Hooking up an Atari 800 to modern flat screen TV?

[Ted Sandler]

Does anyone have suggestions for a converter to connect an old Atari 800 computer to a modern flat screen television?

 

I've attached a cable coaxial converter to the RF cable and plugged it into the flatscreen, but the picture looks very dim.

 

Suggestions welcomed!

[Paul Westphal]

Hercules workshop ( in Canada ) sells a monitor out to composite ( yellow, red , white ) cable. There are cheaper ones on eBay...

[+gnusto]

The Sophia board provides DVI out to an 8bit that for some TVs and monitors can be converted to HDMI with an adapter (the signal Sophia produces doesn't work with all monitors). This is the best quality you can get out of an 8bit. If you don't feel like working inside the Atari, an RGB to composite converter as Paul describes is probably your best bet, or alternately an RGB to s-video if your TV takes it.

 

Edit to clarify: I realized I was inexact above - the Sophia always work with DVI, but it is rare that TVs take DVI, that's mostly computer monitors. When using DVI to HDMI, many TVs will just work with a Sophia, and for many modern TVs HDMI is all you get. If you happen to have S-Video in, there are cables available for that for the 800 and even instructions on how to make them. And your final step down is an RGB to component cable as described.

 

Sophia: Best quality, HDMI, requires internal electronics

S-Video: Medium quality, cable only available

Composite: Worst quality, cable only available

Edited February 5, 2020 by gnusto
clarification

[oracle_jedi]

Depends on what inputs you have on your modern flat screen TV.

 

As Paul says, a simple solution is the composite video option, if you have composite-in (yellow or green/yellow plug) and the resulting output is acceptable to you.

 

Some modern TVs still have SVideo inputs, although they are getting very rare nowadays, and that will offer a slightly better display for an Atari 800 or 800XE, but not all 800XLs had separate chroma/luma outputs, so you need to make sure your Atari has the requisite monitor port wiring, or be willing to add it with a bit of modding.

 

If you are in Europe then you might have a SCART option.  I don't know if they still fit those plugs to European sets, but if you have one, it usually supports composite video.

 

If you want HDMI then you need either an upscaler or a Sophia video mod.  Upscalers will up-convert your composite video into HDMI adding scan lines to maintain resolution and try to address the blurring that occurs when you plug composite video into a modern high-res TV.   Prices range from cheap, to the Frameister XRGB unit which is very nice, but also very expensive, and not for the casual/occasional user.

 

The Sophia mod will allow your Atari to output DVI natively, but it is difficult to fit to an original Atari 800 due to the shielding.  If your 800 is a genuine original 800, with flip up cartridge door and 48K of RAM, the Sophia will be a challenge to install, but it has been done.  For 800XL or 800XE machines it is much simpler.  The DVI output can then be converted to HDMI with a simple adapter I believe, although to be sure, I have not personally tried this, as I still use CRTs for my Ataris.

 

 

 

[TGB1718]

5 hours ago, oracle_jedi said:

If you are in Europe then you might have a SCART option.  I don't know if they still fit those plugs to European sets, but if you have one, it usually supports composite video.

 

SCART died many years ago here too along with S-Video, I use an older flat scren TV which takes all the older

standards (MIKOMI TV) ,UHF tuner, Dual SCART, Composite Video, S-Video and VGA, spoilt for choice

[drpeter]

You have to be careful with SCART because the connector has so many pins, catering potentially for any combination of analogue inputs (audio, composite video, RGB component video, S-video), that many cheaper connectors and cables are only wired to output/carry/receive a subset of the possible signals

Edited February 5, 2020 by drpeter

[Gunstar]

Yes, DVI and HDMI video signal is the same, a simple adapter is all that is needed. I have an HDMI-to-DVI one I use to use to hook my more modern video equipment with HDMI to a DVI input on an old projection TV I used to have. In this case one would need a DVI-to-HDMI adapter. \

 

Isn't TF_HH's Super Color Video Card a better way to go for the 800 than Sophia anyway? I know it only puts out s-video/composite, AFAIK, but it's high-quality and ready for a converter for a good, clean picture on a modern TV (with a good converter).

Edited February 6, 2020 by Gunstar

[Gavin1968]

I use this on mine, seems to work well, but I prefer my CRT TV's for my old classic Atari 800

https://www.vintagecomputercenter.com/product/a-v-audio-video-tv-cable

[Sugarland]

On 2/4/2020 at 10:50 PM, Ted Sandler said:

Does anyone have suggestions for a converter to connect an old Atari 800 computer to a modern flat screen television?

 

I've attached a cable coaxial converter to the RF cable and plugged it into the flatscreen, but the picture looks very dim.

 

Suggestions welcomed!

 

The easiest solution is to turn the brightness and contrast up on the TV. Other than that it's hard to suggest anything without knowing the brand/model of said TV. What inputs does it take?

 

[+mytek]

Anyone try this?

Now listed for $17.50 at eBay.

 

[+gnusto]

5 hours ago, mytek said:

Anyone try this?

That is almost certain to be crap. The market is pretty flooded right now with rock bottom Chinese mass produced video converters. If you care about image quality you probably want something like the OSSC (note: the OSSC is open source, and you can build it yourself, but there are a lot of premade options) or a Retrotink 2x Pro. I was fortunate enough some time back to land a Framemeister XRGB Mini but they are no longer made (I think) and the prices have just gone ridiculous in the past year or so. It was never cheap, but sheesh nowadays.

 

Anyway, suffice to say cheap video converters almost always present a full frame or more of delay, don't deal well or at all with artifacting, and usually have terrible image quality in the best cases (visible banding, noise, drift or poor center). It's one of those areas where saving money doesn't really save you money.

 

 

[Sugarland]

5 hours ago, mytek said:

Anyone try this?

Now listed for $17.50 at eBay.

 

Interesting but aren't the genders of the plugs all backwards on that photo?  Would want an HDMI male plug to plug into TV and female RCA'S.

[Rybags]

Not really.  Generally with anything bigger than a dongle with HDMI you'll run a cable.  That thing would be too heavy and put strain on the circuit board if plugged direct, and also plenty of TVs have the plug parallel to the back of the rear cover with only a few mm clearance.

 

Quality - well, like I've said before you can't really improve if the source signal isn't very good to begin with.  Likely you'd end up with some of the unwanted artifacts that you get on modern TVs from the Atari anyway like accentuated vertical bars where the refresh cycles occur and variance in luma at pixel and/or cycle boundaries.

But given that modern day TVs tend to give you only HDMI and composite with no S-Video or (very annoyingly) component, at the price seems a pretty worthwhile solution.

[bfollowell]

57 minutes ago, gnusto said:

If you care about image quality you probably want something like the OSSC (note: the OSSC is open source, and you can build it yourself, but there are a lot of premade options) or a Retrotink 2x Pro.

While true in general, an OSSC wouldn't help in this case. The OSSC has neither composite or S-Video inputs. Assuming your 8-bit hadn't been upgraded to some other video output capabilities, the Retrotink devices would be the best bet. If your 8-bit were to happen to have one of the Sophia RGB up the VBXE upgrades, you might be able to use the OSSC. Cool Novelties makes a really nice custom SCART cable for the 1088XEL with either the Sophia RGB or the VBXE, that you can then feed to the OSSC. I'm not sure if it will only work with the 1088XEL or if will also work with a regular 8-bit that has one of these upgrades.

 

[Rybags]

Looks to be a scandoubler with more options but no buffering or framerate conversion.  PAL can have issues there as some monitors don't like 50 Hz.

[+gnusto]

1 hour ago, bfollowell said:

The OSSC has neither composite or S-Video inputs. Assuming your 8-bit hadn't been upgraded to some other video output capabilities, the Retrotink devices would be the best bet.

Yes, should have been more clear about that (was trying to cover all the bases with the quality converters I know of). Or at least heard of, I don't have a retrotink because of the aforementioned Framemeister. Which for the record is fantastic - I use it for a lot of old devices actually, not just the A8.

[+mytek]

Ok perhaps I wasn't clear about this... what I was really trying to ask was has anyone tried this particular converter with an Atari 800, or for that matter any Atari 8-bit computer?

 

I am fully aware of what some of the other Chinese made converters look like, and have tried a number of those over the years, but this one is new to me so I was curious if someone had used one already, and what they thought of it.

 

I wasn't asking for speculation .

 

[BillC]

8bitclassics sells a composite only to HDMI device for $20.00. Since their primary market is vintage computers/video game consoles I would think it would be compatible and offer a decent picture, though I haven't tested it myself. They do sell good monitor cables, which I have purchased.

 

https://www.8bitclassics.com/product/armor3-composite-av-to-hdmi-converter-box/

[Jetboot Jack]

Try one of these - 

 

 

sTeVE

[tschak909]

2 hours ago, Jetboot Jack said:

Try one of these - 

 

 

sTeVE

Yup, exactly, a RetroTink 2X + one of the S-Video AV cables from AtariClassics = ALL YOU NEED.

https://www.8bitclassics.com/product/atari-xlxe-5-pin-din-to-s-video-composite-av-cable/

 

Optional: Add a UAV inside the computer to _REALLY_ clean up your video signal
https://thebrewingacademy.com/products/tba-ultimate-atari-video-uav-board-for-400-800-xl-xe

 

 

-Thom

[+mytek]

21 hours ago, mytek said:

Anyone try this?

Now listed for $17.50 at eBay.

 

Since the answer was apparently no to my question, I went ahead and bought one today to try for myself. And before anyone tells me what a piece of cr_p it likely is, I figured it was worth a gamble to see for myself, because I have a specific use case that requires a very compact and inexpensive S-Video to HDMI converter. I already have a RetroTink for comparison.

 

[tschak909]

they do work, with that said...

 

All of these devices use the same few chips for conversion. Ultimately the comb filters present in them are very good for connecting up VCR's and more modern machines, and introduce luma combs in busy parts of the screen. Spending on the RetroTink is a good investment, and is tuned to deal with these off-spec video signals that our older machines produce.

 

-Thom

[bfollowell]

I'd be curious to know how it worked. For my 1088, once I get it to 100%, it has Sophia DVI, and will have VBXE, if it ever gets shipped, so the only time I'd ever need composite is for those things that I really need artifacting for. Since I've already put two expensive video upgrades into it, and spent $150 on an OSSC, I'd really rather not invest $125 in a RetroTink just for composite use if this little device would do in a pinch. I'll be curious to hear about, and maybe see, your results.

 

[Colleton]

I've used a couple of Orei upscalers and they've both worked well for me in connecting an A8 to a modern TV.

 

This one is in stock:  https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004UNYX9M/

This one isn't, but I like it better:  https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00A7B0YZI/

This Monoprice unit works well if you only have a DVI input, but you'll need external speakers:  https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009GUNEAI/

 

[bfollowell]

I’m sort of confused on that last one. You said it required external speakers, but the description said it’s a DVI and R/L Stereo Audio to HDMI converter.

 

If it doesn’t work with sound it’s a waste of money because you don’t need a converter to go from DVI to HDMI. You only need a cheap DVI to HDMI cable if you’re not worried about sound.