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VGA Capture Thread

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Reply 1400 of 1488, by NightSprinter

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How odd, though I don't have any Magewell PCIe cards, the drivers have compiled fine all the way up to the most recent 6.5 kernels a lot of distros ship with. Vastly different story to my Datapath card, which I literally have to use OpenSuSE Leap 15 with Kernel 5.14.3 to even compile the driver on.

Reply 1401 of 1488, by megatron-uk

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I probably need to take a look at their most recent release then. I do recall when I got the card a couple of years ago the documentation said it was for 5.x.

Having written a few devices drivers for the kernel before I know how often the interfaces change between major versions; 2 to 3 and then 3 to 4 were huge changes for example.

If they still build against 6.x then that's promising that the card still has a decent amount of life left in it. I don't tend to keep this system at the bleeding edge as it's my main work/storage system.

My collection database and technical wiki:
https://www.target-earth.net

Reply 1403 of 1488, by NightSprinter

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Gave it a shot on my laptop with RegataOS 24 (OpenSuSE Tumbleweed) running Kernel 6.8.2, and the Magewell driver did fail, but most likely another change since 6.5 is my guess. The most recent driver is from just over a year ago (3/10/2023), but the changelog mentions Kernel 6.1 and 6.2 in it. I'll l0ad up Ubuntu 23.10 as a live distro later, and test there (since it ships with 6.5).

[Edit]
I forgot to mention that if you send Magewell's support team the compilation logs, they tend to work out the error pretty quickly for a driver update. I'll reply/edit once I test on Mantic to see if 6.5 changed something.

[Edit 2]
Ok, so it does not compile on 6.5.0 in Mantic Minotaur (23.10). The current LTS (23.04 Lunar Lobster) does ship with Kernel 6.2. So that version ought to work.

Reply 1404 of 1488, by Kitty Trouble

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Hi, I've been searching for a while for a way to 100% be able to capture DOS games in DOS mode, and I watched the video about the retrotink 4K and it seems like it works amazing. I don't care that much about the 4K but will need to make videos in 1080p somehow. The price tag, though... $750 is a bit much. I have read through this thread a bit in the past and there's just a lot of information. Is there anything cheaper that's 100% known to work, with hardware that I can easily find for sale (or have a link to buy)? I would prefer if it worked off of VGA and I can't install anything on my laptop, and not that confident on installing things on my old DOS / windows 952e PC.

Reply 1405 of 1488, by Kordanor

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Kitty Trouble wrote on 2024-05-07, 07:15:

Hi, I've been searching for a while for a way to 100% be able to capture DOS games in DOS mode, and I watched the video about the retrotink 4K and it seems like it works amazing. I don't care that much about the 4K but will need to make videos in 1080p somehow. The price tag, though... $750 is a bit much. I have read through this thread a bit in the past and there's just a lot of information. Is there anything cheaper that's 100% known to work, with hardware that I can easily find for sale (or have a link to buy)? I would prefer if it worked off of VGA and I can't install anything on my laptop, and not that confident on installing things on my old DOS / windows 952e PC.

There are no better alternatives. There is the Datapath Vision RGB, which you can buy used for around 100€, but new its also around 1000€. This program has no "official" drivers, and fan drivers have some issues unless you use linux, which are still being developed inofficially. Great captures, but definitely not hassle free, and can be problematic especially if you need to switch resolutions or graphics cards a lot.

Cheaper options will usually come with issues or less quality, if you consider capturing 320x200 70Hz DOS.

I am in the same boat. I don't need the 4k stuff. I don't need the filters and scalers. But I don't think, that even for 1080p there is any better alternative.

Reply 1406 of 1488, by appiah4

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I realize this is the 'VGA Capture' thread but I guess this is as good a place to ask as any. My current open bench DOS system has an FX5200 AGP on it and I am using the DVI-Out. FWIW, it seems to work quite well in every resolution/game I throw at it, so I was thinking about capturing directly from that source. Is there a decent but cheap HDMI capture device in the market that I can use for this?

Reply 1407 of 1488, by Kordanor

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appiah4 wrote on 2024-05-24, 11:20:

I realize this is the 'VGA Capture' thread but I guess this is as good a place to ask as any. My current open bench DOS system has an FX5200 AGP on it and I am using the DVI-Out. FWIW, it seems to work quite well in every resolution/game I throw at it, so I was thinking about capturing directly from that source. Is there a decent but cheap HDMI capture device in the market that I can use for this?

I use elgato but essentially most HDMI capture cards will do. Check Epos Vox for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daS5RHVAl2U

If you use DVI, you will be fine capturing anyways. The ussues come with VGA.

And you need to keep in mind that stuff which is older, and not quite "compatible" with DVI will be screwed by your graphics card most likely.

For example if you output any 320:200 resolution or most other stuff in DOS, which your graphics card will scale and stretch for DVI. Once you are using windows and 640x480 or higher and you can have it output as such without scaling, it should be fine.

Reply 1408 of 1488, by appiah4

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Kordanor wrote on 2024-05-24, 11:30:
I use elgato but essentially most HDMI capture cards will do. Check Epos Vox for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daS5RH […]
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appiah4 wrote on 2024-05-24, 11:20:

I realize this is the 'VGA Capture' thread but I guess this is as good a place to ask as any. My current open bench DOS system has an FX5200 AGP on it and I am using the DVI-Out. FWIW, it seems to work quite well in every resolution/game I throw at it, so I was thinking about capturing directly from that source. Is there a decent but cheap HDMI capture device in the market that I can use for this?

I use elgato but essentially most HDMI capture cards will do. Check Epos Vox for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daS5RHVAl2U

If you use DVI, you will be fine capturing anyways. The ussues come with VGA.

And you need to keep in mind that stuff which is older, and not quite "compatible" with DVI will be screwed by your graphics card most likely.

For example if you output any 320:200 resolution or most other stuff in DOS, which your graphics card will scale and stretch for DVI. Once you are using windows and 640x480 or higher and you can have it output as such without scaling, it should be fine.

The card stretches 320:200 to 1080p, and honestly the way it does it is much better than many TVs and analgue capture cards do it, so I'm ok with just taking its 1080p60 output and recording that..

I've also tried recording S-Video output from various PCI cards and honestly that looks like a crapsmear no matter what card/capture device I use.

VGA capture is too pricy for me, so this is where I settled..

Reply 1409 of 1488, by digistorm

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You have to be aware that often those DVI outputs are fixed at 60 Hz so software that waits on v-sync may run too slow. It is the case with my MX440.

Reply 1411 of 1488, by bestemor

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MAZter wrote on 2024-07-11, 01:43:

If anyone looking for perfect VGA splitter, just got one:
https://a.co/d/09NA48dA

What in your opinon makes it perfect ?

And how does that one compare to this one I wonder ?
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/116162 … a_splitter.html

Reply 1412 of 1488, by MAZter

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bestemor wrote on 2024-07-11, 09:13:

What in your opinon makes it perfect ?

Picture still perfect on my Dell CRT monitor when I use this splitter. And contain some extra switches, ID Bit Control & Selectable Sync Input Impedance:

57_272ee605-0ecd-43a1-89a9-c6dc340ee18c_1800x1800.jpg?v=1606489892

Doom is what you want (c) MAZter

Reply 1413 of 1488, by darry

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MAZter wrote on 2024-07-11, 12:52:
Picture still perfect on my Dell CRT monitor when I use this splitter. And contain some extra switches, ID Bit Control & Selecta […]
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bestemor wrote on 2024-07-11, 09:13:

What in your opinon makes it perfect ?

Picture still perfect on my Dell CRT monitor when I use this splitter. And contain some extra switches, ID Bit Control & Selectable Sync Input Impedance:

57_272ee605-0ecd-43a1-89a9-c6dc340ee18c_1800x1800.jpg?v=1606489892

I want one now.

Seriously.

EDIT: Ordered one.

I would have gotten 2, but did not want to risk reenacting Kramer vs Kramer 😀 (Bad joke, I know.)

Reply 1414 of 1488, by darry

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bestemor wrote on 2024-07-11, 09:13:
What in your opinon makes it perfect ? […]
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MAZter wrote on 2024-07-11, 01:43:

If anyone looking for perfect VGA splitter, just got one:
https://a.co/d/09NA48dA

What in your opinon makes it perfect ?

And how does that one compare to this one I wonder ?
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/116162 … a_splitter.html

The Epiphan looks higher specced on paper. Good luck finding one, though, whereas the Kramer ones are plentiful.

Reply 1415 of 1488, by bestemor

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darry wrote on 2024-07-11, 18:34:

The Epiphan looks higher specced on paper. Good luck finding one, though, whereas the Kramer ones are plentiful.

Thankyou for your help! 😁

epiphan vga splitter_July2024.jpg
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But I think better leave this one for some local Aussie - the shipping cost alone gets me 4x Kramer units 🤣

Kramer VP-200N.jpg
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Reply 1416 of 1488, by MAZter

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Release available on Amazon is with black painted bottom, like this:

[Screenshot-42.png

Yesterday I recorded some gameplay video from Chasm: The Rift & Doom 2 using Sager 8500 laptop, Atlona AT-HD500 and simple HDMI recorder, result perfect, will post it soon on youtube.

Doom is what you want (c) MAZter

Reply 1417 of 1488, by Kordanor

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Heyho!

I received my Retrotink4k yesterday and I already played around a bit for video capturing. I have been using the datapath before together with VCS 2.6.0

The issue with the 640x480 resolution being cut off by a few lines does not exist with the Retrotink4k.

The phase can be set automatically but you do need to dial in the width correctly and this to me feels even more finnicky as you need to use the remote. But once its set up, it works fine.

It's also a great that you can basically make the signal almost "ready to use" with the tink alone.

For example 320x200 being 720x400 first need to be decimated and then upscaled.
While 720x400 textmode does not need to be decimated and needs to be upscaled differently, and also comes with a different signal. Once set up, it can easily switched by the press of a button, while in VCS you need to manually change the input video preset for the signal, and then change the processing settings in the Filter graph.

So it's much more confortable to use once it's set up.

But there are also some cons:
-The remote, as indicated already, is a bit fiddly. The interface is ok. But using the remote feels like back in the 90s where you need to press a button multiple times for anything to work, depending on the angle to the device and whatnot. Guess an alternative would have been cheaper. But with a 850€ device 50€ more wouldnt have hurt either.
-It seems to be unable to have standard profiles for resolutions. So I think you need to switch your profiles manually every single time. This also means that you will have a bad time playing a game which uses different modes which need to be handled differently. It does however for some reason kinda save something like phase set in modes, and not in profiles. I am not quite sure I understood it completely yet.
But if you have a 320x200 game which should be scaled to 1280x1000 and in the game you have a map which is 640x480 which needs to be scaled to 1280x960, you will run into issues as you would need to manually switch it every single time if I see it correctly. Only way I see to circumvent most of these issues is to just settle for the same process for all different resolutions, with not so optimal results then.
I think it should be possible to change this easily via software though, where for each mode you could just set one standard profile.

But I also encountered some issues with recording which might not be directly tink4k related, but which I didnt encounter before with the datapath, possibly due to the magic which happens within VCS.
I will post more about that in a separate post, with plenty of info as I would also need some help there.

Reply 1418 of 1488, by Kordanor

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First, let me show the capture directly via the datapath, using VCS and then capturing the VCS window.
You see in this screenshot, that it looks quite perfect. Around the red files you don't see any halo. No denoise, no scaling activated.

DatapathOriginal.PNG
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CC-BY-4.0

Zoomed in you can also clearly see, no halo.
file.php?mode=view&id=197677

Next I put the Retrotink at the capture "card" which in my case is the Elgato HD60S+ Using the settings shown here:

Settings.PNG
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Settings.PNG
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CC-BY-4.0

However with the capture card I always get some halo, which is especially visible around the red font:

tinkElgao60S+.PNG
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tinkElgao60S+.PNG
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120.74 KiB
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533 views
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CC-BY-4.0

And here zoomed in:
file.php?mode=view&id=197680

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Last edited by Kordanor on 2024-07-20, 19:47. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 1419 of 1488, by Kordanor

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Then I also tried plugging in the Retrotink4k directly into the Datapath. (all captures here in 1080p no scaling, only cropping/canvas)
The thing is, that while in VCS it looks great, and if you capture the VSC window in OBS it also looks great in OBS.

TinkTODatapathViaVCS.PNG
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But if instead you switch OBS to capture the Datapath (with the tink) as source you get the halo again.

TinkTODatapathDirect.PNG
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TinkTODatapathDirect.PNG
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122.31 KiB
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1457 views
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CC-BY-4.0

So...I am qutie confused about what actually does create this halo effect. Or maybe it always does and the VSC software by @vvbee does some internal magic even on Digital Signals to clean them up. But I have not activated any filters or whatever there. So I don't know why VCS does get a better picture than if capturing the digital signal directly via OBS.

Last edited by Kordanor on 2024-07-20, 20:55. Edited 1 time in total.