I have an FS-A1WX, which has three different video outs:

1) Composite
2) RF
3) RGB

I have been using composite with a Sony television, but I'm not terribly happy with the image quality. Text in particular is somewhat blurry and ghosted. I'd use S-Video, but I didn't get the A1WSX. Bad planning.

By all accounts, RGB out is supposed to have better quality even than S-Video. However, my television only has RF, composite and S-Video inputs. Are there consumer televisions in the USA that have RGB in?

I do remember that in Europe we used to use something called a "Euro-connector" also known as RGB or SCART (or BNC?). Is this the same connector as the RGB on the a Japanese MSX2+? If so, can one connect the RGB out to, say, a VGA monitor with BNC inputs?

I'm not sure but as far as I know TV's in the US do not have a RGB input. DVD players in the US also don't have RGB output..

Forget RF. The image quality that it gives is rather poor. And you will notice some compatibility problems (it's japanese PAL system, very different from NTSC US standard).

Yeah, if it's called EUROconnector I think that you won't find it in the US.
You have got 2 different options:

1.-Build a RGB to S-VIDEO connector. I think that it shouldn't be very difficult. You can have a look at Hans Otten's MSX INFO pages, or if you are a bit lazy, contact with Calamar Group, whose site is http://pagina.de/calamar

2.-Try to get a different TV or monitor. MSX computers work great with Commodore monitors, and I guess that they can be obtained in the US. I have a 1084S and it works really fine, and they are also multifrequency (50 Hz or 60 Hz)

Think about it and good luck!

Converting RGB to S-video will not give a better result. S-video is better then RF but still suffers from undersampling in the chrominance and this effect results in the blury screen.

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I do remember that in Europe we used to use something called a "Euro-connector" also known as RGB or SCART (or BNC?). Is this the same connector as the RGB on the a Japanese MSX2+? If so, can one connect the RGB out to, say, a VGA monitor with BNC inputs?

EURO-SCART indeed. There's another SCART which is used in Japan, but is not directly compatible.

We (in europe) use a DIN-to-SCART cable to get RGB quality to our TV's/monitors. The pin layout for the RGB DIN connector should be on http://www.faq.msxnet.org/

Unfortunately you won't be able to connect it to a VGA monitor, since the MSX outputs a 15kHz signal, while 99% of VGA monitors require at least 31kHz.
This can be solved by using a scan-doubler, which upscans the 15kHz signal to 31kHz, although this usually degrades the quality a bit :/

So it doesn't sound like I'm going to have much luck finding a TV with RGB-in here in the US. I wonder if an RGB to S-Video cable would at least look better than composite... Maybe I'll have a chat with the Calamar group and see what they think.

A 1084S is actually a decent idea, but in the US in all likelihood they wouldn't have a SCART connector. So the question would be whether the RGB out on the MSX2+ would be compatible with the RGB in on the 1084S...

What I'm wondering is what non-Europeans typically do with their MSX2+ and TRs. I mean, a 13" monitor at 50 or 60 hz isn't all that, and TV image quality through the usual input mechanisms is hard to stare at. It might be good enough for a game, but not for programming or doing anything "serious". I have a 21" monitor on my PC, and the image quality issue makes using an emulator more pleasant than my real MSX...

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Converting RGB to S-video will not give a better result. S-video is better then RF but still suffers from undersampling in the chrominance and this effect results in the blury screen.

Oh, but it WILL deliver way better quality then plain composite video. A Playstation 2 gives almost identical picture quality on S-Video compared to RGB.

But I think there are TV's (or RGB monitors) with BNC RGB inputs in the States. Is should be possible to connect an MSX's RGB output to that. You will probably have to make your own cable, though.
Difficulty may be the h/v-sync signal, since I don't think MSX have a sync-on-green output, which may(?) be neccesary for a US monitor. I don't know for sure, I think you can ask advice at a local electronics shop, because these RGB inputs are also quite common on DVD players.

A 1084S monitor doesn't have Scart in Europe either, iirc. It's just a question of the right cable, which in all likelyhood you will have to solder yourself.

Oh and btw, a 13" monitor is when using RGB, quite good enough for MSX because of the relatively low resolutions. But I can also connect my turboR to my 24" widescreen TV using a Scart-RGB cable...

I've you correcly connect scart rgb (I mean also on a tv that supports rgb input) it is much better then s-video. There is a lot of color information lost by the subsampling used in s-video and cvbs.

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I've you correcly connect scart rgb (I mean also on a tv that supports rgb input) it is much better then s-video. There is a lot of color information lost by the subsampling used in s-video and cvbs.

Actually, I have a TV that supports both, and the difference between S-Video and RGB(both from Playstation2 and from my digital satellite-receiver) is hardly noticable, while the difference between CVBS and S-Video is huge...

That is quite a problem you've got there. There's not really any standard for RGB connections for TVs in the US like SCART/Euroconnector (or whatever you want to call it).

But don't get RGB mixed up with component connections (they are occasionally referred INCORRECTLY as RGB) which is similar but uses (I think) 3 RCA connectors. Most DVD players and high-end TVs have component sockets - and there is probably some way of converting proper RGB to component but it will most definately require some circuitry and some loss in quality (but not as much as converting RGB to S-video).

The only other thing I can recommend is getting an old RGB monitor, or getting a European TV with RGB SCART* input and a stepdown transformer to convert 110V US voltage to 220-240V European mains voltage. But that's at least 150 Euro for a remotely good new 14" set, and its tuner will be totally useless in the US (but good if you have any PAL video tapes!).

*Not all TV sets have RGB inputs for SCART connections as SCART cables also support compostie signals, so some cheaper (and maybe some older) TVs may not have RGB inputs.

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Forget RF. The image quality that it gives is rather poor. And you will notice some compatibility problems (it's japanese PAL system, very different from NTSC US standard).

Japanese PAL system!?! There's no such thing! Japan uses the exact same 60Hz (60 frames-per-second) NTSC system that US and Canada use.

The NTSC/PAL/SECAM colour encoding systems still exist in composite and S-video signals too - so someone, say, who tries watching an NTSC DVD on a PAL-only TV will end up with a balck & white picture with ANY of these connections.

RGB signals send the three primary colours (red, green, and blue - hence RGB) separately, so no encoding is needed. This is why playing an NTSC DVD with an RGB connection works fine on any TV that can do 60Hz - another problem

RF singals only cause even more problems in PAL regions, as there are many different audio sub-carrier frequencies used in different countries, for example the UK, Ireland and South Africa use PAL I, and Germany (along with some other countries) use PAL G (is that right?) - and there are many more, all of them incompatible. If you try a PAL G signal on a PAL I TV set the picture will be fine but the sound will just be static noise. A lot of TVs can handle many different PAL systems (I've noticed a lot of newer sets have country select options in their menus which sets the right audio system).

NTSC is the same in all countries that use the system - except there is the NTSC M system used somewhere in South America which *I think* is just NTSC running at 50Hz (instead of 60). There is NTSC 4.43, which does use a different audio sub-carrier to the normal 3.58MHz(?), but that's not used for broascasting.

I've said way too much about this now!

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NTSC is the same in all countries that use the system - except there is the NTSC M system used somewhere in South America which *I think* is just NTSC running at 50Hz (instead of 60).

Actually that's PAL M, which is just PAL at 60Hz. Used in countries like Brazil.

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There is NTSC 4.43, which does use a different audio sub-carrier to the normal 3.58MHz(?), but that's not used for broascasting.

My VCR has a switch for that

Zilog_Jones: thanks for the information.

One thing I'm curious about: what a Japanese user do if all he had was a standard television? Do they have TVs in Japan with RGB inputs, or would they be using composite or S-Video like an American?

One last note: if you look at the MSX faq, it would seem that the Japanese RGB connector is different than the European connectors, so someone in my situation would be stuck with making a custom cable pretty much no matter what...

http://www.faq.msxnet.org/connector.html

Or maybe I'm wrong... I don't suppose there are Europeans using Japanese MSX2+ models with standard European RGB cables?

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One thing I'm curious about: what a Japanese user do if all he had was a standard television? Do they have TVs in Japan with RGB inputs, or would they be using composite or S-Video like an American?

Composite, S-video, RF (antenna)... Same with europeans that don't have RGB

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One last note: if you look at the MSX faq, it would seem that the Japanese RGB connector is different than the European connectors, so someone in my situation would be stuck with making a custom cable pretty much no matter what...

Yes, but modifying a SCART cable is a matter of opening it up, plugging the pins in the right holes and closing it again. No soldering required.

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Or maybe I'm wrong... I don't suppose there are Europeans using Japanese MSX2+ models with standard European RGB cables?

No standard RGB cables indeed, because Japanese use DIN RGB connectors, not SCART.
Not even all european MSX's had SCART connectors either, a lot had DIN too.

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Actually that's PAL M, which is just PAL at 60Hz. Used in countries like Brazil.

Oh - got it the totally wrong way around!
http://www.repairfaq.org/sam/tvfaq.htm#tvctvsw shows all the different systems used in each country around the world in case you're interested (and there's loads of other info about TVs and TV standards on that page too).

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>>There is NTSC 4.43, which does use a different audio sub-carrier to the normal 3.58MHz(?), but that's not used for broascasting.<< My VCR has a switch for that

Yes, most PAL VCRs, camcorders and DVD players (and the PlayStation 2)which can do 60Hz (NTSC) playback usually output it in NTSC 4.43 because the sound carrier is more compatible with European PAL TVs. But there is also "PAL 60" which is just 525-line 60Hz with the normal PAL colour encoding (may I note that PAL, SECAM and NTSC only *really* refer to the colour systems, not the video frequencies)