US TV with SCART

[MEGADRIVE Jeroi]

Hmm, a decent 20-27" CRT should be within the 30 kG limit, especially newer ones. 20" for sure, 27" might be pushing it though. Still, shipping charges would be a huge pain... Plus you'd still need to pay for the SCART cables, which aren't that cheap. (plus shipping)

For that cost, it's more practical to go with an SCAR RGB to Component transcoder for CRTs, possibly HDMI adapter for HDTVs.
Those tend to run $30-40, though there might be other options too.

Well scart cable I can include for 2€ as I can find them in any Flee Market

[64k]

Scart leads cost new to nothing.

if you want an RGB scart for say the SEGA your looking at about £7-10 delivered.

Im gonna post a comparison picture soon, because RGB is sharp and awesome it kinda shows up all the gradient shades on the screen.

[MEGADRIVE Jeroi]

http://cgi.ebay.com/Sony-Trinitron-2...item414eab01f0

[sicboy057]

http://cgi.ebay.com/Sony-Trinitron-2...item414eab01f0

Pickup only :'(

Currently I am using a Gold Plated SCART cable to a SCART Converter to gold plated Moster Cables. It's pretty nice but I'd love to have a that RCA TV with the matching VCR and stereo.

[kool kitty89]

Huh, that's in the US? Is that an imported TV?


Anyway, once some reasonably priced used LCDs (especially 4:3 SD sets) start showing up online: those will be much more practical to import and likely have decent 240p/480i support (especially dedicated SD LCDs) -no light guns though.

[TmEE]

That TV in the ebay link was in Australia or NZ :P

[Duane Dibbley]

The RCA Dimensia TVs had a SCART Port. It was called "EIA Multiport" on it, but it was still wired as a full Euro SCART. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RCA_Dimensia

I think my grandparents had one of those. I remember the giant remote control and the wood console. It was also the first place I saw the Star Wars movies. I have no idea what happened to that TV.

[64k]

judging from the size of it, id say its taken over a decent chunk of the world.

[MEGADRIVE Jeroi]

What, why the hell australian tv would be pickup only in USA ebay?

[64k]

you really gonna ask that question?

[kool kitty89]

Another thing that's odd was one of the AU users on the board (flygon?) was commenting that SCART was very uncommon over there.

[SF78]

It's funny how Americans want to get their hands on some scart-tv:s and all the Europeans want to have their NTSC/60hz consoles.

Anyway, I would suggest that people keep away form the LCD-models. Especially the older ones that have 12-16ms response time. Also because of the higher resolution, the image is too sharp and older game systems (prior to Dreamcast etc.) look pretty horrible. You have to remember, that every LCD-panel has their fixed optimal resolution and scaling it down always deteriorates the image. CRT really is the only way to go with these retro consoles.

[retrospiel]

Yes, and no. I do use a 27" CRT via RGB-SCART myself and couldn't be happier. However, many of my friends use LCDs and it's not much of a problem, really. If you're in the US and want RGB, I don't see any reasons as to why you should not just use a SCART to HDMI scaler:

Click for full size


All you need is an RGB SCART cable: http://shop.ebay.co.uk/scart+mega+drive

And of course the RGB to HDMI converter: http://shop.ebay.com/hdmi+scart+converter




Then again, if you live in Europe and hook up your Mega Drive without the HDMI scaler, chances are that it will look like this:

Click for full size

...which can only be fixed via a mod to your cable (no idea what needs to be modded exactly) or a custom cable.

Might as well just stick with your CRT for retro gaming.

[64k]

Do American LCDs not come with SCART either?

[retrospiel]

They don't. In this day and age, SCART is an obsolete connector anyway. It is not capable of transmitting anything other than composite AV and/or RGBS in 240p/480i while HDTVs work best with 480p, 720p or 1080p.

HDMI is something like its spiritual successor, allowing the transmission of digital component (Y'CbCr) and digital VGA (RGBHV) along with various different digital audio streams.