S-Video

Hi, i got a few questions about S-Video.

I am currently connecting my 28" CRT TV to the computer via S-Video, from what i seen the picture is good for gaming , at least for me that is

Anyway.

1: If i was in game, and set the game to 1280 x 1024, would this damage the screen, or just add more detail to the actual game as it normaly does?

2: Is there anyway to enable 2 Monitors and S-Video at the same time?

3: Should games take more Graphics power to run through S-Video, i noticed GTA SA was lagging preety bad through S-Video and its ok when playing on computer.

 

I can honestly answer question 1 but the others, I just don't know.
All screens have a resolution limit. With computer monitors, the screen will simply refuse to display said resolution and turn off (and probably make some screeching noises in the case of a CRT screen). With television's however, you'll probably just get a fuzzy, stretched or otherwise "not normal" image.

 

So as long as the image is clear, its ok? I notice my TV really pisses me off with its loud high pitched noise all the damnd time, it drives me mental.

 

My graphics card outputs as s-video at 1024x768 and ive had a 36'' and a 14'' tv running at these resolutions before. tbh I dont understand resolutions and tvs!

Q2. My mx420 can so you probably wont have any trouble! There was a setting on the drivers. When I tried it I had the two monitors (tv and tft) displaying the same desktop.. ie drag the mouse off the edge of screen one and it appeared on screen two.

Q3. Possibly... VGA is RGB and s-video is kind of like component but with two signals.... brightness and colour. Dont consider s-video as component though! Its not even as good as vga. My guess is that when the signals are produced they are produced as rgb and then if you are using s-video the rgb are combined into one colour signal (like composite) and brightness. As there is extra work im assuming there is extra time required by your graphics card to do the job.

This is assuming your graphics card is using either/or vga/s-video. Your graphics card might always be producing both signals (vga and s-video) but only appling the signal to the output you choose with your drivers. This would make my above comment redundant.

 

S video isn't designed with high def signals in mind. Even if it was your TV can only pull off 768x480 or so that extra resolution isn't going anywhere, you might as well set it to 640x480 and let the TV interpolate the rest and save your self the performance loss. It don't think that it should be lagging really, the refresh rates probably aren't the greatest so its might be a little flickery but video out shouldn't cause issues like lag to my knowledge.

 

It wouldn't hurt anything to run the output to the TV at a high res. Windows will flip back after 15 seconds if you don't hit OK. It might look garbled or just give a black screen for that time, but it won't do damage.

Non HD TV's tend to max out at 800x600 on the high-end. HDTV's take that a step further, so you're able to make use of higher resolution. Off-hand, I don't know if S-Video out's have any sort of limitation outside of the display it's connected to.

 

Ah, but wont having a higher res, even thought the tv is still at its native crappy low res, and as long as the picture fits, wont there be a better quality pic?

Also when in GTA SA and looking at trees, i see this like rainbow crap that like flickers on sharp pbjects, i know its to do with the tv, i dunno what to adjust though.

 

The best resolution you will get is 625xsomething or another! Though your telly will only show 576. How I manage to use 1024x768 I really dont know! But it does? Like I said I dont understand tvs and resolutions. I need to scrub up on it all!

It will flicker because your telly uses an interlaced image... theres nothing you can do about it. They brought out 100hz tvs to try and reduce the appearance of the flicker. It makes it worse on ours! Some tellys support progressive scan but I dont know how many, if any at all, CRTs support it. I know hours doesnt and it was a costly lump at a time when everybody had plasmas, lcds, rear projection and the US had HD. If progressive scan was out on CRTs id expect our to have it.

 

Do you think a Sony Trinitron 28" 100Hz TV would display a detailed desktop picture and higher res, coz the one in the lounge that used to be in the main room is never been used and i might try to get that.

 

To be honest I think Exfoliate was right when he said "TV can only pull off 768x480 or so that extra resolution isn't going anywhere, you might as well set it to 640x480" Im not too sure about the 768 but the point remains. I thought the best TVs were PAL and they were 625 though you only see 576 because its interlaced.

My s-video displays at 640x480, 800x600 and 1024x768. The quality is pants no matter which setting you use. The only thing I can see different is the size of the icons... though not to the extent you see on your monitor.
I was well on my way to making a vga-->RGB lead but half way bought a s-video lead (I used to use an s-video--> composite adapter) and it didnt give any better quality over comosite.
So I sacked off my vga-->RGB and when I eventually get round to making HTPC ill get a card/motherboard with component out. No doubt that will turn out to be a waste of time, effort and money!

I suppose what im saying is the resolution out on your graphics card wont really improve the quality of the picture because at the end of the day tvs are crap! I remember reading sometime around 1999-2000 that crt monitors are about 10 years ahead of tvs. That was around 7 years ago and the only crt tvs which match a monitor are HD ones... which are only just beginning to take off over here. That 10 year statement thing wasn't too far off.
The resolution is good because if you use powerstrip or something (in fact I think the features of powerstrip are integrated into graphics card drivers now) you can set the aspect ratio.

The only difference I can think that the format of the output (composite, s-video, component etc) is the contrast and colour intensity, stuff like that.

I wanted to make a vga-->RGB lead so I could do exactly what your asking... will a high resolution make a difference of the telly. Plus I wanted to use RGB instead of composite or s-video. After seeing the difference (well, lack of it!) between composite and s-video I gave up.... and then my northwood decided to start play up. Im lucky if I get into windows! It took 2 days even to install the drivers!

I must admit though the BIOS and black/white text upon POST is far clearer (the colours will be easier to transfer to the telly) than windows (lots of colours) so maybe RGB will make a little difference simply because it handles colours better.


You have an ATI card dont you?
There are cheap adapters (£4ish on ebay) which convert VGA to RGB. You can only use them with ATI cards (it might only be the 9 series cards) because they can out put in a way that will work with your tv. Its to do with the synch.

 

Sony Trinitrons are some of the hightest quality non high def CRT's you can get so that's a good bet. It should help with the flickering and shimmering a bit hopefully. As far as the resolution goes there's just nothing you can really do to help that. There's not much use in using a high res as there are a designated amount of pixels on the screen and it's not going to go any higher than either 640x480 or oddly enough, 704x480 (sorry about the 768 I said ealier, I just assumed because it's usually the trend) it's not going to look any more detailed as all that extra image data isn't being displayed. You might as well stick to a lower res and save some fps.

 

My X800XT PE has this special Adapter, features Video In/out for S-Video and Composite, component?

The Sony trinitron was like £800 3 years ago, awsome picture, i really want it, but my parents wont let me , i would rather have it anyday over the samsung HDTV, except for using it on computer

 

The RGB scart will provide the best TV out quality. If you do use it make sure you are using the RGB scart socket on your telly. Your card doesnt support component. I dont think your tv does either so theres nothing lost there.

 

Is Component, Composite? if so, it does...

 

no, component is the total opposite.

Composite is all the video combined into one cable. (the yellow cable) Because the yellow cable only has video you also get red and white which is left and right sound. You get composite scart too... like this....
http://sewelldirect.com/images/SW-4950_lg.jpg
As all the video is on one signal it is the lowest quality connection you can get.

Then there is s-video (or sVHS) which splits the colour into one signal and brightness into another. Its better than composite as it has brightness on its own signal. You can get s-video scart too, like this..... (ignore the input/output writing! and also the red, white and yellow plugs)
http://images.thgweb.de/2005/11/16/das_grosse_thg_stecker_kompendium/scart2.jpg

Then there is RGB. This splits the video into 3 colours. Red, Green and Blue. This is where the image quality makes a big jump for the better.
Yet again you can get RGB scart. You really can see the difference!
http://www.tvcables.co.uk/images/items/yuv-rgb-scart-adapter.jpg

Then there is component, or YUV.
Im in a rush and its a hard thing to explain so have a look at wiki....
Component video - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Technically there is analog component and digital component but I dont think there is much difference as digital component seems to be a bit of a funny one to me. In fact looking at the wiki page I just posted someone has deleted the digital component part! Rightly so imo!
There are two standards of component....YPbPr and YCbCr. The latter being the so called digital.

Then proper digital signal, which I know little about. Other than I think HDMI has sound as well as video.

 

I got a cable for my graphics card, it had red, blue and green connections, is there anyway i can use that to connect to the TV???

Also my Xbox uses that composite scart, anyway to change this if its that low quality?

 

You can get different leads for the Xbox, whichever xbox it is.

Your card only supports RGB from what I remember from the other day and I think the Sony TV had 1 or 2 RGB scarts... you will just need a scart plug like the one I posted a pic of above. You have to make sure its a RGB scart adapter.

YUV-RGB-SCART - Component Yuv Rgb Scart Adapter - Only £6.99 at www.tvcables.co.uk

Quality can be lost through using a cheap cable. What the one ATI is like is anyones guess. I think ours was £30 and it made a huge difference compared to the one bundled with the telly. As soon as you select RGB on the sky box the screen flickers and then the colour is great.


I should add that RGB is a type of component connection though its easier and less confusing to say RGB for RGB component and component for YUV component. Some websites say your card supports component... they mean RGB component.

 

And can any RCA Cables be used with the RGB connection? as the scart is female and its female on the vid card too, would i see a better picture quality using RGB Scart?

 

You can use any cable yeah but like I said the quality of the cable does make a difference. I tried using the bog standard L+R audio cables you get with hifis and component out on the DVD player and its was pretty well the same as composite. For component to be the same if not worse than composite the leads make a huge difference.

Again like I said earlier though.... "I wanted to make a vga-->RGB lead so I could do exactly what your asking...After seeing the difference (well, lack of it!) between composite and s-video I gave up...."
As its dead easy for you to use RGB you had might as well use it. I was all set on buying a laserjet printer so I could make a circuit board instead of spending £70 on a box adapter. You have that adapter built into your card so you had might as well use it. Its just as easy for you to use RGB as it is composite or s-video. You should see a difference in colour but remember that your telly is pants compared to a vga monitor so you will still have a poor picture, there is no way round that.

I dont know what you mean by "as the scart is female and its female on the vid card too,"
You will always have female scart on your telly but how can you have a female scart on your graphics card? Do you have a vga-->RGB RCA lead, thats the normal way to get RGB from the ATI cards... though ive only really looked into the 9 series ATI cards, all I know about yours is that it can output RGB.

 

On the ATI Cards, were the S-Video connection is, its not a normal one, it has more pins, then you insert the adaptor for like RGB, S vid in/ out etc..., its gonna produce good quality i think, its some sort of HD thing i belive.

I have an X800XT PE (Asus X800XT)