Why does the Atari VCS work on an LCD or Plasma Screen?

[adamchevy]

After doing some research into starting to program for the VCS I have learned that it was specifically designed to follow the scan line created by the electron gun. LCD and Plasma tvs don't have electron guns as far as I know. Hopefully someone a lot smarter than me can describe why the VCS still works? Thanks!

Edited August 29, 2016 by adamchevy

[+Gemintronic]

Basically, each Plasma or LCD TV has a TV tuner card like we used to have in PCs. The built in TV tuner card sucks in the analogue signal and makes a digital frame to display on the all digital hardware.

 

With plasma and its higher refresh rate you have a better chance of it looking correct. It really depends on the "tv tuner" built into the TV.

[adamchevy]

Basically, each Plasma or LCD TV has a TV tuner card like we used to have in PCs. The built in TV tuner card sucks in the analogue signal and makes a digital frame to display on the all digital hardware.

 

With plasma and its higher refresh rate you have a better chance of it looking correct. It really depends on the "tv tuner" built into the TV.

Thanks! I remember having a tv tuner card in my PC in the late 90s. Going forward I wonder if VCS hardware may become incompatible with tvs . If this is the case maybe an external tv tuner may be needed someday? Also maybe racing the beam could become faster or different with a tv tuner specifically made to interface between the VCS and an LCD or plasma. Edited August 29, 2016 by adamchevy

[7800fan]

LCD and plasma TV does have a minor drawback. Their tuner is a little more picky about irregular signal. Analog TV have worked fine because it was pretty much straight from video port to CRT with frequency separating and filtering to composite from RF (if used), RGB separation from composite or S-Video, then amp each one and multiply with lumina (brightness) before being fed to CRT pins. So any small variations like fewer lines or more lines per frame would work just fine. Only really nasty coded games like Air Raid would still cause rolling and it can be fixed by adjusting V-hold

 

LCD and plasma is all digital and the analog to digital converter is a bit more picky. Some games would not display correctly because 240p is not a proper video standard, TV expected 480i/p and may either only process half of the signal (resulting in striped video like there's giant comb over it) or display no signal error.

 

When I tested the really old 480i rom file (using Harmony) people made many years ago to see if 2600 is capable of full 480 lines, it was horrible on my TV. My TV also does not like 240i component, it displays garbage like a broken video card but my modded Duo-R displays beautifully on Wega TV because of analog system rather than digital system.

 

YMMV, some TV works fine, some would display glitches, and some won't work at all.

[Osgeld]

It's not following anything from the TV, there's timing standards that if you want video to appear you have to follow but what they mean is we know that the TV is going to generate a line at this given rate, we tell it when to start and stop, now we just fill in the middle

 

Just like any other signal on the tv

[+Gemintronic]

In the future the cheapest de-modulators will still be an old VCR. Couple that with an RCA to HDMI and you're "good enough"

[fujidude]

Better scoop up those VCRs then. They just recently stopped being made.

[7800fan]

VCR with component or HDMI output? Is there such beast?

 

What about DVD-recorder?

[+DrVenkman]

VCR with component or HDMI output? Is there such beast?

 

 

There was probably - for a brief window of time - a VCR with component output, but I never owned one. DVD Recorder almost certainly would have them though I never did. But even TV's with Component Inputs are hard to find. But a plain old VCR works great as a demodulator to Composite, and there are plenty of Composite to HDMI boxes out on the market from super cheap to super expensive. YMMV.

 

Personally, I just use plain old RF to a mid-80's Apple Color Composite monitor (through a VCR, with audio out to powered speakers) or an early '00s 27" Toshiba aperture grille CRT TV. I will continue to game as much as possible on CRTs until I can either no longer fix the ones I have or find used ones for sale.