New Zenith 720p Plasma playing old school games

[Strider77]

Yeah.... it was using the XRGB and 2d gaming heavily on the set that started a constant monthly service menu tweaking over the past few 4 years or so. It can be done, but to be honest it wasn't till last month that I got it to a point that I don't notice any major flaws (well maybe major flaws is extreme.. let's just say I am very content now and being content for me is difficult). But like I said it was a lot of tweaking and re-tweaking.

To be honest that is the biggest reason I kept that 32 inch upstairs above all else... the thought of having to do the geometry all over for this 34 inch. For movies and TV the geometry isn't a real issue.

The XS955 series is the consumer version of the BVM (a broadcast studio 16x9 CRT set that handles 240p up to 1080i natively by sony). Now one of those..... I'd love to see in person. That little 20 inch PVM I just got it the 4x3 version of the BVM series. And if that little thing is anything to judge its big brother by (32 or 34 inch 16x9 BVM) as far as geometry and convergence... trust me your draw would hit the floor.

I would KILL for one of those. Like I said the color and image on this little 20L5 is the best I have seen with my own eyes, I had no idea a CRT could be that flawless....

[brandonp514]

The problem though is finding one....and then the price for one. I'm surprised you paid 150 for it NEW! A quick google search shows prices in the thousands! That's just insane. It really is a shame that you can't find these things easier. Have you tried a CRT computer monitor via VGA with an adapter box like an HDBox Pro?

[Strider77]

No I never have...... I really only needed a low res one at the time for my PCBs. But now with all the 360 ports I wanted a multisync monitor. This thing fits all my tate needs in spades though and so does the XS955 when combined with an XRGB3 for horizontal stuff. Well I take that back, I have hooked up the XRGB to my PC monitor for curiosity sake and it worked great. it's just some PCBs don't like the XRGB that much... really just my raiden fighters PCBs. Even with the XRGB2 they wind up being shifted way down as far as the picture position goes and it wasn't worth the hassle to buy a device to shift it back up for just those 2 PCBs I own that have that issue.

Basically both my TVs support all my needed resolution needs and them some with scanlines intact and also handle all HD sources with flying colors also.

[brandonp514]

Hey guys, would this be what I need?

Scart AND S-Video to HDMI:
http://cgi.ebay.com/SCART-RGB-Svideo-S- ... 691wt_1012

SNES Scart cable:
http://cgi.ebay.com/SNES-Fully-Wired-RG ... 103wt_1074

Would that be the quick and dirty path to 240p glory that Fudoh mentions on his website? lol. I also want to hook up my N64 via SVideo so this should work great!

Bear in mind I have a standard US SNES like this:
http://media.giantbomb.com/uploads/0/25 ... _large.jpg

[Strider77]

No, you must use a line doubler or scaler of some sort.... there is no way around it. Well it depends on your standards. The XRGB is that key to victory.

[brandonp514]

I'm pretty sure it's a linedoubler. Just can't create scanlines.

From Fudoh's Deinterlacing, Scaling, Processors, Q and A:
Conclusion: while I usually don't like "nameless" chinese manufacturers, Lenkeng succeeded in getting it's name out there. Their HDBoxPro clone, their PSP scalers and their easy to use RGB Scart to HDMI converters are highly recommended. Don't expect XRGB-3-like performance from them, but they're all worth their money and if your goal is basically just to add RGB Scart inputs to your HDTV set, this is the quick'n dirty path to 240p glory.

[brandonp514]

Well some good news to give. The Scart/S-Video to HDMI converter works very well with my HDTV. I'm quite impressed.

This is the device:
http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff83 ... 1289460718

One weird thing is the input lag was very noticeable when I first used the device playing games like Secret of Mana and Zelda. However, I stopped using it for a few hours and came back to use it and now it seems like the input lag is very low, barely noticeable. Still there, but not near as bad as it was....very strange.

Bear in mind my Scart cable has not come in yet and this is totally on S-Video. Still great picture. The difference from composite hooked directly to my TV and this device via S-Video is night and day. Can't wait to hook up Scart.

Only question I have is sometimes you can detect some "glitches" or pixels kinda shifting or looking a little distorted. I guess that's the nature of the device and that you will have some things like that when you de-interlace. But that's the only issues I have.

Cost me 50 bucks for this baby and I must say I'm very pleased with its performance. No scanlines however....

[Endymion]

One weird thing is the input lag was very noticeable when I first used the device playing games like Secret of Mana and Zelda. However, I stopped using it for a few hours and came back to use it and now it seems like the input lag is very low, barely noticeable. Still there, but not near as bad as it was....very strange.

Check and see what your output is. I see this device can output 480i, on up to 1080p. It could be that you were driving it at 1080p originally, after turning it back on again it might have been reset at 480i. I don't know that this happened, but it might account for the lag you saw, and later didn't.

Only question I have is sometimes you can detect some "glitches" or pixels kinda shifting or looking a little distorted. I guess that's the nature of the device and that you will have some things like that when you de-interlace. But that's the only issues I have.

Try it at the various settings for output and see if one works better than the other. You might not see this on certain outputs.

[brandonp514]

Check and see what your output is. I see this device can output 480i, on up to 1080p. It could be that you were driving it at 1080p originally, after turning it back on again it might have been reset at 480i. I don't know that this happened, but it might account for the lag you saw, and later didn't.

Funny thing is they were both at 720p when it happened. I don't think there was any change in the resolution at all. It has a fix resolution of either 720p or 1080p plus some weird hi-res non-standard resolutions

Another thing I was wondering about is that is there ANY way I can make my TV not show annoying gray bars and make them black instead? I know this is to prevent burn-in but there's still black bars a little bit anyway because the videogame screen size isn't "exactly" 4:3 640x480 and so it doesn't even fit in the standard 4:3 my TV gives it. So I have in the middle the game, then small black bars, then big gray bars. It basically defeats the purpose of the gray 4:3 bars in the first place. I can get used to it but would love to just have black all the way around.

[brandonp514]

I also just got the sound working through this box while still waiting for my Scart cable. What I did was hook up the R/L RCA Audio jacks in a Y cable with 3.5 stereo plug end into the input of the box. Output was just a 3.5mm stereo plug to the back of my TV sets audio in. The audio in is supposed to be used for the PC input but it works just fine for this task as well. Doesn't matter what input I'm on the sound will play.

This box works really well I am very pleased. 50 bucks well spent. Input lag is very acceptable and picture quality is also above average. I'm sure it's not as good as the XRGB-3 but dang is it good. Very happy with my purchase. Also you can buy it locally in Washington through ebay by this company Mercott. The name is HD Box, kinda generic I know. lol