SNES vs. S Famicom

[RCM]

I was bsing with this gent a couple days ago and he made the claim that the Super Famicom displayed sharper graphics than the SNES. Any truth to this?

[agbulls]

That is laughable -- they're the same system with different cases. It all depends on your video hookup ... rf, rca or s-vid.

I have a snes and a super fami --- games play identically on both systems, sound identical on both systems and look identical on both systems.

[mills]

PAL units use RGB by standard.

So, yes. Pal Super Famicom's have better picture quality, at the sacrifice of the higher framerate we get in the NTSC region.

[CartCollector]

You can get RGB from a Super Fami/NTSC SNES, so they can match a PAL SNES in picture quality. But the problem is that it takes more work and usually requires buying either a whole new TV/monitor (>$100 + shipping) or an XRGB2 (>$200).

[j_factor]

A European RGB SCART hookup will handle NTSC just fine. With that and a converter, you can do component.

Or get an RGB monitor. You might be able to find one cheap locally (like through craigslist), but then you might have to homebrew your own hookups. I know we've talked about this stuff before.

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

That is laughable -- they're the same system with different cases. It all depends on your video hookup ... rf, rca or s-vid.
It could be the case that the two systems have different video encoding chips that convert the RGB signals into composite and s-video. Different encoders produce different quality output.

Compare composite output from an early Genesis to a later one and the difference is very noticeable: much much less dot crawl and color bleeding. The early Genesis's had a really bad video encoder, though, so the difference might not always be so noticeable.

Nintendo may have used a cheaper video encoder in the US systems to cut costs. Though since you say you have both systems and there's no difference, I guess that's not it. It's also possible the original source of this info was comparing an early US SNES to a later Super Famicom and Nintendo changed encoders at some point in the system's life just like Sega did with the Genesis.

From the systems I've had, I'd say the SNES uses a pretty high quality video encoder. I don't even see much difference between s-video and RGB on it.


...word is bondage...

[walrusmonger]

Or it could just be some guy talking out of his ass to sound like he knows more about gaming then he really does :)

[idrougge]

PAL units use RGB by standard.

They use RF by standard.

[ccovell]

PAL units use RGB by standard.

They use RF by standard.
All 3 regions have every sort of connection on the back, so they all have identical outputs as standard! (it's just a matter of cabling)

I've connected US SNESes and JP SFCs through composite, S-Video, and RGB, and there is no difference between the two regions' quality.

[idrougge]

All 3 regions have every sort of connection on the back, so they all have identical outputs as standard! (it's just a matter of cabling)

Exactly, and the standard cabling was RF, that's my point.