Re: FS: Apple IIc Flat Panel Display Monitor

[mjmahon@aol.com (Michael J. Mahon)]

manitoba wrote:

>That's a good question.  From the pictures I've seen around of the //c LCD
>display, it basically sucked and was only monochrome, and the actual
>output on the screen was vertically squashed.  I doubt I'd ever want one
>unless I got one in mint condition and given to me for free.  Shrug, to
>each his own I guess. One person's junk is another person's gold.  :)

Agreed.

>Has anyone here with any model of Apple II, tried to hook up a modern day
>color LCD/Plasma TV/Monitor via the composite video output on the back of
>your (any model) Apple II ???  If so, could you provide some feedback of
>how it looks, both in 40 columns, 80 columns (if your Apple II has an 80
>column card), as well as color graphics?

It looks like a good composite color monitor--no better, no worse.

All but a very special monitor (like the AppleColor Composite monitor)
will limit the luminance (brightness) video to a bandwidth less than
4MHz, resulting in "fat" pixels and very poor 80-column displays.

All of the usual color artifacts are present, of course, since they
are a result of a faithful display of the Apple's pseudo-NTSC signal.

>I'm sure at least a few models of the modern day Plasma/LCD TV's have
>composite video input(s), or failing that, one could hook up a composite
>to S-Video adapter, as I'm sure most of these Plasma/LCD displays have at
>least S-Video as a lowest common denominator input.

Having more _potential_ bandwidth with, say, component video inputs
has nothing to do with the _actual_ bandwidth which the monitor will
extract from a composite signal.  And S-video converted from composite
will have exactly the same issues.  A "special" S-video adapter that
passed on the higher luminance bandwidth actually present in the
Apple composite output could be somewhat better, but not enough
better to make 80-columns look good.

The AppleColor Composite monitor does a "trick" that is completely
non-standard:  it detects when the color burst is absent and boosts 
the luminance video bandwidth to 10+ MHz, making an 80-column
display pretty good.  No "video" monitor will (or should) do this,
since there is never any useful signal there in a standard video signal.

The way to use the hi-res capability of modern displays is to use
them in RGB or component mode, with an appropriate video adapter
for the Apple II.

-michael

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