NTSC / PAL / 60Hz / 50Hz Fact Sheet

[evildragon]

Since people seem to get a little confused on this subject, I'm going to make a fact sheet, and specs, hopefully it can be stickied.

NTSC and PAL have some in common, and some differences. There are also different versions. We normally assume NTSC-60, and PAL-50, in most cases. However, there is more variants than just those two.

Below, is a list, and specifications of the modes.

NTSC = 480i/240p, 15KHz horizontal sync, 60Hz vertical sync.
NTSC-50 = 576i/288p, 15KHz horizontal sync, 50Hz vertical sync.
PAL = 576i/288p, 15KHz horizontal sync, 50Hz vertical sync.
PAL-60 = 480i/240p, 15KHz horizontal sync, 60Hz vertical sync.

Even though NTSC-50, and PAL are pretty much the same, the color space are respective to their name. The same goes for PAL-60 and NTSC.

When describing Component video, the terms NTSC and PAL are false. NTSC and PAL encoding on Component video is non-existant. The only thing similar they can share is resolution and scan rate..

I hope this clears some stuff up.

Oh, and by the way, the Sega 32X can take advantage of the oddball encoding modes. For example, if you use an NTSC 32X on a PAL MegaDrive, the 32X will output NTSC-50. If you use a PAL 32X on an NTSC MegaDrive/Genesis, the 32X will output PAL-60. (Getting the Genesis to output the oddball modes won't happen any day soon, sorry.)

[Mr Smith]

Wow! I have no idea what that means.

[evildragon]

Wow! I have no idea what that means.

just compare the numbers..

PAL and NTSC-50 are almost the same.. same resolution and refresh rate.. same for PAL-60 and NTSC..