PAL 60hz problems with Wii (and others?) on a modern LCD TV.

[Betagam7]

I'm wondering if I could get some advice on this.

I noticed a while back that setting my folks' Wii to 60hz on their HD LCD tv and running the console through its standard AV connections caused display problems. The wii channels all had a flickery outline around them and when I tried to run 60hz VC games they just displayed as a mess of green.

Recently tried running my Wii in a similar fashion also on an LCD HD TV (though a different make). I simply get total colour washout in both wii games themselves and VC titles. Everything is brown and sepia tinged.

Two quick questions. Would running the Wii with a component cable fix these issues on these TV's and secondly what solutions are available for my collection of 60hz modded consoles? Would they also need some sort of modded cable or is it simply a case of having to find an older TV to use them on?

I've ran them fine before on a portable flatscreen LCD TV (not HD) but I'm guessing they won't work on this one.

I'm thinking of getting a little portable flatscreen HD LCD TV to play these on but don't want to waste my money if they won't be compatible.

Any advice on this would be appreciated.

[CRTGAMER]

Component will be a definite improvement, even upping the video to 480p. What other consoles do you own? PS1 and N64 for example can go SVideo, an improvement over composite by separating the chroma and luma signals. Unfortunately most LCDs don't work well with older consoles lower resolutions.

[theclaw]

PAL suggests to me that you own or could readily find, a set capable of 60hz RGB SCART. On the right TV that is the best picture quality option built into systems like SNES and Saturn (some other consoles need RGB mods first).

[Betagam7]

Component will be a definite improvement, even upping the video to 480p. What other consoles do you own? PS1 and N64 for example can go SVideo, an improvement over composite by separating the chroma and luma signals. Unfortunately most LCDs don't work well with older consoles lower resolutions.

consoles I have modded for 60hz are: SNES, Saturn and Master System but I'd also like to play my Dreamcast on this TV. My modded Snes used to give me a slight problem on my old TV in that the screen wasn't properly centred in 60hz and so I would lose a fraction of the image on the right hand side but nothing like the horrendous problems I've seen with the Wii.

So to clarify, if I buy a component cable for my Wii I should have no problem running it in 60hz and playing 60hz VC titles? I want to download Chrono Trigger, FF6 etc and actually support 60hz VC releases but at the moment they would be unplayable to me on LCD TVs.

I wonder if this doesn't have something to do with Nintendo's otherwise seemingly idiotic 50hz policy for most VC releases.

PAL suggests to me that you own or could readily find, a set capable of 60hz RGB SCART. On the right TV that is the best picture quality option built into systems like SNES and Saturn (some other consoles need RGB mods first).

Are you talking about old TV's or would modern HD sets have this feature? My SMS has the RGB mod.

As I said, I do own a set capable of this. Unfortunately it's in another country and the set I have in my current flat, which is a more modern HD set gives me these horrible display problems. I've seen cheapish £100 sets but I don't want to waste money buying a new TV that is going to be incompatible with my Wii, let alone my older consoles. Especially as I rarely watch TV and mostly use the sets for gaming.

[theclaw]

I can't think of any logical reason besides a defective Wii, as to why 60hz would be only messed up on it. If your current TV doesn't support 60hz on standard a/v every other 60hz console you own should also have an identical problem when plugged into the port.

[Betagam7]

I can't think of any logical reason besides a defective Wii, as to why 60hz would be only messed up on it. If your current TV doesn't support 60hz on standard a/v every other 60hz console you own should also have an identical problem when plugged into the port.

It's not a defective Wii since my parent's Wii has 60hz problems on their LCD HD TV and my Wii (different machine) has different, yet still 60hz related problems on my TV.

Both Wii's are using the standard hookups that come with it, my parents through a scart adaptor and mine going straight into the TV itself.

My PS3 has no problems running in 60hz on that TV but then it uses an HDMI cable.

[theclaw]

Well yes. HDMI is more descended from PC display standards like VGA, where 60hz has been all but universal for years upon years. Can you even name a PC game without 60hz support?

[CRTGAMER]

Component will be a definite improvement, even upping the video to 480p. What other consoles do you own? PS1 and N64 for example can go SVideo, an improvement over composite by separating the chroma and luma signals. Unfortunately most LCDs don't work well with older consoles lower resolutions.

consoles I have modded for 60hz are: SNES, Saturn and Master System but I'd also like to play my Dreamcast on this TV. My modded Snes used to give me a slight problem on my old TV in that the screen wasn't properly centred in 60hz and so I would lose a fraction of the image on the right hand side but nothing like the horrendous problems I've seen with the Wii.

So to clarify, if I buy a component cable for my Wii I should have no problem running it in 60hz and playing 60hz VC titles? I want to download Chrono Trigger, FF6 etc and actually support 60hz VC releases but at the moment they would be unplayable to me on LCD TVs.

I wonder if this doesn't have something to do with Nintendo's otherwise seemingly idiotic 50hz policy for most VC releases.

Give the Wii Component Cable a shot, see what happens. Does the LCD have manual screen zoom and slide adjustments? For the Dreamcast, go SVideo or even better get the VGA adaptor. The LCD has to support 640x480 resolution though.

[alienjesus]

Is this for all Wii games, or just Virtual Console. If it's just VC, you should try activating interlace mode by going into the operations manual and hitting Z + A + 2 simultaneously. Most VC games support this function, but not all. It made my old VC games work on my TV with composite, they lagged horrendously otherwise. It's probably not the source of your problems, but worth a try.

[theclaw]

Is this for all Wii games, or just Virtual Console. If it's just VC, you should try activating interlace mode by going into the operations manual and hitting Z + A + 2 simultaneously. Most VC games support this function, but not all. It made my old VC games work on my TV with composite, they lagged horrendously otherwise. It's probably not the source of your problems, but worth a try.

Yeah I get the impression Nintendo fudged up big when designing the PAL VC. Except I'm not sure, given US systems won't access it. With component cables 99% of our VC games allow upscale to 480p. I seem to recall Neo Geo ones needing interlace mode on my TV.