Way to make an Atari 2600 look like stella?

[AskewTV]

Hey I was wondering if it was possible to get my Atari 2600 to have the same colors as Stella. I use an Orion TV (Not sure what model), I have tried adjusting the colors and that didn't work. Should an Atari on a TV even look like Stella?

[+xucaen]

Hey I was wondering if it was possible to get my Atari 2600 to have the same colors as Stella. I use an Orion TV (Not sure what model), I have tried adjusting the colors and that didn't work. Should an Atari on a TV even look like Stella?

 

They should be the same colors, however on a TV the games will more more pixelated or grainy, depending on the size of your TV. If you are using a PAL console or PAL games then things may be different, I don't know, I've only ever used NTSC. If you are connected to a modern LCD, LED or Plasma TV then your colors may look different - on mine they did until I connected it to a proper TV.

[Wickeycolumbus]

You ever hear the joke for what NTSC means? Never The Same Color.

 

Especially with the way that the 2600 gets it's color.

[CPUWIZ]

You ever hear the joke for what NTSC means? Never The Same Color.

 

Especially with the way that the 2600 gets it's color.

 

In Europe it is PAL = Picture All Lousy.

[Keatah]

Did you adjust the color inside the VCS?

[AskewTV]

Did you adjust the color inside the VCS?

What do you mean by that? I opened up my console and adjusted the color.

[Keatah]

Ohh..

[AskewTV]

Ohh..

Oh! I feel dumb now! For some reason I was thinking of the cartridge!

[+Andrew Davie]

 

In Europe it is PAL = Picture All Lousy.

 

I have never heard that. PAL pictures were excellent - higher resolution than NTSC and always consistent and reproducible colour between TVs.

The lower frame rate was totally un-noticeable to most people at the time and really I can't see why PAL would be called lousy. Jealous yanks, I'd say.

Having lived in both PAL and NTSC countries for some period of time, I will say that you could barely tell any difference in the two when watching the crap that they put on anyway. The biggest difference I think was the appalling quality of cable TV in the states where they apparently tried to cram 100 channels onto a cable TV system that could probably have held 10 or so. In any case, NTSC was in my view a much worse TV standard in terms of colour reproduction between TVs.

[+SpiceWare]

 

In Europe it is PAL = Picture All Lousy.

 

 

 

I've been importing PAL DVDs for a few years now: Blake's 7, The Brittas Empire, numerous Doctor Who^*, Red Dwarf, The Thin Blue Line.

 

The picture quality is noticeably better than NTSC DVDs when viewed on an HD display. The lower rate of 50 fps does cause minor motion judder when watched on a 60 fps display, but I find it less noticeable than the judder you get when watching a 24 fps film on a 60 fps display (this page has a good explanation, with visual aids, for source of the judder - scroll down to the grey box titled The Nature of Interlaced TV, Film-to-Video Conversion, and Other Interesting Gambits)

 

 

 

* I've been rewatching the classic series from the beginning (1963). I'm currently on season 7, for which I was greatly surprised to discover that Jon Pertwee's first story is available on blu-ray it was the only classic story filmed in its entirety instead of video taped. It looked awesome!

[+SpiceWare]

Forgot to mention that I've been finding it cheaper to import the PAL DVDs of British shows rather than purchase the NTSC version in the states. I imported all of these for $103 (that's including the shipping & handling from England) while the NTSC version of The Mind of Evil goes for $130 all by itself.

 

 

Likewise the NTSC version of The War Games goes for $100 while I imported the PAL version for $22 (once again, that's including S&H).