How bad are old games gonna suck on a 27inch 1080i widescreen tube?

Mike 01Hawk

Mike 01Hawk

CAGiversary!
Only TV in the house is a projector, great for movies, bad for every day TV/Games :(

Was thinking about getting a tube so I could bring out all my old systems from the grave:

NES
SNES
3DO
PS2
Gamecube (just bought today 10-30-2007, WITH the GBA Player attachment! :bouncy:)

I tried playing my PS2 with component outputs on my Dell 24 inch LCD, and it looked like utter donkey doo... Non-native LCD just ISN'T forgiving!

So.. here's my thinking: I'd want a tube tv for my office. Dosen't have to be very big because I'm only gonna be maybe 3-4 feet away from the screen. I'm thinking of down the future of getting an XBOX360, plus I already have a HDTV tuner card for my PC, so basically I need a HDTV no-matter what.

So I guess here's my question, how bad do NES/SNES era games look on 1080i? With the black bars on the side, the 4:3 aspect ratio will be obtained.. and I can live w/ the bars... I'm mainly woried about 'clarity'.

Anyone run a setup like that?
 
playing old games on my 42inch hd doesnt bother me one bit. others on the board will disagree, youll just have to try it for yourself. id imagine your tv has some sort of option to switch it to 4:3, so if having it stretched bugs you, just switch it.
 
[quote name='banpeikun']i've heard that playing nes/snes games on the wii vc looks infinitely better than on the original systems.[/QUOTE]

yeah but you have to REPURCHASE all them ... but the source is probably better then a SNES or NES Cart going through a 22 year old system with equally as old cords.
 
Holy crap I was playing ps2/ps1 games ona 20inch lcd 780p television, man did the grapchis #1 suck nuts#2 piss me off because they were so terrible.
SNES,NES,Atari ,etc don't look bad only because that they are supposed to be pixelizzed, these O_O
 
[quote name='Mike 01Hawk']Only TV in the house is a projector, great for movies, bad for every day TV/Games :(

Was thinking about getting a tube so I could bring out all my old systems from the grave:

[/quote]'

There is nothing old about a SNES. The only problem is you. They had HD
( RGB ) Tube screens from a long time ago. The problem is that your not going to see them around as often.

Just stop crying and buy any monitor or display panel and nobody even keeps up with this dots per inch crap.

About projectors Nintendo gives you a warning in every instructional manual telling you not to use a game system with a projector. Since the colors are extremly bright on projectors. They have a lot of good projectors compared to the ones they have now.

Holy crap I was playing ps2/ps1 games ona 20inch lcd 780p television, man did the grapchis #1 suck nuts#2 piss me off because they were so terrible.
SNES,NES,Atari ,etc don't look bad only because that they are supposed to be pixelizzed, these O_O
Click to expand...

Are you using a projector that was made recently or one you had from 1992?

NES games on a movie projector looks wonderful from where I stand. There is no way the graphics will be affected by the projector unless the projector is made for an alternative purpose.
 
They shouldn't look any worse than playing on a 480i TV. CRTs don't have a native resolution so it will play whatever you hook up at it's native resolution.
 
it looks like shit cuase you guys are using composite cables. I play emulated games on my xbox through 1080i on component and it looks awesome!!!! the emulators use software and hardware filters and will make it look super sharp. Funny how using a xbox to play zelda looks better than when you use a real super nintendo to play it. oh yeah I'm playing it on a 42 inch 1080p lcd tv too.
 
[quote name='banpeikun']i've heard that playing nes/snes games on the wii vc looks infinitely better than on the original systems.[/QUOTE]

not if you've played them through emulators before.

So, does anyone have some constructive suggestions?
Click to expand...

Go for the tube. That's where those specific systems will look best hands down.
 
Old games like NES/SNES/Genesis games don't bother me at all on my 32" LCD.

Once you get to the 3D and polygonal stuff (N64, PS1, etc.) things start to get on my nerves a bit.

One thing I can't get over though is the 4:3 ratio. I know I can stretch it but it doesn't fill up the whole screen. I can't stand those black bars on the sides/top/bottom.

For you, I'd suggest getting a regular a 1080i TV tube TV. Our old 53" rear projection is 1080i and everything (old or new) looks great on it... it's like the perfect compromise.
 
Well you won't get your old games to output 1080i, so that won't be an issue. Each source controls it's own resolution, not everything is 1080i. I had a Samsung 30" CRT tv that would support up to 1080i and it worked great. BUT it broke one day without warning while I was playing Wii (no I didn't chuck the Wii-mote into it, I believe the power supply went bad on the TV). I played SNES on it all the time and it was great.
 
I've fired up ScummVM on a modded XBOX back when I was rooming with its owner, and played through Day of the Tentacle, Monkey Island 1 - 3, Full Throttle, and most of THE DIG (have original CDs for all of them - Monkey Island Maddness for 1 & 2) on his very nice HD TV. I don't know what kind of output he had for his XBOX but the games looked megasharp, and playing through them was amazing. I even gave Space Quest III a spin on XBOX-DOSBOX, but without a real keyboard, that game is kind of hard to play (it's a text parser, you see).

Fire up the original Super Mario Bros. and I can guaratee that you won't be dissapointed. Won't look as sharp as it should, but I highly suggest going Wii -> Component -> 480p -> VC. It'll look _awesome_.

If you have Dragon's Lair for the 3DO, however, I'd play that one first. :)
 
Yeah, I couldn't play ps1 games on my friend's 42" 1080i. Bottom line is, if you really are anal about this (like I am), think about getting a receiver that can upscale composite and s-video inputs. I know some of the nicer Harmon/Kardon receivers do this. I'm thinking about getting one for this reason.
 
Well folks, even with all the geometry issues mentioned over at AVS, I think I'm gonna go with the Slimfit 30, the TXT3093WH... mainly cause it's the only one f'n available around here.

Now I just gotta wait on a Best Buy or Sears sale... :)

Oh and yeah, I'll check local ebay/craigslist as well in the mean time for the Sony 960 :)
 
I would use any CRT base TV (HD or SD) for anything Playstation 1 or older. I bought myself a cheap Sanyo SDTV for my "retro" consoles and they look amazing. Since HDTV has no set resoultion, anything you throw at it should look amazing. Also with CRT TV's, you never have to worry about video lag.
 
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