GUIDE: Telling apart good Genesis 1s and Genesis 2s from bad ones.

[PimpUigi]

Yeah, but the Kega Fusion emulator on those settings looks extremely close to how Genesis outputs video to a regular TV.

I can't really tell the difference on my TV (PC connected to TV)

[StevieC]

so judging by all-round quality, the best Genesis to have is a Crystal Clear Audio Modded Genesis Model 2 Revision VA2 with the CXA-1645, yes?

[m68k]

Well, factory stock early model 1 is best as its easy to get, or a late model II if you can. (Not everyone can have a modded genesis). However, the Sega CD sound output does partly fix the louse Model II audio problem.

[Jax184]

So far the best quality I've seen is my CDX with a few caps replaced combined with a 32x. None of the vertical lines or banding, none of the rainbow waterfalls, and the new caps fixed the shifting lines the CDX is known for.

One good thing about the Gen2 VA2 BTW is that so far every one I've checked had a 12 MHz CPU from the factory. It's not clocked at 12 MHz, mind you, but it should be a great overclocker.

[StevieC]

and now that I go back and look, it seems that the only full-mainboard Geneses to allow the Crystal Clear Audio Mod all have the samsung video encoder chip, or do they sometimes have the Fujitsu, given the choice between the Fujitsu and the Sony CXA-1145, which of those two is better, or is it possible to get a VA1.8 with the 1645?

[kool kitty89]

So it looks like I'll be delayed by a few days. I can't get acceptable quality out of my capture rig.

Compare www.jax184.com/Emulator%20reference1-1.png
with
www.jax184.com/CDX+32X%20Composite%202-2-2.png

I know composite is bad, but the image looks a hell of a lot better than that on my studio monitor.

I need to drag that Avid mac out of the corner of my workshop and get it up and running, or put together the Media 100 system.

Huh??? That emulator image looks WAY better, pixel perfect and clear, though maybe a tiny amount of softening would be preferred:
That's how REAL genesis video looks: use RGB and get the real image, though on most TVs it will be a bit soft compared to an emulator, but not far off. (very much like Fusion or Gens with filtering enabled)

There are a few cases where excessive dithering makes unfiltered video look bad, but for the majority of stuff I'd prefer the real picture to artifacted crap in composite video. (S-video isn't perfect, but at least it avoids the aweful blurring and/or luma artifacting of composite video)


I know some people like th evidoe blurred to crap, but I certianly don't... I'd take composite video luma artifacts over video so blurred you can't even see that.


Emulation is missing some artifacts too (like mid-screen palette changing garbage pixels) and also has scaling artifacts with NTSC aspect enabled for the many games using 256 wide instead of 320 in Fusion without the doubleraw plugin disabling scaling. (on any CRT monitor and a real genesis that's not an issue -only LCDs/HDTVs would scale it, though you still have some aspect ratio issues in NTSC and PAL vs games designed for square pixels)

Some examples: http://www.disgruntleddesigner.com/c...reenshots.html
http://www.sega-16.com/feature_page....%20Connections
http://www.sega-16.com/forum/showpos...2&postcount=28

Well maybe
With Kega Fusion you should be enabling the filter, and TV Mode (CVBS)

Only if you like blurry composite video. There's a few cases where it does look better (namely tons of dithering), but not so much otherwise.

I think most users feel that way too... at least I got that impression from the numerous amount of people choosing to S-video mod or SCART users with RGB (or an adapter to component for NTSC users).



Edit: I totally misread that first comment... not sure what happened.

[Jax184]

What are you on about?

My point was that the emulation looks utterly amazing and my capture rig can't come anywhere near it. I'm trying to get my better rig running so I can produce better screenshots, since the real Genesis on a high quality CRT looks a lot closer to the emulator image than the captured image.

[Jorge Nuno]

You're comparing a pixel-perfect picture against the composite signal.
Your TV may do some awesome stuff on the signal as opposed to the capture card that probably just has a normal (mid-end) decoder. Its also de-interlacing the MD video signal, which is already progressive in this case :/

However composite is composite, and due to way the signal is formed it has loss of luminance bandwidth and the chrominance is subject to little phase errors, and you can't get them back.

[Jax184]

My capture device is a $2500 JVC professional Super VHS/Mini DV tape deck with an analog-digital converter, not some cheesy $20 PCI TV tuner card, so I would expect it to produce an image at least half as good as the one on my 1983 Commodore 1702 composite monitor. But that seems not to be the case, so I'm moving on to my $20,000 Avid Mac.

[Devon]

My capture device is a $2500 JVC professional Super VHS/Mini DV tape deck with an analog-digital converter, not some cheesy $20 PCI TV tuner card, so I would expect it to produce an image at least half as good as the one on my 1983 Commodore 1702 composite monitor. But that seems not to be the case, so I'm moving on to my $20,000 Avid Mac.

can i have your 20,000 dollar mac?

[Jorge Nuno]

$2500 !? O_o...

Yet it's deinterlacing a progressive signal. Maybe theres an option to turn it off?

[Jax184]

I suspect so, but I lack the manual and the remote, which complicates things.

[PimpUigi]

Jax
Just do the screen caps, and compare them to the Kega Fusion with filter enabled, as well as TV mode (CVBS) enabled - (these options are what make the emulator look like a Genesis with Composite video)

Ace
VA3 Geneses can get the CCAM correct???

[Jax184]

The captured image is still way worse, believe me.

[PimpUigi]

Prove it?