Email: clone systems

All the new clone systems I have seen still use composite or s-video. I have
yet to see any with HDMI output. They also tend to have inferior graphics and sound quality and compatibility problems with some games. Genesis sound emulation tends to be shockingly bad in all clone systems I have seen, it is often very badly distorted. They can’t make them like Yamaha used to. The MAME project has managed to reverse engineer the YM2612 including all the internal number tables to reproduce the exact same sound in software.

People are working on running old games on modern TVs better. For example, the SLG 3000 generates scanlines for modern LCDs to recreate the original “look” of CRTs:

http://arcadeforge.de/?page_id=745

Of course to use that you need a good scaler which can output VGA. This can be a costly endeavour. The definitive scaler for retro systems is the XRGB, but
it can only be imported from Japan and is very expensive. It can also do the
job of scanline generation.

http://www.micomsoft.co.jp/xrgb-3.htm

A cheaper option is the new cheap SCART to HDMI converters from China which you can find on ebay. RGB SCART is supported by most old consoles since they use it internally (some require modification) and it provides the best video quality, superior to S-video and composite (which mix colour signals together producing a blurry mess). You can also use composite via SCART too for consoles that can’t produce RGB signals (one notable console is the NES since the PPU outputs a composite signal directly and there is no way to patch into an RGB signal on the board).

Excellent info. Thanks for sending it my way.