Will USA (NTSC) Extender work on UK (PAL) TVs?

Hi, I'm keen to buy an Extender device soon and can import from the USA to
the UK. However as we use the PAL system, and USA uses NTSC (which has
fewer horizontal scan-lines thus lower resolution), I need to know how
configurable the Extender devices are.

Specifically, does the Settings menu give an option to choose the country
the box is living in, and the output format PAL vs. NTSC?

Or, is this predetermined from the factory?

I note on the HP page at http://tinyurl.com/6cctn it states the output
connectors feature 'NTSC Composite', but the rest do not say NTSC. As I
will be using S-Video direct to my TV, will this work and give me a full,
PAL picture?

On another note, does anyone know if the "Component Out" mentioned is
standard phono jacks for R G & B?

And if so, will I be able to use that output simultaneously to the S-Video
out? (My aim here is to bounce on the picture using a standard TV-sender to
smaller TVs in the house.)

Sorry for all the questions! Hope someone here knows the definitive answers

--
Thanks.

CJSnet

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Sorry but these are NTSC only devices.

 

Thanks Barb. Could you be a little more specific? They will work on a PAL
TV that can support NTSC I assume?

So what you are saying is that Linksys and HP are not going to be able to
sell the same devices in the UK? I would have thought they just had a
software setting to specify the TV format, like most DVD players do?

If anyone can go into the menu to have a look, that'd be great
--
Thanks.

CJSnet

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You may be better off getting the Xbox MCE Extender package. It's much cheaper
for a start & provided you have a modified Xbox it shouldn't matter that it's an
NTSC title. The Xbox will give you RGB out to your TV via SCART.

 

there is no option setting in the menus. it's NTSC only. the devices
are only going to be sold here in the US. there is far more going on
here than just the PAL vs NTSC. These devices have embedded wireless
as well and it's specific to the US FCC wireless specturm and as you
probably know, different channels are in use elsewhere.

 

The Media Center Extenders will only be sold in the US. They are not
compatible with the PAL format. Thanks.

--
Andy Vanosdale
Microsoft MVP - Windows XP Media Center Edition
Microsoft Student Ambassador - University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
Microsoft Associate Expert
Expert Zone - http://www.microsoft.com/WindowsXP/ExpertZone

 

Media Center Extenders are to be sold in Europe "sometime next year" to quote a
press release from Linksys.

 

Note that MCX for Xbox is only sold/supported in the US and Canada (i.e. if
you decide to try it in Europe, you're on your own

 

So the MCX for the Xbox is not going to be released in Europe ?????

 

not another kick for the european customers. I have to say in all my IT life
so far MCE has got to be my single most regrets - and I have even owned an
imac !

David

 

Not at this time.

--
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

Well, the general consensus from this thread was that it definitely won't
work.

I have news for everyone here - it does

I live in the UK and received my USA Extender box from www.outpost.com
today. Here's the process I went through:

1) Power Connection
Hmm, worrying this as it has a USA plug and I know they tend to use the 110
Volt supply, however on checking the manual it said it supported 100-220V.
UK uses 200V so I purchased a £5 adapter plug, connected it to the mains
and... NO EXPLOSION! Yay. Power lights on, all systems go.

2) Audio/Video
I connected the S-Video cable from the Extender direct to my TV using a
SCART adapter that has an S-Video socket on it. Note this was connected to
an S-Video compatible SCART socket. Not all TVs have them, but most UK TVs
have an S-Video input. The picture came up -- beautiful! Filled the screen
perfectly, and a lot crisper than I was used to using the analog TV sender I
had before. Audio was connected via optical digital to my Receiver, which
again worked perfectly.

3) Network
This was the tricky bit as I first tried using an ad-hoc peer-to-peer
network just with a network card transmitting to the Extender. Doesn't
work. I therefore purchased a Linksys Wireless-G Router and set it up.
Suddenly the Extender picked up the connection and gave me a setup key. I
proceeded with the install from the PC-side and it connected within 2
minutes!

PAL recordings play back perfectly via the NTSC Linksys Extender - full
screen, no problems. It seems the box is doing converting nicely. Note, my
Hitachi TV is 5 years old and may well be NTSC-compatible so I can't
guarantee this will work on all PAL TVs, but I understand most modern ones
do support NTSC.

My only grumbles I hope someone can help with are:
* I can see the scan lines slightly due to the lower NTSC resolution, but
this will do until the UK boxes come out at which point I'll swap it for a
PAL Extender. This is just the nature of NTSC vs. PAL so no advice needed
cheers
* The compression appears higher than before, as pictures move slightly
more wishy-washy than before. They leave a 'ghost' of themselves behind,
but this is only very slightly noticeable and women won't even notice it at
all (don't ask me why!). I suppose wireless video is inherently more
compressed. Could this be due to bad network performance, or is the video
transmitted via Wireless-G in a 'one-size fits all' method? I.e. does the
compression change dynamically depending on network performance? The
network tuning wizard reported I had good enough signal, and the Extender
box reported it as 'Very Good'.
* All the fun animated menus and visualisations are gone Bad move
this. On the Extender when you access menus, they just flick in a static
manner to the next option. Even the 'egg timer' doesn't spin. And no
chance of visualisations when playing back music in your living room then
Anyone know if there are plans to improve this, or is the processor too
basic?
* There is no Zoom option! If I press MORE I just get Settings,
Messenger, etc. How can I tell the Extender box I have a 16:9 widescreen
telly?

Other than that I couldn't be happier. To all the nay-sayers out there, my
advice would be don't say "it won't work" unless you know for sure. I hope
this info is useful to the optimists in the UK!
--
Thanks.

CJSnet

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Hmm, there is one thing I don't understand: PAL is 50Hz, NTSC is 60Hz. If
the box outputs 60Hz NTSC from a 50Hz PAL input, you can't get smooth
motion. Every once in a while, it would have to display the same frame
twice to make up for the lack of new incoming frames. Are you sure you
don't see an effect like this?

The Extender is running a Remote Desktop session. If you have a second PC,
make a remote desktop session to your MCE PC and run the Media Center in
it. You should get the same cut-down UI that you see on the Extender.
That's because the Extender doesn't render the UI itself, it only "copies"
the frames rendered on your PC. Since network bandwidth is limited, you can
only transfer rather static images in an amount of time that still allows
for good enough responsiveness when using the remoted UI.

Umm, not at all? I still wonder if anyone in "NTSC world" actually has a
widescreen TV set. I wouldn't know how widescreen is signalled in NTSC. In
Europe, we have line 23 WSS (Wide Screen Signalling) and SCART pin8 for
this, but neither exists in NTSC...

Regards,«

 

Well, it's not noticeable, but the picture isn't as smooth as if watching it
on the PC itself, but I put that down to higher compression. In any event,
it's better than the analog TV Sender and will keep me going nicely until
PAL boxes come out

Thanks for clarifying. A shame that.

We shall see! Linksys say the PAL box will be out "sometime next year"
(2005). Until then I have the perfect interim measure, which according to
many would not work, and according to MS must not be sold outside the USA.
Thanks www.outpost.com for such speedy delivery to the UK then!
--
Thanks.

CJSnet

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They leave a 'ghost' of themselves behind, but this is only very slightly
noticeable and women won't even notice it at all (don't ask me why!).

By any chance do you notice the 50 or 60 cycle flicker of flourescent
lights? I've noticed that most of the people that can see it are male. Very
few females have ever complained about it. Must be a genetic thing, much
like the "photic sneeze reflex" where a transition from a dark room into
bright sunlight sets off a series of sneezes. Supposedly this only affects
males, although my daughter had the problem when she was younger...

Dana Cline - MVP

 

Interesting! And yes, fluorescent lights can sometimes really bother me!

 

Robert, something just occurred to me...

If it cannot cope with animated screens and visualisations, why can it cope
with full motion video!! :-S

I really hope someone at MS can say this is being looked at. The Extender
device seems lifeless without those cool things. Even the background clouds
don't move slowly across the screen any more
--
Thanks.

CJSnet

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Because that runs outside the RDP session. Extenders are basically the good
old RDP with "hacked on" audio/video streaming running outside the actual
RDP session.

If what you're getting at is why not run the entire UI this way - for that
you'd have to MPEG-2 encode the screen contents on the MCE machine to
transfer it to the MCX. Consider that up to 5 MCX can be connected to an
MCE machine. I think you'd need about a 10GHz CPU to encode 5 MPEG-2
streams in parallel...

All by design, AFAIK.

Regards,«

 

You are correct - the raw encoded video is streamed to MCX (it is not
recompressed)

 

PS: Teletext is not supported either, nor is DVD playback