17 replies to this topic

[MrFish]

This is a question I've wondered about for some time. I'm interested to see what the averages are for displays people use to retrocompute.

 

My displays have averaged from about 212 to 220, with various monitors and televisions (never used an LCD). The current monitor I use displays about 220; It's a JVC BM-H1300SU Studio Monitor.

 

I'm not looking for exact numbers, obviously, since this poll just allows for even numbers to be selected. It's close enough for me.

 

Use the attached executable Atari image file to make your determination by getting your upper and lower numbers and then subtracting the upper from the lower for the total.

For those with quite curvy monitors, you can adjust your numbers accordingly to reflect visibility at full width if you like, but it's not necessary.

 

Selections are available for the various types and both NTSC and PAL: CRT Monitor (Real Monitors), LCD Monitor (of Any Type or Related Tech), and CRT Television. If you have monitors in multiple categories, you're welcome to enter as many as you'd like. If you'd like to post information about what monitor(s) you're using, that'd be cool too.

 

Altirra diplays 224 scanlines for NTSC and 240 for PAL, and these are the dimensions you'll get when saving a screenshot with Altirra.

 

Altirra - NTSC

 

 

 Screen Height.xex   2.46KB   54 downloads

Edited by MrFish, Tue Jan 9, 2018 2:08 AM.

[MrFish]

Alright, hold on.

 

I have to restructure the poll, as it forces you to answer each "question", which would mean you'd need to own every type of monitor in order to participate.

 

This will just take a second... (unfortunately the results won't come out as detailed as I wanted, unless I open a separate poll / thread for each type of monitor, but I guess it'll be good enough).

 

[Edit]

OK, I modified it so people can select "Don't have this type" in any category.

 

So to vote, you'll need to select "Don't have this type" in each category of monitor that you're not entering data for, before you hit the vote button.

 

This way the poll can be a little more detailed than it would be otherwise.

Edited by MrFish, Tue Jan 9, 2018 1:57 AM.

[Kr0tki]

Your testing procedure is not relevant for PAL systems, on which more than 240 scanlines are visible.

Pavros attempted a similar test for PAL, on AtariArea (PL) and here on AtariAge as well; the last post of that thread contains the results.
 

Altirra diplays 224 scanlines for NTSC and 240 for PAL, and these are the dimensions you'll get when saving a screenshot with Altirra.

That entirely depends on your setting of View->Overscan Mode. The default value of 224 for NTSC is probably based on the size of action-safe area by cutting the recommended 3.5% from the top and bottom of the screen.

For PAL/SECAM, Altirra's default settings are somewhat misleading, as typically more than 240 scanlines are visible in these TV systems.

Edited by Kr0tki, Tue Jan 9, 2018 8:09 AM.

[MrFish]

Your testing procedure is not relevant for PAL systems, on which more than 240 scanlines are visible.

Pavros attempted a similar test for PAL, on AtariArea (PL) and here on AtariAge as well; the last post of that thread contains the results.

For PAL/SECAM, Altirra's default settings are somewhat misleading, as typically more than 240 scanlines are visible in these TV systems.

 

Thanks for the info; I wasn't aware that all PAL displays were like that.

 

In that case I'm just interested in NTSC, since my point is to have information for image, game, and application screen creation for Atari systems.

 

 

That entirely depends on your setting of View->Overscan Mode. The default value of 224 for NTSC is probably based on the size of action-safe area by cutting the recommended 3.5% from the top and bottom of the screen.

 

Yes, I was just talking about for "normal" overscan mode.

[Rybags]

Yep, PAL here so more than 240 and I've got 3 options:

 

- old CRT TV from the 80s which has a V-height adjustment which I've used.   From memory I set it so it'd be about 260... if you set it much under about 245 the blanks between scanlines become annoyingly visible (which is what NTSC would give you by default), and if you set it too much over 260 the aspect ratio starts to look crap.

 

- 1084S monitor with it's various height and size adjustments.  I generally set it to equivalent to showing about 336 x 256 pixels.

 

- modern LCD via 16 KHz RGB to VGA converter (uses VBXE output).  This has various options but shows most/all overscan area if you want but I generally reduce it as it also shows unwanted glitching in some areas.

[a8isa1]

I'll have to move the TV back to the desk later Today.

 

I'm posting results for my old scan converter, 2002 Viewsonic VB50HRTV and 2000 vintage 15" Compaq CRT because I was surprised and I think what I found is interesting. [EDIT] This is NTSC.  I assume scan converters are not part of the poll's scope.

resolution                 refresh rate
                       60 Hz       75Hz
 
640x480                09-228      09-228                    
800x600                03-234      02-233
852x480                03-232      03-232
1024x768               04-235      N/A

Edited by a8isa1, Tue Jan 9, 2018 10:28 AM.

[Gunstar]

Here's my problem, I use an LCD monitor, but it's NTSC VGA, while my computer is PAL and output is converted to VGA 60Hz from PAL 50Hz s-video. But I definitely get all 240 lines on my LCD monitor, after all, the monitor can do better than 1080p and and them my 240 line PAL image is upscaled to 480p then displayed at 1024x768 VGA. So how do you recommend I vote?

Edited by Gunstar, Tue Jan 9, 2018 11:06 AM.

[a8isa1]

TV is hooked up.  Overscan is horrible and because of the round corners of the picture tube no scanline graph lines extend to either side.

 

I'm going to make a judgement call.   I'm picking lines that actually reach the circumference of the rounded corners.  I make it 12 and 224 for 213 scan lines.

[MrFish]

Here's my problem, I use an LCD monitor, but it's NTSC VGA, while my computer is PAL and output is converted to VGA 60Hz from PAL 50Hz s-video. But I definitely get all 240 lines on my LCD monitor, after all, the monitor can do better than 1080p and and them my 240 line PAL image is upscaled to 480p then displayed at 1024x768 VGA. So how do you recommend I vote?

 

Is your machine originally PAL or a hybrid (I seem to recall you mentioning it being hybrid before).

 

Because I'm just interested in NTSC at this point, it would only matter if your machine is being detected as NTSC.

 

So, if you'll boot into Turbo-BASIC XL, type this command, and hit return:

? PEEK (53268) & 14

 

If it returns zero "0", your machine is being detected as PAL. Otherwise it's detected as NTSC -- at least with this routine that I use.

 

If it's detected as NTSC then go ahead and select 240 for NTSC LCD.

Edited by MrFish, Tue Jan 9, 2018 12:15 PM.

[_The Doctor__]

NTSC

Any CRT I used was always adjusted to show the full screens of Arkanoid and other such games... I adjusted height first and width second (even if a soldering iron was required), I did not give a rats *ss about dots crawling at the top of the screen or uneven lines at the bottom for various broadcast television even when sent to a a monitor, I always made the whole thing fit. No one ever complained, they enjoyed seeing everything there was to see. Never counted for much, just made sure linearity, convergence, and aspect ratio were maintained... the crt's always showed the complete field... here the problem though when we actually bothered to count

the TUBE based monitor would not give us more than 504 visible lines....now we knew the first 21 lines contained all kinds of crap.... but really only the first 9 were needed for anything of value and I think later it might have been up to 15? for color correction info?  We ended up losing a few lines to know where land !! on the scope the only things we could conclude was the tubes didn't have the ability to keep up... so 525 came in and 504 came out using what was thought to be at the time 504-525=21... which is roughly what gets tossed away at the start of things, those lines are used for all kinds of crap... on later televisions and monitors that's the crud (dots and such beginning the screen...)

 

If you are doing this to determine the most a person should do on a computer using televison or old vacuum tube board based crt monitors 504 should be the limit, and heck some of those only would show around 500 visible

 

what came later? that was crazy depending on dot pitch and manufacturer.. the most I saw was JVC and NEC... fine dot pitch Super class monitors 530 dots give or take and 560 lines? (can't remember)  ymmv it's probably in a book buried with Jimmy Hoffa.... this was not the norm but it sure looked good with the proper source material... then the modern hybrids came and all that goes out the window CRT monitor class televisions, but hey what about the EGA CGA VGA monitors from back then? Do we want to go there? It gets tough because I think you are talking monitors, but with the added stipulation NTSC/PAL... which limits things.

Edited by _The Doctor__, Tue Jan 9, 2018 2:20 PM.

[jmccorm]

Hey, I wanted to thank you for reminding me of this issue!

My vertical and horizontal center was off (too low, and slightly too right), and the vertical size was zoomed in too far.

 

Surprisingly, on the Sharp TV/VCR combo from 1997 that I am using, there were no back-of-the-set controls, and NONE of these settings were adjustable with the built-in menu. To reach the service menu options, I had to Google a technical service manual and discover the special combo of holding the CHANNEL UP button while plugging the TV into the wall socket (just using the power button wasn't enough). It fixed things up quite well, but it reached the edge of what it would allow on the vertical centering.

 

You mentioned the curved tube (which I have) but if I understand you correctly, you've left it up to us if we're going to measure it? Do we state how many complete lines are visible (save for the last inch or so on the curved edges), or do we reply with the maximum number of lines we see in the very center of the tube at the top and bottom?

 

Before tuning, my NTSC TV resolution was around 220 at the center, which was awful.

After tuning, my resolution at the center is 236, and the complete edge-to-edge lines are 220.

 

Again, not the direction you were heading, but thanks for the reminder to tune our sets for horizontal and vertical positioning as we see fit. (Realizing, of course, that maximizing resolution in most cases will increase border size in most applications.) Works well for me because I was just working with a series of images that filled all the vertical scan lines.

[Gunstar]

 

Is your machine originally PAL or a hybrid (I seem to recall you mentioning it being hybrid before).

 

Because I'm just interested in NTSC at this point, it would only matter if your machine is being detected as NTSC.

 

So, if you'll boot into Turbo-BASIC XL, type this command, and hit return:

? PEEK (53268) & 14

 

If it returns zero "0", your machine is being detected as PAL. Otherwise it's detected as NTSC -- at least with this routine that I use.

 

If it's detected as NTSC then go ahead and select 240 for NTSC LCD.

Right in the post you quoted, I clearly stated a PAL machine. But I guess i was confused, since you are only looking for NTSC, since you posted all the PAL options too...

[kenjennings]

There are NTSC TELEVISIONS (not monitors)  that show  240 scan lines ?  I'd like to see that.   I had a plain, old, goldstar 13" color TV back in the 80s  A custom graphics mode could go to 212 scan lines before the corners touched the bevels.  Any more and graphics were lost.

 

Atari purposely limited the OS  graphics modes to 192 scan lines (though ANTIC has no problem doing much more), because of big bevels and extensive overscan on many TVs , especially those console TVs.  My Atari 800 on a friend's console TV had the corners of a default graphics 0 screen solidly under bezels with almost no black border visible.

[_The Doctor__]

oh my you suffered much injustice Mr. Jennings... but televisions had square edges and were monitor class by the latter half of the 80's,

now late 70's super early 80-82 not so much...

 

every early display I came into contact with got the adjustments done,  it was just expected that I would Doctor it up on arrival... cover off the back plastic alignment tools and patterns brought in from the cars trunk...

Edited by _The Doctor__, Wed Jan 10, 2018 10:03 PM.

[Stephen]

Tried this with my 1088XEL setup in PAL mode.  It is connected to a Sony 14" PVM.  I see from 0 to 239.  I cannot get a decent pic of the screen - my cell phone has a seizure (as I almost do) with the 50Hz flicker of the screen.

[Osgeld]

I dont have any crt's and none of my LCD's are <= 240

[FULS]

This video seems to be very interesting.

https://www.youtube....h?v=3BJU2drrtCM

 

Have a great day,

Doug

[CharlieChaplin]

Hmmm,

 

Mr Fish's test program gave me 240 scanlines, no surprise, since I have a PAL Atari and PAL tv.

Pavros test program gave me 272 scanlines (moved the zero to the very top of my PAL-only tv and at the very bottom I could see two lines/stripes below 270, so thats 272 scanlines I guess)... This "old" PAL tv from the 80s has no height or width settings that are adjustable.

 

Will test the newer PAL tv's from the 90s and 2000s in the next days and also one LCD PAL tv by Toshiba (which shows a very bad picture when the A8 is connected to it).

Edited by CharlieChaplin, Thu Jan 18, 2018 4:01 PM.