ALS'/DLF' : your daily dose of Arcade Life Style...inside the Dragon's Lair!
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Only a few months after approaching Jochen with the suggestion to create a component version of his popular SLG3000, it's now already available for order (35 EUR at http://joca-tech.de/Arcadeforge/product ... ucts_id=97 ).
In early 2011 the SLG3000 was a groundbreaking device. The possibility to add scanlines to any VGA signal, either directly from a console (360/DC) or to a linedoubler's VGA output, became extremely popular. Unfortunately VGA is a dying breed. Panasonic and Sony have now removed VGA inputs from their current TV sets and so did many other manufacturers. Many of the new PC displays, especially the higher-end ones with 1440p of higher also come without VGA connections these days.
The new SLG-HD offers scanline emulation to any ED or HD component signal. It works great with 480p, 720p and even 1080i (with 480p and 1080i being the recommended resolutions). This means instant compatibility with PS2*, XBox, GameCube, Wii, WiiU, 360 and PS3 and almost any display.
Especially interesting for our North Americans community members, the SLG-HD can be used directly on any CRT set which offers a ED or HD component input. Or course it can also be used with LCDs or Plasma sets, it can be used with upscalers (between the source and the processor), or it can be used behind a linedoubler or scaler (if it offers component output - most do).
Overall the SLG-HD offers much higher flexibility compared to the VGA version (in terms of compatibitliy with different kinds of setups). THe SLG-HD offers an on/off switch, a switch for odd/even scanlines and a set of dips to chose between three different scanlines densities. My prototype still had a variable resistor (just like the SLG3000), but this caused some problems with sync stability on the higher settings, so Jochen opted for the dips instead. The highest scanline density you can achieve is about 2/3 of what the SLG3000 can do (so you can't get full 100% scanlines), but that's ok, since most people didn't use 100% scanlines anyway. The technical reason behind this is that on the SLG3000 the scanlines were "applied" to all three color channels, while on the SLG-HD the color channels remain unaltered and the scanlines are only applied to the luminance channel. The Lumimance signal can only take so much attenuation, before the TV or display won't accept it anymore (while the RGB VGA signal keeps it's full sync signal intact).
Component signals are much better standarized than VGA signals (in terms of refresh rates), so it's easy to convert the SLG-HD's output to HDMI using a scaler or a mere converter.
A great new addition to the SLG-family and a welcomed approach to get scanlines into setups where VGA is no option.
(* Scanlines on the PS2 are lighter than on other systems and the SLG-HD only works with games that support 480p, either out of the box, or using the GSM or XPloder boot discs)
I've been lucky enough to get my hands on one of the prototype's and to support Fudoh's comments, it certainly get's my "scanline" approval.
Based on my personal findings:
XBOX 360 and original XBOX work perfectly with 480p, 720p and 1080i. As an example, Deathsmiles on the 360 looks "mint".
PS2 & Wii works very well (only tested 480p at the moment). The Wii image with the SLG HD is very very nice (means you don't need something like the GBS scaler, to transcode to VGA (for scanlines with the SLG 3000) for this console imo).
I can't help think if this device had been available a few years back, for Wii users, Jochen would have made a killing!!
YT "review" video inbound shortly!
with engraving
