Any reason(s) to use s-video/composite over component, if you have the option?

[MammonMachiner]

So I've been using an older Sharp CRT for a few weeks now (that I got for free from a friend) that only has composite ports. I've been using it with Antonio's adapter and apart from the dot crawl (especially horrible on the Sega cores, for some reason), I've been pretty happy with how it looks (It's a million times better than how it looked on my HDTV, in any case) but I've been wanting to find something with component, mainly for my PS2 and Wii. I figure that's the optimal way to play those systems.

Fast forward to this afternoon, I was scouring various online marketplaces and I just happened to come across a 32" Sanyo DS32225 for $15 fairly close by, and I've decided to pull the trigger on it. It has both component and S-video ports, as well as the usual composite. What I'm curious about is how well component actually looks for the cores on the Mister, seeing as how none of them were designed for it. Would it possibly be more optimal to stick with composite or s-video for the Mister (since I already have Antonio's adapter) and just use the component ports for my PS2/Wii? I don't want to lose the retro look that I love so much from using the CRT in the first place and I wasn't sure if component would hinder that? I thought maybe s-video would be a good compromise since it's in between composite and component.

Any thoughts/advice on this is appreciated!

[akeley]

Component is a tad sharper than composite, but more importantly it will get rid off all the "bad" natural artifacts you're seeing, and especially the additional ones caused by these adapters & MiSTer's incompatibility. That means any interference, dot crawl, shimmer, what have you. This way the image looks much much better, while still retaining the CRT charm. Some consoles and micros even in the Eighties already had RGB output so it's not really true that none of the cores were designed for it.

For those who have a really strong nostalgia for the composite look it's an option, though I'm not sure I could stomach the extra artifacts. Also unsure how well does this method reproduce the "good" artifacting which was used for assorted special effects in games. I'm not dead set against composite, like many modern CRT fans, and sometimes like to use it as well on my real machines, but the truth is that I spend 95% of time in the RGB space. In this situation using S-Video would be a bit pointless imo.

MikeS1 is working on improved composite output which eventually might become the best and most accurate composite solution on MiSTer.

All in all, it'd be best if you checked it for yourself, it's just the price of a cable after all.

[FoxbatStargazer]

S-video is pretty close to component. Close enough that if my TV only had s-video I'd probably settle for it. But it's also close enough that you aren't really gaining anything over component. Certainly all the tricks they use to exploit composite blending fail to work at all in s-video.

With the current state of composite/s-video I'd just use component if you have a TV that does that. Maybe revisit once MikeS adapters and cores are more finalized. From what I hear Antonio's s-video is fine, but the composite is kind of terrible in terms of dot crawl.

[MammonMachiner]

Component is a tad sharper than composite, but more importantly it will get rid off all the "bad" natural artifacts you're seeing, and especially the additional ones caused by these adapters & MiSTer's incompatibility. That means any interference, dot crawl, shimmer, what have you. This way the image looks much much better, while still retaining the CRT charm. Some consoles and micros even in the Eighties already had RGB output so it's not really true that none of the cores were designed for it.

For those who have a really strong nostalgia for the composite look it's an option, though I'm not sure I could stomach the extra artifacts. Also unsure how well does this method reproduce the "good" artifacting which was used for assorted special effects in games. I'm not dead set against composite, like many modern CRT fans, and sometimes like to use it as well on my real machines, but the truth is that I spend 95% of time in the RGB space. In this situation using S-Video would be a bit pointless imo.

MikeS1 is working on improved composite output which eventually might become the best and most accurate composite solution on MiSTer.

All in all, it'd be best if you checked it for yourself, it's just the price of a cable after all.

Yeah, I can't lie, the dot crawl has been bothering me with composite. It's not so bad in the PSX and SNES cores (I can stomach it at least) but my god, the SEGA cores! It started giving me a headache within minutes! So much movement. I haven't been able to try the s-video from Antonio's adapter yet but I've read it pretty much eliminates that stuff. I've also read that it kind of takes away from that more "retro" look of composite though so I guess it's a trade off. Seems like MikeS1's solution may be the best route to take in the end, for those of us who like that look. Looking forward to trying his adapter when it's available.

Thanks for the reply!

S-video is pretty close to component. Close enough that if my TV only had s-video I'd probably settle for it. But it's also close enough that you aren't really gaining anything over component. Certainly all the tricks they use to exploit composite blending fail to work at all in s-video.

With the current state of composite/s-video I'd just use component if you have a TV that does that. Maybe revisit once MikeS adapters and cores are more finalized. From what I hear Antonio's s-video is fine, but the composite is kind of terrible in terms of dot crawl.

This is a noob question, but I guess those blending tricks probably don't work in component either, given the clarity it has versus composite? I figure this is one of those situations where I'll just have to test all three options myself and go with whichever one I like the most. I may end up just sticking with composite on the Mister (probably using MikeS1's solution) for nostalgic reasons and than use component for my PS2 and Wii. It's nice that I'll have the option for component/s-video now, in any case.

Thanks!

[shertz]

In my opinion, smaller CRTs are good enough for composite and S-Video. Anything past a 26in CRT, you should really be using component if you want a sharp vibrant picture

Don't get me wrong, I love S-Video on my 13" commodore 1702 monitor and my 20" sony trinitron looks amazing! When you start getting up to the 26"+ CRTs, you really start to see the ghosting artifacts etc.

S-video is a huge step forward over composite but maybe one small baby step behind component.

[FoxbatStargazer]

What's worse is that every system had its own way of encoding composite. The Genesis/Mega Drive was especially terrible so that dithering was quite effective. An even more extreme example would be a composite PC CGA monitor. I'd wager not all system's composite conversion could produce effects like that, and were' basically only going to get one approach from the Mister, probably a higher quality one than most consumer devices had, sans any dot crawl issues.

[MammonMachiner]

What's worse is that every system had its own way of encoding composite. The Genesis/Mega Drive was especially terrible so that dithering was quite effective. An even more extreme example would be a composite PC CGA monitor. I'd wager not all system's composite conversion could produce effects like that, and were' basically only going to get one approach from the Mister, probably a higher quality one than most consumer devices had, sans any dot crawl issues.

Hmm, that's a good point. I guess no matter how you slice it, you're not going to get total accuracy no matter what you do, without using the true hardware with the display(s) it was designed for. That being the case, I'm just going to test all 3 options on the new CRT (once I get it) and decide which looks best with what. I'm honestly not disappointed with comp on the PSX or SNES cores, so far. It looked horrible for PS2 and Gamecube though, imo. As for s-video, I've never used it so I don't even know what to expect, heh.

[C-R-T]

I couldn’t tolerate composite back in the day of CRTs and the fact that you guys are bringing it back feels like heresy to me. These old TVs can look glorious, but it’s not composite that does it. RGB/component is the only option in my opinion.

[MammonMachiner]

I couldn’t tolerate composite back in the day of CRTs and the fact that you guys are bringing it back feels like heresy to me. These old TVs can look glorious, but it’s not composite that does it. RGB/component is the only option in my opinion.

Isn't it true though that some developers utilized the composite look for blending purposes? I saw a good example somewhere with two side-by-side, up-close screens of Earthworm Jim--one with composite on a CRT and the other on a modern TV. The Composite screen looked much more naturally shaded. Also, the waterfall transparency effect in Sonic the Hedgehog--which looks like it's supposed to using composite. Is that retained when using component? (Honest question as I haven't had the chance to try it yet.)

At the end of the day, I guess I'm somewhat of a purist about this stuff so I like for the games to look as close to originally-designed as possible. That's what drew me to the Mister project in the first place: a modern option for playing all these old systems as true to form as possible. The visual aspect is a big part of that for me.

That said, I'm still looking forward to trying out s-video and component when I get my CRT in a few days. (The guy ended up giving it to me for free, just to be rid of it! One man's trash and all that, heh.)

[FoxbatStargazer]

Most console devs tested things at least on composite because that was the baseline expectation, yes. And Genesis had a combo of limited colors and blurry composite so it featured those tricks quite a lot.