Getting Better Image Quality with Composite A/V?

[Taijigamer]

That product is probably good for a cheap option but it only upscales CVBS and S-Video. When we refer to Frameister and OSSC we are looking at upscaling Component video (be it Y,Cb,Cr or RBGS/HV) for best possible picture quality.

 

The OSSC is a good product from my point of view. Half the price of Frameister, open source, well supported and offers many input options (Scart, Component, VGA). It also offers a lot of settings to get the maximum picture quality out of your favourite consoles.

[keepdreamin]

 

 

The Framemeister is good. Picture quality is fantastic. However, it introduces noticeable input lag on most retro game systems. For a Device that goes for upwards of $400 - this is completely unacceptable. Honestly, the Framemeister is really intended for converting old VHS videotape and other low res video recordings up to HD scale, but it's not really designed for fast paced button mashing retro gaming.

 

 

Yeah, this is a complete load of bull. I'm not sure where this is all coming from. First of all, the Framemeister is marketed for retro gaming as a large focus of it's usage. This is coming directly from Micomsoft's literature.

 

I also don't get where you say it introduces lag for "most systems", implying some don't. It introduces 20ms for everything. PlayStation 1 to Master System, 20ms. 20ms is just shy of 1 1/2 frames. On a already slow TV this might push over the edge, but for decent sets it's fine. This is way less than the lag from a Raspberry Pi. I find the Framemeister and a Snes feels the same as the Nintendo snes classic edition. Perfectly fine.

 

Another key feature you've glossed over is the treatment of 240p and 480i. All cheap scalers I've ever seen treat 240p as 480i. This adds interlacing artifacts to flickering Sprites. Also causes anything moving to blur out. The framemeister can differentiate between 240p and 480i. 240p is treated as Progressive. The Retrotink would be the cheap solution people should look for if they want that taken care of. Not some random HD scaler off Amazon.

Edited July 16, 2018 by keepdreamin

[John Stamos Mullet]

 

Yeah, this is a complete load of bull. I'm not sure where this is all coming from. First of all, the Framemeister is marketed for retro gaming as a large focus of it's usage. This is coming directly from Micomsoft's literature.

 

I also don't get where you say it introduces lag for "most systems", implying some don't. It introduces 20ms for everything. PlayStation 1 to Master System, 20ms. 20ms is just shy of 1 1/2 frames. On a already slow TV this might push over the edge, but for decent sets it's fine. This is way less than the lag from a Raspberry Pi. I find the Framemeister and a Snes feels the same as the Nintendo snes classic edition. Perfectly fine.

 

Another key feature you've glossed over is the treatment of 240p and 480i. All cheap scalers I've ever seen treat 240p as 480i. This adds interlacing artifacts to flickering Sprites. Also causes anything moving to blur out. The framemeister can differentiate between 240p and 480i. 240p is treated as Progressive. The Retrotink would be the cheap solution people should look for if they want that taken care of. Not some random HD scaler off Amazon.

1.5 frames of loss per cycle from a device that costs $400 is completely unacceptable. You can buy two 50 inch 4K TVs for $400 these days.

[John Stamos Mullet]

That product is probably good for a cheap option but it only upscales CVBS and S-Video. When we refer to Frameister and OSSC we are looking at upscaling Component video (be it Y,Cb,Cr or RBGS/HV) for best possible picture quality.

 

The OSSC is a good product from my point of view. Half the price of Frameister, open source, well supported and offers many input options (Scart, Component, VGA). It also offers a lot of settings to get the maximum picture quality out of your favourite consoles.

yeah - that makes sense.

[Cobra Kai]

Ok, I'm going to chime in here with some pictures. First, here's a gratuitous and shameless couple of pictures of my gaming rig in the basement:

 

and a close up of what I currently have all simultaneously hooked up:

 

I disagree that you need a fancy $400 upconverter to get quality results. More power to you if you think that a Frameister will squeeze a little extra sharpness out of it than a 'cheap Amazon converter'. But, I've had wonderful results with my $50 unit from Amazon, seen here on the upper right. Next to it is a S-video automatic splitter, I can plug in up to 4 consoles through this as well. I'm not getting any interference with this either.

 

I know, I'm only upconverting S-video, but I'm happy with it. No lag either. Here are some Saturn screenshots:

 

Look how sharp that is. Are you going to try and convince me that if I spend an extra $350 to get the fancy Japanese upconverter that I would notice the difference? A $350 difference? I consider myself a videophile, I'm into 4K UHD, and I have spent lots of money upgrading all my old consoles so they can play on my rig with S-video. I want great picture quality, it means alot to me. Sometimes you can just buy better cables, like for your SNES, sometimes you need to do actual mods like with any pre-NES, I don't see how you avoid it. You will probably have to spend some money either way, but I definitely say you don't have to spend a ton on an HDMI upconverter. Your mileage may vary, and your budget too.

 

I'm not going to lie, I would like to see what the max potential of my systems could pull off, but not for that kind of money.

 

Also, you should know, you will want to upgrade from Composite to at least S-video. I have my Genesis/32x hooked up with composite, it's the only one, and it doesn't perform very well through the upconverter, not like S-video does, not even close.

 

Cheers

[John Stamos Mullet]

Yeah - my rig is similar. Running it into a Sharp 4K and the onboard composite input just wasnt cutting it. The TVs scaler just didnt handle making the jump from 480i/240p up to 2160p well. I took a flyer on the ekon after reading and watching a ton of reviews on similar products, and its as close to perfect as Im willing to spend.

[keepdreamin]

I like how in your dismissing of the Framemeister you conveniently just glossed over everything.

 

Does your Enko take a 4:3 source and properly display it inside a 16:9 1080P signal, or does it stretch the 4:3 image to 16:9 and you're left hoping your TV has some control over that? The Framemeister can properly put a 4:3 image inside its 16:9 1080P output.

 

Does your Enko treat 240P as 480i, or does it process it as a separate progressive image like a proper upscaler should? This is a big deal, interlacing a 240P image leads to all kinds of visual garbage. The Framemeister recognizes 240P as a progressive image and displays it properly.

 

Does your Enko offer scanlines, zoom, and overscan cropping abilities? The framemeister does.

 

Does the Enko accept RGB, component, and 480P over RGB (Dreamcast VGA). The Framemeister can.

 

Can you save setting profiles to quickly call up per different system? The framemeister can.

 

Lastly, is your Enko even faster than the Framemeister? I haven't seen you actually list any lag data for the amazon special.

 

Feel free to list all the devices the Framemeister is competing against that this 1 1/2 frames is supposedly ridiculous. Line doublers don't count. The Framemeister has a frame buffer, weird refresh systems can be displayed. There's no compatibility issues with any set. Yes it's expensive, but this has been known since 2011.

 

No one said anyone had to get a XRGB mini, mine's boxed in storage and I've moved on to the OSSC. The lag improvement was minimally noticeable at best, so this whole 1 - 1/2 frames is terrible angle is just bogus. I'm using the OSSC more because, 1) I have a TV that works with all the line doubling modes. If I still had a set that only took 480P from the OSSC, I'd pull back out the framemeister. 2) The 240P/480i switch is faster on the OSSC. 3) There's less noise on solid colors. 4) The OSSC does a bit better job with a 480P source. All that said, I found the framemeister to be equal to the SNES classic edition in terms of lag, which is perfectly acceptable. I'm holding onto the XRGB mini, because as of 2018 there's nothing on the market it compares to.

 

 

 

But we're talking about composite here. Anyone looking for low lag, composite/ s-video to HDMI that has 240P being treated as Progressive should look at the Retrotink. Not random amazon finds, for all those reasons I mentioned above.

Edited July 17, 2018 by keepdreamin

[Austin]

Look how sharp that is. Are you going to try and convince me that if I spend an extra $350 to get the fancy Japanese upconverter that I would notice the difference? A $350 difference?

Honestly, it's not all that sharp compared to what you'd get out of something like the Framemeister. Not to mention you're not getting the proper 4X3 aspect ratio with your device, which distorts the image further.

 

So with that said, I guess it needs to be clarified that no one is recommending the Framemeister as a first choice. It is my preferred device but that is because 95% of my game time these days is spent streaming and recording. It's by far the most flexible and reliable device for that purpose, there's no question about it.

 

Like I said a few posts back, cheaper devices like the Retro Tink or OSSC are what I recommend to people who aren't streaming or recording, but are looking for great, high quality, maybe "not as flexible" solutions: The Retro Tink for folks that don't want to go past s-video and the OSSC for people that want to dig into RGB (while still being able to use component and VGA). There are fantastic videos on YouTube from various folks that dig deep into these devices and compare them to some of the cheaper scalers, like RetroRGB and My Life In Gaming. They are great resources and when you see various captures side by side, the difference from a cheap scaler off of Amazon is pretty obvious.

 

If you are happy with your low-end device, that's perfectly fine, and that's all that really matters.

[keepdreamin]

Honestly, it's not all that sharp compared to what you'd get out of something like the Framemeister. Not to mention you're not getting the proper 4X3 aspect ratio with your device, which distorts the image further.

 

 

Thought this would be easier to just show.

 

This is a real Saturn hooked up to an OSSC with RGB. 5X scale which is 1080P output, that's why the top and bottom are slightly cropped. But the game is at the proper 4:3 ratio. Notice how the plane and bomb items aren't so squished. All this showing off forgotten, I'd rather play a game over composite with the proper aspect ratio and 240P treated as progressive versus a game over s-video or even RGB at the improper ratio and 240P is being interlaced.

Edited July 17, 2018 by keepdreamin

[youxia]

I'm just about to pick up a 24" Trinitron for about 30$. Reading through these learned squabbles is great fun

[Cobra Kai]

 

Thought this would be easier to just show.

 

This is a real Saturn hooked up to an OSSC with RGB. 5X scale which is 1080P output, that's why the top and bottom are slightly cropped. But the game is at the proper 4:3 ratio. Notice how the plane and bomb items aren't so squished. All this showing off forgotten, I'd rather play a game over composite with the proper aspect ratio and 240P treated as progressive versus a game over s-video or even RGB at the improper ratio and 240P is being interlaced.

1945saturn.jpg

That does look crisp. Why are the colors all screwed up? I'm getting full deep color, your picture is a blue wash. Is that your hdtv settings or is it something your upscaler is performing poorly at?

 

I knew the aspect ratio would be brought up, but it doesn't affect gameplay. I don't even think about the aspect ratio when I'm playing. Especially with shmups the most important factor at all is lag, and I don't have any lag. I don't even know how you could enjoyably play a game like Strikers with input lag.

[Austin]

I don't even know how you could enjoyably play a game like Strikers with input lag.

The OSSC has zero input lag.

[HoshiChiri]

There's two great truths to be had amongst all of this:

 

1) You're never going to get a perfect picture from composite on an LCD. It's simply too far removed from what modern TVs are trying to output. You can use many things to work on it, but it will never be perfect.

2) You won't necessarily get the same results from your gear as someone else with the same gear. The quality of your specific cables & boxes, plus any interference unique to your home, plus your TV's inherent input lag, & your own expectations will affect your performance.

 

Start by experimenting with what you have. Try connecting a system directly to the TV instead of through your switcher & see what happens. Wiggle your cables around to see if there's a small bend/break that could change the picture with manipulation. After that, decide how much you're willing to spend to upgrade your picture, and see if what you can get will work for you.

 

My setup consists of a 32" Samsung J6300, an MT-VIKI 8-to-1 composite switch, and an Enko converter. I'm happy with it- bright colors, not much lag, etc. I'm sure there's some lag, becuase I can't play Donkey Konga to save my life... but I did get through Parappa the Rapper & Um Jammer Lammy recently, so I do wonder if my secondhand drums are somewhat to blame. However- the picture is NOT CRISP. Becuase, as happy as me & Mr. Stamos' Mullet are with ours, the Enko is a converter, NOT an upscaler. It lets you hook up your composite via HDMI, and it's better than my built-in connection, but it's still a composite signal going into an LCD- it won't be perfect.

[CRTGAMER]

2010 Panasonic Viera 42" 1080P Plasma

PS2 and up look FANTASTIC on this thing when hooked up via Composite, and obviously, HDMI-connected stuff looks great. The problem is with Composite A/V-connected consoles, AKA the yellow wire with the red and white stereo sound wires.

 

The TV has a 480 mode and displays in the right aspect ratios (which are also fully adjustable and have a variety of filtering options), but anything connected via that yellow cable seems to get a slightly dirty, fuzzy signal. My Genesis is by far the worst; it looks like I'm playing it through an RF modulator in a thunderstorm.

 

Aside from modding all of my classic consoles, is there a way to clean this up? Would a better quality cable with more shielding help? I don't get interference with any other form of input. These Composite A/V consoles are routed through a multi-switch. I've used it before, and it worked ok on the CRT.

 

Plasma TVs are much more forgiving then LCD and LED TVs when it comes to upscale of lower resolutions. As others stated, component cables are a better connection, especially when enabling 480p mode. For older consoles that only have composite cable try a direct connection bypassing the switchbox to see if any improvement.

 

Can you post a picture of just the TV screen displaying a composite hookup console? The fuzzyness you describe could be an upscale issue at which better quality cables will make no difference. the 42" plasma even with the 480 mode feature still blowing the pixels up to the larger screen.

[Silverfleet]

I'll have to get some pics of the "interference" or "fuzziness" when I get a chance. It could be anything from bad power supplies, to bad grounds in my house's wiring, to crappy cables. I have no clue.

 

For now, I'm just running a modded Wii through Component to play the old stuff. After messing with some TV settings, as well as the settings on the emulators and Wii, it looks good enough on 90% of the games I've tried. I used a modded Wii on this particular TV for years now, and it does the job. I also have a Retropie kicking around that I can use that looks great on modern TV's.

 

I'll look into the OSSC and that cheaper Amazon option soon when I get the urge to use the real deal again.

[keepdreamin]

That does look crisp. Why are the colors all screwed up? I'm getting full deep color, your picture is a blue wash. Is that your hdtv settings or is it something your upscaler is performing poorly at?

 

I knew the aspect ratio would be brought up, but it doesn't affect gameplay. I don't even think about the aspect ratio when I'm playing. Especially with shmups the most important factor at all is lag, and I don't have any lag. I don't even know how you could enjoyably play a game like Strikers with input lag.

 

I don't see the colors being screwed up in person. Phone camera may not be 100%, but there's nothing wrong with the OSSC. It's doing true internal 4:4:4 color processing with a RGB source. It's possible the deep colors as you stated with your setup are actually exaggerated values. Kind of like how some people think HDR isn't vibrant enough because they're used to overblown color values. The color settings on the OSSC are stock, I haven't messed with them.

 

There is incredibly low lag in that setup. As Austin already stated, the OSSC has no lag. There's no frame buffer. That particular display is measured at 17ms, which for all HD sets has the lag measured at midscreen. If you were to do a lag test on a CRT midscreen as well, you'd see input lag of about 8.#ms, because it's halfway done drawing the frame. So that HDTV isn't 17ms slower than a CRT, it's around half a frame slower (17ms - 8ms).

 

My manual lag tests in the 240P test suite, which is a great indicator of gameplay impact, usually show delay of 0 frames.

Edited July 17, 2018 by keepdreamin

[keepdreamin]

happy as me & Mr. Stamos' Mullet are with ours, the Enko is a converter, NOT an upscaler. It lets you hook up your composite via HDMI, and it's better than my built-in connection, but it's still a composite signal going into an LCD- it won't be perfect.

 

You're incorrect.

 

 

Sorry, but that Enko he showed IS a scaler. It says scaler right on the picture, 1080P. A true converter makes no change to the source resolution. If it was a converter it would be putting out a 240P HDMI signal. I have not encountered a cheap converter that doesn't like anything below 480i. The ossc and Retrotink are some of the only devices I know of that can do a true 240P pass thru.

Edited July 17, 2018 by keepdreamin

[John Stamos Mullet]

I like how in your dismissing of the Framemeister you conveniently just glossed over everything.

 

Does your Enko take a 4:3 source and properly display it inside a 16:9 1080P signal, or does it stretch the 4:3 image to 16:9 and you're left hoping your TV has some control over that? The Framemeister can properly put a 4:3 image inside its 16:9 1080P output.

 

Does your Enko treat 240P as 480i, or does it process it as a separate progressive image like a proper upscaler should? This is a big deal, interlacing a 240P image leads to all kinds of visual garbage. The Framemeister recognizes 240P as a progressive image and displays it properly.

 

Does your Enko offer scanlines, zoom, and overscan cropping abilities? The framemeister does.

 

Does the Enko accept RGB, component, and 480P over RGB (Dreamcast VGA). The Framemeister can.

 

Can you save setting profiles to quickly call up per different system? The framemeister can.

 

Lastly, is your Enko even faster than the Framemeister? I haven't seen you actually list any lag data for the amazon special.

 

Feel free to list all the devices the Framemeister is competing against that this 1 1/2 frames is supposedly ridiculous. Line doublers don't count. The Framemeister has a frame buffer, weird refresh systems can be displayed. There's no compatibility issues with any set. Yes it's expensive, but this has been known since 2011.

 

No one said anyone had to get a XRGB mini, mine's boxed in storage and I've moved on to the OSSC. The lag improvement was minimally noticeable at best, so this whole 1 - 1/2 frames is terrible angle is just bogus. I'm using the OSSC more because, 1) I have a TV that works with all the line doubling modes. If I still had a set that only took 480P from the OSSC, I'd pull back out the framemeister. 2) The 240P/480i switch is faster on the OSSC. 3) There's less noise on solid colors. 4) The OSSC does a bit better job with a 480P source. All that said, I found the framemeister to be equal to the SNES classic edition in terms of lag, which is perfectly acceptable. I'm holding onto the XRGB mini, because as of 2018 there's nothing on the market it compares to.

 

 

 

But we're talking about composite here. Anyone looking for low lag, composite/ s-video to HDMI that has 240P being treated as Progressive should look at the Retrotink. Not random amazon finds, for all those reasons I mentioned above.

I could probably reply to some of your comments with either available facts, or my personal experiences, but clearly that would be pointless. You seem to want to fight anyone who disagrees with you. I'm not here for that. If someone wants to pay $400 for a framemeister, that's their call. I was merely sharing what I've seen first hand. Enjoy your games.

[keepdreamin]

I asked you simple questions regarding the performance of your Enko scaler. You've provided no details about the Enko and simply chose to trash the Framemeister. It's hard to take an opinion seriously if you can't elaborate on it.

[John Stamos Mullet]

Im not understanding how pointing out that the framemeister has delay (which you confirmed) and is $400 is trashing it?

 

Those are both facts.

[John Stamos Mullet]

As for the enko:

 

1. It is a scaler.

2. It scales composite video to 720p or 1080p.

3. I dont personally have a means by which to measure any input lag. To my eyes, and to those of the hundreds of reviews on the net for this product, there is none, or if there is any it is imperceptible.

4. No it does not offer scanlines. Not sure Id want it to since the goal is to scale it to 1080p.

5. Yes, it DOES properly recognize 4:3 content and displays it natively as such. Or I can adjust the TV if id like to see it stretched to fit.

6. The enko I bought only does composite to hdmi scaling. They also have another unit that does s-video and composite. Im not sure if they make one that handles True RGB, but I really dont care either as I dont have any systems with RGB cables, so I have no need nor desire for one.

7. The enko does not have presets or savestates or whatever. Doesnt need them. You plug a system in, turn it on, and it works. End of story.

 

Im not really interested in having a gear cock fight. I bought this device. I like it. It works well for my purposes. If you want to gearshame people, youre not going to get an argument out of me. Your setup is expensive and Im sure you love it. I like mine. Namaste.

[HoshiChiri]

 

You're incorrect.

 

 

Sorry, but that Enko he showed IS a scaler. It says scaler right on the picture, 1080P. A true converter makes no change to the source resolution. If it was a converter it would be putting out a 240P HDMI signal. I have not encountered a cheap converter that doesn't like anything below 480i. The ossc and Retrotink are some of the only devices I know of that can do a true 240P pass thru.

 

My mistake, didn't look at it too closely- I must own a different model.

[keepdreamin]

Just remember I'm not the one who started in on trashing gear that other people might own. For all you know the framemeister may be equal to or even a slightly bit faster than the scalar you just bought.

 

Does the Enko treat 240p as 480i or does it recognize 240p as progressive? If you're not sure, you can use the 240p test Suite to check this.

 

This is arguably the most important thing for a scaler to properly do, before RGB, before scan lines, before any of the other extra features, having 240p recognized as a progressive image is the first thing you should look for when shopping.

 

Recent Samsung televisions have been actually recognizing 240p as Progressive and displaying it properly. they would be a better idea than any scaler that is interlacing it instead. These TVs would be plugged up to with component ,preferably HD retrovision cables

Edited July 17, 2018 by keepdreamin

[John Stamos Mullet]

Last time I checked, Im allowed to make any opinion of retro video scaling/hdmi conversion gear I choose. My opinion is that the Framemeister is vastly overpriced for what it does. It thats trashing to you, then well, ok.

 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

This thread was started asking for peoples opinions on what gear to use for this upscaling hdmi conversion purpose -or not - and why. I offered my thoughts and experiences. You dont need to take personal offense. Im not insulting your gear. Im just explaining why *I* wouldnt use it.

[Silverfleet]

 

This thread was started asking for peoples opinions on what gear to use for this upscaling hdmi conversion purpose -or not - and why. I offered my thoughts and experiences. You dont need to take personal offense. Im not insulting your gear. Im just explaining why *I* wouldnt use it.

 

I started this thread looking to see if there was a better solution for running my Composite A/V-connected consoles and why the display was getting noise and other weirdness on my Plasma TV I just put in my game room.

 

I wasn't even thinking about upscalers, let alone arguing about them.

 

This has turned into a complete s***show.

 

Mods, feel free to close this one down. I think I got enough info to figure out the rest on my own. Thanks to those who actually helped!