gc-forever - Gamecube/Wii Forums

Well yesterday I received from my cousin his old gamecube stuff(he had to clean up and make some space at home). I was wondering if it was possible to connect the gamecube to pc or laptop. Because we only got one tv and it's old like from 1997, but still working =D (and if I would play there, my parents would say : Don't you got home work to do? ).

possible. you need a pc that has a video-in (some video cards have it) or a videograbber (usb).

It is possible, but most video capture devices cause too much delay for gaming. I have an internal capture card and there is about 0.5 sec delay. Maybe it will work if you get one with a hardware encoder, but they are expensive.

I use a WinTV-HVR-1850 for RF/Composite/S-Video and an Intensity Shuttle for Component.

Delay is 1 frame (16-20 msec) or 2 fields (33-40 msec).

hmm I have also seen a (small) vga box which could be used, so what is the difference except the recording option from ezgrab? And the digital AV port of the gamecube won't be an option anymore right?
http://sewelldirect.com/MayFlash-Compon ... nboxanchor
http://www.nierle.com/nl/artikel/11847/ ... zwart.html

arale wrote:hmm I have also seen a (small) vga box which could be used, so what is the difference except the recording option from ezgrab? And the digital AV port of the gamecube won't be an option anymore right?
http://sewelldirect.com/MayFlash-Compon ... nboxanchor
http://www.nierle.com/nl/artikel/11847/ ... zwart.html

Do you want to connect it to your PC or PC's monitor? Your products only require a PC's monitor.

Digital AV port is an option if you have enough money to spend, megalomaniac is working on it. This way 480p games can be played directly (via VGA) to a screen.
Cheap option better than yellow composite cable, and not bad in my eyes, is to use analog output (meant for SCART). And use linedoubler/upscaler: GBS-8220 (+ sync stripper LM1881N). Output is VGA. Stays below <30 euro if you have power supply around. But only possible if you have a PAL cube.

PC's monitor I guess so since I want a screen to play on and yes I got PAL cube.

It seems you are in the need of something entirely different .

Two options then. Component cable (can be found for ~100 euros, or wait for megalomaniac ~40-50 euros) which has to be modified into VGA (and only 480p games) or RGB SCART cable (~8 euros) to GBS-8220 ( 25 euros + simple sync stripper circuit). GBS-8220 is overall good picture, vertical stripes appear when there is a lot of movement, but hard to see.

Or you stay with yellow composite and such box as you mentioned, but quality on a big LCD won't do wonders. Are you using a 4:3 or widescreen btw?

infact wrote:possible. you need a pc that has a video-in (some video cards have it) or a videograbber (usb).

I have exactly the same one, but its quality is horrible
Oh, and it only supports 50Hz in colour.

I got a 15,6 inch screen, so widescreen. Uhm the compatibility, it need to be playable . For me that is more important than the graphics. Oh btw that's apparently a easygap a fake one. The real one is Ezcap. Official site(quite vague with different versions Ezcap) http://www.szforwardvideo.com/product/Pro_7_6.html and some other site http://www.ezcap.tv/support.html do those things overheat? and I forgot about those pal/ntsc settings >_<

Anything USB 2.0 is guaranteed to be garbage or ill-suited.

I'm right now working on a LM1881N based solution for the cube ^^..
But i gues it has to be solderered in, because getting the connectors is kinda impossilbe, because i need more pins then any tv-cable uses..

I hope my lm's to arrive in a few weeks...

_Nold_ wrote:I'm right now working on a LM1881N based solution for the cube ^^..
But i gues it has to be solderered in, because getting the connectors is kinda impossilbe, because i need more pins then any tv-cable uses..

I hope my lm's to arrive in a few weeks, if anybody is interessted in this project, contact me, i will build some more if some guys are interested in it.. and they will be cheap

The LM1881N is only good for converting the V-Sync from Composite-sync into C-Sync. On some consoles this helps with certain upscalers or TVs but it will not allow you to connect a Gamecube directly to a PC monitor or laptop though which is what arale is looking for.

hm.. that would suck.. but anyway.. i'll have a try on it ^^

Sorry for the bad news...

I can remember a few of us looking into this years and years ago on IRC, Somebody even made a diagram which is probably still kicking around on the net but it would never have worked because without an upscaler/Line doubler the H-sync would still only be 15Khz which will not work with nearly all VGA monitors available.

yea, i'm just looking at a nice solution for line doubleing ^^
If i have any success i will post it here ^^

I believe I made the diagram years ago.. yes you'd only get 15khz

Like this, or this, only I used a 681k res. (as stated in documentation of LM1881N):



But the H-sync on this one isn't true H-Sync (it is C-Sync?), you will need an extra circuit (creator of Sync Stripper has drawn one) or just get the EL1883. EL1883 has true H- and V-sync.

Important also is that you need at least 8v for the input voltage for the LM1881N, running below caused C-sync signal to drop and someone said this can damage the IC. This is because of the high voltage composite signal can reach I think, I found it somewhere. Or you have to use the chroma filter as described in the documentation of the LM1881N. If I'm correct, a chroma filter is essential for the EL1883.

Like said, this won't work directly on most VGA equipment, because of the 15khz H-Sync. Here more info + 'simple' line doubler: http://elm-chan.org/works/sc/report.html

Wow, If that is what you call a 'simple' line doubler then I would hate to have build a complicated one Looks like a big job to me and you could probably pick up a low budget line doubler and save yourself a lot of hard work.

You would also probaly be limited to playing 60Hz games as 50Hz upscaled/line doubled will still be 50Hz which a lot of TVs and moitors will not accept over VGA.

Finally I found this information again about the LM1881N, quote:

Actually, it's not fine to hook up a composite sync signal to the input of an LM1881. See the datasheet under Absoulte Maximum Ratings where it lists the input voltage max at 3Vpp when run with a 5V Vcc. A TTL sync pulse can get as high as 5Vpp (esp true for PC video cards) which can damage the IC.

There are a couple of ways around this that I can think of atm...
-Run the IC from a supply voltage of 8 volts or more. The problem with this is that the IC's outputs will no longer be TTL compatible so you'll need resistor dividers on the sync output(s).
-Put a 1k series resistor followed by a reverse biased 2.7v zener diode to ground bofore the input coupling cap. This (should) let the video pass through unharmed and squash down the TTL sync down to less than 3Vpp before it enters the IC.

Now I use 12v and it is working perfectly, but what are those resistor dividers? And TTL?

Edit: it seems this man was trying to use a composite SYNC input, just composite should be fine. Although I had problems with 5v and using 12v solved this.