Starting Setup for Atlona AT-HD500 VGA-HDMI with Dreamcast

[artphotodude]

OK so in the previous post I share some info about this now VERY affordable Rolls Royce HDMI solution for Dreamcast ( https://www.racketboy.com/forum/viewtop ... 28&t=52226 ), but the setup did take a few hours to figure out. I've been working in Electronics, Color Management and Video since the 1980's so I'm confident that this is a good starting configuration to at least try out. With only one sample, there's no way to know how much variation these might have, but if you initially have a picture that's way too red and muddy-looking, this is likely a good starting place that will balance between realistic, neutral-color games like: "Sega Bass Fishing I/II", "Resident Evil: Code Veronica", "Resident Evil 3", "Unreal Tournament" and really bright, colorful, high-contrast games like "Quake 3 Arena", "Ooga Booga", "Samba de Amigo" and Capcom Fighters. I strongly advice doing further adjustment on your TV. Now if your box does perfect-color right out of the box, please post info on that here. Would be interesting to see how much variation we might expect in a professional product like this.

BTW if you mess up and get to where you can't see the screen to fix it, just hold the MENU button for 5-seconds, while unplugging the unit, keep holding for 5-seconds while it is unplugged and while still holding it, plug back into the power for 5 seconds, and it should revert to base settings of 480p full-screen.

Also, as stated in the update on the original post, if you leave the unit unplugged for too long, it can loose your custom settings, so is probably good to jot them down on paper.

When you click MENU, you will see a bunch of options, and here are the suggested ones to adjust and settings:

Contrast: 50

Brightness: 48

Color:
Red - 38
Green - 46
Blue - 48

Size: Panoscan (4x3)
*Note - if you want to force widescreen select "Full" here, as your TV might not be able to override it with the normal controls since the box pads the sides with black to achieve normal width while in 4x3.

Output: 1080p, 1080i, 720p, 480p as you wish in 60Hz (NTSC) or 50Hz (pal)


Why is the all the color stuff necessary? Good question. All I can figure is that the original NTSC1953 colorspace the Dreamcast works in is getting lost when it goes through the box to HDMI and your TV is assuming it to be sRGB.

Anyway, hope this is helpful