RetroTink 4K All But Officially Announced ....

[bobrocks95]

Crosspost- anyone try PSP on PSTV, Sharpscale set to Real, with crop + 8x zoom? Looks wonderful, BUT I'm getting constant screen tearing on the same set of horizontal lines.

Don't think it's the Tink unless zooming and cropping a bunch can cause it.

EDIT: Happens on Triple Buffer too... I guess Sharpscale just has screen tearing on Real framebuffer mode? Sucks because it looks much better...

EDIT2: confirmation bias, it looks the same after pixel peeping actually. I guess Sharpscale just struggles on Real.

[copy]

Mister DV mode on firmware 1.1.0 is pretty good so far, but right now it doesn't work great for systems with multiple resolutions or rotations. Like for the Genesis, you ideally need different cropping and scaling settings for the 256 and 320 width modes, but the RT4K doesn't remember and switch between different settings for each of those.

I'm guessing this is something that could be added though, and it wouldn't surprise me if Mike is already working on it...

[jd213]

Can the RT4K reproduce how a CRT shows the twinkling stars on Gradius when connected through composite, and other similar effects?

Not a deal-breaker, just curious.

[fernan1234]

Can the RT4K reproduce how a CRT shows the twinkling stars on Gradius when connected through composite, and other similar effects?

If you are connecting a composite input to the Tink4K it should look pretty much the same, especially if you use a CRT filter. After all those effects come from NTSC (or PAL) decoding and comb filters, which both the Tink and CRTs use.

[Konsolkongen]

Can the RT4K do something about chroma shifting?

Using Wii U’s vWii mode could be preferable as you supposedly can overclock the vWii mode to run at Wii U clocks.

Unfortunately even with 480p and the evWii plugin the image quality is still far worse than a HDMI modded Wii. Primarily because of the very noticeable chroma shift.

[Guspaz]

It doesn't currently, as far as I know, but I'll file a feature request for it.

[Konsolkongen]

Thank you

It would be neat if the 480p eWii output could match that of a GC Dual modded Wii some day

[Balleratt]

Good luck with batch two folks

https://youtu.be/-B5ebucZ69s?si=sgxh6ViH-pKGn31h

[kamiboy]

Finally got around to hooking my Analogue consoles to the RT4K. There are so many things I am still unsure about. However, most pressing, the Super NT seems to have a strange sync issue when I turn on Aanalogue DAC mode in the 4k. The audio keeps cutting out and the screen keep jumping a few pixels down and back up periodically. Has anyone else had this issue?

Also, I assume the row of random pixel up top of the screen is a signal for the DAC and is supposed to be cropped away manually, right?

On that note, the cropping feature seems to exhibit some strange behavior. Maybe it is not doing what I think it does. It is a bit overwhelming how much knowledge one needs to have about every minute detail of this complicated device to be able to feel one sort of known what one is doing with it.

[Guspaz]

There's pretty much zero tweaking required to do the basics with the vast majority of consoles, it defaults to automatic/safe settings (triple buffer with generic sampling) that will look good with almost anything, but when you start to get into the weeds (like trying to convince a console it's connected to a proprietary DAC when it isn't), yeah, you're going to have to start tweaking. Unless you use one of the many included profiles where that tweaking was done for you already, though there isn't one available for the RT4K.

Cropping is about as straightforward as it gets, you adjust the cropping on the top/bottom/left/right for how many pixels it should add/remove. In most cases, with a game on something showing a full-screen image, you can just hit one of the auto-crop buttons (AUX 1/2/3) to get a rough approximation and then tweak if required. It's possible to pick extreme cropping settings that go beyond what the scaler is actually capable of, which can produce odd behaviour. Using decimation when pixel repetition is involved can help get the pixel counts down and increase the scaler flexibility.

The wiki has lots of information: https://consolemods.org/rt4k

As for your specific issue with ADAC mode, what output mode and resolution are you using on the RT4K? Have you tried triple buffer vs genlock? VRR on vs off? Deep colour off? Have you tried a lower output resolution?

You'll probably have more luck getting help on the RetroTINK Discord, though, rather than here.

[SquidHominid]

Finally got around to hooking my Analogue consoles to the RT4K. There are so many things I am still unsure about. However, most pressing, the Super NT seems to have a strange sync issue when I turn on Aanalogue DAC mode in the 4k. The audio keeps cutting out and the screen keep jumping a few pixels down and back up periodically. Has anyone else had this issue?

Also, I assume the row of random pixel up top of the screen is a signal for the DAC and is supposed to be cropped away manually, right?

On that note, the cropping feature seems to exhibit some strange behavior. Maybe it is not doing what I think it does. It is a bit overwhelming how much knowledge one needs to have about every minute detail of this complicated device to be able to feel one sort of known what one is doing with it.

Hi, I was the one who did most of the testing for A/DAC mode.

I feel like you'd benefit from reading the disclaimer I put on the A/DAC mode section of the wiki.

PLEASE NOTE: While using A/DAC mode, the connected Analogue console will output 240p with horizontal variable pixel repetition, in order to allow for cases such as SNES 512-column mode to be rendered correctly. This may cause some scaling settings to not behave how you expect. Nothing is broken, please adjust Input Decimation and Scaling/Cropping until you get the desired image, noting that the initial horizontal scale is 4x what you are probably expecting (2x if you're playing a game that uses 512-column mode), and THIS MAY CHANGE IN THE FUTURE. Additionally, A/DAC Mode when set to PAL will require manual aspect ratio adjustment, and when set to either NTSC or PAL will require significant cropping when used with the Mega Sg due to the Mega Sg's output having a significantly exaggerated overscan area. Due to limitations both with Analogue hardware and with our understanding of the Analogue DAC, none of these issues can be addressed automatically at this time. Finally, please also note that, like with the actual Analogue DAC, changing the A/DAC mode setting while your Analogue console is connected and turned on will result in improper operation from your Analogue console, and is not recommended.

I'm not sure about the image jumping up and down, I didn't observe that behavior, nor did Mike testing with Mega Sg, but someone on the Discord did report the image 'wobbling' up and down. I plan to retest with current firmware. As for audio dropouts, I'm not sure but that sounds like it might be related to A/DAC mode mirroring the original system timings and that not playing well with your AV setup. If you're in Genlock mode, try Triple Buffer.

Also yes, the line of garbage at the top is control data that the Analogue console is sending to what it thinks is an Analogue DAC, not the RT4K. You are expected to crop that out.

Edit: as of January 6th, the other user with 'wobbling' reported the following:

"Latest FW (I was on the latest jailbroken FW before) and gen lock works perfectly, no more 'wobblies'. I did both at the same time, so unfortunately don't know which of these two made it work."

Try updating your Super Nt's firmware, and try Genlock if using Triple Buffer or vice versa.

[kamiboy]

I was on the latest jailbroken firmware and I did try all available sync methods, none of whom solved the issue. The Super NT won't be getting any other firmwares as far as I understand, so if there is an issue it will have to be solved on the RT4K front. On that front I was also on the latest firmware 1.1.0. My display is an LG 77" GX OLED. I was outputting in 4k, HDR with VRR enabled, though the issue persisted even if I turned VRR (AMD freesync?) off on the RT4K front.

In regards to cropping, the strange behaviour I spoke of is the fact that cropping seems to affect scaling. I was trying to cut away junk pixels around the frame of the gameplay field where junk or solid colours live and to my surprise after removing a few row or columns of pixels from any side would make the scaling go crazy. Now, I was kind of expecting cropping to be a sort of after the fact masking thing that is done one top pf picture after all other processes had already been done and wouldn't influence the scaling process, but it seems I was wrong.

Autocropping won't work either for Analogue DAC row of garbage pixels, because it would just cut above those pixels, if I understand the cropping algorithm it looks for solid colour rows or columns of pixels to judge where to cut. In Analogue DAC mode it should be specifically programmed to cut away the garbage row of pixels automatically since they are always in the same place in the frame, at least I think. I assume the DAC is hard coded to do this already, so it should be simple enough to replicate.

As for the 512 SNES games. I had read that little tidbit on the wiki, though I chose to ignore it, since I believe the games that run in 512 mode are somewhat rare and I was just testing simple games like super Mario world.

I should mention the Analogue SG gave me no issues in analogue DAC mode, it worked as it should, the issue was just the Super NT.

On another note, I tried to hook up the Analogue Duo to the RT4k and for the life of me I could not get it to look even halfway decent with scanlines and masks. I tried to set the system to output 480p and set the Tink to do 1:2 sampling of input, but the image quality looked like ass, far short of the SG and Super NT in Analogue DAC mode. Anyone has any settings to share until Analogue updates the system with DAC support?

[ZellSF]

I've gotten mine, not much interesting observations, but things I noticed:

[...]

There's no way to set limited vs full range for the HDMI output. Not sure if many 4K TVs don't support full range, but for me with an older TV (that I plan to replace know that I have a 4K scaler) it's a bit annoying.

This is fixed in the latest experimental updates.

[Wariolicious]

I was on the latest jailbroken firmware and I did try all available sync methods, none of whom solved the issue. The Super NT won't be getting any other firmwares as far as I understand, so if there is an issue it will have to be solved on the RT4K front. On that front I was also on the latest firmware 1.1.0. My display is an LG 77" GX OLED. I was outputting in 4k, HDR with VRR enabled, though the issue persisted even if I turned VRR (AMD freesync?) off on the RT4K front.

In regards to cropping, the strange behaviour I spoke of is the fact that cropping seems to affect scaling. I was trying to cut away junk pixels around the frame of the gameplay field where junk or solid colours live and to my surprise after removing a few row or columns of pixels from any side would make the scaling go crazy. Now, I was kind of expecting cropping to be a sort of after the fact masking thing that is done one top pf picture after all other processes had already been done and wouldn't influence the scaling process, but it seems I was wrong.

Autocropping won't work either for Analogue DAC row of garbage pixels, because it would just cut above those pixels, if I understand the cropping algorithm it looks for solid colour rows or columns of pixels to judge where to cut. In Analogue DAC mode it should be specifically programmed to cut away the garbage row of pixels automatically since they are always in the same place in the frame, at least I think. I assume the DAC is hard coded to do this already, so it should be simple enough to replicate.

As for the 512 SNES games. I had read that little tidbit on the wiki, though I chose to ignore it, since I believe the games that run in 512 mode are somewhat rare and I was just testing simple games like super Mario world.

I should mention the Analogue SG gave me no issues in analogue DAC mode, it worked as it should, the issue was just the Super NT.

On another note, I tried to hook up the Analogue Duo to the RT4k and for the life of me I could not get it to look even halfway decent with scanlines and masks. I tried to set the system to output 480p and set the Tink to do 1:2 sampling of input, but the image quality looked like ass, far short of the SG and Super NT in Analogue DAC mode. Anyone has any settings to share until Analogue updates the system with DAC support?

I have used my Analogue consoles extensively, and don't have the sync issue you describe with the Super NT. Would need to check what firmware I'm on though.

[kamiboy]

It seems a week or so after the the last jailbreak version of the Super NT released there was a single official update which fixes something related to audio cut out when using a he DAC.

This fix might be related to the sync issues on the RT4K in DAC mode. If so that would suck, a lot, because I only ever use these systems via jailbreak to run games off of an SD card. My games are all packed away far beyond casual easy access. I doubt there will be another jailbreak release, so I suppose my choices are nix DAC support or play using a flash cart.

I’ll test this out shortly and report back.

[Wariolicious]

It seems a week or so after the the last jailbreak version of the Super NT released there was a single official update which fixes something related to audio cut out when using a he DAC.

This fix might be related to the sync issues on the RT4K in DAC mode. If so that would suck, a lot, because I only ever use these systems via jailbreak to run games off of an SD card. My games are all packed away far beyond casual easy access. I doubt there will be another jailbreak release, so I suppose my choices are nix DAC support or play using a flash cart.

I’ll test this out shortly and report back.

Nothing holds you back to returning to a previous firmware though? I'm also on jailbreak firmware though, probably the latest one. Edit: I'm on Jailbreak 7.0

[Guspaz]

In regards to cropping, the strange behaviour I spoke of is the fact that cropping seems to affect scaling. I was trying to cut away junk pixels around the frame of the gameplay field where junk or solid colours live and to my surprise after removing a few row or columns of pixels from any side would make the scaling go crazy. Now, I was kind of expecting cropping to be a sort of after the fact masking thing that is done one top pf picture after all other processes had already been done and wouldn't influence the scaling process, but it seems I was wrong.

It shouldn't, but it could be that cropping the image pushed it over some threshold where, when combined with auto-scaling (like a "fill" mode), it pushed the scaler outside of what it can do. RT4K firmware v1.1.8 adds automatic decimation for Analogue consoles, which may help with that: the less pixels involved, the easier for the scaler, and Analogue consoles feature very high pixel repetition factors in DAC mode.

On another note, I tried to hook up the Analogue Duo to the RT4k and for the life of me I could not get it to look even halfway decent with scanlines and masks. I tried to set the system to output 480p and set the Tink to do 1:2 sampling of input, but the image quality looked like ass, far short of the SG and Super NT in Analogue DAC mode. Anyone has any settings to share until Analogue updates the system with DAC support?

You'll need to set the Duo to an integer scale in both the horizontal and vertical directions, which would not be the default for the Duo at 480p, since it didn't use square pixels. I don't own a Duo, so I can't say how, but basically turn off interpolation and ensure that the Duo's scaling settings are to an integer multiple of the game resolution.

[kamiboy]

I can confirm that the Super NT sync wobbling issue is not present on the latest official firmware, unlike the latest jailbreak. It does not seem to be possible to downgrade to an earlier jailbreak either, when I copy it to the SD card and place in Super NT nothing happens on boot. Seems I am stuck with the latest official release on RT4K. It is a shame, the jailbreak core functionality is really, really convenient. To the point that the unit on an official firmware is borderline useless for my purpose. I see that people have submitted requests for the jailbreak to include the latest official firmware changes, but who knows if that will ever happen.

On the Duo front, the system can be set to output custom resolutions, however the PC engine seems to be capable of outputting several resolutions, as such setting a integer output would likely only work for certain games. Too fiddly and inelegant for my taste, I guess I'll just wait for Analogue DAC support to come along.

[Guspaz]

Does the jailbreak firmware provide any functionality that the FXPak Pro does not?

[kamiboy]

Not sure, but the thing it has going for it is that it is free and requires no extra hardware.

[Wariolicious]

I can confirm that the Super NT sync wobbling issue is not present on the latest official firmware, unlike the latest jailbreak. It does not seem to be possible to downgrade to an earlier jailbreak either, when I copy it to the SD card and place in Super NT nothing happens on boot. Seems I am stuck with the latest official release on RT4K. It is a shame, the jailbreak core functionality is really, really convenient. To the point that the unit on an official firmware is borderline useless for my purpose. I see that people have submitted requests for the jailbreak to include the latest official firmware changes, but who knows if that will ever happen.

On the Duo front, the system can be set to output custom resolutions, however the PC engine seems to be capable of outputting several resolutions, as such setting a integer output would likely only work for certain games. Too fiddly and inelegant for my taste, I guess I'll just wait for Analogue DAC support to come along.

You definitely can return to previous jailbreak firmwares, in fact it's been specifically designed to that. I have also done it in the past. Please check a faq or a .txt that comes with the firmware files.

[kamiboy]

I do not find any mention of a method for firmware downgrade anywhere. All I can find is the generic firmware update instruction of copying the update to an SD card and booting system, which doesn't seem to do anything, when it worked fine to update the firmware to the latest official release. I doubt it, but perhaps they removed the jailbreak functionality in the latest release and somehow no one has yet to notice? I do get the feeling that they are moving away from the whole jailbreaking thing for their systems going forward. The Duo hasn't had any jailbreaks after all.

[kamiboy]

On another note I took a few hours today to configure all available HDR optimised CRT profiles for the Super NT in Analogue DAC mode, in 4K with HDR, VRR etc, all bells and whistles. After saving them all I assigned them to random remote number buttons so I could jump between them quickly. This allowed me to cycle between them all quickly with one button so I could do an eyeball taste test and judge once and for all which one offers the most pleasing CRT emulation aesthetics.

To no ones surprise I quickly settled on one which felt to rise above the rest, and upon looking it up, it was indeed the PVM 20L5 profile. I then had my Bang and Olufsen Beovision 1 CRT running the same game and to my eyes the Slot Mask Medium is almost an identical match to it. Quite neat that specific models of CRTs can be emulated so accurately, I never thought I'd see 240p games rendered on a flat screen in a way that could rival my beloved CRTs. I am, to put it mildly, very impressed. I think the Analogue systems with DAC support, or presumably, the MiSTER FPGA are the perfect match for the RT4K, you get pretty accurate hardware emulation and no analog signal shenanigans. I'll keep my OG systems hooked up to the CRT and try to keep the RT4K full digital for the time being, time will tell which setup I'll gravitate towards most in the future.

[evil_ash_xero]

One thing I'm skeptical about (keep in mind that I do not have a 4K TV or a RT4K) is how good the filters actually are. I'm very fascinated, but I dunno...

I've been checking out the Trinitron filter on the Analogue Pocket on the TV, and it just starts to look jaggy. I have a 36 inch CRT, and it doesn't look jaggy at all. I've got
a decent image out of my MiSTer, but it's too dark (I know the RT4K can solve this), and it also is laggier than I'd like.

I don't know when I'm going to get a 4K (I've made too many expensive purchases lately), but I have really been eyeballing the RT4K. I just wonder if it can live up to my high expectations. I do have 3 CRTs hooked up atm, so I'm looking right at them and comparing to any kind of filtered image on a panel. Not going by memory here.

I'm very happy that people are trying to emulate the CRT look. It seemed like when I first started getting into upscalers, all people cared about was scan lines and "razor sharp pixels", which I thought
looked like dogshit. Absolutely nothing like a CRT, and with fake scanlines to somehow make up for it. Just a strange thing people were into at the time. My opinion.

How much better are the 4Ks filters compared to say, Analogue's, or MiSTer's? I'd have to assume it's a lot better than Analogue's, as it doesn't have many customization options at all.

[tongshadow]

One thing I'm skeptical about (keep in mind that I do not have a 4K TV or a RT4K) is how good the filters actually are. I'm very fascinated, but I dunno...

I've been checking out the Trinitron filter on the Analogue Pocket on the TV, and it just starts to look jaggy. I have a 36 inch CRT, and it doesn't look jaggy at all. I've got
a decent image out of my MiSTer, but it's too dark (I know the RT4K can solve this), and it also is laggier than I'd like.

I don't know when I'm going to get a 4K (I've made too many expensive purchases lately), but I have really been eyeballing the RT4K. I just wonder if it can live up to my high expectations. I do have 3 CRTs hooked up atm, so I'm looking right at them and comparing to any kind of filtered image on a panel. Not going by memory here.

I'm very happy that people are trying to emulate the CRT look. It seemed like when I first started getting into upscalers, all people cared about was scan lines and "razor sharp pixels", which I thought
looked like dogshit. Absolutely nothing like a CRT, and with fake scanlines to somehow make up for it. Just a strange thing people were into at the time. My opinion.

How much better are the 4Ks filters compared to say, Analogue's, or MiSTer's? I'd have to assume it's a lot better than Analogue's, as it doesn't have many customization options at all.

These are my attempts on the RetroGEM (limited to 8x8 matrix), and I think the custom CRT filters looked very convicing at 960p on my 4k OLED.

https://i.imgur.com/CkntK5q.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/gKhFRfB.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/fpsOtPh.jpeg

"Filters" that immitate high TVL PVMs have been around for decades btw, and it's just basic horizontal scanlines cutting the vertical resolution by half. You dont need 4k filters to achieve that look, but you do, ironically, for a lower resolution CRT.

[kamiboy]

I am well versed in the basic scanlines, have witnessed them as far back as the XRGB days, they pale in comparison to the RT4K PVM L5 scanline emulation on a 4K HDR OLED TV.

After some more testing I actually seem to enjoy the medium slot mask profile and one of the Toshiba ones very much as well. Depends a bit on the game and my mood, I am happy to use either actually.

One thing that surprised me is that some of the profiles seem to actually be emulating that shadow trail effect you see on cheap consumer sets or on any set if you use bad unshielded video cables, I wasn’t expecting that.

I also noticed that the medium slot mask version doesn’t have smooth horizontal scrolling, I had to adjust one of the settings from bilinear sharp to laconzes to fix that.

On the topic of Analogue console scanline emulation vs the RT4K. After understanding how the RT4K and the Nalogue Duo work I managed to make a profile that gets me the same results as if the Duo suppoted the DAC and could do a comparison of CRT emulation via Analogue Duo or via the RT4K.

I have to say I am quite impressed by what Analogue has done, their CRT emulation looks really good, even though it has 1/4th the resolution to work with at 1080p.

To see the finer points of how RT4K and Analogue CRT emulation differ I’d need to do a side by side, which is not possible. But while I was certain the RT4K would blow 1080p crt emulation by Analogue out of the water, I have to say, they are close enough that it is a matter of taste which one prefers.

I was sure you’d need at least 4K to do decent CRT emulation, but that does not seem to be the case.

[DejahThoris]

How much better are the 4Ks filters compared to say, Analogue's, or MiSTer's? I'd have to assume it's a lot better than Analogue's, as it doesn't have many customization options at all.

Blows them out of the water. I too was skeptical, but this is the first time I've seen CRT filters that actually look authentic.

[bobrocks95]

I must sit too far away from my 55" TV, so far I haven't done much with scanlines because it all just muddles into a screen door effect at normal sitting distance. I've focused all my time on razor sharp output so far, which to me is starting to reveal the limits of analog signals and my consoles' mods/outputs, when I scrutinize things. Will gladly continue to install digital mods as they release.

[SavagePencil]

How significantly have the built-in filters changed since launch? I've seen Wobbling Pixels updated some, but didn't dig into if new CRT filters have been added/updated.

[evil_ash_xero]

How much better are the 4Ks filters compared to say, Analogue's, or MiSTer's? I'd have to assume it's a lot better than Analogue's, as it doesn't have many customization options at all.

Blows them out of the water. I too was skeptical, but this is the first time I've seen CRT filters that actually look authentic.

I really need to see this in person. Too bad none of my friend game... or have money... or play retro games.