6500,5500,etc etc Video Out Slot Options

[macuserman]

I was wondering if anyone ever made a list of the video out options on these boards, personally I've seen two variations one is a DB15 out, and the other was S-Video and RCA. They don't look super complicated and it got me wondering what other options had been made, makes you wonder if it wouldn't have been super simple to make one that is direct VGA out? Not sure if you can use that port instead of the main graphics out port or if it has some sort of limitations. Anyhow any thoughts on the functionality of the video out port? I see the CSII ports getting all the love and it made me curious.

 

[jeremywork]

You’ve mentioned the two I know of. The Composite/S-video version was made by Focus Enhancements; the DA-15 by Apple. Both will mirror the main display at whichever resolution/refresh you’ve chosen (the Focus Enhancements board appears distorted when not run in one of its supported modes.) Since DA-15 is simple to adapt to VGA it should be straightforward to wire it directly. Potentially, you could also hide a generic adapter on the inside of the case...

The same port on the motherboard was also used as an internal AV loopback port for PC compatibility cards.

There’s also the AVID Cinema PCI card, which connects to the DAV port on the video-in module and also offers Composite/S-Video out, as well as realtime hardware compression.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Not sure if you can use that port instead of the main graphics out port or if it has some sort of limitations. Anyhow any thoughts on the functionality of the video out port?

If you're talking about what I think you are, the limitation is that the TV/Tuner Setup is an input only sub-system, no output function is available on the baseline Apple setup. The card pipes video input straight thru to what's a blank display window as far as the Mac is concerned. Do a screen cap while playing from a Video Source and it's empty.

Processor/video buffer of the main system is not involved and really can't be, not nearly fast enough.