elmagicochrisg wrote:eastside wrote:SpaceBooger wrote:From all of the research and even member help, especially the long lost mozgus, we have determined that it is the way that newer TVs handle the signal from the DC that causes the vertical lines.
I'm not convinced it's an LCD problem for the vertical lines.. My ealier post showed that my 19 inch rectangular, 7 year old, Dell monitor had the same vertical lines as my Sony LCD.
Even a rectangular monitor will scale the picture unless it's native resolution is 640*480. If that's the case we can eliminate scaling as a reason for the vertical lines. Also, is it a CRT monitor?... If so, then I would also doubt scaling to be the problem. I think scaling on a CRT works quite differently than on an LCD monitor...
Mod_Man_Extreme wrote:Get a heavy and well shielded VGA cable.
All very nice, but what if the Dreamcast VGA cable itself isn't well shielded?... The connection will only be as good as it's weakest link.
Any pointers on what to look for in a good VGA cable?...
The way the VGA Box handles the signal is via an amplification circuit so no matter what the end result being spit out is at 100% signal strength.
The straight Dreamcast VGA cable is designed for immediate connections to the back of an LCD Monitor/TV or CRT monitor, but I'll never touch one of those. the circuit inside the DC was never designed for a direct feed, but to be used in conjunction with a box and amplification circuit.
EDIT!: This is what you should look for in a VGA cable:
Very thick and quite stiff, but optimal for high resolutions and to prevent any cross talk or artifacting with large or modern displays that lack proper amplification. With mine I no longer get any of the squares or lines I originally got on my LCD with a bad cable as newer monitors are extremely critical of the input image.
Key things to look for are:
Weight - Heavy cables mean heavy duty shielding.
Thickness - About as thick around as the tip of your pinky finger or more means lots of insulation and shielding is present.
Contact Quality - Gold is good, look for gold on the pins. Silver or nickel plated cables might work the same for you as long as they are properly shielded.
Ferrite Cores - Those little cylinders right before each connector. These prevent signal noise, distorted images, and improve signal quality by miles over a cable without them.