Component vs VGA - which is better ?

mjw123

Prominent Member
Joined
Apr 21, 2004
Messages
1,302
Reaction score
32
Points
303
Well i'd heard the hype about VGA cables and ordered one that arrived yesterday for my HD sammy 32" LCD.

Although happy with my component cable I did see Jaggies on PGR3 and was informed the VGA was superior and would deal with this.

So last night plugged in my new Joytech VGA cable and here are the results :-

DVD Playback - nothing in it, both show dissapointing results with too much arefacts in the picture background.

360 Menu screens - VGA is rubbish here, everything looks far too soft and some ghosting of text is visible. Component is pin sharp

Halo2 - VGA looked tripe

PGR3 - Well VGA certainly got rid of the jaggies by making the picture very soft and intruducing some colour run on the reds in the night tracks. Give me the jaggies any day.

So in summary i've found the VGA lead pants with my Sammy 32" LCD.....will try some further tests tonight but it's heading straight to Ebay at this rate.....don't waste your money !!
:suicide:

Any others had dissapointing results with VGA ?

Mike.

ps I set it to the highest res which was 1300ishx768
 
Nope my Joytech VGA is sweet as for everything, including Halo2.
 
Yeah, I got the official VGA cable but I've gone back to the component as I find the colours alot more vivid that way. Didn't notice the VGA get rid of the jaggies, but they never bothered me in the first place. I did think the VGA did DVD playback noticeably better, but I don't watch DVDs on my 360 anyway, so not really bothered.
 
Sounds like you've got the same / similar tv to me, and to be honest I preferred the picture using the official VGA cable, as it seemed to get rid of the jaggies and have no / little ghosting compared to the component cables I've used. I also found that settings could be altered on the tv to compensate for the more washed out colours.

The main problem was the tv's backlight though, which is set to max brightness when using VGA, and ruins the picture if you're playing in low light conditions (which I usually am). I also seemed to notice more frame rate issues with the VGA cable compared to component, so for now I'm using a monster component cable.
 
Well barring a miracle with the settings tonight i'll be heading back to component. The awful picture you get in the menus says it all to me. Surely this should be pin sharp ?...This isn't my settings as a friend with the identical set up to me gets equally rubbish picture quality in the menus but feels the actual game picture quality is better....maybe I need to borrow his glasses ! :eek:
 
Hmm - It seems to be a maze of contradictions on this forum

Perhaps we should start some new threads by display model and rate the PQ via component \ VGA for each screen

I keep getting tempted by the Monster ( Presently using the Joytech lead ) as I suffer from the same washed out look on the colours on my old Hitachi 42PD3000.

However tweaking some of the settings have provided a comparable colour quality to component.
 
duke748 said:
Hmm - It seems to be a maze of contradictions on this forum

Perhaps we should start some new threads by display model and rate the PQ via component \ VGA for each screen

I keep getting tempted by the Monster ( Presently using the Joytech lead ) as I suffer from the same washed out look on the colours on my old Hitachi 42PD3000.

However tweaking some of the settings have provided a comparable colour quality to component.
get a monster gives better contrast and colour
because the cables are thicker and better shielded even the rubbish official leads are better than the joytecs if u dont nottice a difference then maybe u need a better screen
 
I agree with previous posters, the joytech VGA is rubbish compared to the official one. Test that one, and then give us your view.

Ive used both, and I prefer the vga for its sharpness and the component for the colour saturation. So, im split!
 
Gillsfan said:
I agree with previous posters, the joytech VGA is rubbish compared to the official one. Test that one, and then give us your view.

Ive used both, and I prefer the vga for its sharpness and the component for the colour saturation. So, im split!

Same here, VGA is better for sharpness, component for colour!
 
I am totally confused what type of cable to go for i.e VGA or Component hopefully I will be getting My sammy LE40M61B this week and the connections on this panel are as follows HDMI,SCARTx2,COMPONENT,VGA and S-VIDEO.

I originally was going to hook the 360 up to the panel with a Monster VGA but after reading other people thoughts I am starting to think to connect the 360 via component.

The trouble is though I really wanted the component left for My DVD player what are You thoughts regarding the above.
 
I have a Sammy LE40R51 and have both the official MS VGA and a 3rd party component lead from Germany (not Joytech or Madcatz). The component gives by far the best picture, the vga looks washed out and too soft.
 
I have the Toshiba 37WLT58 along with the official MS versions of the both the component and the VGA. The VGA initially appeared "washed out" compared to the component, but after some tweaking of settings on the Toshiba I was able to get good colour levels - so even steven's so far.
Next observation, the dashboard in VGA appeared slightly "soft" - like I was viewing it through a plastic film... the text seemed marginally crisper but the "soft sheen" affect detracted from this IMHO, with component the text is slightly less shpar but the overall picture does not suffer from the "soft sheen" effect.
Onto games, I only have PD0 but I noticed some slight framerate issues when playing using the VGA connection, admitedly there was a very slight improvement in edges, but the subtle judder made game play worse compared to the component.
In summary I am favouring the component cable, I'll do a few more tests but ist likely I will be flogging my VGA cable on the classifieds after this weekend, so if you are looking for one... keep an eye out Sunday afternoon.
 
I have a MS Component and Joytech VGA and on my Panny AE900 PJ the component has better colours but has really bad ghosting. The VGA is really sharp but has poor standard colours. After tweaking the VGA is by far superior.
I've got a Component to VGA converter coming should be interesting to see how the Component looks going through my VGA input.
 
T800 said:
I have a MS Component and Joytech VGA and on my Panny AE900 PJ the component has better colours but has really bad ghosting. The VGA is really sharp but has poor standard colours. After tweaking the VGA is by far superior.
I've got a Component to VGA converter coming should be interesting to see how the Component looks going through my VGA input.

I agree my VGA (Set up correctly) is spot on :thumbsup:
 
Have to agree with the VGA camp. The VGA cable has given my ageing Hitachi 42PD3000 a new lease of life
 
Zen1star said:
I have a Sammy LE40R51 and have both the official MS VGA and a 3rd party component lead from Germany (not Joytech or Madcatz). The component gives by far the best picture, the vga looks washed out and too soft.

Phew - i'm not going mad ;)
 
I have a 37WLT58, the component has better colour saturation but the vga is pin sharp. The vga did initially look washed out but I have since tweaked it and it all looks fab, I prefer vga.
 
There's also been some reports of frame rate issues over VGA when using the higher resolutions.

It really does seem to change set by set, and the difference in the lead used seems to be very noticeable
 
Just to confuse issues I have both leads (official Component & Joytech VGA) and a Panasonic PW6 Plasma

I was delighted with the component picture, but when I plugged in the VGA I was sold - pin sharp text on Dashboard and great colours in game. DVD playback via VGA was as good (if not better) than my Sony DVD player.

Only drawback is that you need to plug in the Component to update/play some original xbox games on the back catalog list....

Confusing huh? Must be the panel I guess.....

Regards GreenBhoy
 
I use Official VGA on my Sammy 32" and used a THX optimizer DVD to set the colours etc and it looks amazing. Far better and crisper than component imo.
 
So in summary different cables on different screen types from different manufacturers playing different games give differing results............wonderfull....roll a dice and take your pick :eek:

The mud thickens :hiya:

M
 
I don't think it depends on the games, they are what they are.

Look at it this way the worst thing you have to do is buy two £15 MS cables.
Which ever looks best to you after tweaking that's what you use.
Possibly sell the one you don't use on Ebay.
 
Another vote for the VGA camp, and an additional point to keep it ever so slightly personal-pref based!

I found VGA to be good on res, and poor on colour. The colour was sorted out by adjusting the TV for 20 minutes (sammy 32"), and as it keeps the settings per-input, it only needs doing once.

What res does everyone run here? I can't say without being in front of it, but I think I have mine set to 1280 x 768.

I have another plus point for the VGA - now that I have freed up the component input, I can run my PS2 thru it, and the difference between composite and component on the PS2 is :eek: Playing Resi Evil 4 and SOTC is much better thru component.
 

The latest video from AVForums

TV Buying Guide - Which TV Is Best For You?
Subscribe to our YouTube channel
Back
Top Bottom