DREAMCAST VGA QUESTIONS! come here for everything VGA w/ DC.

[eastside]

From all of the research and even member help, especially the long lost mozgus, we have determined that it is the way that newer TVs handle the signal from the DC that causes the vertical lines.

I'm not convinced it's an LCD problem for the vertical lines.. My ealier post showed that my 19 inch rectangular, 7 year old, Dell monitor had the same vertical lines as my Sony LCD.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Get a heavy and well shielded VGA cable.

My 1600x900 LCD looks like crap with any normal VGA cable, even at it's native resolution. There's bleeding, ghosting and more awful artifacting.

But as soon as I went and switched it with a nice cable I had in my drawer that's pretty thick and well shielded, voila. It now looks just as good if not better as a DVI cable hooked into the other input on the same screen.

EDIT!: Remember guys VGA is an analog signal. So, while it theoretically has no boundary for screen size or resolution the quality of the cable and the ability of it's shielding to prevent crosstalk and interference is actually really important.

Cheap or junky cables means crap picture.

[elmagicochrisg]

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

From all of the research and even member help, especially the long lost mozgus, we have determined that it is the way that newer TVs handle the signal from the DC that causes the vertical lines.

I'm not convinced it's an LCD problem for the vertical lines.. My ealier post showed that my 19 inch rectangular, 7 year old, Dell monitor had the same vertical lines as my Sony LCD.

Even a rectangular monitor will scale the picture unless it's native resolution is 640*480. If that's the case we can eliminate scaling as a reason for the vertical lines. Also, is it a CRT monitor?... If so, then I would also doubt scaling to be the problem. I think scaling on a CRT works quite differently than on an LCD monitor...

Get a heavy and well shielded VGA cable.

All very nice, but what if the Dreamcast VGA cable itself isn't well shielded?... The connection will only be as good as it's weakest link.

Any pointers on what to look for in a good VGA cable?...

The way the VGA Box handles the signal is via an amplification circuit so no matter what the end result being spit out is at 100% signal strength.

The straight Dreamcast VGA cable is designed for immediate connections to the back of an LCD Monitor/TV or CRT monitor, but I'll never touch one of those. the circuit inside the DC was never designed for a direct feed, but to be used in conjunction with a box and amplification circuit.

EDIT!: This is what you should look for in a VGA cable:



Very thick and quite stiff, but optimal for high resolutions and to prevent any cross talk or artifacting with large or modern displays that lack proper amplification. With mine I no longer get any of the squares or lines I originally got on my LCD with a bad cable as newer monitors are extremely critical of the input image.

Key things to look for are:

Weight - Heavy cables mean heavy duty shielding.

Thickness - About as thick around as the tip of your pinky finger or more means lots of insulation and shielding is present.

Contact Quality - Gold is good, look for gold on the pins. Silver or nickel plated cables might work the same for you as long as they are properly shielded.

Ferrite Cores - Those little cylinders right before each connector. These prevent signal noise, distorted images, and improve signal quality by miles over a cable without them.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Also, I got my nice cable at the flea market for only $1.25 so hunt around goodwills & flea markets and you're bound to find tons like it.

[elmagicochrisg]

[SpaceBooger]

Hmmm... Ill try the cable next time I take my TV off the wall, which isn't that often since it's a 50inch plasma. I currently am using the vga cable that came with an old Dell monitor so that could be a problem.
It just popped into my head so I'll ask: Do you think having near my subwoofer could also be causing a problem with the magnet and all?

[Hobie-wan]

Hmmm... Ill try the cable next time I take my TV off the wall, which isn't that often since it's a 50inch plasma. I currently am using the vga cable that came with an old Dell monitor so that could be a problem.
It just popped into my head so I'll ask: Do you think having near my subwoofer could also be causing a problem with the magnet and all?

The subwoofer should be fairly shielded if it's decent, but make sure the cable isn't sitting right on top of it and try with it turned off as a test.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

The straight Dreamcast VGA cable is designed for immediate connections to the back of an LCD Monitor/TV or CRT monitor, but I'll never touch one of those. the circuit inside the DC was never designed for a direct feed, but to be used in conjunction with a box and amplification circuit.

Sorry to say, but there's no such thing as a straight Dreamcast VGA cable.

Check again:
http://www.racketboy.com/store/featured ... e-box.html

By straight I mean directly taking the signal straight out of the back of the system pre amplification and letting the display do the work.

AKA, you're pulling straight from the source sans any other factors.

Even with the amplifier giving 100% signal, the part of the VGA box/cable that comes out of the amplifier can still give interference due to bad shielding. Right?...

Umm, no. Everything inside that box is properly grounded and shouldn't have any interference. As for the 3-5 inches of cable coming from the Dreamcast to the box itself unless you're living inside a reactor, adjacent to an electrosupermagnet factory on the Sun you'll be fine. Cable runs over 1-3 feet is where interference starts to kick in and plus, the boxes themselves have ferrite cores on the cable coming from the system.

At least the well made ones that racket sells and the original Official Sega made ones do.

Ferrite Cores - Those little cylinders right before each connector. These prevent signal noise, distorted images, and improve signal quality by miles over a cable without them.

Nice, I never knew what those things were doing on some of my cables... lol

Yeah, they're good for keeping interference out on high priority cables such as VGA and analog/digital combo cables like on PS1/2 Dual Shock controllers.

They've also seen an alternative use as stress reliefs on wires to prevent taught lines and frayed cables.

[elmagicochrisg]