video standard converters why so much?

[Bob Todd]

500 quid for one that does 500 lines of resolution!

this is disgusting when most cheap DVD players do NTSC>PAL50.

why so much?

 

[LV426]

Probably because:

1) The conversion in a DVD player starts in the digital domain and converts as part of the transition to analog, whereas a standalone converter has to take an already analog signal, digitise it, write it to memory, re-scale it and then convert it back to analog all in realtime. ie a more complex process
2) They are niche-market devices with low volume/demand.