Skip to main content
Home Forums 68kMLA Macinstosh SE 6400 — #11
Post #11 by Bunsen
Source Forum68kMLA
CategoryHardware
Post DateMon, 24 Oct 2011 - 18:58
Original URLhttps://68kmla.org/bb/threads/macinstosh-se-6400.24054/
Post
the 6400 can output at 512 x 384 / However, the CRT of the compact Macs has a resolution of 512 x 342.
Quite so, my bad.

Technically, the Cathode Ray Tube itself has no specific resolution. It's the analog board and driver circuitry that sets it. In *theory* you could drive the tube at near any resolution - if you're up for designing and building your own high-voltage, high-frequency, precisely tuned electromagnetic tube driver...

Part of the reason I advised - and still advise - extensive searching and reading, is that this is *not even remotely* a simple plug-A-into-B hack. It's not something I would recommend unless you know what you're getting yourself into (I mentioned the high voltage, right?) - and not knowing the relevant search terms to bring up what you're looking for is not a promising start.

For example, no-one's even mentioned refresh rates, sync rates, or video and sync signal polarity yet. Sync is your biggest issue, IMO.

I would suggest starting with the comments I left on the very first, stickied, post ("What this forum is about") in the resurrected Hacks forum, where I dropped in a list of useful existing threads. Also, search term: eviltim

I'd be more interested in seeing if the original CRT could be pushed to do Grayscale along the lines of the SE/30 hacks (poor man's grayscale?)
Oy vey. The original attempt at the PMGS involved transplanting the analog board and deflection coils from another monitor onto the SE's tube. Even he ended up using a complete substitute monitor in the end.

It's back up, btw, as part of the resurrected Power Color Classic pages.

Sync and rez aside (*snerk*), it's possible to get grays from a mono monitor by hijacking the brightness knob's PCB points - as eviltim/viletim demonstrated on one of his RGB monitor hacks.

Space wise, an LCD would free up a metric shed-load...

mp.ls