who plays these games on vga?

[drunkensailor]

I hate the black borders!

You can crop to reduce them, distort the ratio to your liking, etc. I choose not to because I'm an image purist and want everything displayed natively. Such things never bothered me, but to each their own. Most people who despise borders are playing on uncalibrated sets anyway, to them I say "enjoy!"

what tv is that and what is the size? I'm looking for a new tv just to use vga on for my dreamcast since I got a new hdtv but it doesn't have vga connection. I still have an old 42 inch hdtv from samsung that I now use for dreamcast but it looks to outstretched

also what is preferable? led lcd or plasma?

Sony XBR3 and it's 46". The only upgrade I'd go for at this point is a newer 4K XBR, though they're simply not worth it at this time (for me at least). It's no shock that you don't have VGA, most newer TV's don't and in the past it was a price hike for manufacturing. You could do the option I spoke of above with a transcoder, though won't have any native VGA tweaking options. Still, the signal should look just fine as a quality transcoder takes care of most of that.

does it not look incredibly outstretched on your tv then?

[Fenix]

I hate the black borders!

You can crop to reduce them, distort the ratio to your liking, etc. I choose not to because I'm an image purist and want everything displayed natively. Such things never bothered me, but to each their own. Most people who despise borders are playing on uncalibrated sets anyway, to them I say "enjoy!"

Nah. I wouldn't change anything of this. I want original ratio.

By the way. The quality of image must be more than amazing. I remember 7 or 8 years ago when I connected Shenmue to my fathers's Sony Bravia and my face was

[Yama]

Nah. I wouldn't change anything of this. I want original ratio.

For sure, you and me both. Oh and just to clarify, I meant the trouble of calibrating older CRT's which is near impossible to achieve perfect image reproduction. The trade off of a perfectly calibrated image for bars is worth it to me, though I too would take native 4:3 display if possible. Just to note though, it is the original ratio, just not fill. But I know what you meant. ;)

By the way. The quality of image must be more than amazing. I remember 7 or 8 years ago when I connected Shenmue to my fathers's Sony Bravia and my face was

It's phenomenal.

does it not look incredibly outstretched on your tv then?

Of course not. It's 1:1 faithfully reproduced.

[drunkensailor]

you mean you play in 640x480 on your big screen? thus leaving lots of black borders? it doesn't look like that on your pictures. it looks just like 4:3 over your entire screen. on my 42 inch samsung hdtv it looks very unclear and stretched. and I wonder how.

[BlueMue]

He probably ment that the aspect ratio is kept 1:1 while the size increases. The picture of course isn't in 1:1 mode as in native resolution wich of course is just a small portion of the screen.

If your TV gives you a streched image you should look at your aspect settings. Maybe it's running in 16:9 mode or some intermediate size. If it's set to 4:3 and still to wide you should check the VGA settings of your TV. Just like with computer monitors there should be options for V/H position, V/H size, clock phase and so on.

[drunkensailor]

He probably ment that the aspect ratio is kept 1:1 while the size increases. The picture of course isn't in 1:1 mode as in native resolution wich of course is just a small portion of the screen.

If your TV gives you a streched image you should look at your aspect settings. Maybe it's running in 16:9 mode or some intermediate size. If it's set to 4:3 and still to wide you should check the VGA settings of your TV. Just like with computer monitors there should be options for V/H position, V/H size, clock phase and so on.

all I can do with options in my tv is centre the image or move it across the screen. I have it on 4:3 and it looks very outstretched and unclear. I used to have it on a samsung 32 inch that had incredible image. I ust don't understand how.

also I have no clock pahse option on my tv and don't know what it is either.

[BlueMue]

Well then I guess the VGA port of the TV isn't very good or it just doesn't like the Dreamcast resolution. It can happen, VGA ports vary a lot on TVs, some have really good ones, others can be pretty bad for low resolutions.

[drunkensailor]

Well then I guess the VGA port of the TV isn't very good or it just doesn't like the Dreamcast resolution. It can happen, VGA ports vary a lot on TVs, some have really good ones, others can be pretty bad for low resolutions.

I plan on visiting some tv shops with my dreamcast and vga this weekend to test some tv's out if I can. anything particular I should watch out for? option for clock phase I guess?

[BlueMue]

No that option isn't really that necessary. If the TV is good you won't have to mess with the settings at all, it will find the correct ratio and size by itself.

[drunkensailor]

I just got a new tv and hit has clock phase setting but what is it and what should I put it?

[BlueMue]

Like I already said that option isn't very important. Usually it's not needed to adjust that setting at all.
If you encounter lines of some sort you could get around these with that setting.

http://www.techmind.org/lcd/phasexplan.html