Show photo or video... no diagnostics possible without that information.

Yes, a photo please! 😀 Or a 5 sec video or so, so we can see the shakyness of the picture.
If you have got an YT account or one by any other video hoster, this would be ideal.
Attaching a little file or sharing a link to afile hoster would also do fine, I believe.

PS: I really recommend keeping a little CRT for testing, btw. 😀
It doesn't have to be big. There are black/white camping TVs not bigger than a shoe box in size.

Yeah, I will post youtube video later (maybe today or tomorrow) - It was just too late in the night.

I thought there might have be some obvious mistake I've made.

Also I have another CGA card as well (although with integrated RTC and multi i/o) so I might do a quick comparison as well.

BTW - CGA and EGA card had this 4 & 6 or 2 & 2 & 6 pin headers near the bracket. I know one is probably for a light pen and other is for composite out again? Was there some standard established which pin is which? Are the pins on EGAs the same as on CGAs?

In my experience, LCD TVs simply don't like the output from CGA composite. I managed to persuade 1 of my TVs to behave but it required constant switching of inputs back and forth when changing to different games. In my case, the colour image would distort with horizontal bars, which I'm assuming is probably the same problem you're having. It's basically the TV struggling to sync, some are better than others.

If the problem you're having is the same as I've mentioned here, then you'd probably be better off getting an old CRT TV instead. Also in my experience, even if you do get it working, LCD TVs look horrible with CGA's Palette 0 colours.

PTherapist wrote:

In my experience, LCD TVs simply don't like the output from CGA composite. I managed to persuade 1 of my TVs to behave but it required constant switching of inputs back and forth when changing to different games. In my case, the colour image would distort with horizontal bars, which I'm assuming is probably the same problem you're having. It's basically the TV struggling to sync, some are better than others.

If the problem you're having is the same as I've mentioned here, then you'd probably be better off getting an old CRT TV instead. Also in my experience, even if you do get it working, LCD TVs look horrible with CGA's Palette 0 colours.

Yeah, this pretty much sums up the problem I'm experiencing. I don't have space for CRT TV anyway and I wanted it to work on LCD because I plan to install this CGA in my 286 which I'm taking to retro PC meetup next week (there will be a projector and we will watch some demos - I wanted to show some 8088 (Corruption and so on) demos.

That's understandable. I had the same issues, in fact, I stil have them. 😅
A few xears ago, though, I had gotten myself a cheap CVBS-VGA adapter box.
It did the scaling and conversion from PAL/NTSC to VGA 800x600 or 1024x768.

While cheap, it was much better than what the LCD TVs had inside.
I played many hours of Sega MegaDrive games with that thing.
If you can, have a look at these converter boxes. Should be around ~20€ or so.

If you serious about CGA gaming, get one of these hip upscaler/scan line devices (framemeister etc).
Or just a little CRT monitor. In the time that you don't need it, just store it in the wardrobe or under the desk.
Boxy TV sets or video monitors, like the Commodore 1702, also make nice side tables if you put a pretty sheet on it. 😉

Jo22 wrote:

That's understandable. I had the same issues, in fact, I stil have them. :sweatdrop: A few xears ago, though, I had gotten mysel […]
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That's understandable. I had the same issues, in fact, I stil have them. 😅
A few xears ago, though, I had gotten myself a cheap CVBS-VGA adapter box.
It did the scaling and conversion from PAL/NTSC to VGA 800x600 or 1024x768.

While cheap, it was much better than what the LCD TVs had inside.
I played many hours of Sega MegaDrive games with that thing.
If you can, have a look at these converter boxes. Should be around ~20€ or so.

If you serious about CGA gaming, get one of these hip upscaler/scan line devices (framemeister etc).
Or just a little CRT monitor. In the time that you don't need it, just store it in the wardrobe or under the desk.
Boxy TV sets or video monitors, like the Commodore 1702, also make nice side tables if you put a pretty sheet on it. 😉

I bought HP 2035 monitor for now - it has 4:3 ration and 1600x1200 resolution and composite and SVideo inputs... I will take a look how it handles it.

I only need CGA for artifact colours over composite in demos and such... VGA supports CGA modes so there is no real point for me for using it in anything else than that.

Framemeister is just too expensive for me, but one of the guys on the meetup I mention is going to bring his so I will take a look how it handles CGA input :]

If you want to see the analog electronics artifacts the original, non-interpolated way, get a 1980/1990s multinorm studio Sony PVM monitor, as long as they are still available. Their supply is already drying out, it will be very difficult to obtain one soon.
These Trinitrons are super fine pitch (.25mm) and available in 9 and 14 inch.