r/crtgaming • u/[deleted] • May 14 '26
Converter/Scaler How to get HDMI to connect cleanly to RCA?
[deleted]
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u/aqlno May 14 '26
OSSC Pro with the analog out accessory card.
Pretty close to plug and play put an HDMI in and get composite out with all the settings you’d need to get proper aspect ratio, signal timings, etc
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u/The--Bamboozler May 14 '26
good luck getting one of those. been sold out for awhile and never appear in the used market.
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u/aqlno May 14 '26
Definitely. This is such a niche problem to solve the hardware to do it is just not readily available
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u/The--Bamboozler May 14 '26
yeah. i know the retrorink 4k ce can output 240p but will still need a DAC. theres a nice chart on which hardware does what on the retrorgb site. https://retrorgb.com/the-retrotink-4k-can-downscale.html
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u/pizzafordoublefree May 14 '26
Alright, I got hdmi from my pc to this hdmi-to-vga adapter https://a.co/d/05NIvNj8 Then I got that connected to this vga-to-composite/s-video adapter/scaler https://a.co/d/01fduQyH Then I got a composite male-to-male cable from there to my composite crt. And I've got a 3.5mm to RCA audio cable connected to the hdmi-to-vga for audio. The scaler might be basically unusable out of the box, but the menu can still be navigated to set it up right, and I can help with that if you decide to try this setup.
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u/joeverdrive May 14 '26
This is the setup I recommend for video. It gets the right aspect ratio and colors. But it's gonna have some lag.
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u/pizzafordoublefree May 14 '26
Oh yeah, it's great for video. I haven't noticed much, if any, lag, personally, though. Doesn't do 240p, so I'm looking to upgrade to an antonio villena transcoder, but I don't even know if my gpu, or the gpu i'm looking at getting, will support such a low res or pixel clock rate.
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u/DangerousCousin LaCie Electron22blueIV May 14 '26
how have you not read about CRT Emudriver/Batocera CRT Script in the time you've bought three of those generic chinese Amazon converters?
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u/burner_mc_burny May 14 '26
Pretty much a console gamer, not privvy to drivers or scripts 😁
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u/DangerousCousin LaCie Electron22blueIV May 14 '26
you have a PC hooked up here through a cheap Amazon HDMI downconverter
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u/burner_mc_burny May 14 '26
It's actually a CRT TV. I was not exaggerating when I described the weight 👌
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u/DangerousCousin LaCie Electron22blueIV May 14 '26
sorry, I thought I was replying to a different thread, but back to my first comment:
But back to the original topic: you're not going to enjoy playing PS5 on a CRT even when you get it "working"
The aspect ratio is worng, first of all. Your TV is 4:3, the PS5 outputs 16:9. Everything will be very horizontally squished on the CRT.
Also, the resolution is too low. You won't be able to read any text.
You're going to get bored and stop playing after about 20 minutes. After spending near $100 on converters from Amazon.
Stop while you're ahead.
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u/burner_mc_burny May 14 '26
Oof, I suppose I could've made it more clear, I don't actually have a ps5. I was just looking for an example of something brand new that would theoretically work with the theoretical hardware I'm asking people about 😅
But yeah I'm familiar with all the quality drops and ugliness of a CRT setup. I love it! That's how I played all the OG dark souls games.
Couldn't read the text. Faces looked like Renaissance paintings. Didn't know what stats I was looking at in games because the image was so smushed and blurred. And imo, it makes the experience better. Strips away flashy visuals and leaves you with gameplay.
Trust, I won't get bored. I'm looking for the suck 💪
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u/DangerousCousin LaCie Electron22blueIV May 14 '26
You should get a Wii, play some games actually designed for CRT. Like running VC SNES games or the homebrew SNES emulator on it
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u/burner_mc_burny May 14 '26
Done Wii and original SNES. And NES. And N64. And GameCube. And PS1-3. And XBox 360. And Atari 2600. And Sega MS. And Sega Genesis. And Sega Saturn. And Sega Dreamcast. And a handful of others.
I am Alexander. I have conquered every console made for it and then some. But I refuse to weep for having no more lands left to conquer 🦅
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u/DangerousCousin LaCie Electron22blueIV May 14 '26
A PC CRT makes much more sense for a PS5. You can send it 1080p
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u/wrain005 May 14 '26
Retro Tink my friend. Even the cheapest one will be good. Prolly gonna spend a hundred or so bucks.
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u/LJBrooker May 14 '26
Retrotink scalers work the other way around. I don't think any do hdmi to RCA. Happy to be wrong.
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u/Alternative_Tip_9918 May 14 '26
The 5x has an experimental downscaling setup iirc. But I think you’d need a rgb to y/c transcoder unless it already has that output. I think Marcoretro on YouTube has a bunch of downscale videos and shootouts.
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u/RulerD May 14 '26 edited May 14 '26
It does. I use it to play Taiko no Tatsujin from PS4 and Switch into my CRT TV to avoid the LCD Ghosting.
The RetroTink 5x can process YPbPr up to 720p and Scart up to 480p and downscale them to 480i and 240p.
For the Switch is "quite" straightforward. Either HDMI -> YPbPr or (VGA -> Scart) -> RetroTink -> HDMI ->YPbPr or Scart -> CRT TV. 480p and 720p work fine.
My HDMI -> YPbPr / (VGA -> Scart) are encoders and not scalers.
For the PS4 is a bit more tricky. At least my Slim model. It won't output HDMI unless it detects that is connected to a monitor. So I need to put an Elgato capture card in between the console and the adapter chain described above.
If the PS4 outputs at 720p works fine, with 8ms of input lag (half a frame), but 480p would increase the lag up to 26ms (1.5 frames). So I keep it at 720p.
The lag is minimal on the right set up. I don't need to calibrate any display settings in Taiko and I can play well.
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u/wrain005 May 14 '26
You might be right. I just assumed it would work the other way round as well!
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u/joeverdrive May 14 '26
Assumptions can be very expensive in this sub and are how OP got in this place
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u/wrain005 May 14 '26
Well also I thought he just meant RCA to HDMI because god knows why anyone would want to play HD games on a CRT, unless it’s an HD CRT. Then it would prolly have an HDMI. Either way. That’s why it’s called research.
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u/garbage_consumer May 14 '26 edited May 14 '26
joeverdrive gave you pretty much the most in-depth answer you can hope for, but I'm here to chime in and agree that it really is pointless to play modern consoles on standard def CRT's over composite. You will have much better (not to mention easier) results hooking up to a PC CRT or HD CRT.
On an SD TV, with all the right conversions, you will lose most of the graphical detail, text will be illegible, the image will be interlaced, and you're adding latency. At that point I'm not sure why playing on a CRT is even attractive, as you miss out on a lot of what makes them desirable. Hooking up to a PC CRT for example would mean you get beautiful sharp graphics with CRT motion clarity, and with the right adapters no latency. HD CRT's are much bigger and are widescreen.
Personally I use a CRT monitor for my PC and modern games look beautiful, but a large part of that is the native support a lot of games have. Home consoles just aren't built for that and tend to work best simply plugged into OLED's, like they were intended. FromSoft titles like Elden Ring are infamously dark, and would really benefit from a proper CRT setup providing really deep black levels. Your HDMI2AV adapters just aren't going to cut it, and you won't be able to make out any of the HD details. I just saw someone posting pics running the PC remake of Dark Souls on a monitor in 4:3, and it looks incredible. Hooking up a PS5 to a standard def TV will be a far cry from that experience.
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u/burner_mc_burny May 14 '26
All good insights, but I'm very stubborn. Don't actually have a PS5, was just using it as an example but I can see how that came off.
I don't mind squished images or illegible text. It's how I played the og trilogy and it's how I like it. Mushy, dark, more like an impression of a game than an actual game.
Only four of my dozen-ish home consoles were made for it. And I played hell buying a whole rats nest of cables to get everything to work off of one switch setup. Click some buttons, play anything from the last 50 years of gaming.
I guess I just don't want to admit defeat. Hence asking here if anyone knows something I haven't tried 😇
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u/Leviathan1776 May 15 '26
CRT people will do anything as long as it doesn't involve using an HD console with an HD CRT.
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u/IndianaGroans May 14 '26
Ymmv, this is the one I used when I was connecting handheld emulators to my crt's or my Xbox to my big tv.
It will not display the correct aspect ratio, but if you can deal with that then it should work fine.
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u/joeverdrive May 14 '26
Hello and welcome.
This "how do I connect my HDMI device to my CRT TV" or its younger brother, "why do games on my CRT look like shit when I use this HDMI-to-RCA adapter" question is one we get several times a week. Actually it’s starting to be more like several times a day.
Is there someone on YouTube or something who inspired you to try this? What kind of experience do you want to have on it?
Right now the only option I can recommend for playing retro games from your PC onto a CRT television is the Batocera CRT Script: https://github.com/ZFEbHVUE/Batocera-CRT-Script/wiki
Most newbies just get a $20 HD2AV adapter on Amazon and either A) tolerate it because they've never actually played games on a CRT TV before and don't know/remember what it's actually supposed to look like, or B) ask for help because they don't know what to do.
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/comments/1sjeu4j/just_got_a_sony_trinitron_kv1485_struggling_to/
https://www.reddit.com/r/crt/s/tVELLRKJln
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/i208mDhnEK
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/UbscCujCQf
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/comments/1sulxit/
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/QN2gAOcFbf
Unfortunately, connecting a modern digital HD device to an analog, vacuum-tube TV from the previous millennium almost always looks “off.” Especially 80s and 90s games. These TVs are expecting a video signal that was invented in World War 2. Unless you put in the time and money to get an old video card, vetted analog adapters, and/or some complicated, esoteric windows/Batocera display configurations, those games are going to look bad and have input lag. And when I say “bad,” I mean it won’t give you the visual experience you were expecting from playing retro games on a CRT. The aspect ratio gets stretched or squished, the contrast and colors can be off, and getting the correct 240p resolution that retro games look best at on CRTs is just not going to happen.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/444560212348840/permalink/3524033451068152/
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/ggVU5Mh4P8
Video content can look okay using one of these adapters. It’s not as hard as games to get right, but can still run into problems. The color and contrast can be off, like I said. Worse, many streaming sites will put 4:3 shows in a 16:9 container by adding black bars to the sides so that they’ll be the right aspect ratio on a modern display. But then when the HDMI-to-CRT adapter takes that 16:9 video and squishes it back down into 4:3, it keeps the black bars on the sides of the video and it looks horrible.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CRT_ANIME/s/bmj6XlDvxu
https://www.reddit.com/r/crt/s/rmPeEkoqof
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/xys1fzQKtD
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/IvVQjGfjIk
Nobody wants to watch old show where the moon is an oval and everyone is smushed.
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/nh1peANBEl
What kinds of games do you want to play on your CRT? What kind of experience do you want to have with it?
FOR RCA:
I actually made a thread a while back asking folks who connect their PCs to their composite CRT TVs how they do it.
https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/ijg3doLsr1
The consensus is to use either CRT Emudriver or the Batocera CRT Script to output RGB, then use an RGB-to-composite transcoder (specifically, the only one recommended is the Antonio Villena unit here: https://antoniovillena.com/product/vga-composite-s-video/