Genesis RGB - why?

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Ohlt
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Genesis RGB - why?

Post by Ohlt » Thu Oct 02, 2014 12:00 am

Why does the Genesis support RGB? As it's basically unused in the US and would cost more pennies per unit (I assume), it's something I've been curious about. Maybe for future add-ons like the 32x, which requires RGB?

Also, does Genesis 3 actually output RGB without modding?

First post here and just wanted to ask something that's been on my mind. Thanks in advance + for the great site.

sega16
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Post by sega16 » Thu Oct 02, 2014 1:36 am

RGB is the highest quality output. The people who do use RGB greatly appreciate the extra pennies spent to support it if it did raise cost. Also you know that at some point the video signal is RGB and is converted to composite. I do not own a genesis 3 but I did google this and it appears you do need to mod it to get RGB output.

Eke
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Post by Eke » Sun Oct 05, 2014 1:45 pm

The VDP, like most video processor from that time, uses RGB color palette internally. Also it was designed in Japan, not USA, although video connection used in those countries has no influence on the internal video format.

For this reason, raw RGB output is actually simpler to deal with than composite or s-video output. I also do not see how this could have any impact on the console price, as video still need to be encoded at some point, be it internally or externally. External solution is more practical: the french megadrive for example did not include the video encoder chip present in other models, so theoretically, it was actually cheaper to manufacture.

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