5 ms·

A Line at a Time: The Atari 2600, Now with S-Video

78 points by zdw 3y ago

plasticbugs 3y ago
I have RGB modded my Atari 2600 with the Tim Worthington mod mentioned in the article. It’s one of the easier RGB mods in the retro games hobby scene. If this kind of thing sparks your interest, check out retrorgb.com where they’ve cataloged the video modding options for most older game consoles.
- lapetitejort 3y ago
  I recently acquired a CRT with component and S-video in and went on a minor bender snatching up cables to improve video quality. I've only considered 90's consoles and beyond, but I may have to step backward to fill out a few older consoles. I may focus on the Colecovision, which has a module that plays Atari 2600 games (quite controversial at the time). There's also a USB-C power adapter to replace the giant fragile power brick.
- MenhirMike 3y ago
  Somewhat OT, but I think that it's really unfortunate that North America got a 60 Hz TV standard, but didn't get the SCART Connector that makes RGB or even S-Video just natural. Composite video is one of those unfortunate mistakes in history, even though it might've been perfectly reasonable back in the day :( And even S-Video seems like a rarity in the US.
  - tredre3 3y ago
    SCART was pretty great but not perfect. I lived part of the 90s in Europe and you really had to know where to buy your cables if you wanted the best quality. It was essentially a prequel to what we have now with USB-C. Not all cables had all pins wired up, you often ended up with composite quality. S-VIDEO support was very poor, you had to manually select it and not all equipment would accept it. Not all cables were shielded. Some equipment really hated hotplugging so you had to be careful with that too.
    - MenhirMike 3y ago
      > Not all cables were shielded Oh, yeah, that brings back unpleasant memories. Also, if the SCART-end was cheaply made and you pull it out at an angle, the metal part could separate from the plastic part and got stuck in the socket. Okay, it's not a good connector really, but it was the standard way to get proper RGB in Europe, so I love it for that :)
      - toast0 3y ago
        Having a RGB connection is pretty awesome. A better connector would have been nice, but the US never really got RGB for SDTV. Component video is more or less equivalent, but that didn't really appear until around the time of DVDs as I recall. Lots of DVD players supported it, including the PS2; but we had no mainstream way to get RGB from SNES or n64. Some other sixth generation systems also had component video; xbox, gamecube (early models only, there was digital video out and nintendo sold an encoder). Dreamcast could play most games with VGA out, but that's 480p, not 240p/480i.
        plasticbugs 3y ago
        Some older consoles can output RGB natively if you have the correct cable: including most SNES models (not the ‘mini’), every Sega console, Atari Jaguar and the Neo Geo home system. Interestingly, the SNES mini has the cleanest video signal of any SNES model directly out of the GPU but requires a mod to get RGB out of it.
NonNefarious 3y ago
The Atari computers (except the 400) had S-video from the very beginning, and the JVC-made Commodore 1702 is a great match for them because it has separate luma & chroma inputs. Interestingly, LaserDisc players, the best consumer video medium until the late '90s, mostly didn't have S-video outputs because the luma & chroma signals were mixed on the disc; providing a separate output for each wouldn't have gained you anything.
- nicole_express 3y ago
  I believe the Atari 8-bit computers' CTIA/GTIA chips generate their video output through pins in much the same way as the TIA, with digital luminance and a color output, so it makes sense that S-Video (or I guess I should say "some sort of separated luminance/chrominance", since the S-Video standard didn't exist yet) would be the way to go for a higher-quality picture there.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
the_third_wave 3y ago
OT: there is a comment [1] by one NonNefarious which seems to have been killed instantly (dead 7 minutes after posting). The comment itself seems to be relevant, free from the sort of claims and/or language which tend to get comments killed on this site but is was still killed. Checking this user's comment history [2] it becomes clear that all his comments in the last 11 months have been killed. The user has positive 'karma' so this is not the cause of his comments' untimely demise. What is the mechanism behind this killing spree? Is this an example of shadowbanning (which this site is not supposed to employ according to Dang), does someone have it out against this user and put a flag/downvote bot on his account? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37571450 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37571450 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=NonNefarious https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=NonNefarious
- ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
  Thanks for bringing this up. I was told that there's no "shadow banning," which is obviously not true. There's also no excuse for letting people type out a lengthy comment or question and THEN rejecting it with a throttling response. If we can't reply, the Reply button should be disabled. It's deliberately and monumentally rude.
- helf 3y ago
  [dead]
- mixmastamyk 3y ago
  It happens pretty often, a lot of accounts are penalized for not being sufficiently devout to HN guidelines. You'll find most of their comments are fine, even helpful. But, have a bad day, an unpopular opinion, or be rude once in a while and your account will be penalized, whether by automated rules or targeted by moderator. Another example: One day dang didn't like one of my comments and my account has been saddled ever since... I can't post more than three times per three hours or so. Otherwise it says "slow down!" If it told me ahead of time it would be OK, but it waits until I've written a lengthy post, only to lose it on submit. :D :-/
  - 3y ago
Aldipower 3y ago
I really can suggest the Atari 2600 CleanComp. It is a PCB directly soldered at the pins of the TIA chip. No internal wiring needed! You get composite AND s-video from it and the video quality is just superb. I am not related to the Atari 2600 CleanComp guys. Just a happy user. :)
joemi 3y ago
I'm thrilled this was posted, because now I've discovered a great blog to read. This level of writing about these topics are totally what I'm into. I opened most of the links in the post in new tabs, and now I've got a lot of reading to do. I'm surprised I haven't come across Nicole's blog before now.
musicale 3y ago
> F-1 Race is attributed to programming genius Satoru Iwata, who’s appeared on this blog before. I still have his gold pants Mii on my 3DS. ;-)
onewheeltom 3y ago
I ordered some s-video conversion PCBs from Parker Dillman back in 2010. Worked great.

78 points by zdw 3y ago

I have RGB modded my Atari 2600 with the Tim Worthington mod mentioned in the article. It’s one of the easier RGB mods in the retro games hobby scene. If this kind of thing sparks your interest, check out retrorgb.com where they’ve cataloged the video modding options for most older game consoles.

lapetitejort 3y ago
I recently acquired a CRT with component and S-video in and went on a minor bender snatching up cables to improve video quality. I've only considered 90's consoles and beyond, but I may have to step backward to fill out a few older consoles. I may focus on the Colecovision, which has a module that plays Atari 2600 games (quite controversial at the time). There's also a USB-C power adapter to replace the giant fragile power brick.
MenhirMike 3y ago
Somewhat OT, but I think that it's really unfortunate that North America got a 60 Hz TV standard, but didn't get the SCART Connector that makes RGB or even S-Video just natural. Composite video is one of those unfortunate mistakes in history, even though it might've been perfectly reasonable back in the day :( And even S-Video seems like a rarity in the US.
- tredre3 3y ago
  SCART was pretty great but not perfect. I lived part of the 90s in Europe and you really had to know where to buy your cables if you wanted the best quality. It was essentially a prequel to what we have now with USB-C. Not all cables had all pins wired up, you often ended up with composite quality. S-VIDEO support was very poor, you had to manually select it and not all equipment would accept it. Not all cables were shielded. Some equipment really hated hotplugging so you had to be careful with that too.
  - MenhirMike 3y ago
    > Not all cables were shielded Oh, yeah, that brings back unpleasant memories. Also, if the SCART-end was cheaply made and you pull it out at an angle, the metal part could separate from the plastic part and got stuck in the socket. Okay, it's not a good connector really, but it was the standard way to get proper RGB in Europe, so I love it for that :)
    - toast0 3y ago
      Having a RGB connection is pretty awesome. A better connector would have been nice, but the US never really got RGB for SDTV. Component video is more or less equivalent, but that didn't really appear until around the time of DVDs as I recall. Lots of DVD players supported it, including the PS2; but we had no mainstream way to get RGB from SNES or n64. Some other sixth generation systems also had component video; xbox, gamecube (early models only, there was digital video out and nintendo sold an encoder). Dreamcast could play most games with VGA out, but that's 480p, not 240p/480i.
      - plasticbugs 3y ago
        Some older consoles can output RGB natively if you have the correct cable: including most SNES models (not the ‘mini’), every Sega console, Atari Jaguar and the Neo Geo home system. Interestingly, the SNES mini has the cleanest video signal of any SNES model directly out of the GPU but requires a mod to get RGB out of it.

NonNefarious 3y ago

The Atari computers (except the 400) had S-video from the very beginning, and the JVC-made Commodore 1702 is a great match for them because it has separate luma & chroma inputs. Interestingly, LaserDisc players, the best consumer video medium until the late '90s, mostly didn't have S-video outputs because the luma & chroma signals were mixed on the disc; providing a separate output for each wouldn't have gained you anything.

nicole_express 3y ago
I believe the Atari 8-bit computers' CTIA/GTIA chips generate their video output through pins in much the same way as the TIA, with digital luminance and a color output, so it makes sense that S-Video (or I guess I should say "some sort of separated luminance/chrominance", since the S-Video standard didn't exist yet) would be the way to go for a higher-quality picture there.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

the_third_wave 3y ago

OT: there is a comment [1] by one NonNefarious which seems to have been killed instantly (dead 7 minutes after posting). The comment itself seems to be relevant, free from the sort of claims and/or language which tend to get comments killed on this site but is was still killed. Checking this user's comment history [2] it becomes clear that all his comments in the last 11 months have been killed. The user has positive 'karma' so this is not the cause of his comments' untimely demise. What is the mechanism behind this killing spree? Is this an example of shadowbanning (which this site is not supposed to employ according to Dang), does someone have it out against this user and put a flag/downvote bot on his account? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37571450 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37571450 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=NonNefarious https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=NonNefarious

ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
Thanks for bringing this up. I was told that there's no "shadow banning," which is obviously not true. There's also no excuse for letting people type out a lengthy comment or question and THEN rejecting it with a throttling response. If we can't reply, the Reply button should be disabled. It's deliberately and monumentally rude.
helf 3y ago
[dead]
mixmastamyk 3y ago
It happens pretty often, a lot of accounts are penalized for not being sufficiently devout to HN guidelines. You'll find most of their comments are fine, even helpful. But, have a bad day, an unpopular opinion, or be rude once in a while and your account will be penalized, whether by automated rules or targeted by moderator. Another example: One day dang didn't like one of my comments and my account has been saddled ever since... I can't post more than three times per three hours or so. Otherwise it says "slow down!" If it told me ahead of time it would be OK, but it waits until I've written a lengthy post, only to lose it on submit. :D :-/
- 3y ago

Aldipower 3y ago

I really can suggest the Atari 2600 CleanComp. It is a PCB directly soldered at the pins of the TIA chip. No internal wiring needed! You get composite AND s-video from it and the video quality is just superb. I am not related to the Atari 2600 CleanComp guys. Just a happy user. :)

joemi 3y ago

I'm thrilled this was posted, because now I've discovered a great blog to read. This level of writing about these topics are totally what I'm into. I opened most of the links in the post in new tabs, and now I've got a lot of reading to do. I'm surprised I haven't come across Nicole's blog before now.

musicale 3y ago

> F-1 Race is attributed to programming genius Satoru Iwata, who’s appeared on this blog before. I still have his gold pants Mii on my 3DS. ;-)

onewheeltom 3y ago

I ordered some s-video conversion PCBs from Parker Dillman back in 2010. Worked great.