Streaming RF without a VCR displaying in RGB

tripletopper · August 15, 2020

I bought on eBay a cheap Chinese device called an MTV box, which if the chinglish means what I think it means it was supposed to be an ntsc /PAL/SECAM tuner which lets you convert RF signals into VGA signals.

at first I thought it didn't work then I noticed why splitting a VGA unless both devices are connected will not make one or the other. It's either both or nothing.

So I went straight to the VGA Monitor, and got a blue screen and an on-screen menu.

in about 5 minutes of getting things wrong I finally figured out how to navigate the menu.

There are options called video / TV, and color space, which have options like Auto which other the text was coming in as well as ntsc pal and secam.

the physical adapter I found out is either a Euro adapter or a proprietary adapter from MTVBox which doesn't list any manufacturer name so it's probably just a generic Chinese knockoff that various companies produce.

The weird thing is regardless of the color the tuning system is not in traditional ntsc frequency designations like most VCRs and tuners in America they are numbered in xxx.25 M where XXX is a 2 or 3 digit number from about 80 to 700. The number XXX is always odd and the decimal point is always .25. So whatever the unit of M is, I don't know whether it's wavelength in meters or frequency in megahertz, but I can't figure out how to get 3 channels on there.

for Video Game machines there are probably only three channels will ever need unless you go into dedicated systems that are single games with no removable ROM, and on everything I've seen there either Channel 2 and 3 or channel 3 and 4. Since there was an analog channel 3 in my Cleveland market, and they might be broadcasting a candlelight broadcast saying please insert your digital converter box or buy a new TV to get all the signals, so the analog 3 may still be active. I see options for auto-tune where I try to turn on a video game system and see if it picks up a frequency but it doesn't. Then I try to manually tune, but the numbers are not ntsc Channel designations but either wavelengths in meters or frequencies in megahertz.

Can someone tell me how to manually program ntsc analog 2 3 and 4, (and hopefully not, but will do, other channels that are use by other RF-only video game consoles)

does anyone know if antenna tuners are Universal if you could fit the physical connectors in the right way. I understand the different standards are how TV transmits color information will still be in black and white compatible. It seems like this device could adjust four different standards around the world.

By the way all my home consoles that are RF only are all American consoles. I have no Japanese or european ones in the bunch, or if they are, they're made for the American market.

Mikebloke · August 15, 2020

I'll say what my experience is, I got a USB tuner a few years ago, it sounds like it operates very closely to your device.

All formats of signal appear to be standard, I can do NTSC (both American and Japanese), PAL, SECAM and a few more. This seems to be standard to ensure universal ability which naturally makes it easier to sell. You should be able to insert any type of RF video device into it, or buy an adaptor to convert it. I've even wound some copper wiring into a point and inserted it into a port and its worked fine (although not the best idea!) so it should work no matter what you throw at it.

I find however, so much of the software is based on automatic tuning, I can edit entries to fine tune the channel in the software but you often can't make new ones yourself, which is frustrating when you know exactly what frequency to use. automatic tuning on these devices (and tvs generally) often simply replace rather than add to existing channels, so if I'm trying to find a new signal, I often have to sacrifice the ones I'd hard earned to scan already.

None of these devices work perfectly, none of these devices I could recommend fully, none of these devices work reliably every time. The converting and recording of RF remains a total pain in the butt.

tripletopper · August 15, 2020

I was hoping someone at atariage would be able to know how to run these.

Luckily this was one of many options and not an option I must have or else it would.

luckily got a second streaming Studio where I could do like gun games and RF games.

No big loss just thought it would make certain things easier.

carlsson · August 15, 2020

In NTSC, channels 2-4 equal the VHF Band I:

Channel 1 = 45.25 MHz video, 49.75 MHz audio (withdrawn on June 14, 1948)

Channel 2 = 55.25 MHz video, 59.75 MHz audio

Channel 3 = 61.25 MHz video, 65.75 MHz audio

Channel 4 = 67.25 MHz video, 71.75 MHz audio

Channel 5 = 77.25 MHz video, 81.75 MHz audio

Channel 6 = 83.25 MHz video, 87.75 MHz audio

If your device really begins scanning around 80 MHz, it would mean it only supports part of VHF Band I which is strange. On PAL most systems begin at 41-47 MHz so it wouldn't work with those neither. In Japan, the VHF low-band starts at 91.25 MHz.

On the other end of the scale, you have UHF channels which easily go up to 800 MHz and super channels up to over 900-950 MHz depending on TV standard, so if the device only covers up to 700 MHz it would leave out most channels from UHF 51-83 depending on TV standard.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_channel_frequencies

I don't have a suggestion how to make it behave differently, if changing the TV standard from Auto to one of the other options doesn't help. I don't know about the US, if nearly every console and home computer operated on the VHF band on the lower channels 2-4 but in Europe a good number of home computers and even some consoles operated on UHF around channel 36.

tripletopper · August 15, 2020

There were options for VHF 1, VHF 2 and UHF.

But I'm not quite sure how to select it on my chinglish instruction book and very bare system OS

But thanks for the help, and I'll try again once I figure out why my Macintoshbfron 2011 can have 3 live camera feels but only display one to 2 at a time on OBS.

In the meantime, I'll play RF, and possibly more in the basement with a lower cllecel computer that can do standard definition and analog video

tripletopper · August 20, 2020

well I found that I turn on auto scan while the RF is plugged in and it's on Channel One, and I got video from the ColecoVision but not audio. a lot of ColecoVision games are silent until you press the game selection button.

2 questions about programming, since there's no TV plugged in should I set all my game consoles to channel 3 so that they all work on the same frequencies instead of having to have separate two three and four frequencies?

second question is should I run a video game that constantly plays music like for example Carnival or Venture on the ColecoVision? maybe you could better pick up the audio frequency if there's actually audio playing cuz currently I got some sort of data squelch on my audio channel.

(Played with it for a couple days. Left post in limbo. Now coming to this conclusion.)

fiddling with the controls I found in a place that is not supposed to organically be on the menu a place to determine whether you use PC sound or if sound both or something else I can't tell the other one background.

I don't know what exactly the setting is called or what it should be set on but now it seems like my RF adapter is better than either my S video adapter or a specific machine on it.

My ColecoVision looks perfectly clear on the MTV box. So good I canceled the refund.

Now I got to figure out why the MTVBox looks better than my N64 going through S-Video into an S-Video to VGA adapter.

The S video is getting jail bars. I'll see if it's just the N64 all s videos or all s videos plus composites be back in a couple hours to tell you.

tripletopper · August 21, 2020