S-Video hack progress, and pictures!

[adric22]

I received my Neobitz board today and assembled it.  I eagerly connected it to my Amiga 1000's video port and to my PC's video capture card.   Honestly, I am amazed at the results!  I don't have any pictures of the hardware because right now it is just a mess of wires and alligator clips.  I just wanted to see it work.  But I do have some screen captures for you to look at.  Keep in mind that as impressive as these are, there is about 10 feet of cable between my Amiga and the neobitz board and another 10 feet of S-video cable from the neobitz board to my PC.  There are several feet of cable that are not even coax (like the foot long alligator clips on each of the red, green, and blue wires)  So I am certain when this is made more tidy and professional it will be even more clear!

These are in BMP format, by the way, as I wanted you to be able to see every pixel without compression. Okay.. first here are some example pictures I pulled from the composite output on my Amiga 1000:

http://www.my-pc-help.com/images/misc/amiga100-direct-composite.bmp

http://www.my-pc-help.com/images/misc/jrcomm-direct-composite2.bmp

The following picture was taken from the Neobitz's composite output:

http://www.my-pc-help.com/images/misc/test1-composite.bmp

And all of these pictures were taken from S-video:

http://www.my-pc-help.com/images/misc/test2-s-video.bmp
http://www.my-pc-help.com/images/misc/jrcomm-s-video.bmp
http://www.my-pc-help.com/images/misc/interceptor-svideo.bmp

As you can see, they are spectacular looking!  I believe this is currently the best method for getting your older Amiga on a more modern monitor. It is fairly inexpensive too. Soon I'll be connecting this to a 17" flat panel television through the S-video and we'll see how it looks.

I'm also going to see about hooking this internal to my Amiga 1000 so that it is self-contained.  Currently it is running off of a seperate +5V power source, I hope it will run fine from the Amiga's internal power.  

[Piru]

These are in BMP format, by the way, as I wanted you to be able to see every pixel without compression.

PNG

[Olecranon]

Very cool indeed.  Did you get the Neobitz or the Neobitz-S board?  Where did you purchase it from?

I'm interested in the Neobitz board because it can do component output as well as S-Video and composite.  I'd love to connect an Amiga to a 32" LCD TV via component and let the TV do the FlickerFixer/Scandoubling.

[adric22]

Very cool indeed. Did you get the Neobitz or the Neobitz-S board? Where did you purchase it from?

I bought it from www.neobitz.com.  Yes, it is the Neobitz-S board, it does not have the component output on it.  One thing is for sure, the board is a lot smaller than I first thought.  It is only 1" x 2".

[adolescent]

Very nice.  I'll have to get a couple of those to play with.

[rare_j]

If they could make one of these little boards in a plastic box with a DB23 on one end and an S-video plug on the other, basically like a little A520 for s-video, then I bet they would sell very well.

I'd buy two for sure.

[Louis Dias]

doesn't the Amiga use 2 signals for each of R, G & B?

[Fester]

Hello adric22,

I'm very impressed.

Would you be willing to share a how-to or make a sort of document for people like me who have just enough electronics to follow a diagram?

Fester

[guru-666]

Sweet!

[adric22]

Would you be willing to share a how-to or make a sort of document for people like me who have just enough electronics to follow a diagram?

Fester, yes.. I am working on that now.  I'm putting together a video of the entire process of installing this into an A1000 but the idea should transfer over to other Amiga models as well.  You could also hook it up external with the 23-pin video port.   Expect to see the finished video in 2-3 days.  I'll post back on here when it is done.  I'll also have some more screenshots as the wires will be much shorter and RF shielded.  So the pictures may look even clearer.

[Zac67]

The ghosting will be reduced a lot when you use decent wiring.  ;-)

[DonP1]

S-Video hack progress, and pictures!

Great Job! I have an A1000 as well.

[AJCopland]

Wow those are an amazing improvement!

[adric22]

Hmmm.. this is a bit troubling.  I installed the board inside my A1000 today.  It works, but the video isn't quite as clear as it was outside the case connected with alligator clips, especially the composite video.  When it was outside, I felt the neobitz composite video was slightly better than the A1000's built in. Now I think the A1000's is slightly better.   My theories are:

1) The inside of the computer has a lot of RF noise (the board is inside the RF cage)

2) The power supply is dirty.  I was using an external regulated power source before.

Currently I'm putting together a little RF cage to put the board inside of to see if that helps.

Still.. The S-Video output remains quite a substantial improvement over either of the composite outputs. So I can't complain too much.  I filmed the entire process, just need to edit it together now.. should have a google video up soon.

[jarrody2k]

Piru wrote:

These are in BMP format, by the way, as I wanted you to be able to see every pixel without compression.

PNG

It's far more practical to get points across without being smug

Jarrod.