[rescue] Sun 13w3 to VGA to HDMI

[john ferguson]

Date: Fri, 15 Oct 2021 07:43:22 -0500 (CDT)
From: Jonathan Patschke<jp at celestrion.net>
To: The Rescue List<rescue at sunhelp.org>
Subject: Re: [rescue] Fwd: Sun 13w3 to VGA to HDMI
Message-ID:<289fe628-569f-ed9c-465c-e87d61b67846 at celestrion.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed

On Wed, 13 Oct 2021, Mike Spooner wrote:

> IIRC, all the early Sun colour framebuffers (CG3, CG6, CG12, GT, etc) were
> composite-sync-on-green, as were the Sun CRTs.

Combposite sync, yes, but on a dedicated pin.  It's why the Sun BNC
monitors of the era had four connectors.  SGI and RS/6000 did sync-on-green.

*Some*  Sun-branded monitors could cope with having sync on the green
pin, but some could not.   The impressive-looking one based on the Sony
GDM-20D10 could not--even though the SGI monitor based off the same
design could.

For quite a while, I had a goofy setup where I ran my Suns connected to
an SGI monitor using a 13w3->4BNC connector on the Sun end, a BNC
T-connector to join Sync and Green, barrel-couplers for Red and Blue,
and a 13w3->3BNC connector on the monitor end.  It meant that none of my
Sun systems could auto-set a resolution based on the monitor (provided
the framebuffer was new enough to even try such a thing), but it meant
having one fewer montior on the bench,

-- Jonathan Patschke Austin, TX USA
I'd forgotten but in my days as a Sun VAR, Arcadia Systems Inc, Miami, 
we had a 35 inch Sony CRT monitor which I used for CAD demos. It weighed 
a whole lot and I used to have some difficulty getting people to help me 
lift it out of the case we toted it around in.
The Sony had BNC connectors on the back and we had a 13w3 to 4 bnc 
connector adpater and I cannot remember ever having any difficulty with it.
john ferguson