RGB scart what pitfalls?

I have just got the bits to build my Radeon VGA out to RGB scart cable but I was just a little worried as everything has lots of warnings about ruining your TV (I have a 29" Sony CRT) and I was interested in what the issues actually are and what I need to be aware of.

... following on from this, I could probably do with knowing how to solve these issues too !!!

 

I think worries about ruining your TV are greatly exaggerated. No one can point to a ruined TV in reality.

Make sure you use a multimeter to check your soldering from VGA pin to SCART pin and you will be fine.

Also check that pins immediately around a pin AREN'T connected ( by ham fisted soldering )

 

I am actually a bit lazy (and I lost my soldering iron) so I am just going to hack up the cable and use connector blocks inside a little plastic box!!

I have read somewhere about outputing the boot-up (BIOS etc) screens to TV via scart is bad ??

 

You will not be able to access the bios with this cable so all adjustments must be made via Svid or using a monitor.

I have booted my system 100's of times and so far touch wood no damage has occurred to my TV.

I am not going to say it isn't a possibility but I have not seen any problems so far

 

Being a bit thick but why ??

Are the normal boot up screens not output as normal ?? (i.e. the bit which detects IDE devices, memory etc)

 

You can't make this lead without a soldering iron - a resistor needs to be soldered across two of the SCART pins.

This site is a good "howto"

http://ryoandr.free.fr/english.html

This forum thread has lots of useful info on configuring PowerStrip for this lead

http://www.avforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=136811


I hope you realise that you can't just make the lead and it all "works" - you have to install PowerStrip and configure it for your TV too.

Question: If you can't see PowerStrip because the screen is scrolling and unreadable, how do you input your TV's paramters to configure a stable screen ?

Answer: by the S-Video out of your graphics card connected to the S-Video of your TV.

Also this whole shebang only works for certain makes and models of graphics card, not any old model - the site mentioned above lists which.

 

As mentioned by groovyclam you need to use powerstrip to output the corrected interlaced signal, and as powerstrip is a program running under Windows you don't get an image until it's all loaded up (hence no BIOS).

About the damage that can be done to TVs I can easily understand how older sets may not be able to handle an out of frequency signal. I would have though that a TV with 100Hz has enough signal processing to handle the boot; my set has no problems. So I would be a little weary about using the lead on an ageing 50Hz only unit.

Unfortunately, there's no real way of checking if it will damage your set unless you can find someone who has had direct experience...:/

 

Yes aware of this.

What signal is output then normally ?? Presumably there is a signal into TV during boot but the TV can't handle it so doesn't display it ??

 

Boot screens are probably 60Hz progressive and a PAL CRT can't handle a progressive signal via SCART - it needs to be interlaced ( by PowerStrip ) at the correct PAL frequency.

 

What he said.

 

I don't quite know what happens during bios, but they don't display well at all on my 60hz TV (although 640x480@60Hz is fine). I have a feeling they may be 640x400, or something. Someone will know...