Best color for PAL game on NTSC TV?

[Swami]

So, I managed to track down an 20 inch (51 cm) NTSC TV from 1982 that has a vertical hold on it (FREE!!), so I can play PAL games with a PAL ANTIC in my NTSC 800xl (that don't work on a more modern NTSC TVs) by adjusting the vertical hold. The color looks really good, although, for all I know it is off. My question is, what would give the best color for these PAL games on the NTSC TV? An NTSC 800xl with the PAL ANTIC and/or GTIA or a full PAL 800xl? Would the full PAL 800xl end up black and white on the NTSC TV? Thanks!

[Rybags]

GTIA isn't a straightforward swap - the PAL one uses a seperate crystal to source the colourburst frequency and as a result the motherboard design is different. People have put the PAL GTIA in and I think there's even an adaptor board that's been made.

 

But chances are your TV will just show black and white. If it's a commonly used TV for retro gear then you could search for other people's results with it.

 

For Atari games in general, it's usually a case of PAL machines suffering poor colour from NTSC developed games rather than the other way around.

 

There's plenty of colour bar programs around - an NTSC machine running PAL Antic but with GTIA untouched should still show it's original colours.

[Swami]

Well, I have discovered through personal experience that a PAL 800xl will give you black and white, B&W, on an old NTSC CRT TV. Also, I don't think you can get the RF to tune on one of those old 80's TVs with the VHF and UHF dial and only the RF coax and antenna screws. I use this because it was 21", free and has vertical hold adjust. I read in a post on here somewhere that said a UK PAL I 800XL will tune to one of RF channel 34 or 36, but upon some investigation I found the frequency this corresponds to does not correspond to a US channel. I think it lies 3MHz off an American channel.

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/137509-tv-channels-used-by-the-various-400800xlxe-machines/?p=1663194

 

UK PAL CH36 - 591.25MHz video/597.25MHz audio

 

US NTSC CH34 - 593 MHz video; CH33 - 587 MHz video

 

It might be possible to use the coarse and fine tune rings on the knobs, but I was not able to do it. I end up having to send the composite through an old VCR and RF out to the CRT. I'm sure composite from the PAL 800XL will work on my multi-region LCD TV fine.

 

My NTSC 800XL will give color on the ancient 1980 NTSC CRT after a swap to a PAL ANTIC, but I wanted to see if I get some different, better color with the full PAL 800XL. Turned out to be the opposite.

 

 

So....pretty sure the answer to this one is that the only way to get any color on one of these old 70's to early 80's NTSC TVs, and most NTSC only CRTs/LCDs after this and NTSC only monitors, like 1702 and some PVM, is the ANTIC switch is an NTSC 800XL.