Becoming aware of some solutions for the MiSTer made me look around for RGB to - Svideo / composite converters for PC 15 Khz output. I eventually got this:
Tested it first with the PS2. S-Video looks great, difference to RGB is noticable, but nowhere near as large as the jump from composite to RGB.
Composite conversion suffers from significant color fringing. I was aware that this is also a problem with the MiSTer options, but I was still surprised how annoying it is, it’s worse than really bad interlace flicker. The real test was with the PC output and the SCART adapter (UMSA) though.
This is where things became interesting, because the results differ wildly depending on the modeline. PAL was especially picky, some of my preset modelines didn’t even show color.
I thought at first that it could help to be close to standard NTSC and PAL signals, but it seems it depends on other parameters, as you can also get a decent picture with e.g a 58 Hz refresh.
But anyway, eventually I managed to get good enough signals.
Here are some composite examples from the AEG set:
Sonic waterfall, Streets of Rage 2 bar, and SMB 1.
The lights of Streets of Rage are the obvious eyecatcher, at one point I also managed to make them almost completely turn into a light red, and in another instance I just had a stripe of rainbow within the usually yellow there.
I also briefly hooked the PS2 up to my USB grabber…
Top to bottom: RGB-Svideo, to composite, native composite.
