OSSC General Help w/Pixel Perfection

[NewYears1978]

Good posts and explanations, thanks all. I gave up on the PS1 because it seemed that I could not get a stable picture in the optimal modes..and in 4:3 at 5x it seemed fairly accurate and sharp anyway.

I tried so many things with PS1, I could get it looking good in one thing or in the test suite but then in a game something would be wrong (glitching or moving pixels in a menu or text that is jumbled etc)

So my observations today along with the previous posts explaining, I was able to see what you guys were talking about. 5x in 256×240 optim with the proper timings is super sharp. It looks great.

In Generic 4:3 mode with default timings it also looks really nice – and if I turn sharpness on my monitor to max that compensates for some of the less sharp pixels. To me this more mimics a CRT. The optim modes seem artificially sharp..and while it looks great it doesn’t quite mimic the CRT look.

I can see how people would be divided on this..both work though. Using 5x 256×240 or 4:3 in 1080p mode looks quite good on SNES and PS1 and you of course only get the bars on the side, something I could get used to ignore over time (but it does bother me lol)

On NES I can use 4x or 5x with it filling the whole screen – since the graphics are much simpler the pixel stretching doesn’t look near as jarring in NES than SNES. But for overall consistency I may just use the same modes for both (and PS1) so that I get a consistent feel I can get used to.

Thinking using 4:3 mode might but the best bet since I cannot get optim modes to work with PS1 – maybe the consistency across those 3 consoles will be easier to get used to since they are all very similar =D

Anyway, just speaking my thoughts out loud. My problem is just being so anal and OCD about everything when really any of these work well enough to enjoy the games lol.

I may get a GameCube and/or Genesis to add to my collectoins so then that throws another wrench in there..but I think Genesis would run just like the SNES and GameCube of course has built in Component I could run that through my CRT that my PS2 is on or whatever…will cross that bridge later (have too many games to play right now anyway…I have a modest collection of stuff I actually had growing up and will use rather than trying to collect everything)

Thanks all for your support and posts – look forward to more opinions from others and what you ended up going with for your setup 🙂

(Small Update – oddly it seems like maybe 4x line mode with bars on all sides is preferable (same way FBX sets his up) – it’s less distracting on my eyes to have a full border around it…lol. Ah the joys of firstworldproblems…can’t decide which I like most)

[Steo]

I feel like 4x is definitely the best method for PAL games by using the V Active 270 method, because that way you get 1080p which scales perfectly even on a 4k set. For NTSC though, I definitely think 5x looks much sharper on my set than 3x optimised. I understand that 720p x 3 = 2160p, but the pixels still have softer edges than they do in 5x. The only thing is that in 5x I have to use 1600×1200 and force my set to 4:3, otherwise the aspect ratio will be wrong or the top and bottom of the screen will be cropped.

Also, the borders don’t matter on OLED because they’re completely black like the TV’s frame. 😛

[NewYears1978]

That’s exactly where I ended up. 5x in 1600×1200 forcing 4:3 on my monitor. 🙂

[Steo]

Yeah it seems to work really well on my TV. 1920×1200 is too narrow in 4:3 while being too wide in 16:9, then 1920×1080 is missing a fair amount vertically. 5x with optimised modes using 1600×1200 with forced 4:3 looks pretty amazing. 🙂

[James]

#2 a wavey line rolling down the screen every 80 frames (or so) when something is scrolling vertically. I assume it’s a sync issue, no matter what I try, I can’t get rid of it.

I think this is caused by the off spec refresh of a PAL PS1, PAL Megadrives are bad for it as well.

It doesn’t seem to happen on X2 only higher multiples.

I now use a switch modded NTSC Megadrive when I have to use 50hz as it actually closer to 50hz than a PAL console. It still skips a frame every few seconds when scolling vertically but you don’t get the wavy line.

[Steo]

I was getting frameskip like that on my old TV with the PAL SEGA consoles (Mega Drive and Saturn) which were modded to NTSC, because they’re 59.3Hz rather than 59.9Hz. I haven’t used my modded Mega Drive much tbh since I bought a Genesis instead which has the mod done to remove jailbars. The difference in the sound pitch between the PAL Mega Drive and NTSC Genesis was driving me insane, but most people don’t even realise there’s a difference. Maybe I’m OCD when it comes to sound. ?

To clarify, I mean how the PAL Mega Drive is about 15-20 cents lower pitched than the NTSC Genesis and it was very noticeable to me as it makes the music sound completely different to my ears.

[videogameperfectionrocks]

I agree! It’s extremely difficult to discover the right h.samplerate for optim mode. The MVS optim settings have been discovered and are available here and they look great:

http://www.firebrandx.com/OSSC/OSSC%20-%20Neo%20Geo%20Optimal%20Timing.txt

I tried to do Espgaluda by trial and error (no test pattern available on the PCB that I know of) and this was as close as I got but there is a wavy pattern through the background as it scrolls vertically:

Line5x mode 512×240 optim.
h.samplerate 680
h.backporch 67
v.backporch 13

Sampling phase on the other hand doesn’t seem so difficult to do by trial and error.

I’m trying to figure out the right way to determine h.samplerate here:

OSSC for PCBs

[videogameperfectionrocks]

More info in the thread I linked to above but I got Espgaluda nailed down:

Line5x mode 512×240 optim.
Sampling phase 292 deg
H. samplerate 640
H. synclength 80
H. backporch 46
H. active 450
V. backporch 13

Those settings should work for other PGM boards as well. It’s worth mentioning that my Espgaluda is a standalone PCB (not a cartridge) but apparently it’s still on the PGM platform.

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