Great! Let me know what you think.

OpenRift wrote on 2025-08-27, 19:30:

Hey, I'm in the market for a good MS-DOS VGA capture solution that isn't too expensive. I haven't read all 75 pages of this thread (I don't even know what I should be looking for at this point), but I've gathered some bits and pieces. The Sewell Manta and Startech VGA2HDMIPRO seem to be really solid options, but neither seem to be available for purchase anymore, new nor used. I wish the RetroTink 4K CE was something I could get, but even being the reduced cost model, $475 is still pretty steep for something I don't even know if I'll use enough.

Are there any other solid solutions that I've glossed over?

I use a Datapath VisionAV HD PCIe capture card on Windows 11 with the final windows release of VCS and have no complaints. I haven't found a video signal yet that it couldn't handle; DOS is no problem, Sync-on-Green at a weird resolution from the S24 card in the SPARCstation 5 was fine, the weird VGA output from the RS/6000 that no IP-KVM or LCD monitor I've tried can handle did need a little tweaking to get the picture on screen properly but once that was done its been fine. I've not tried EGA/CGA but I've heard that it should work with a few extra bits to deal with signal levels.

The cards are still available for purchase new but cost a fortune. I got mine second-hand on ebay for US$70.

Dusko wrote on 2025-08-29, 06:12:

Great! Let me know what you think.

Just got it in the mail today and it works great!! The auto-adjust feature puts a lot of my worries about the scaling and image fitting to rest. I will say, my one complaint is that the color isn't all that great, with the whites and blacks not being as bright/dark as they are on my CRT. Is there a way to fix that? It's not a huge dealbreaker or anything, but if I can fix it with some kind of LUT or something, it would be much appreciated.

Interesting. I’ve never had any color issues with mine. Here’s a screenshot of Norton Commander captured with an EZCap GameDock Ultra. It’s not the best capture card out there, but it works just fine for my needs.

Update: I managed to get it looking acceptable using some color correction in Streamlabs OBS, and I'm happy with the results.

I have an OSSC Pro which I use for all my upscaling needs, and it's just okay. It's fine, but nothing special. If I had to do it over again, I'd probably go with the Retrotink 4k CE. The OSSC Pro works but is lacking a little polish. For example, mine doesn't keep its settings when powered off for long enough. Sometimes it has trouble figuring out the video input, and I have to wiggle the cables or unplug and plug back in. It has a TON of settings, but 99% are already set at the optimal value. Depending on the input and the settings, you can get really clean insanely beautiful output, or something less good. It's very uneven. Sometimes it's gorgeous, other times its mediocre.

Overall, it's kindof a mixed bag which is why I say its just okay. But the whole user experience feels very unpolished and uneven. I will say that it's good enough that I feel no reason to upgrade, but it's not so good that I would recommend it. It will work for your upscaling needs, but I would nudge anyone towards the Retrotink instead.

The one thing I will say that I think the OSSC Pro does well is color reproduction. It does have a crazy degree of customization, but weirdly I don't find it to be all that useful. Maybe if I was using really bizarre input sources...