XRGB-mini Framemeister

[EmperorZelos]

That's kinda the point, he's zoomed the PAL version in to eliminate the bars.

I'd like to see one with bars so there is a comparison because I can tell nothing

[Thomago]

I'd like to see one with bars so there is a comparison because I can tell nothing

Well, here you go: http://forum.snesfreaks.com/viewtopic.php?f=136&t=7469

[Fudoh]

By the way: we now have the option to use the front RCA/Cinch audio inputs along with RGB video. That's new, isn't it ?

I just tested the HDMI passthrough mode. Works quite well. All menu options (like color or picture settings) are greyed out, so what Micomsoft meant with the comments is probably that the Mini still converts from YCbCr to RGB, when the XRGB's output is forced into RGB mode. With the color output options set to auto it should be a true passthrough mode. Right now I don't have my lag tester at home, so I couldn't test for differences in lag yet.

Another thing I just noticed (not sure if that's new or not), but the scaling engines for 480i and 480p work completely different on the HDMI inputs compared to a component source. For 480i component the scaling is better, but the filtering is more aggressive, while for 480p the scaling via HDMI is considerably better (no more ringing bug). On the HDMI inputs the scaling for both 480i and 480p is much more video-optimized. Kinda like a DVDO processor compared a Gennum powered one like the CII or Optoma.

With a cheap ($30) component to HDMI converter the HDMI inputs now work very well for systems like Wii, XBox, Cube or Playstation 2. Overall I still like my TV's 480p upscaling better (so passthrough for 480p on the Mini), but compared to the broken 480p upscaling on the component input, this is a blessing. Also the color balance is much better on the HDMI inputs (ever noticed those overssaturads reds or greens through component?) and the filtering is much less aggressive. Problems with color banding or noise were gone as well. Also the fiddling with the ADC settings is a thing of the past when using the HDMI inputs instead of component.

[Krakko]

Anyone who's having color glitching (random wrongly colored pixels, etc) when using the PS3 via the XRGB-mini's HDMI passthrough, try going into the PS3 and making sure "Deep Color Output" is turned off. That fixed the issue for me.

[EmperorZelos]

Anyone who's having color glitching (random wrongly colored pixels, etc) when using the PS3 via the XRGB-mini's HDMI passthrough, try going into the PS3 and making sure "Deep Color Output" is turned off. That fixed the issue for me.

I have it for RGBs when used on 1080 size but never on 720

[EmperorZelos]

I'd like to see one with bars so there is a comparison because I can tell nothing

Well, here you go: http://forum.snesfreaks.com/viewtopic.php?f=136&t=7469

ah the bars above and below teh screen?

[Thomago]

ah the bars above and below teh screen?

Yes, excactly.
You know, PAL has a 20% higher vertical resolution than NTSC (576 vs. 480; the horizontal resolution and the aspect ratio are the same). Instead of filling these additonal 20% with graphics, most developers took the "lazy" route when making PAL versions of their NTSC titles and just mapped the 480 pixels they had in the middle of the 576 pixels, leading to the infamous pal bars and - of course - a squashed picture (see screenshots).

[brownvim]

Why did microsoft not have a lag free B1 mode in the mini? Is it because it's an analogue output to just line double the image, as the mini only has hdmi out.

[EmperorZelos]

ah the bars above and below teh screen?

Yes, excactly.
You know, PAL has a 20% higher vertical resolution than NTSC (576 vs. 480; the horizontal resolution and the aspect ratio are the same). Instead of filling these additonal 20% with graphics, most developers took the "lazy" route when making PAL versions of their NTSC titles and just mapped the 480 pixels they had in the middle of the 576 pixels, leading to the infamous pal bars and - of course - a squashed picture (see screenshots).

care to share the settings to achive this? =)

[Thomago]

care to share the settings to achive this? =)

You mean the Framemeister's zoom settings? Not at all, here they are:

ZOOM_SIZE = 90
ZOOM_H_POS = 42 (optional)
ZOOM_V_POS = 8
ZOOM_WIDTH = 72
ZOOM_OVERSCAN = 100 (standard)

And you have to increase V_WIDTH from 32 (standard) to 53.

To achieve the same result with an intelligently designed zoom funktion I would have needed to increase ZOOM_HEIGHT (fictional setting) by 20%, for example from 100 to 120. But no...

[Fudoh]

Why did microsoft not have a lag free B1 mode in the mini?

because the Marvell is hardwired into the processing chain and it doesn't allow for such a mode.

[EmperorZelos]

Okey I got a wierd problem with mine meister

Standing on its own now this is the kind of picture I get, it has this strange liney look to it as it can be seen here


but whenever I change image mode, from anything to anything, just for a brief moment it looks like this


and hten it returns to the original one, any ideas how to fix it?

[Thomago]

and hten it returns to the original one, any ideas how to fix it?

You have to change the Scaler Mode ("AUTO_SCALER" in "VISUAL SET") from "GAME" to "VIDEO". Or, even better: Change it to "MANUAL" and adjust "H_SCALER" to 5 and "V_SCALER" to your liking.

[EmperorZelos]

and hten it returns to the original one, any ideas how to fix it?

You have to change the Scaler Mode ("AUTO_SCALER" in "VISUAL SET") from "GAME" to "VIDEO". Or, even better: Change it to "MANUAL" and adjust "H_SCALER" to 5 and "V_SCALER" to your liking.

Thank you, worked marvelous but why would "game" make it so Liney?

[Shining]

Is there a way to force RGB full range with the Mini? My TV reports the signal as RGB limited. The Mini is set to RGB and Deep Color. I have the option to select full/limited range on my TV but i feel the colors are a bit off.

[Thomago]

Thank you, worked marvelous but why would "game" make it so Liney?

The "GAME"-mode is meant for old games with 240p/288p resolutions and applies no vertical filtering (nearest point interpolation). This looks pretty good for these games since it maintains their natural "blocky" look, but it's unsuitable for more recent 480/576 i/p games as well as movies.

[marqs]

Is there a way to force RGB full range with the Mini? My TV reports the signal as RGB limited. The Mini is set to RGB and Deep Color. I have the option to select full/limited range on my TV but i feel the colors are a bit off.

I don't know about the new FW, but with 1.07 most 60Hz RGB inputs are outputted as full-range by Mini, while 50Hz material usually remains limited-range (or with similar brightness offset). Deep color isn't related to this, it just sets the output to 30/36bit if your TV supports it.

[AkibaDecker]

Hi everyone, I recently purchased a XRGB mini and should be getting in a week or two from Japan. I did some searching and found this great community.

I plan to hook up the following consoles to it from time to time: Super Famicom, PS2 (US "fat" unit and Japanese "slim" unit) and Dreamcast.

For the Dreamcast, would buying a Hanzo VGA Box (then doing VGA to HDMI IN of the XRGB mini, via adapters) be the easiest way for the best looking signal (meaning, not composite).

EDIT: Sorry, I also wanted to add why I would add The XRGB mini to the Dreamcast equation: I'd like to include it in my game capture/livestream setup. I have an Elgato Game Capture HD that accepts HDMI in. So I would plan to feed the Framemeister's output through that

Thanks for your time.

[Midnight Milkshake]

Is there a way to force RGB full range with the Mini? My TV reports the signal as RGB limited. The Mini is set to RGB and Deep Color. I have the option to select full/limited range on my TV but i feel the colors are a bit off.

With my tv (and with 1.07), I have to turn it on before the framemeister, otherwise I get limited range and bad colours

By the way: we now have the option to use the front RCA/Cinch audio inputs along with RGB video. That's new, isn't it ?

I just tested the HDMI passthrough mode. Works quite well. All menu options (like color or picture settings) are greyed out, so what Micomsoft meant with the comments is probably that the Mini still converts from YCbCr to RGB, when the XRGB's output is forced into RGB mode. With the color output options set to auto it should be a true passthrough mode. Right now I don't have my lag tester at home, so I couldn't test for differences in lag yet.

Another thing I just noticed (not sure if that's new or not), but the scaling engines for 480i and 480p work completely different on the HDMI inputs compared to a component source. For 480i component the scaling is better, but the filtering is more aggressive, while for 480p the scaling via HDMI is considerably better (no more ringing bug). On the HDMI inputs the scaling for both 480i and 480p is much more video-optimized. Kinda like a DVDO processor compared a Gennum powered one like the CII or Optoma.

With a cheap ($30) component to HDMI converter the HDMI inputs now work very well for systems like Wii, XBox, Cube or Playstation 2. Overall I still like my TV's 480p upscaling better (so passthrough for 480p on the Mini), but compared to the broken 480p upscaling on the component input, this is a blessing. Also the color balance is much better on the HDMI inputs (ever noticed those overssaturads reds or greens through component?) and the filtering is much less aggressive. Problems with color banding or noise were gone as well. Also the fiddling with the ADC settings is a thing of the past when using the HDMI inputs instead of component.

Good to know, think I'll get a converter and test it

And one last thing, I had some sync issues from time to time (screen jumps and blackouts), changed the surge protector, and almost solved it, but still have the jumps from time to time (much less than before) could it be something related to the power adapter?

[Shining]

Is there a way to force RGB full range with the Mini? My TV reports the signal as RGB limited. The Mini is set to RGB and Deep Color. I have the option to select full/limited range on my TV but i feel the colors are a bit off.

I don't know about the new FW, but with 1.07 most 60Hz RGB inputs are outputted as full-range by Mini, while 50Hz material usually remains limited-range (or with similar brightness offset). Deep color isn't related to this, it just sets the output to 30/36bit if your TV supports it.

Is there a way to force RGB full range with the Mini? My TV reports the signal as RGB limited. The Mini is set to RGB and Deep Color. I have the option to select full/limited range on my TV but i feel the colors are a bit off.

With my tv (and with 1.07), I have to turn it on before the framemeister, otherwise I get limited range and bad colours.

I've tried both 1.07 and 1.10 with the same results. However, If i switch to DVI mode (1280x1024) i get full RGB. For now, i set the Mini to output color Auto(YUV) and it looks much better than RGB limited. Am i missing out when using YUV instead of RGB?

I will try and seclect full RGB on my TV before starting the Mini when i get home tonight.

[Fudoh]

Am i missing out when using YUV instead of RGB?

if you'd see any differences will completely depend on your TV set.

[EmperorZelos]

Anyone who's having color glitching (random wrongly colored pixels, etc) when using the PS3 via the XRGB-mini's HDMI passthrough, try going into the PS3 and making sure "Deep Color Output" is turned off. That fixed the issue for me.

I have it for RGBs when used on 1080 size but never on 720

Anyone know the cause of this?

[Fudoh]

bad cable. The higher the bandwith (1080p > 720p and 12-bit > 8-bit), the easier it is to cause problems due to bad or mediocre cables.

[BuckoA51]

For the Dreamcast, would buying a Hanzo VGA Box (then doing VGA to HDMI IN of the XRGB mini, via adapters) be the easiest way for the best looking signal (meaning, not composite).

No, this gets asked every other week, go read the wiki here:- http://junkerhq.net/xrgb/index.php/Dreamcast

[RGB32E]

I tested out the new HDMI Direct setting in the new 1.10 firmware. So far I am pleased with the results! This should save me from buying a HDMI switcher.

I created a simple test pattern using full color channel (e.g. 0x00FF00) 1px lines to check for chroma subsampling against a 0x000000 background.


HDMI Direct OFF


HDMI Direct ON

[Fudoh]

nice, thanks!

Any obversations regarding the color conversion with forced RGB output on the Mini ?

[AkibaDecker]

For the Dreamcast, would buying a Hanzo VGA Box (then doing VGA to HDMI IN of the XRGB mini, via adapters) be the easiest way for the best looking signal (meaning, not composite).

No, this gets asked every other week, go read the wiki here:- http://junkerhq.net/xrgb/index.php/Dreamcast

Sorry, I was getting a tad overwhelmed the other night after checking forums and reading so much info at once Guess it'll take some work then. Thanks for the link.

[SavagePencil]

Would someone mind adding a guide to what all the buttons on the controller do to the wiki? The one on Fudoh's site is a good start, but I stumbled into this discussion trying to find out how to toggle scanlines and found that answer back on page 109...button C?

Here are a couple other questions:

• * What do A, B, and C buttons do?
  * What about the Blue/Red/Green/Yellow buttons at the bottom? One can only dream of being presets

[BuckoA51]

Sorry, I was getting a tad overwhelmed the other night after checking forums and reading so much info at once Guess it'll take some work then. Thanks for the link.

You can DIY it or there's a plug and play solution, full details on that page anyway.

Would someone mind adding a guide to what all the buttons on the controller do to the wiki?

I have been meaning to actually, I am sure Fudoh won't mind that being reposted on there and then people can add to it as things are figured out. I've nearly finished my current work project so I should have a little free time for editing shortly.

[SavagePencil]

I have been meaning to actually, I am sure Fudoh won't mind that being reposted on there and then people can add to it as things are figured out. I've nearly finished my current work project so I should have a little free time for editing shortly.

That'd be great! It sucks digging all over the internet to find this info, and your wiki has been invaluable.

Of note, it looks like with 1.10 they're using the colored buttons at the bottom as zooms: