Output 240p (instead of 480i) on composite RCA

ohmycommodore

True enough, but I'll stick here for now.

I can confirm this 240p thing does something. I definitely notice a difference in games, but any text in the RetroPie menu system certainly goes out the window, and even more so the command line is pretty much unusable. I suppose the eventual goal might be to establish a 240p tweak for the games for composite out, while maintaining 480p or similar for the menus to keep them sharper.

Regardless, the steps I followed were:

Download and copy over to my Pi the test firmware files noted here: https://github.com/raspberrypi/firmware/issues/683#issuecomment-283179792

Then:
sudo apt-get install rpi-update
Followed by:
sudo rpi-update

And finally, adding this to the end of my config.txt and rebooting:
sdtv_mode=16
(according to the GitHub thread the earlier command sdtv_progressive_scan=1 has now been supplanted by this sdtv_mode one)

Well, I think I followed everything correctly at least. I certainly noticed the change on cue, and entertained myself for a morning :)

nitrogen_widget

I'm liking this.
no more flickering screens.
an update came out to allow higher res. for front ends then change res. for game.
you can do it with these options.
I'm testing out a 320x240 on front ends to simplify everything and make it readable.

tvservice -c "PAL 4:3 P" ; fbset -depth 8 ; fbset -depth 32; tvservice -s
Powering on SDTV with explicit settings (mode:18 aspect:1)
state 0x80001 [PAL 4:3], 720x576 @ 50.00Hz, progressive
$ tvservice -c "NTSC 4:3" ; fbset -depth 8 ; fbset -depth 32; tvservice -s
Powering on SDTV with explicit settings (mode:0 aspect:1)
state 0x40001 [NTSC 4:3], 720x480 @ 60.00Hz, interlaced
$ tvservice -c "NTSC 4:3 P" ; fbset -depth 8 ; fbset -depth 32; tvservice -s
Powering on SDTV with explicit settings (mode:16 aspect:1)
state 0x40001 [NTSC 4:3], 720x480 @ 60.00Hz, progressive

ohmycommodore

@nitrogen_widget
I'm in NTSC land. So you need to add one of these tvservice lines to the end of config.txt? What are the actual lines you need to add? It seems like some of those are just comments, and of course some for PAL, etc.

Would I add all this, for example?

$ tvservice -c "NTSC 4:3 P" ; fbset -depth 8 ; fbset -depth 32; tvservice -s
Powering on SDTV with explicit settings (mode:16 aspect:1)
state 0x40001 [NTSC 4:3], 720x480 @ 60.00Hz, progressive

And in this case does the original "sdtv_mode=16" line need to be removed, or modified?

nitrogen_widget

Hi,
the $ means command prompt.
so you would run the command as part of a script or when you ran the emulator
I havn't tested it yet but this is what the developer said to do.

edit: ok, verified running:
tvservice -c "NTSC 4:3 P" ; fbset -depth 8 ; fbset -depth 32; tvservice -s
at command prompt gives you 240p for emulator.

throwing out: tvservice -c "NTSC 4:3" ; fbset -depth 8 ; fbset -depth 32; tvservice -s
put you back to interlaced mode for your front end.

so you have to call the commands at run time and run end of emulator.

I'm just going to use a 320x240 res theme. :)

Turgon

@nitrogen_widget
Do you have any suggestions regarding themes for 240p? Most of them don't work very well: metadata can't be read, snapshots cut across the screen, layout messed up...

nitrogen_widget

@Turgon
I'm using this one for now.
https://github.com/keilmillerjr/flavors-layout

Very simple layout that works well.

Turgon

@nitrogen_widget
Thank you. I'm going to try it too.

bifelix89

Hello! Where this command line should be inserted to interlace the signal ???

Thank you! :-)

$ Tvservice -c "NTSC 4: 3 P"; Fbset -depth 8; Fbset -depth 32; Tvservice -s

morpie

I am just wondering, does this firmware still need to be downloaded from the google docs link, or is the original pi-firmware on board with 240p over composite now? I have updated my pi and wonder if I need to reinstall firmware for 240p. Thanks

matchaman

@ohmycommodore said in Output 240p (instead of 480i) on composite RCA:

I suppose the eventual goal might be to establish a 240p tweak for the games for composite out, while maintaining 480p or similar for the menus to keep them sharper.

Excellent idea, I'd love to see that. 240p on a CRT TV still remains much better than any shader possible.

ohmycommodore

And certainly down the line it would be wonderful to have something like this as a toggle within the system itself. A "select your desired output and restart" type thing.

morpie

Still cant figure out or find out...

Does the 240p firmware linked in this thread still need to be manually installed on new and updated Retropie builds?

Sorry to be a nag, just can't find an answer. Thanks.

edmaul69

@nitrogen_widget so question with the tv service stuff you posted. do we still need to us popcorn mixes stuff? and can i put the tvservice things in runcommand-onstart.sh and runcommand-onend.sh? or where would i put them? or do i have to do this in command line everytime?

Capeman

@edmaul69 Popcorn mixes updates to the firmware are just part of the normal raspian package now, all you have to do to enable the progressive output is update raspian and set one of these 2 parameters in config.txt:

sdtv_mode=16 # progressive NTSC
OR
sdtv_mode=18 # progressive PAL

As for the runcommand_onstart/end commands, i think those are for switching back to 480i in emulation station so the resolution is easier to read (es in 240p, even with a decent theme is terrible haha)

Anyway, im curious as to where those go too.

edmaul69

@capeman so i need to do i need to do sudo apt-get install rpi-update or did me updating the kernel in retropie-setup today good enough?

Capeman

@edmaul69 I'm not sure if the update you did does it. Try adding that parameter above to config.txt and rebooting. you will know immediately if it's outputting 240p or not, the console text will be unreadable in 240p mode and ES and emulators will have scanlines.

The reason i havent been using it is i cant figure out a way to get a perfect scanline, it seems the scale is off and the pixels are not fitting the scanlines at a 1:1 ratio. The best way to tell is to play megaman games, the power bar is supposed to be alternating white and black pixels but it looks line doubled and line skipped. So until i can figure out an output scale that works correctly, i haven't enabled it yet.

edmaul69

@capeman i ended up do it all the old way. But not sure if it mattered or not. It didnt do anything until i ssh'd in and ran the command for progressive which i should gave tried first. Now if we can get a way tomake it change back and forth automatically would be cool.