The Saturn is 16/9 compatible !!!!

I recently bought a 16/9 82cm TV set

I did not test my Skeleton Saturn with it yet...

Tonight I did.

And it's amazing!!!

My Saturn gives perfect 16/9 picture!

It's no weird zoom or deformation stuff, but a real 16/9 transfer.

I tried with a Svideo and RGB connexion, both worked perfectly ok!

The TV commutes automatically into a 16/9 picture format, and you can't go back to 4/3 format, which to me confirms that the TV is indeed getting a true 16/9 signal from the Saturn; and anyway the games confirm it very well.

So far i have tested Virtua Fighter 2, Daytona USA and Virus.

Each displays perfectly allright.

Nevertheless, I don't know whether it's my Skeleton model which has the ability, or if all Saturn models have it.

Can anyone give his experience about this issue?

Thanks!

Raph
 
As far as I know, VDP2 can generate a 16:9 and even some HD-range output, but the encoder used doesn't support them... are you sure your TV isn't just stretching the image?
 
Well, to me the picture does not look stretched at all...

I t really looks like a real 16/9 transfer.

Picture is not flatened or suffering any deformation either

Plus, as I mentioned, when the console is ON, I can't set my TV back to 4/3 mode,

it switches to 16/9 mode and can't be changed.
 
You should try Nights and Panzer Dragoon Zwei. Both have a "widescreen" option in their settings. When used in normal tvs, you get a vertically scretched image (a widescreen image resized to 4:3), and you can clearly see the extra visible area.

Some pictures would be VERY welcome :)

You can check if the games are really getting into acutal widescreen by comparing the image with the ones from a normal TV. Check if you can really see extra stuff on the screen (should be easier to notice in a 2D game).
 
;)

Panzer_Wide.jpg


Panzer2_Wide.jpg


Lunar2_Wide.jpg


Astra_Wide.jpg


Astra_b_Wide.jpg
 
At least the Panzer Dragoon title screens look identical to what I get on my TV. Some gameplay screenshot would give more info. If I had to guess what's going on, these are all NTSC or not fullscreen-fixed PAL games being played on a PAL Saturn, and the black bars are causing the TV to switch to some stretch mode.
 
I have used only Jap games and I use them on a Jap Skeleton model, on Pal Thomson 82cm 16/9 TV, NTSC and 60Hz compatible.

I tried other games and eventually it looks like the picture is kind of stretched horizontally

but strangely it does not look particularly deformed... as the picture "fits" well in that format

that's why I said the Saturn looks to me 16/9 compatible

anyway the wide picture looks realy nice! ^^

When my TV screen mode is set to "Auto", and when I power the Saturn ON, the picture switches to 16/9 mode, just like when i use my dvd player

and i can't go back to 4/3 mode from the shortcuts on my remote.

But I can set to 4/3 from the main menu of the tv set.

Sorry for the slow display of screenshots, it because of the webhoster server...
 
Of course, nothing prevents anyone from making a game with a "widescreen" mode like PD2, where some of the top and bottom of the screen is left unused. You won't get higher horizontal resolution (the hardware prevents that) but the picture won't look distorted on a widescreen TV.

Modern widescreen TVs are also getting pretty good at stretching the picture horizontally without too bad distortions, you only really notice during long panning shots.
 
Well, then maybe it's my Tv that displays the picture correctly in 16/9

i must also add that, in 4/3 or 16/9 mode, i'm always in full screen mode, as I use a 60Hz Jap console and not a 50Hz Pal console.

I have no black bars up and down the picture displayed.
 
humm, I think saturn outputs a wider image than the regular 4:3, when I started playing on my 16:9 tv, I noticed that the image was no longer cut on the sides, eg. when I play SFA2 on a 4:3 tv, the player's energy bars are cut... On my 16:9 tv I can see the whole image :)
 
hmmm...

maybe it was your tv, as I never had such display problem with my Saturns

All we have here is the only common problem caused by RGB Scart connexion, which is that the picture slides to the left by a few inches.

It results in a picture not really full screen any more, as you miss the few inches on the left of the picture displayed, those inches being "out" of screen.

Apart from that and this bloody 50Hz mode for those who have a non-modified Pal machine, everything's perfectly alright.
 
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