hi

can anyone suggest an sd box (pref. reasonably cheap...) that does ntsc output.

i've got an ntsc only digital video recorder that i want to use with a stb

my tv displays ntsc just fine so watching the output isn't a problem - i just need to find an ntsc source for the input.....

Cheers
David

In Australia there is no such animal. Sorry.

Well, the Topfield can do NTSC output (a menu option), but kind of as Gepm said, it isn't worth it.
It is like putting a PAL DVD into a DVD player but forcing its output to NTSC. The end result is a bit jerky from trying to convert 50fps to 60fps (some DVD players don't assume the source is film based and won't do 3:2 pulldown... I don't really know what the Toppy does in this respect, but the end result looks unimpressive) Also the reduction in lines makes things looks a little dodgy.
Regards

There is such an animal. It is a modified Teac DVB400 but it still isn't worth it.

http://www.dtvforum.info/index.php?showtopic=5370&hl=NTSC

Many SD boxes have NTSC as a menu output option, not all work that well. This topic was covered on Aus TV Digital Forums about 6-8 months back, the Emtech SD box was moderately successful.

Like David I am also tring to find a STB that does NTSC out Well.

I have tried the Unimax ST-102 and get jerky output on NTSC, PAL is fine.

I also went to The Mod Shop to purchase one of their YESS DVB-T1288 which is promoted by them as being able output NTSC. But the shop only has rabbit ears for a demo! which means even in PAL the signal kept freezing. I asked if I purchased this box and it does not output NTSC well, could I return it for a refund. They said they would only exchange it. I explained that did not make any sense as the replacement would do the same thing but they still refused to offer a refund if it did not work as advertised. So I refused to buy from them.

The search goes on.

Peter.

You aren't going to get one that is smooth (well, not while Australia is still using the superior PAL broadcast standard), because you can't turn 50fields/sec into 60fields/s without some jerkiness. If you knew the source was film (and thus each pair of fields is from the same moment in time) then the STB can do 3:2 pulldown and give the same results as an NTSC DVD, but this relies on the proper flags being in the stream to indicate film, and I reckon that this wouldn't exist and instead the broadcasters would just send "interlaced flags" permanently.... thus no matter how good the STB is, it can't work magic to find extra fields from no-where to smoothen the whole thing up.
Regards

I thought that was how digital standards convertors worked, by looking at the difference between the 2 fields and add a psuedo field in between them.

I hoped new STBs would be smart enough to be able to accomplish this. Especially since they happily proclaim that they do NTSC out on the box.

It does look like a STB which can handle this well does not exist (I have not seen the suggested EMtech in the flesh yet).

I have since tried the following boxes Nintaus DT-200, Centrex CTDV200 with the same result as the Unimax reported earlier.

I also was shown a Lenoxx STB-500 which a retailer assured me would work well and has been used for incar TV on Japanese imports which have NTSC LCD's.

But the salesman could not figure out how to select NTSC out on this box, and would not let me try the remote.

Peter.

LOL! As if a $150 box is going to be able to interpolate fields, only the most expensive dedicated standards converters are able to do this. The best you will get out of any STB less than $1500 is going to be repeated fields.
STBs aren't designed to be standards converters, although like I said already, if the source is film and flagged accordingly, then it is very easy for the STB/DVD player to do 3:2 pulldown, and most will do this.
Regards

I bought an 8mb Digital standards converter for $400 a few years ago, and it happily converted Pal-NTSC.

So yes few years down the track, I would have thought a $170-$200 STB that proclaims NTSC out, would actually have a watchable NTSC output.

Peter.

If there is a DEC 2000t Hauppauge owner out there, check the output selection for NTSC please, and advise.

My XMS-007 (see also the DSE and Trio STBs) seems to do a good job of outputing NTSC. I can't see any obvious jerkyness.
http://www.triocorp.com.au

If the XMS is affected you will only notice the jerkyness on resonably fast motion or a camera panning the scene.

Thanks for the suggestion DSE is out of stock at the moment, so I can't check there. I have emailed Trio support to see what they say.

Peter.

Neither the STB setup nor the USB-PC setup have any obvious NTSC output options.

Thanks for looking, Bill, I did hope my son would have looked in his box menu and replied.