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I have a Sony Trinitron which on the back has R+G+B+SYNC inputs, and I *think* buttons to switch the RGB inputs to YPbPr.

I have an SCART cable that plugs into the back of my trinitron. I like my SCART setup.

I have acquired an S-VIDEO device.

I am in Toronto, Canada. It is March 2025.

What is the easiest, cheapest way to plug S-VIDEO into my SCART adapter, or to run the S-VIDEO directly into the Trinitron?

in reply to mcc

what's on the other end of the SCART cable? I think a direct s-video path would be easier than s-video over SCART.
in reply to John Francis 🦫🇨🇦🍁💪⬆️

@johnefrancis R+G+B+SYNC. But it would still be better for me to use SCART, because my office is small. The R+G+B+SYNC are hard to access but the SCART terminal is easy to access.
in reply to mcc

old video cards had s-video out on them. I never had one with rgbs, but maybe they exist? What's the rgbs coming out of?
in reply to mcc

I'm using such gizmo, to get C64 but do mind the actual *direction* - this is more of a illustration: pl.aliexpress.com/item/1005007…
in reply to mcc

S-Video to SCART adapters existed, but it depends on the TV whether they work (and it's similar with YPrPb over SCART – only RGB and composite were guaranteed to be supported; if the TV doesn't support S-Video signal through SCART, you'll still see a picture, it'll just be greyscale).
in reply to Jernej Simončič �

@jernej__s That's right. What's worse is that many TVs would have a SCART pinout with the right pins labeled for S-Video, but no actual support for it.

I don't think there are any external s-video to rgb converters still made. So the answer is either an expensive DIY project or "use composite".

in reply to Kyle

@kyle_pegasus @jernej__s the TV doesn't have SCART. I have a SCART to RGBS cable, which I would prefer to use as it's easier to swap items on the SCART than get behind the television.
in reply to mcc

@kyle_pegasus @jernej__s If the component data is passed through unchanged, I believe the RGB plugs can be switched to a component mode.
in reply to mcc

@jernej__s Ah, so if the TV can do component the challenge then is going to be converting the Chroma signal back into R-Y and B-Y signals. TDA4650 is a common chip TV sets used to do that as part of their colour decoder circuits, but it needs a colour carrier reference clock etc.

I can't suggest anything ready made

in reply to mcc

Suddenly, I'm having flashbacks of trying to find a sync-on-green cable for my eBay-scrounged SGI monitor.
in reply to mcc

Update: SO APPARENTLY THE SOLUTION IS TO PLUG THE S-VIDEO INTO… THE S-VIDEO INPUT… WHICH IS ON THE BACK OF THE UNIT. crtdatabase.com/crts/sony/sony…
in reply to mcc

I love it when the solution to the problem is "do not have the problem"
in reply to mcc

Still interested in an s-video solution for our backup PVM, which at some point everyone intends shall be sold to [redacted] but this hasn't happened yet. I found an $11 converter on amazon but it might not work amazon.ca/Haokiang-Scart-Femal…
in reply to mcc

that's a passive adapter, which some displays might accept but plenty of others absolutely won't. it's probably worth trying, but if it doesn't work you'd need an active converter. (i unfortunately don't know of any inexpensive options here, only some rubes goldberg machines that you almost surely don't want to use)
in reply to Ada Worcester 🏳️‍⚧️

@pikhq I guess what I don't understand is, is the *signal* conveyed over S-Video different from what's conveyed over "Component"?
in reply to mcc

@pikhq S-Video is Y/C, meaning it conveys the luminance and chrominance on 2 separate lines; "Component" generally refers to YCbCr, which further splits the chrominance down into two components for a total of 3
in reply to Ridley @ WATCH LYCORECO

@pikhq imagine taking an RGB cube and rotating it, then squishing it so it fits into a new cube in its new orientation; call one axis Y (make that the one most correlated with brightness), and the other two U and V

Y/C puts U and V together on a single wire (using QAM), while YCbCr gives all 3 axes their own wires

in reply to Ridley @ WATCH LYCORECO

@rcombs @pikhq OK. And… which of these is correct?

- It's possible to merge those two components back again, but not with passive components

- Passive components *can* merge them, but the recipient has to have the funky resistors or whatever that would allow a passive mixer to work

in reply to mcc

@pikhq merging them in a useful way would require performing quadrature amplitude modulation, which is decidedly not possible using passive components
in reply to Ridley @ WATCH LYCORECO

@rcombs @pikhq Thanks again. One more question. What about merging them in a … *unuseful* way.

Like, what if you just plugged chrominance into one of the two components and grounded the other. Would you get colors, just funny incorrect ones?

in reply to mcc

SCART is sorta like 1980s USB-C, it carries a ton of stuff over the same cable, so it's hard to say whether a particular doodad will do the job without knowing what signal is being output and what signals the display supports.

I dislike the whole SCART thing because of this (and price) and prefer to make the right cables myself.

in reply to mcc

If the TV has S-Video input, it almost certainly also supports S-Video over SCART (the newer the TV, the more things it supports over SCART; if it has multiple SCART inputs, it is however possible that only some sockets support non-RGB/component inputs).
in reply to mcc

the koryuu is kind of expensive (85 EUR) but it's a high-quality s-video to ypbpr transcoder videogameperfection.com/produc…
the Sony YR-421, Extron CD 400, Kramer FC-4044, and Kramer VM-19N are all contemporary professional video products that do similar things but are rare and expensive nowadays (....to be fair, still much cheaper than they probably cost back then)
This entry was edited (4 months ago)