Printable View
Ok,
So I got a decent enough TV card for my system, hooked up my cable TV box to it, and the quality is absolutely sh**e. Even using DScaler. :mad:
One of the problems might be that, at the moment, I'm only using the normal cable aerial thing. You know, the big circular cable that connects a standard aerial to a TV.
If I switch it so that the cable is output through its SCART socket, into the TV cards S-video, will the quality improve much?
Or should I just give up and buy an LCD TV?
What's the cable like that's connecting to the TV card? If it's poorly shielded it probably won't be too happy.
It's just a normal plasic one from Maplins, nothing too special
The quality of the picture is alright when it's in a smallish window (as you'd expect I guess), but it looks blocky when it's blown up. I'm running a TFT at 1280x1024.
I mean maybe I just wont be able to get a decent picture with my setup.
Well TV's run at 640x480 or thereabouts (I think it might be 720x512 for PAL, can't remember) so that would explain it somewhat.
I'm afraid I'm not really up with TV cards - last one I used was for a review of some recording software and that was over a year ago.
if you're using rf out it will be poor, you'd be better off using the scart output,
but as kez said the resolution of the Pal is only 720 * 576 in the first place..
So how do LCD TVs achieve their excellent picture quality? I've switched to using Scart to S Video and the picture hasnt really improved. I know LCD TVs run at a lower res than monitors....so do they use lower res and have bigger pixel pitch or something?
I thought it might have something to do with the resolution; but I've tried setting it to 640 x 480, etc and it remains just as blocky. Maybe if I try setting it to 720 x 576 it might improve...
Gutted for me, I might have to buy an LCD TV after all!
For example, here's two grabs from my system at native res:
http://www.appf93.dsl.pipex.com/screengrab.jpg
http://www.appf93.dsl.pipex.com/screengrab2.jpg
That's off a pretty clean rf source on my AIW card, the only way to get better than that is via s-video/scart directly from a freeview/sky box..
For some reason bbc2 provides better grabs than the other channels (1st piccy)..
no, lcd tv's run at the same resolution as the mainstream lcd monitors (unavoidable due to the nature of the lcd screen), the tv's have built in hardware scalers, that's all. and to be honest virtually all the lcd tv's i've seen aren't that great a quality either..Quote:
Originally Posted by MAS
What's the best/cheapest card option that will pick up all freeview channels from a std freeview box? I might be interested in getting one for my other pc to cut down on TV channel wars :)
MAS - can we see some shots of your card ... different 'crapness' is created by different problems. Seeing the actual picture can diagnose what exacly is wrong.
most scart cables will generally not output a correct s-video signal (they always seem to be incorrectly wired, with no sync on green) - even if you do, that's outputting about 400 lines compared to 200 for vhs (rf quality).
best is component if you support it, and even composite should be about the same. if you're coming out RF, that will have a huge and evil effect on the signal.
if the s-video off the scart works, that may well be your best bet. composite is guarenteed to work, and RF is pants.
along the same lines guys, like displaying things on otrher formats, im thinking of trying to use my small sony flatscreen television as a secondary monitor for my pc, or a primary one if i can (i think i can) im just wondering what the quality is like, its mainly for playing games like ut2004, halo, cs, and bf1942, would it be good enough display to do this? the pc card connects to the tv via a s-video lead, and the grfx card is a 9600 pro
ne ideas?
It might just be my monitor, the contrast, etc. I did have a closer look at LCD TVs and actually the picture isnt as good as I'd thought, although they might have been suffering from poor input quality. And generally they do have a lower res than monitors, e.g. a 22" LCD has a res of 1280 x 768. A monitor that size would usually have 1600 x 1200. Even at the same size, they technically have a slighly lower resolution due, I presume, to their different aspect ratio.
My picture maybe isnt as bad as I thought. Can someone point out how to post pics, and I'll upload some photos?