This doesn’t look too shabby. Do yourself a favour and try the ones with “Old Skool 36in…” in the filenames. They’re my latest.
Try the Sharp presets as I’m basically switching over to them at the moment as opposed to the Smooth Presets.
They would be a lot easier on the Shield too since no SuperXBR. If you haven’t updated the pack you can do so now.
Imgbb preserves much more detail (well all of it) than imgur when uploaded and sharing.
Try the recommended Custom Aspect Ratio settings and/or set your Scaling to use Integer Scale, Underscale.
For some presets you might get some moiré patterns or scaling artifacts which can be resolved by selecting an optimal scale factor.
Remember all Megatron presets can be switched between SDR and HDR mode.
So coming to think of it, the main advantage for you of running the presets in HDR mode instead of SDR mode is that in HDR mode you can control the brightness of the TV via the paper white and peak brightness values, while in SDR mode you’d have to mess with the TV’s brightness/Backlight/Contrast controls.
Also try, 36in Arcade Slot Mask Sharp Advanced CAR6x8x or CAR7x8x Fine which is a higher TVL version of the Old Skool 36in Arcade presets.
These are presets that I would like to use in a possible arcade restoration project.
I just have to figure out a proper end to end solution that balances price to performance and is as compact and turnkey as possible.
I’ve seen some dying arcades and it’s really disheartening to see some of the contraptions that the well meaning but uninitiated have thrown together to allow people to just “play a game”, rather than enjoy these treasures in a way that truly honours they historical value and ethos.
I’m thinking Raspberry Pi 5 for the foundation and it’s really awesome that that can provide excellent CRT output as well but I really have no experience with those.
I was originally ruling out the MiSTer due to cost but then the new MiSTer Pi is here. However, that can’t run these shaders.
So it might have to be Raspberry Pi 5 or a cheap miniPC, or something with an APU on a microATX board.
I would like to be able to run the latency as low as possible. I’m familiar with using Run-Ahead/Pre-Emptive Frames and Frame Delay but I know there are some folks who go even further with things like Hard GPU Sync and stuff like that.
Then comes the display. Have to find something that can do these shader presets justice, so it needs to be very bright and preferably RGB Subpixel Layout. I would like fast response and smooth motion so maybe IPS might be preferred over something VA which are mostly BGR. Not sure if I’ll be able to get something cheap that can also be bright enough to run these shaders properly while also being bright enough to run BFI.
There’s the new CRT Beam Simulator but so far I haven’t been able to set it up properly yet.
Sorry I’m just off to work so I can’t give a detailed reply… but I have to say I have preemptive frames on using only the cores that support that. I honestly think it makes the world of difference (more than I thought it would tbh).
Coincidentally I’ve been giving thought to my own arcade setup… on the main tv in the front room (which I’ll never be allowed to use for an arcade lol) I rotated 1941 using a shader full screen. It made me think … imagine wall mounting a 65” tv to a swivel mount so you play vertical or horizontal games… I don’t think I’ve seen that done on such a large scale!
Me neither, but I have definitely seen it done with a 55" though and it’s quite impressive for arcade use. That produces a 36in ~4:3 or 3:4 screen if using my Custom Aspect Ratio settings with my 36in Arcade presets.
Looks amazing when standing or sitting at typical arcade game playing distances.
Hi hi @Cyber how can we convert any of your megabezel shaders to pure no-border or reflection variants? I know your newer shaders are just screen-only, but I’m a favourite of a few specific megabezel ones and want to maximize screen real estate and avoid OLED burnin.
I looked under Shader Paramaters but couldn’t figure out what to turn off/modify.
No problem. My Mega Bezel Preset Pack is now vintage by modern standards but that certainly doesn’t mean the presets are obsolete or irrelevant.
This is a question that has been asked and answered many times before but rather than just search the thread for you, I’ll see if I can find a more modern and elegant solution eventually.
It would help if you can share which preset/presets you would like to convert so that I can see if there’s already a Mega Bezel base preset which I can show you how to replace the existing base preset with, that contains all of the other shader functionality.
The old way of doing this is just to set the graphics brightness all the way to 0 and to replace the preset with one from the No Reflections folder.
I do have a few presets which already have no border, have you tried those?
You can try this in the meantime:
You might still suffer from eventual uneven wear due to the scanlines and scanline gaps but that might take a very long time to manifest and notice.
Even if you avoid using the frame/bezel/background, there will still be uneven wear if you display mostly 4:3 content on a 16:9 OLED display.
Despite all of this, users are being steered towards OLED for the ultimate CRT Shader experience.
I rather take my chances with miniLED plus OLED cannot reproduce all subpixel Masks and TVLs accurately, only a small subset but ignorance is bliss I guess.
Hey Cyber. Hope you doing good.
I came across your work from recent video by RetroCrisis on one of your shaders for miniLED screen and wanted to try it out after watching the video. I hopped onto this forum and after reading a bit i thought to go with “CyberLab Megatron NX W420M Death To Pixels 4K Shader Preset Pack 18-11-24” as i have a normal 4k IPS screen with no form of HDR. I should choose this version, right?
Anyways, following the guide further, I downloaded the “CRT-Guest-Advanced-NTSC version 2024-02-29-release1” and pasted that as well. Loaded a game and selected a SDR preset “CyberLab Megatron NX W420M 4K SDR Game SNES S-Video Shadow Mask Ultra Smooth Ultimate CAR5x4x Advanced”.
All good so far. Where I lost track is on the line where you mention this " Instructions are in RetroArch under ‘Quick Menu->Shaders->Shader Parameters’ ". Where am i look for what to change? In Shader Parameters I see a bunch of numbers outside and within closed brackets. Can i get some help?
Sorry if this is pretty simple and maybe am blind and not reading it properly.
Hey, thanks for posting. I really appreciate this instead of folks not understanding the concepts involved in trying to have more realistic CRT emulation by utilizing the brightness of the screen, then immediately jumping to critism.
You’ve reached this far but you haven’t stated or described how things look. Feel free to share a pic.
Good for you that you’ve actually reached to the point of reading this! If I were to judge by the feedback alone, very few it seems read the instructions or browse the many posts for information, either that or they’re just very silent about it.
The instructions for how to setup Sony Megatron Color Video Monitor are actually on the left side of the Shader Parameters so I just tried to point users to it.
My presets have other shaders stacked on top of Sony Megatron Color Video Monitor, so those instructions might be buried a little lower down.
The instructions basically state that if you’re using an HDR Screen, go to RTINGS or another review site to get your display’s Peak Luminance Value and enter that in the Shader Parameters then set your Paper White Luminance Values to what looks like the white of a blank sheet of paper to you.
In reality, users should just set them to what looks good using their eyes and trial and error.
This only applies to HDR mode and displays.
The instructions also state that users of bright SDR screens should turn the brightness of their displays all the way up.
That’s all it says for SDR display users to do.
Of course you’ll also need to ensure that the preset is set to SDR mode.
Other things you can do are to ensure that the Display’s Subpixel Type matches that of your display.
You can also adjust the Display’s Resolution to match that of your Display, particularly if you’re trying to use a lower resolution screen but if you’re using a 4K screen don’t interfere with that.
The instructions to increase the brightness to the Max is a bit vague as not all TVs use a setting named “Brightness” to do so. On some TVs, “Brightness” just increases the black levels and ends up washing out the picture with little increase in actual Brightness.
On some TVs the Contrast settings actually does more to increase the brightness than the brightness setting.
Then you have the Backlight setting.
And you may also have to turn off your power saving.
I used Shadow Mask for those W240M presets because I had the limitation of using a TV that couldn’t display RGB 4:4:4 at 4K 60Hz. RGB 4:4:4 is a requirement for all subpixel accurate CRT Masks with the exception of certain very low TVL combinations and Shadow Mask/Lottes (rotated mask) patterns.
If your TV doesn’t have this limitation then feel free to use the other Mask Types and preset packs. With the others you would just have to switch them to SDR in the Shader Parameters.
Don’t expect colours to be very accurate in the W420M presets as I was running a kind of a hack job of a setup.
I actually used to watch HDR movies on that SDR TV so if you’re interested in my settings, I’d be happy to share.
Once you get things working, I can try to help you tweak the colour and stuff like that.
None of this is pretty simple actually, so it’s pretty understandable and encouraged for users to seek assistance. In order for this new generation and style of CRT-Shader Technology to really be ushered in, there needs to be a community of its own to take shape.
If enough people start sharing things like Peak and Paper White Luminance settings that worked for them then eventually that might make things easier for folks who come after.
Same goes for things like photos, videos and HDR screenshots and videos. You hardly see anything of the sort so people really don’t know what they’re missing out on and they don’t even know what they’re supposed to be aiming for because it’s so hard to communicate and share the final results.
Feel free to share your display/TV model so that I can do some research on it.
I’m running HDR in TrueBlack 400 mode and calibrated HDR via the windows calibration tool. I know from various websites that peak brightness is around 480 nits in this mode. Anything else I should do to calibrate the HDR on my monitor?
Also, when setting up HDR in Retroarch, I know the defaults are 1000 nits and 200 for paper white luminance. Besides changing 1000 nits to 480 (or should I do…400?), should I change paper white luminance to something lower? I played around with it and lowering it makes the whites significantly visibly darker…but maybe this is more colour accurate? Intuitively, I actually want to turn it UP, but I don’t know at what values I’ll get artifacts and distortions etc…
Also, when tinkering within the shader paramaters, I want to confirm, I also need to set the peak brightness and paper white luminance to whatever I set it in the retroarch HDR setting section, right?
I noticed RetroCrisis turns on Integer scaling for both this and the Death to Pixels megabezel packs. I’m confused, is it safe/preferable to turn on Integer Scaling for the Cybertron shaders?
I noticed RetroCrisis skips the " **These presets REQUIRE CRT-Guest-Advanced-NTSC version…" and just straight up updates the shaders via retroarch. Don’t your presets require a specific version of Guest-Advanced, not just the most up-to-date version?
Very good, you definitely need to do this to get the most of these presets.
This is good operating procedure, however for these types of presets, you might have a better experience overall using the * DisplayHDR: Peak 1000 nits mode.
You definitely don’t want to neuter the brightness of the display with these things and you have the ability to run at 240Hz which is a dream if you pair these presets with the CRT-Beam-Simulator.
Do over your Windows Calibration using the Peak 1000nits mode. Make sure your Windows Calibration looks right to your preference. Most of the calibration is objective though, only the very last part, where you have to adjust the brightness/Saturation slider is subjective.
This calibration has no bearing on RetroArch in HDR mode however. It would only affect shaders and presets which don’t use HDR and then only if HDR is switched off in RetroArch. It’s still good to have things configured so that you can always get the advantages of HDR though for example when viewing your HDR Screenshots and stuff, they’ll look right.
The defaults mean nothing basically.
What applies to one display doesn’t apply to others.
This is actually pretty simple if you don’t overthink it. Follow your intuition. Use your eyes. There’s no way I know of to get it completely accurate and achieve what we’re trying to use HDR inverse tonemapping for in any case.
Pick your favourite games, ones that you’re familiar with and just set the Paper White Luminance to what’s comfortable to your eyes in terms of brightness.
If you push it too far colours and whites might look too “hot” and harsh. That means there’s clipping and maybe you’re exceeding the limitations of your display.
Like wise, look at things like white text to fine tune the Peak Brightness, regardless of what RTINGS says if the white text stands out to the point where they look like a light bulb and you can’t make out the scanlines and mask then it could be too high. Again, set that to what looks best to you and slowly tweak over time.
Retro Crisis failed to do this in his last video and the result was an unpleasant image. He seemed a bit overwhelmed by the number of choices even though Genesis only has a handful relatively and one can easily and quickly jump to the section they’re concermed with by using the left and right keys or buttons or the L & R buttons. In addition to that, the presets with the longest, most outlandish name or the more recent ones or hyperbole like Neo-GX, Extreme or Supreme tend to be the newer and better ones.
I’m surprised there was such a positive response to the video despite these apparent oversights but I can’t complain too much because I’m grateful for the opportunity to share and showcase what I do.
Please report back with your improvements and post some pics as well.
Yes, no and maybe because the RetroArch settings have an additional Contrast control which the Shader Parameters doesn’t have. RetroArch controls do nothing for Sony Megatron Color Video Monitor Presets by the way, they’re intended for other shaders.
If you’re completely lost you can use the grey ramp and colour bar tests to get a ball park for getting the highest colour volume before clipping and also, proper grey scale at least on the high end. Seeing a few black bars chopped off at the low end is normal as well as living with a little clipping in the reds to get them look actually red at least on some displays.
I tend to focus on my favourite games for calibration though.
Remember to report back and share some pics/video clips.
For Mega Bezel Integer Scale needs to be off in the RetroArch–>Settings–»Video–»Scaling menu and Aspect Ratio set to Full as per the Mega Bezel setup instructions.
The presets would have integer scaling enabled (or disabled) via the Shader Parameters.
The same applies to Uborder.
For everything else, Integer Scale should be On in the RetroArch–»Settings–»Video–»Scaling menu unless otherwise specified in the readme for the particular Shader Preset Pack.
This is why it’s important to read the entire first post and to browse the thread. Since my W420M Preset Pack, I’ve self contained and included the appropriate Guest Shader.
Thank you for clarifying re. Integer Scaling. And also you’re completely right, I actually went ahead and re-read the first post while I was waiting for my comment to be approved, and I stumbled on the answer. I even tried deleting my comment but it wasn’t letting me for some reason. Maybe because I’m a new account…? I’ll try to just edit next time until I get delete privileges.
For this monitor (along with all the other qd-oled 2024 monitors; they all have the same panel), there are issues with the Peak 1000 mode. The EOTF curve doesn’t track well past 10% APL, leading to some image scenarios where HDR 400 is brighter. See here for more details.
MSI engineers are aware of the issue and trying to solve it with firmware but until then, I’m running HDR400 mode (and I can attest it usually IS brighter than P1000, sadly).
I was going to tackle incorporating the CRT Beam Sim eventually, once I have the HDR issues sorted out. I wish I had one of those spiffy top of the line 2025 monitors that can do a 1080p 480Hz mode. Those refresh rates are finally getting closer to CRT motion clarity…
One q: playing around, why does changing the CRT Resolution also change the colours so much?
Don’t delete, allow others who visit the thread to benefit as well.
I understand what you’re saying but do remember that we’re only using HDR in this case to “unlock” any additional brightness that the display can provide. Any colour correction can be done at the Shader Parameter level.
Most of or at least a large percentage of the screen is dark or off anyway so the APL levels issues may not apply the same way in this scenario. Maybe you can test it both ways and see but you’re going to need the extra brightness headroom in order to utilize the temporal improvements of the CRT-Beam-Simulator.
“For smaller APL from there, the True Black 400 mode (referred to from here as ‘TB400’ for ease) doesn’t get any brighter, and reaches it’s peak at around 471 nits maximum. The ‘Peak 1000’ mode (referred to from here as ‘P1000’) on the other can get brighter for the smaller APL of 5% and 1% areas measured, reaching up to 1002 nits maximum and therefore meeting the 1000 nits peak brightness spec of the panel.”
“The shape of the lines in P1000 mode is very similar, but the difference is that in SDR content the screen only reaches up to around 500 nits maximum, whereas in HDR mode it reaches twice that at 1000 nits.”
“You can see from the measurements in these real content videos and movies that the P1000 mode was able to reach higher peak luminance than the TB400 mode for lower APL scenes and for bright highlights. The Christmas light videos were a very good example of low APL % scenes where the P1000 mode reached a lot higher luminance than TB400, and where you can experience the full brightness capability of the panel.”
“Using a normal white test pattern (signal input level = 100) you can see that both modes are the same for all APL between 10% and 100%, but the P1000 mode can reach higher peak luminance for the smaller APLs. This is in keeping with the earlier measurements of HDR content in the two modes.”
“However, you can see that for the larger APL the P1000 mode is now darker, and this is caused by that poor PQ tracking for the mid grey shades (signal levels 45 – 80) for the larger APLs. For instance at 50% APL the TB400 mode has a 112 nits higher luminance while at 100% APL the TB400 mode is 100 nits higher. This equates to around an 18 – 19% difference in perceived brightness (based on XCR)”
I think I’ve read enough. You’re not going to be using many High APL scenes when doing these CRT Emulations. Almost half the screen will be black/off due to the pillar boxing on the left and right sides of the screen.
Then you have the scanlines gaps taking up near half the remaining pixels of the screen being dark/off.
Then even the phosphor mask is going to have black lines for the slot mask and aperture grille wires and and the only time all RG and B subixels are going to be lit at the same time are when displaying white.
So you should be able to take full advantage of the display’s full luminance range in Peak 1000 mode.
It’s up to you if you want to leave Windows in SDR mode.
I really don’t know. I just try my best to corrrect whatever differences I encounter. It could be as simple as the light is passing through a different filter (the mask) so there will be differences in the output.
Notice I said share some pics/videos and not screenshots.
Both of those screenshots look similar except for the TVL.
If you want me to be able to “see” what you are seeing you would have to rely on high quality photographs or video recordings of the screen.
Now that I think about it one of the reasons why you might be experiencing colour shifts when adjusting Resolution (TVL) might be due to none of the Display’s Subpixel Layouts available in the Shader actually matching your Display’s actual Subpixel Layout.
So at some TVLs the misalignment might just be worse than others. Some colour and sharpness shifting is normal when switching TVL on displays which have matching subpixel layouts available though but it might be even worse with one that doesn’t match.
By the way, the risk of burn-in/uneven wear is real. Some say newer OLED displays fare better than older ones but I’m not so sure by how much.
I’m not sure what you can do to mitigate against the pixels used for the scanlines wearing out faster than the pixels used for the scanlines gaps.
Then there’s the uneven wear caused by the pillar bars of 4:3 content.
Nothing lasts forever but I now consider OLED Displays to be “temporary” displays, they’re way too expensive for me to call them disposable.
This is something that you won’t want to do while using subpixel accurate CRT shaders as they are designed to address and map down to the subpixel level of the display to simulate as accurate as a 1:1 ratio with emulated CRT RGB Phosphors. So you would need to be running native 4K or 1080p centered with no scaling to Fullscreen or Aspect Ratio.
… imagine wall mounting a 65” tv to a swivel mount so you play vertical or horizontal games… I don’t think I’ve seen that done on such a large scale!
