feeding limited wherever I can, really the only device I own that doesn't support it at all is the Deck. I do think it's a bit of an oversight that the Extron has so little in terms of input configuration, the outputs have a lot more options.