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Upscalers, CRTs, PVMs & RGB: Retro gaming done right!

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Peltz

Member
I'm trying out Morrowind using Morrowind Watercolored and deliberately playing in 720p upscaled to 1080. Two reasons for that. One is that the sharp edges of the polygons can get a bit jarring compared to the smooth stylized textures at 1080, and second is that the lowpoly nature of older 3D games becomes more pronounced than they really appeared back in the day when you play them at much higher resolutions. Could potentially try even lower resolutions...

Yikes. Why?

I mean, yea you explained why. But... WHY?!
 

angelic

Banned
Ive found it interesting putting the 360 into mine, the scaler is very different to the internal one...playing edf 2025 set on the machine to 720p and 1080p on the FM gives really sharp results, maybe too little AA for some but i liked it.

Also 480p lets you apply scanlines which is quite fun too.
 
I'm still annoyed the Bandridge switches are no longer on eBay. Hell, they're not even in stock on Amazon.co.uk, and I don't think they could ship to the US even if they were.
 
I'm still annoyed the Bandridge switches are no longer on eBay. Hell, they're not even in stock on Amazon.co.uk, and I don't think they could ship to the US even if they were.

Did a popular youtube game personality clue people in resulting in a feeding frenzy? Wild how they dried up so fast.
 
I'm still annoyed the Bandridge switches are no longer on eBay. Hell, they're not even in stock on Amazon.co.uk, and I don't think they could ship to the US even if they were.

Hey, but now that there is no longer an easy switch to get, maybe some enthusiast will start making ones of better quality and selling them.
Not going to happen.
 

Peagles

Member
Hey, but now that there is no longer an easy switch to get, maybe some enthusiast will start making ones of better quality and selling them.
Not going to happen.

If I had the skills and resources to do this, I'd build and supply for gaf in a heartbeat.
 
If I had the skills and resources to do this, I'd build and supply for gaf in a heartbeat.

Think the hard part with something like that would be the housing for it tbh. In a few years with better 3d printing maybe not, but it is something you need actual unique manufacturing for. Unlike making custom cables and what not where you are using readily available parts.
 

baphomet

Member
Hey, but now that there is no longer an easy switch to get, maybe some enthusiast will start making ones of better quality and selling them.
Not going to happen.

Already happened.

1_scaled.jpg
 

Peagles

Member
Think the hard part with something like that would be the housing for it tbh. In a few years with better 3d printing maybe not, but it is something you need actual unique manufacturing for. Unlike making custom cables and what not where you are using readily available parts.

Yeh, I've already decided to get a 3d printer when it becomes feasible, just not sure how far away that is.
 

baphomet

Member
But the waitlist is so longgggg. I wish he were a Gaffer. I'm not feeling that forum.

Yea, they're pretty nice though. They wouldn't be hard to build of you were good with designing circuit boards. They're fairly simple.

I would still need at least 2, and possibly 3 to hook everything up at once. At some point its just not worth all the room that stuff takes up.
 
Hey Hey Hey,

So I'm trying to record original consoles but I still want this CRT, scanline, TV look to them.

I got one of them Scart to HDMI scalers,
It does a nice job for the price, You can see some parts where its de-interlacing a SNES as the pixels its moving go a little blurry
but its far better than anything else I've tried (without getting a more expensive upscaler)

anyway I'm happy with what it can do, but the output video is plan and widescreen,
So I've been trying to recreate some effects in premiere pro to make it look better.
I Have also been trying to split the video out to go into a TV,
I live in Europe so I use scart and have found one of these work quite well at giving me a passthrough with a composite out,
The only problem is getting a good quality one
(the one in the link is NOT a good quality one and is too wide for the upscaler as the power cable is next to the scart in port)
as adding this extra link to the chain degrades the quality of the recording, not a lot but you can notice it.


Heres what I have so far with a SNES
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HD10UGZOdBc

What do you guys think? any changes? I still need to sort out a border.
also getting the width right. I know that some people like the wide stretched look from how they played it even tho it should be more 4:3.
The upscaler I'm using gives me a 1080p wide video from the SNES.

Here you can see what was done to it
http://imgur.com/a/dQOku#0
along with fullsize images of each change

I'm also looking to do other consoles, I really like some of the CRT shaders, ones that give that rgb pixel look from a TV.
But I'm not really sure how to do them, hence why I'm showing you guys and asking for help

so, any ideas how can I recreate some of these shaders in premiere?


This is a slight crosspost with the RETROARCH thread as we're both after the same end results.
 

Peltz

Member
If you want direct capture while maintaining a CRT look and saving money, just emulate and use a good shader.

The interpolation on your image is pretty harsh in my humble opinion. No offense.
 
If you want direct capture while maintaining a CRT look and saving money, just emulate and use a good shader.
I've found issues with emulating, input lag and graphical problems, hence why I want to use original hardware

The interpolation on your image is pretty harsh in my humble opinion. No offense.

Yeah the images does tend to wobble up and down when moving, hmmmm
also Its not something I'm doing so I can't exactly take offence.

It doesn't seem as bad at 50fps but you do notice it
 

Khaz

Member
Shame it appears to be powered. It's the fact that the Bandridge was a non-powered switch (at least, one of the variants) that appealed to me, since I'm short on plugs.

The powered thing most likely means it's an automatic switch, which I like very much because I'm lazy like that.
 

baphomet

Member
Shame it appears to be powered. It's the fact that the Bandridge was a non-powered switch (at least, one of the variants) that appealed to me, since I'm short on plugs.

Its also powered off the scart cable as long as it has the 5v connected. The ac adapter is in case you want to use nonpowered cables.
 

BONKERS

Member
But the waitlist is so longgggg. I wish he were a Gaffer. I'm not feeling that forum.

AFIRemember he was selling them on Shmups and Assembler. Both forums I can vouch for personally. Tons of positive experiences on both.

https://www.assemblergames.com/foru...utomatic-8-1-SCART-RGB-switch&highlight=SCART

I'm trying out Morrowind using Morrowind Watercolored and deliberately playing in 720p upscaled to 1080. Two reasons for that. One is that the sharp edges of the polygons can get a bit jarring compared to the smooth stylized textures at 1080, and second is that the lowpoly nature of older 3D games becomes more pronounced than they really appeared back in the day when you play them at much higher resolutions. Could potentially try even lower resolutions...

Words cannot describe how much I disagree with this.

However, whatever works for you /shrug
 

Filben

Member
I still need to sort out a border. also getting the width right. I know that some people like the wide stretched look from how they played it even tho it should be more 4:3.
The upscaler I'm using gives me a 1080p wide video from the SNES.
Strech it to you desired aspect ratio. You won't get rid off those borders, so strech the image until they disappear (while maintain the 4:3 ratio, of course. Those black borders, for obvious reasons, you will not get removed).

I prefer the old games in 4:3, too. Although some work well with a streched widescreen look.

Here's a video from Rayman 2 (PS1 and N64):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tD3CCQoqaA
Captured via RGB to HDMI. The scaler sent the signal in 720p, and streched, to the PC. I cropped (since there are black borders around the image no matter what resolution or aspect ratio) and reduced the resolution accordingly post-process.

This is how the signal gets through:
You see those very black borders you got.

And cropped:
 

antibolo

Banned
Gonna take some pictures of my living room tomorrow (need to do some cleaning up first lol).

Is there still interest in making our own retro-focused gaming setup thread?
 

televator

Member
Gonna take some pictures of my living room tomorrow (need to do some cleaning up first lol).

Is there still interest in making our own retro-focused gaming setup thread?

I've been doing just that the last 2 days... Holly shit! Reorganizing my entire catalogue, modifying my shelves, rerouting my AV connections... It's like I'm launching a space shuttle. lol
 

brainpann

Member
Gonna take some pictures of my living room tomorrow (need to do some cleaning up first lol).

Is there still interest in making our own retro-focused gaming setup thread?

I think it would be nice. Wecan share any tips or tricks for organizing all of our stuff.
 

D.Lo

Member
Gonna take some pictures of my living room tomorrow (need to do some cleaning up first lol).

Is there still interest in making our own retro-focused gaming setup thread?
I'm in. But will need to reorganiise to make room for my second Famicom (dedicated to FDS) and Mark III first!
 

Huggers

Member
Don't change a thing! I'm not gonna post mine if people are gonna judge my messy small apartment lol. I need some company :p

Don't worry bro I got you. Mine is a proper disaster area. You go in the modern setups thread and everyone's home looks like 50 Cents gaff
 

Filter

Member
Does anybody have any suggestions on what machine would be best to run mame with a scart out connection?

I have an Astro city arcade machine shell with a monitor in it that has a scart connection.
At the moment I am using an original old Xbox to run mame but I don't think it really has the power to run cps2 stuff reliably. Playing super street fighter II turbo, it's important to have a reliable frame rate or it's just frustrating.

The good thing about the Xbox is that it has scart and works with a keyboard encoder that I've got wired up to the sticks and buttons.

Maybe the best option is just to build a supergun?
 

D.Lo

Member
Don't worry bro I got you. Mine is a proper disaster area. You go in the modern setups thread and everyone's home looks like 50 Cents gaff
Haha yeah, all the glass shelves, $4000 speakers and 70" TVs. I quit looking at the setup threads because it was like an episode of cribs.
 

Bancho

Member
This Ikea cube became spare this week and i've been looking for something to sit the PVM on. Fits perfect. I've got some casters sitting around somewhere so i'm gonna fix them to the bottom so i can wheel it about when i need to put it away. Will add another shelf on the bottom so i can have 2 consoles set up at once and attach a 4 plug power cord.

2015-02-222012.27.36.jpg
 

Peltz

Member
This Ikea cube became spare this week and i've been looking for something to sit the PVM on. Fits perfect. I've got some casters sitting around somewhere so i'm gonna fix them to the bottom so i can wheel it about when i need to put it away. Will add another shelf on the bottom so i can have 2 consoles set up at once and attach a 4 plug power cord.

2015-02-222012.27.36.jpg

Is that a 20" or a 14"?
 

antibolo

Banned
So who's going to start the retro set ups thread? Should I do the honours?

I was considering doing it but I don't think my setup is awesome enough to be the thread starter lol

If you're already ready to go then I'd say go right ahead.

Currently taking photos as we speak. Question: should I put stuff on my displays or just leave them off?
 

Huggers

Member
I was considering doing it but I don't think my setup is awesome enough to be the thread starter lol

If you're already ready to go then I'd say go right ahead.

Currently taking photos as we speak. Question: should I put stuff on my displays or just leave them off?

Mine is pretty bollocks but I'll start it anyway. Just taking some snaps now too. Monitors on I'd say
 
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