SCART Switch/Splitter Recommendation

[Rock Man]

Thanks gotcha. I'm on top of it!

[Zapf]

I bought mine from amazon.de. it was around $110 for 2 of them, but it came in 2 days, which is nice.

[daskrabs]

I bought mine from amazon.de. it was around $110 for 2 of them, but it came in 2 days, which is nice.

Shipped to USA?

[RGB32E]

I should have all the parts I need to make a switcher specifically tailored for the XRGB mini this weekend...

[Rock Man]

I should have all the parts I need to make a switcher specifically tailored for the XRGB mini this weekend...

You can do that!? Is there any way you could forge one that holds between 10 & 16 consoles? I could totally spare my room from any further clutter if I'm using 1 switcher, lol.

[Zapf]

I bought mine from amazon.de. it was around $110 for 2 of them, but it came in 2 days, which is nice.

Shipped to USA?

yes
http://www.amazon.de/Hama-00042957-Scar ... 141&sr=8-4

the price goes down when you put in the US address (I guess vat?)

[RGB32E]

You can do that!? Is there any way you could forge one that holds between 10 & 16 consoles? I could totally spare my room from any further clutter if I'm using 1 switcher, lol.

Lol... no, it's only going to be for 2 inputs. Should be more polished than the generic plastic ones, or the printer switchers mentioned.

If you want a ton of inputs you'll need to get one of those huge Extron RGB switches. Though for each input you'd need a SCART to BNC adapter... For example - http://www.retrogamingcables.co.uk/sony ... vertor-bnc
The Extron switches don't use RCA connectors for audio, but the link is just for an example.

I only ever have 2 consoles connected to AC at a time anyways, so I think I'll be able to make a high quality 2 way switch for the mini.

[Rock Man]

I'll pay you a million dollars if you make one.

Okay not really, lol. You should post the thing after you build so we can gush all over it.

[trunk]

http://www.computeruniverse.net/product ... +switchbox

Good info, I just ordered 2.

[Rock Man]

http://www.computeruniverse.net/product ... +switchbox

Just ordered the Hama switch (little black box with the rotating button), shinybow is next! Thanks Daskrabs.

[Rock Man]

Amazon UK still list them, not sure if they ship to the EU or not though http://www.amazon.co.uk/Scart-Matrix-Sw ... 024&sr=8-1

Anyone know if these guys ship to the States or not? I'm currently looking for a trust worthy site which houses shinybows and delivers US. So far I've found them on both Ebay and Amazon but only on their UK site. I have determined the Ebay one doesn't ship to the US. Not sure about Amazon... if someone could tell me if Amazon will be shipping to the States or point me to another site that houses these switchers and are familiar with a US shipping method, I'm all ears.

[Zapf]

amazon.co.uk does not ship to the US. Individual sellers might differ.


edit: but you could have found that out during checkout though.

[Rock Man]

amazon.co.uk does not ship to the US. Individual sellers might differ.


edit: but you could have found that out during checkout though.

Thing is I was worried if the checkout was "binding", I didn't want to risk being commited to buy and then they can't even send the thing.

This sucks! Anyone willing to sell me theirs?

[Apt Irrelevance]

Hey everybody. I found my way over to this thread via VideogamePerfection's Scart Switch Roundup.

After spending hours searching for the best SCART switch that fit my needs, I decided to take the plunge and go with the Shinybow SB-5525, mostly for its high quality design and the fact that it comes with a remote control. Over the weekend, I followed the advice posted in this thread and contacted Shinybow USA via their website. I received an email reply from them first thing Monday morning with purchase info.

They quoted me $134 plus shipping via FedEx ground and said it would take a week to get the unit in once the order was placed. (This, by the way, is much cheaper than the current price listed on Amazon.co.uk or the Shinybow Europe site, which doesn't even include shipping.)
They sent me a Paypal invoice and asked me whether or not I wanted the North American AC adapter. After my payment processed, they sent me a Fedex tracking number and let me know it would ship on or before July 31 (1 week later).

I am currently waiting for the unit to ship. When it arrives, I'll post some pics.

[blizzz]

Got the Marmitek Connect 236 today. Picture quality seems to degrade a bit on the SC-500N1 and I only get black with a bit of noise on the two recording outputs. Oh well... guess this thing is going back tomorrow.

Edit: Tried it on my TV and I'm pretty sure that the two extra outputs are composite only! WTF.

[BuckoA51]

Composite only isn't that surprising as these switches are designed for VCR use quite often. I am surprised the quality was degraded though, that's disappointing. I'll make a note on my page for anyone else wanting to give this a try.

[blizzz]

I am surprised the quality was degraded though, that's disappointing.

Original vs with Marmitek. It's less sharp and the colours are weird.

[Fudoh]

yep, different routing times for different color signals... very weird.

[papa_november]

Yes, I'm in the US. ~$85 total.

They seem to be out of stock now. Anywhere else that might have these and ship to the US?

[BuckoA51]

Re the Marmitek. http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/138051

I can definitely see what you mean about reduced sharpness now, I will document that, thanks.

I'll have to try capturing screenshots of other SCART switches vs direct connection to my capture card.

[blizzz]

Bought a Shinybow Scart distributor with some quality cables on eBay for a few Euros. Hope it works fine for recording stuff

[blizzz]

Got the Shinybow SB-3720 SCART distributor today.

Shinybow / Direct
It adds a bit of noise and makes it also looks a bit less sharp.

YUV
YUV has some pretty bad noise / artifacts.

I think I'll just use direct connections, even high quality splitters seem to degrade quality.

[jeffsledge]

Try using a VGA or BNC splitter instead.

[BuckoA51]

Shinybow vs DC

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/138989

I wouldn't exactly call that bad, in some ways the SB looks sharper. I can see noise in the sky area on both though it does seem worse on the SB. I wouldn't exactly call it bad enough to go through the hassle and wear/tear of manually swapping connections though.

Try using a VGA or BNC splitter instead.

They don't always support interlace. There's always the Extron commercial grade RGB switches if you've the space and can solder your own cables.

[cyborc]

They don't always support interlace. There's always the Extron commercial grade RGB switches if you've the space and can solder your own cables.

would it be safe to assume the extron crosspoint series would provide exactly the same signal quality as if the console was directly connected to the monitor?

[BuckoA51]

I don't think you can assume anything where SCART/RGB is concerned !

[cyborc]

I suppose we'll find out soon then! I ordered an Extron crosspoint 8x4 for a decent price. Now I just need to build some cables. I will post an update when it's all done.

[cyborc]

just thought id post a little update on the extron crosspoint: so far the one negative thing about this unit is that it cannot pass composite video as sync correctly. It has something to do with TTL voltages or something that is beyond my limited scope of electronics knowledge. Anyway, if you feed it a proper composite sync signal it seems to work just fine. On my consolized MVS I couldn't really tell a difference in picture quality between running it through the crosspoint and plugging it straight into my pvm.

[Rock Man]

Use the SB all the time if anything I felt a quality INCREASE rather than de. I switched back and fourth from SNES/Gen RAW and to the switcher. Difference is very minuscule but shadow and background depth appear stronger on the SB whereas raw they aren't as focused. Of course I can only speak for personal experience regarding my TV. It reminds me of the difference you'd get when you compare multiplats like Persona 4 & MK9 for PS360. PS3 version on both is lighter thus overlapping detail whereas the 360 the shadows are in the right spots and looks perfectly natural. I feel like the SB replicates that sort of "360" difference.

I went on ahead and comboified my set-up and now I locked the SB, SyncBlaster and the Hama switch box together. The one that's given me the most to pick about is the Hama, but that's to be expected being the other two are powered switchers. I think I'm really growing fond of the Keene if it had more sockets like the SB I might of replaced that with the Commander. Auto-switching is 10x more convenient than having to grab the remote and manually change the channel. So long as I'm doing 1-2 systems at a time everythings solid.

[Kyle]

After mulling this over for months I ended up getting a Hama 100S. It has a neat unintentional (?) feature. You can simultaneously depress all three inputs, effectively making it an automatic switch. This will have it automatically display whichever console is powered on. Obviously it gets wonky if multiple consoles are powered at once but otherwise I found this useful. I do not experience any degradation of picture quality with this either.