What video card has NTSC out?

I have a new Mac Pro and looking for a video card that can output s-video. I've been to three major stores and an Apple store. Nobody knows anything and each has led me to a goose chase with mis-information. Ended up buying a HD4650 which everything I read online says they don't work with Mac.

Doesn't anybody use analog out to a pro analog monitor anymore? What card are you using? Do I need to go to AJA or Blackmagic? Please advise.

thanks,
Td

Nope - they no longer make analogue monitors and I think TVs are all but stopped too.

However if you wish to connect to older NTSC devices you will as suspected need a video card.

Which you also need to connect (for a properly calibrated output) to an HD TV or Pro HD Monitor.


AJA [www.aja.com]

Blackmagic Design [www.blackmagic-design.com]

Matrox [www.matrox.com]



By the way NTSC is dead - ATSC is the new standard.

Quote
Excerpt from Wikipedia
United States ended all full-power analog broadcasts at midnight on Friday, June 12, 2009. Low power television stations continue to be broadcast in analog in several areas until their final analog shutoff dates... In September 2010, the FCC announced a proposal to set a hard deadline of 2012 for low power stations to broadcast in digital.

For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Guess it's time to buy a new monitor instead eh? thanks

That is unless you are looking a way to record the computer screen? Or output the Mac screen to a projector?

If that is the case then you will need to get a Mini Display Port converter to DVI-I (NOT DVI-D)

Something like:

[www.amazon.com]

and then a DVI-I to S-Video connector.

[store.apple.com]

Can't promise that will work though! Check the products carefully!



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Quote

Guess it's time to buy a new monitor instead eh? thanks

Honestly?


Yes

SD is only hanging on in low income homes and trailer parks because the coupons haven't been redeemed or received by the vast majority unable to afford to upgrade to HD. (if you are able to upgrade but haven't shame on you! )

But seriously though the low power SD stations will go soon and you won't have a choice...

Then we can all breathe a sigh of relief when we don't have to watch non-square pixels with less than 1/4 resolution (of HD) and awful colour reproduction anymore!

If you are going to get a new HD TV I would like to recommend the Panasonic Plasmas 2D or 3D (I wish they would pay me for advertising) as they are without doubt the best HD picture you can get in the consumer to prosumer and actually in my opinion the pro-range (if you can afford them). Suffering non of the viewing angle issues or washed-out blacks of LCD or annoyingly over achieving eye-straining vibrance of LED backlit LCDs.

Downside is power consumption but the last two years Plasmas have improved massively in that respect too.



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Quote
Ben King
SD is only hanging on in low income homes and trailer parks because the coupons haven't been redeemed or received by the vast majority unable to afford to upgrade to HD. (if you are able to upgrade but haven't shame on you! )

Not only is this comment rather classist/elitist, it is quite inaccurate (unless most people, at least in the U.S., live in low income homes and trailer parks). I doubt that it was your intent to be derogatory, even jokingly so...


However, according to hard facts (nielsen) most TV viewing (80%) in the U.S. is standard definition. About 60% of U.S. homes have at least one HDTV, but less that half of them actually subscribe to HD cable/satellite service, or watch true HD broadcasts (over the air), leaving the total amount of people in the U.S. watching true HD signals/content at less than 20%, regardless of the type of TV used. (Source.)

But, yes, why would you want to use an S-video connection for anything, especially signals leaving a computer? Maybe for transferring old material from Betamax/VHS/etc.

Those stats are probably a surprise to most of us...

And, lest I be accused of going too far off-topic, the Intensity PCI video I/O card from Blackmagic Design (under US$200) has an S-video connector.


-Dave

Good point Dave - but 60% and growing... fast. Also as the market share increases and the technology gets even cheaper for production then the shows will increase too... fast!

However my point should have been clearer - its not so much the content being HD more that the the ATSC is broadcasting now on Full power stations and over networks and you are all going digital as the UK and (a large proportion of) Europe are now.

The ATSC specs still allow for NTSC size and frame-rates but you have to upgrade your equipment which a lot of people are doing to HD as SD equipment is in short supply.

NTSC was officially abandoned and is holding on for dear-life by an old threaded coax with a dodgy connector.

Yes D, I should have been a bit clearer - but you won't have a choice next year regardless of the statistics.

I still watch SD broadcasts on my HD TV as there still aren't that many HD channels in the UK - however we all have digital and those on old analogue TVs have to use digital tuners to receive TV (over the air).

I reckon by 2012 you will be looking at over 80% of US homes having HD and access to it and if they actually turn off the low power local stations then there will be a whole boatload more or a massive increase in sales of sports equipment

Lets look back next Jan/Feb and see

Now 3DTV will be another story...



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

<<<and awful colour reproduction>>>

Oh yes we will. We use a number of Toshiba panels around the place and they come out of the box in "Sports Colour." Sports Colour is felt in the parking lot before you even get out of your car and get to the living room to watch it. It's pretty painful, but it's what's "normal" for Harry Homeowner who never touches the knobs. Worse, we have several RP Projection systems for 3D and those have permanent, if you can believe it, "Consumer Colour." There are ways to suppress it, but the colour distortion is burned in.

And in 1080.

What fun.

Koz