Hardware AA from an HDMI cable? mCable Gaming Edition Review!
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- Опубликовано: 13 сен 2024
- Better picture quality is promised when using this HDMI cable, adding contextual anti-aliasing to anything passing through it - plus other image enhancements. From our tests it absolutely delivers, but for its high price, it's worth considering the pros and cons. Tom covers all the details - including the matter of input latency.
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You should have tried older consoles without much AA/post processing, like the PS2, Gamecube and OG Xbox.
Lee Everett I have tried, they output 480i and 480i cannot be upscaled on the mcable
Virtual Reality gamecube can be converted to progressive scan.
John Halloran I did more research and trying out some stuff there are a good amount of ps2 games that support progressive scan and GameCube games. The ones that do will be upscaled all the way to 1080p.
Those consoles don't have HDMI..
You would need some converter which adds its own processing from analog to HDMI.
lostn65 yes that's true. but for PS3 the fat 60gb model has the ps2 inside already and is not emulated and you can use the mcable on that and make it look even better
That cable works best for older consoles. I have one and use it for my original Xbox and the amount of difference it makes is crazy. For PS3 and Xbox 360 it's also still quite good but I wouldn't buy it for a PS4/Xbox One and ofc not for a PC
Considering it costs 2 times as much as last gen consoles and 5 times as much as original xbox, it's not an ideal solution.
Admiral Ackbar How is that even relevant? People aren’t playing consoles because they’re cheap, they’re playing for the great games
I wasn't really factoring in price here. Obviously this cable costs like 3 times of what an original Xbox costs. But if you want a clearer picture (and the original Xbox doesn't have a working emulator on PC) this is a great (and the only) solution and like I said, the difference on an original Xbox is huge with that cable. People buy Framemeisters for their 8/16 bit consoles and that one is 300$. The solutions to make older consoles look better is limited and this mcable is a good solution.
This right here. I am surprised you guys didn't pick up on that and test the ps3/360/wiiu out on it. That's most of the selling feature of it, to upscale and clean the edges on those to give a better overall look. And that is what I use it for too. :)
How did you get this to work with original Xbox? What adapter did you use specifically? I have a Component to HDMI upscaler but the image was all messed up for original Xbox. Major bummer because it was part of the reason for purchasing this cable. Everything else works well for last gen consoles, except for my PS3 losing signal when the resolution changes. Have any suggestions to get the original Xbox working? Thanks!
How does this work on text in games? Reshade and SweetFX AA can sometimes make the text look blurry/odd. Does this have the same effect?
Wow nice seeing you here
mcable improve text
I was really hoping to see you or MLiG tackle this. Really glad you did.
I'd MUCH prefer them to put this tech into a DSP Processing box or something than a cable. Would pay $$ for that
I have 2 of these (the gaming edition). One connected to the switch on a 4K Oled and the other one connected to a 360 to a regular 1080p screen.
It’s basically free antialiasing for games that don’t have it. The IQ improvements is noticeable at first sight.
At this point, it’s basically a requirement for Switch gaming in 4K docked mode for me.
One thing DF didn’t mention, the antialiasing also improves the shadows. In Mario kart, arms , Zelda, etc. The shadows get more “rounded and curved” instead of kinda jagged
Leo Gabriel Roque Fariñas so why would this cable be preferable to smoothing/anti-aliasing features onboard the HDTV’s ?
I cant play BotW without it DF is Wrong it does work very well.
Leo Gabriel Roque Fariñas even if the game it self has anti aliasing.. It will give you more anti aliasing.. Its a form of supersampling at 1440p only at max..it will not go beyond at 2160p..
I mean the tech itself is cool, but for 120$ its not worth it
Too right. Even half that is asking too much for the minimal change it brings to the table.
Not everyone works at Mcdonalds guys...
more income doesn't change the fact that it's a bad deal you know
Nathan Da Vinci And not everyone works in high positions either.
True but money is very hard to come by and extremely easy to spend.
I need to go to the eye doctor because my eyes are too noob to see a big difference.
JustSomeDudeWhoPlaysVideogames
Seriously. He was like you can see all these differences on the switch! And I just see the same stair steps. Clearly, I am unworthy of the graphics
There is not a big difference. If you aren't already used to heavy AA on PC you don't even need to consider this. If you are used to maxing games you still probably don't need this. Only reason I'm even considering one is because of my intense Switch addiction.
You're watching a compressed youtube video, so yeah...
Do a double take
why does that matter? you should still see the differences. It's not going to make mcable footage look worse and then comparable to normal hdmi. The fact is it only has a small effect which when you're gaming isn't enough to justify the cost.
I would have liked to see how it handles older consoles like a PS1, PS2, and N64 (through a HDMI adapter of course since those consoles don't have HDMI) where AA was almost never used. Also, I assume you can put this cable on the output of an HDMI switch/receiver and have it apply it's affect to everything plugged into the switch?
thanks jk I was speaking more to the PlayStation games, but thanks for the smartass reply. ;-)
I'd be interested in this too. Always curious about the ways modern tech can clean up the visuals on older games.
Maybe some material for a DF Retro episode?
It would be interesting to add this to an UltraHDMI N64 with blurring off.
A couple N64 games have gameshark codes to turn off AA
N64s anti-aliasing is basically a digital equivalent of smearing vaseline on the camera lens
One of the first things I thought it would be great for is a HDMI modded N64. You can set the output to 480p through line doubling and disable the blurring feature. Then use this cable to smooth out the resulting pixelation. GameCube with GCVideo would be another great candidate
TofumanFC3S wii too
Ya, and use an everdrive to patch roms to disable the AA in the game, deblur on the ultra hdmi, and then this to put in SMAA.
Whats discontinued? UltraHDMI is still around, just sells out and you have to wait months for the next batch. GC Video is still selling and their plug n play adapter is in beta (a couple other companies put out plug n play HDMI adapters in the meantime).
GC Video is open source and versions are being sold and in development by several parties
Their doing something like that now actually
I see a Vita in the background. I found a new friend! Good job on the vid!!
I recently got a vita, in process of hacking it but I've been too busy playing switch and other things in my free time. Well I've hacked it, but I still need to setup sd2vita and load it with psp/ps1/vita games. Kinda wish the sd2vita went into the sd card slot though, because the physical games I bought I wont be able to play after I set it up.
Roscoe Jones "A what?" - Sony
I see a SCORPIO SOC in the background. WAY COOLER
Hijynx87, just save up the cash, if needed, to get a 32gig or 64gig memory card. It's quite obtainable my friend. I only do physical Vita games with an exception to a few. The memory cards went down in price, not a whole ton but it's cheaper now through the right seller. Only mod I use is for my PSTV which is the [psvimgtools] mod which is better suited for the PSTV rather than henkaku.
mjc0961 true! Haha that's funny but true for Sony of America. Japan... different market!
I got one of these to use my last-gen consoles (360, PS3, Wii U, PSTV) with my 4K TV. Works like a dream.
you got one for each console? I have those consoles too and was wondering what's ur set up?
I wanna get one for my ps3 on a 4k tv, any setting that i need to change on my ps3 console when connected to this cable?
My guess is he's using a receiver or hdmi splitter
I only have one, and I don't use a receiver or splitter, I just manually switch the connection whenever I change consoles.
The only setting you need to change is the display output from "1080p/Auto" to "720p", since the cable kicks in when it recognizes 720p, and won't do anything if the console is spitting out a 1080p image that it upconverted from 720p.
Most of the games for the consoles I mentioned are native 720p, but for the small handful that are full 1080p, switch the output setting back to "1080p".
It works great? Did you test with demons souls?
I actually use a mCable with the PSVR; plugged from the PSVR box to the HMD and it works, though it can sometimes have some issues i.e. you need to be certain that the cable has power before any signal is put though it or it can act like a normal pass-though cable or just not give any signal at all! So the number one issue is normally to do with power i.e. if you plug the usb cable into the PS4 it will be very unreliable, so I use a separate usb power supply for my mCable.
Next we come to the blackouts and yes there are a few issues with the V1 PSVR's that I think have mostly been eliminated with the newer version of the PSVR (I can't test this as I only have the V1). The blackouts as I understand them are mostly related to odd HDMI encoding outputs from the PSVR box, so when it switches between modes the HDMI signals can upset the mcable and it will not process the signal right (most times turning the hmd off the on will fix the problem), one of the oddest things is that if you have been playing a PSVR game and then close the game application you will often find that no image will go to the PSVR of the home screen in cinema mode, start a PSVR game up and mostly it will work fine apart from when you go back to the home screen where you will just have no image until you switchback to the game.
Now we come to the real odd blackout issue that some times comes up once a month or every few months where you will get constant blackouts at random and the image will not come back on no matter how many times you turn off the hmd or unplug the mcable source end from the PSVR box a plug in again (this normally fixes things if pressing the hmd power off/on fails), now the fix for this should in no way what so ever make a difference, but that said has worked every time for me and that is to unplug the hdmi from the PS4 and plug that end into the PSVR box and the end that was in the PSVR box you plug into the PS4. Now I know that should not make a blind bit of a difference but it has worked every single time that I have had a problem.
In conclusion I think you should go back and try again with the PSVR and see if any of the above sorts that out for you so you can test it out fully.
SalsaKetchup thanks for the post and clearing things up hope they see this too!
Is the difference in image quality with PSVR on Pro pronounced enough in your opinion to be worth considering?
John Bowen if you are just taking about pro not the mcable then I think pro is a definite. After playing psvr on standard for a few months it definitely was a clear advantage. The first demo I went back into was the shark encounter and it was much clearer. I couldnt go back to standard playstation with psvr. Also helps if you have 4k tv but my main pro purchase reasons was for psvr
When talking about the mCable It depends greatly on the game, something like Eve Valkyrie benefits most I think as it's mostly in the mid to far distance that the effects are easiest to spot and when native render resolutions are not full 1080 the mCable can help with the jaggies quite a bit. A game like Bound on the other hand gains nothing that I can spot. The other effect is that with some games the little added AA helps to make objects a little more solid. However it can also make a mess of foliage in some titles and as mentioned it has issues now and then.
I don't regret buying it but I would not go out of my way to encourage others.
If talking about upgrading to the Pro then; yes though the benefits are different from game to game.
Thanks guys.
I did upgrade to a pro when it came out, and agree the improvement on titles that support it is significant.
I was tempted by the m cable too.
My main reservation beyond the price, was and that it adds more cabling to, let’s face it, a lot of PSVR cabling already, and that it would likely only noticeably improve games that don’t already feature a bit of supersampling on pro.
We need in-depth look at the new "mClassic" HDMI dongle :)
The cable is definitely not snake oil. I had this cable for a while to use on my Switch and it does up the visuals be a good degree. I wouldn't say it is 150 dollars kinda good, but it does do its job. But like Tom says, anything it sees on screen, it will apply AA to. In particular, I noticed that the background loading screen on Mario Kart 8 was completely distorted because of the AA effect blending in the subtle grays with the whites of the image. Some assets just aren't meant to have AA and the cable will not recognize what needs it and what doesn't. Honestly though, things like that are a minor hit to take for the higher quality visuals the cable offers. I ended up returning the cable at the end of the day only because it was too expensive, but I can confirm from a first hand perspective that it does work.
LTT did a review on this like a year ago.....
But Im glad you guys did too!
So what?
LTT is not Digital Foundry ;D So I've waited gladly - Linus is good, but DF is THE authority on image quality, at least for me.
Subi_fan Is the sky blue?
xpgx1 No DF is the authority on Frames per Seconds Rtings are the authority on image quality..DF really doesnt know squat about image they just zoom in a frame and there and point out jaggies..thats not expertise
And his was shallow and sensational. I'm glad these guys that go much more in depth has covered it too
I use the older Mcable for psvr and with a hdmi coupler it does in fact work and improve image quality. There are videos on RUclips that show how to hook it up properly.
This kind of tech is perfect and should be applied on modern TV input though, other than using a cable. Hopefully the TV manufacture will get this and try to implement the tech on their TV with more options to control the intensity of the effects.
A.G. price matters
Howard Jang
Yea but we have already TV's that can stream netflix, youtube heck even surf the web, so TV's have already PC like chipsets.
I think having a chip to add AA would not add so much to the cost
Agreed.
I wish his/her hopes would come true but the world just doesn't run like that.
And just putting in a chip like that for gaming? little potential and high cost ( compatibility, chip cost, software management, etc )
A good 4K TV already DOES do this sort of thing when upscaling from lower resolutions. But they don't want to make them TOO good as they save the best for the really high-end TVs that cost way more than 99% of consumers can afford.
Obviously if you are buying a new TV it makes more sense to spend the cost of this cable on a better one. But if you have an older or budget TV, this cable is going to make an improvement for much cheaper than buying a whole new TV.
A good AV receiver can do this - if it has a quality upscaler it can do an amazing job of making things look better. Good TVs can do this as well, but even the best upscaling TVs are still doing it on a budget - but a good AV receiver (talking thousands of dollars here) can make DVD's look like blu-rays, it's remarkable.
I don't really get why they made this into a cable rather than a box... Maybe to be able to be able to charge huge extras for the longer length? Seems like a huge ripoff to get anything but the shortest one and just connect a regular hdmi cable the rest of the way :) it would be kind of cool if someone made a more feature rich image processing box that you'd pass the hdmi signal through though.. maybe that exists already
aL3891 yep makes more sense to just create a pass through box 😊
Id like a box aswell and yes this allowed them to ask more monet even tho id just use a hdmi extention cable for 2 bucks. but a box has more space so it can have a better processing unit and even better results. id like to see this used on the wii. i still like the wii but god it looks awesull at 480p...
@@messemaker22 if you use a wii game via wii u and setting the dashboard to 480p beforehand it is a nice improvement
would have loved to have seen this in use on wii games, ps2 and gc games and possibly even ps1, n64 as they should have the biggest return
Dreamcast and OG Xbox also would see significant benefits...the ps1 however I doubt would as it didn't output anything over 480i....it's max resolution was 640x240 iirc.
Okay, so I'm going to sound like Kramer from Seinfeld here but...
I had this exact same idea about 5 years ago.
A cable that upscales or super-samples the output of your console/PC to whatever resolution with real-time AA and low latency. They stole my idea Jerry!!!!
i think the best useage out of this cable is using a digital out to HDMI converter on a gamecube and then this cable since the gamecube didn't do AA in most games and at most the game are 480p so the post AA really has a lot to work with.
Henrik Olsson if you're specifically thinking about this for GameCube, I'd suggest that you seriously consider Dolphin's ability to use both higher resolutions and superior forms of anti-aliasing. Combine the emulator with the Wii U GameCube controller adapter and the whole experience feels really premium.
It wuld only work on games tht hav a 480p option and most games during tht era only had 480i. If u try to run a game through the mCable with a 480i signal then it wuld just act like a regular hdmi so u wuld get no benefit at all.
Gabbiadini Of course emulation can never replace the experience of the real thing. There are all sorts of weird issues that you'll run into on emulation that you never have to worry about on the real deal. All I wanted to say is that emulation should be a serious consideration as it offers a solution specifically for this problem. People should use what best fits their use-case and preference. If emulation isn't for you, I completely respect that, and I didn't intend to suggest any differently.
FirPtl Can you please elaborate? Why would 480p have an effect, while 480i wouldn't? Thanks for your help in advance.
Awesome review. Got this cable 6 months ago and don't regret it at all. For Switch, it's a match made in heaven.
is it HDMI 2.0? can hdr?
It would be cool to see if this would improve Riddick on original Xbox. That game has a shit ton of aliasing so it would have been a perfect test subject. Obviously you would need additional peripherals to test it, but still.
I doubt it would improve it at all judging from the effects it seems to produce in these tests, though.
It's good to see a different type of episode, this being an accessory based one. Keep up the good work.
The manufacturer recommends you guys get 2 cables connected through an HDMI female to female adapter for games with a lot of jagged edges
Alias Fakename 😂😂😂
Wow, that just like setting 2xSMAA.
I have one of these on Switch and the difference is CLEAR AS DAY on my 4k TV.
Kirby Star Allies for example looks gorgeous just like Mario Kart 8 Deluxe but then games like Odyssey while still getting a boost in image quality don't look as good as they could.
I'm shocked he didn't bring up older consoles like PS1 and PS2, I have hooked up my PS2 to it and man games look freaking amazing using this cable.
Was it part of the DF Cv to require crazy hand gestures?
Yes they are!
necropig They should've done the Italian way.
Hahahaha
Never back down! I love visual speakers.I take a lot of flack for wild hand gestures on my videos as well.
Wonder where would be good to start learning hand gestures?
I remember seeing Japanese book about hand language before but I don't remember the name.
This cable is the first step towards tv manufacturers opening their eyes to gaming. Instead of all post proccessing being focused on movies, i hope some have a game mode that can make AA and even other post fx enhancments for game directly from the TV. It might make some input latency, but imagine lighter sweetfx or reshade fx being on a TV, that wouldn't be half bad
Okay, if you have to zoom in 400% and the change is still to slight to notice, then it isn’t worth it.
Thank you. Will never understand videos like this. Where you have to zoom in to notice the difference. Thats stupid !
TheChad lol I was thinking the same, DF has been exaggerating their reviews on a zoom level of 400%... Geez... Well I think that is videogames this days =/
You guys completely fail to see the point, you don't have to zoom in to see a difference, AA settings are easily noticeable, the reason they do zoom in is so you can clearly see up close just exactly what the difference is, it'd be stupid if they didn't zoom in.
It's RUclips video mate. You have to go extra mile to showoff the difference because details like that get lost in compression.
Thats just to show off the diffrence.... When u are looking at the full screen there is whole screen that has AA on it which=better picture . You dont have to zoom in to see it/. Your eyes will see the diffrence when u see all the pixels with aa and with no aa
So I finally got this cable. All I can say is , for everyone of us that game on 1080p tvs and get constantly dissapointed of the 720p Switch releases, this cable is for us !
could you compare mCable with mClassic adapter ?
This does work with psvr and makes a difference! You will need a double sided HDMI adapter. Plug the side with the usb into the psvr box directly, then put the adapter between the tv side and the vr plug to connect them. It will fool the system. At time when it first boots up you will have to close your eyes as it has a weird blinding light because it's booting up but it will work and I've noticed a big difference for some vr games
Does unplugging the USB Power Supply turn off the post processing (ie effectively an on-off) or does it render the cable dead?
Matt Turner it renders the cable dead
Yea I was asking myself the same question, its strange it does not just pass the signal if it have no USB power
Dead
Buy in import from USA and received a few days ago. I can say that this cable is really a great product.
Works perfectly with my ps2, my xbox360 and my ps4. I note a real difference with and without this Mcable gaming. I do not regret my purchase!
Looks good for the switch
indeed - i have the cable and i'm having a blast with it on the switch, works and looks great!
real0wner im about to get one for my switch to see how beautiful it can be with games like bayonetta and breath of the wild
Ghost Geist hell yea
+Ghost Geist I dont mind jagged edges as long as the image is 720p and above. But if I had the option to increase AA then I wuld definitely use it.
It really does
Hello. Just wanted to say the cable does work with the psvr, you just need to use a female to female adapter. There are a few videos floating around explaining further if you search "mcable psvr".
I want to correct digital foundry here i have been using my Mcable for almost 5months now and i have been using it mostly on my switch but recently for Rage 2 on my Ps4 Pro but what i want to correct df on is what they said about BotW not giving a very a noticeable difference in image quality that is absolutely wrong infact compared to the many games i have tried BotW on switch is actually one of the best it really does a great job i cant play without it anymore and everytime i boot it up again my mind is blown by how good it looks the Mcable was made for breath of the wild id say its almost like turning that 900p into 1080p and this is no lie i struggle to find games that go well with the cable but BotW definitely does even tho its at a funny resolution to begin with i swear its really night and day with the cable BotW is a very Jaggy game and its a Huge difference if you want BotW to look its best on the switch because you cant emulate it on your PC the Mcable it feels like it was made for it.
The only problem i have found is on my older sharp 1080p screen it glitches out with the mcable and dynamic res but on my 4k samsung its great and a real huge difference it look like 1080p to me or the nicest 900p i have seen and i havent played many 900p games its an expensive cable i think i spent around $260 getting it here to Australia but i feel lucky to have this cool tech if you just want it for BotW id actually buy it its all i use it for really and it looks really you can absolutely tell the difference there are many forums of people showing pictures and correcting DF it does work cant live without it.
I don't suppose you have xenoblade chronicles 2? I would love to know what that looks like as the resolution is pretty bad
SMAA lookalike, sharpening, dynamic contrast, digital vibrance, tone mapping. _Chromatic aberration should not be added to the game in the first place._ Exept the first one, everything can be enabled on any TV with the same
"Removes chromatic aberration"/"reduced aberration", for me, that alone justifies its price. Gimmie!
Have you tried it??
That sounds bad...
Anything the devs have intended should stay
@@princepeachfuzz Pft...who cares what the Devs implemented into the game. It's all about what the user wants to experience. Just like graphics settings in games. You think everyone's simply going to set everything to Ultra and call it a day? Hell nah!
@@DJHeroMasta developers create 100% of the game, correct?
But you seem to think developers are basically babysitters & fantasy fulfillers for screaming & bitchy users
"it's all about what the user wants to experience" is a toxic toxic sentence dear masta
Because ultimately gamers are consumers, consumers without a sense of what they "want" & what they "need"
Chromatic aberration is an important effect, unlike overused motion blur & bad frame pacing & lens flare it tries it's best to emulate lenses & camera sensors in games & we're getting better at that & I love their approach to realism such as Film Grain, different FOVs, dust on lens & so on
It matters what the dev implement because they make the damn game! It's messed up to take THEIR decision & THEIR work & ideas (the shit that they own) to "all about what the user wants",
That would be really easy to accomplish! Believe me
But isn't the magic of gaming about someone else handcrafting an artificial world for you to surprise & inspire you?
Their game, their decision, their product
Besides Chromatic aberration is in the corners of the screen just move the damn camera!
@@princepeachfuzz "Chromatic aberration is an important effect, unlike overused motion blur & bad frame pacing & lens flare it tries it's best to emulate lenses & camera sensors in games" - So I'm supposed to accept something that I don't like and think is visually appalling? That shit doesn't look good on any game. Like how most people don't like Motion Blur, I do. But Chromatic Aberration, and Film Grain....get that shit out of here. I don't need that messing up my image. Plus when gaming at 4K those effects are barley noticeable anyways except for film grain. It just further destroys the image by creating "noise".
"Besides Chromatic aberration is in the corners of the screen just move the damn camera!" I don't look through a camera, I use my eyes. Have you experienced a VR title? Let me know when you come across one with film grain and Chromatic cranked up too 100 and it looking good lol. Lens FX is and motion blur are the only two that I enjoy looking at. Even Vignette is a shitty visual effect.
I'm not sure why you would want to disable the effect, but I'm pretty sure you can unplug the USB cord and it still functions as a normal HDMI cable.
DigitalFoundry: we play our games 500% zoomed in
They zoom in because most people watch their videos on phones. The difference is clear on a large tv.
Nick Motsarsky even less on my 60" TV tbh, my phone is not even at arms length when i'm in bed i notice way more on it then :p
Just got these cables used locally.
It works as intended and cleans up the image on the Switch (look pretty amazing) but it's not worth the retail price.
I got it used for $35 but it's was only 3 feet long, so spent $5 for HDMI extender and used the existing Switch HDMI cable for length.
Only worth it if you can get it used or on a deal, the 3 feet version works all the same with a $5 HDMI extender.
This can help improve VR quality.
Way better review than the other one made by Linus. He was just unreasonably happy with the cable.
Do a video on the new m Claasic
I have this cable. I can confirm that it really makes Switch games look great on my LG 4k T.V Also it reduced input lag when using it on HDR as well. This was an excellent review of the cable. I had it since November as I bought it on whim specifically for the Switch. No one did any switch specific reviews and I had to rely on Linus Tech Tips, in order to guess how the Switch would benefit. You guys are the best in this business!
What we need are powerful ICs on GPUs to do geometry level AA.
Jeremy Johnson I believe AMD and nVidia will implement this along with driver level dynamic resolution scaling. With the Pro and the 1X delivering these features I don't see how they could let this slip from PC gaming on a driver level rather than a setting in the game menu.
randomguy8196 I don't mean supersampling, I meant internal dynamic resolution scalers should someone need to take advantage of something like that because it's not available in every game.
This was essentially done with the X360 with its 10MB EDRAM. With such fast memory bandwidth, 2x and possibly even 4x AA was just about free for developers and games.
PS3’s lack of this as well as lazy developers often meant poor AA on PS3 multiplat or no AA
randomguy8196 Actually it was possible with some older DX9 games iirc. Well, internal res scaling was, idk how well you could implement dynamic res scaling without some extra code. Other than that you're totally right.
At the time the 360 was launched MS made a big deal of the fact that the 360 would apply an AA affect to everything as a post processing effect, that it was done in eDRAM so it could be applied with no performance effect at all. My understanding is that all early games had this requirement, but it was later dropped as games became more complex and devs had a harder time meeting the AA and 720p requirements. Then again resolution is way over rated, for example people watch ESPN and don't even realize it's only broadcast at 720p. It's not the resolution that counts, it's what you do with the pixels.
I'd be interested in something like this once it can support 4K and HDR, and with any more aggressive improvements it can provide, so long as it doesn't introduce more input lag to accomplish it.
What if you use the Mcable with AA enabled, wouldn't that make it look even better?
Thank you for always looking off to one side👍🏿
would this be a good option for Xenoblade Chronicles 2?
That's exactly what I came here for
For PS4 and Xbox one and pc, I'd say it doesn't do a lot, but for Wii U, PS3 and anything behind that supports HDMI it helps a lot.
Any plans on testing freesync and 1440p output on Xbox one X?
Mondo no because the console is trash. Can't even handle a stable 30fps and not to mention drops to 12fps lol.
Hope they test it out
Danny Boyyy I’m guessing you’ve never played one. If you feel that about the X then you must surely think all the current gen systems are trash. You must have one hell of a PC I assume
Mondo, "Any plans on testing freesync and 1440p output on Xbox one X?"
You would have to enable Low Framerate Compensation (LFC). "new feature of Radeon Software that effectively extends the refresh rate range of many Radeon™ FreeSync displays, enabling pristinely smooth gaming down to 30 FPS or less. Many popular Radeon™ FreeSync-ready monitors automatically use LFC when Radeon Software Crimson Edition (or later) is installed."
I don't think the console is using "Radeon Software Crimson Edition (or later)" so that option probably isn't available. To my understanding freesync without LFC starts at 45 FPS and goes up from there.
idk if they will i cant think of any monitors with a minimum freesync range low enough to smooth drops like in pubg
I've bought the cable for my backwards compatible Ps3 and it's certainly worth it since I play a great deal of ps2 and ps1 games.
I hope DF comes back to this and reviews the cable for previous console generations
It doenst make sense to buy this cable at this price. If you are playing older consoles (where the cable makes sense) you are probably not willing to pay extra 120 dollars on a cable, as the PS4 PRO and Xbox X are pretty close to this difference on price to the base consoles while they offer far more improvements than better anti-aliasing
Pedro Rezende Thank you!
It doesn't make sense to buy a cable that adds anti aliasing and upscales when you have a PS3 Xbox 360 or Wii U
I'm mocking the first comment, I use an Mcable with my PS3 and Switch, it makes the games so much more playable, games are sharper and nicer looking without me having to pump up the sharpness on my TV
I meant to put a question mark on the end, it works as a sarcasm too, the Mcable is an amazing piece of hardware though, it's given me a new appreciation for console gaming, I always felt the need to turn up the sharpness on my TV for consoles just to get any definition, but with the Mcable rather than making the image overly bright with sharpness I can play games with nice smoothing that adds definition, I can't recommend the Mcable enough, don't get the big Mcable though, I got a small Mcable and hooked it up to an HDMI extender and HDMI switcher box
Let's hope we will see more of this type of technology, for now it's expensive because there no other product that offers the same thing, there is no competition.
It's nice though and it's a beginning, I hope one day we will be able to improve image quality and reduce GPU usage using a cable. Maybe we will see something in the future some combo display port for G-sync and Freesync.
test this on 360 ps3 and wii please!
GeneralMyke74 Wii doesn't have HDMI so this cable won't work.
You can take Component 480p and send it in 480p HDMI with a converter, so you can work with it, and the Wii U has HDMI with the ability to output 480p via HDMI (Wii Native Resolution) so Yeah it's very possible to test this.
Wow what a difference it made to my vita games on my PSTV!! Godly!! The ones I bought - Marseille mCables- are 4feet and not expensive at all from amazon!
Yea. $120 for AA on Minecraft
I was hoping to see John tackle this one, but Tom still did a good job.
I’m getting this for Wii U
Did you?
@@sladey21 Not the person you responded to but god damn is it a great combo with the Wii U.
@@mynam3isnathan really, is it a vast improvement or just some nice smoothing?
@@sladey21 Sorry in advance for the long response. ;)
In certain situations it can look noticeably smoothed over because that implementation of anti aliasing can have a certain stylized aesthetic to it. Almost like the oil paint filter in older versions of Photoshop to a degree. Which isn't bad, but it's not transparent if that makes any sense.
Overall though, oh man. I love it. It's PERFECT for Wii U titles in 720p. So very similar to the Switch recommendation in this video. But I find the Wii U's sweet spot for most things falls into 720p more than the Switch. For PS3 it's also fantastic. Basically any consoles that likes 720p for a majority of the games library. Hardware backwards compatible PS3's combined with the mCable and smoothing on the console itself can give you pretty insane results for PS2 games. You can also balance out how much each part of the chain is processing the signal by turning smoothing on and off on the PS3, or outputting different resolutions into the mCable. It's just incredibly useful. And depending on the complexity of your setup in terms of switching, routing, etc. it can be equally versatile.
OG Xbox into a scaler, Wii U GC injects, it all works pretty well. The only things I don't like are the mandatory stretching of 4:3 480p content to widescreen, and the fact that changing input resolution will sometimes cause the mCable to drop the signal until you reset it.
Really happy to answer any other questions or give specific subjective opinions on various configurations!
@@mynam3isnathan nice, thank you it's useful information, I've been considering laying out for one but didn't know if it is worth the money. How about switch games set to 720p? Any standouts
Hi @digital foundry, thanks for this video, it would be amazing if you can show us how mCable works on last gen console , especially on ps3 as some game had poor anti aliasing, we would like to see games like uncharted 2 &3 , God of war 3, mgs4 , killzone 2 & 3, and last of us. And also how it works on PS vita TV too !
And thankyou for such great work ! You guys are One of the best gaming RUclips channel
For $120 I'll just stick with aliasing.
You know how many High Speed 4K cables you can buy for $120... And what's even more disappointing is the 1080p limit, smh
Looks better than SMAA to my eye, a lot sharper.
Probably because SMAA is AA-free. SMAA is the sharper AA-free algorithm , and not overshadowed (no weird black halo). It looks generally far better, because with mcable theres less aliasing, but some artefacts remain.
The mCable does not work with the updated version of the PSVR headset. It has been confirmed to work on the original version. Also when connecting the cable, it is not supposed to be connected into the back of the breakout box. Instead it is supposed to be connected to the HDMI our signal going to the headset. You need a male to male adapter to get the desired effect. The reason for this is the the chip at the end of the cable needs a direct handshake with a monitor of some kind and the breakout box interrupts this handshake.
Has Tom been hitting the gym? Looks a bit bigger
Nice catch! Digital Foundry is full of cuties.
Guilherme Eduardo Carvalho Yeah! Wichard is my Favourite!
Yeah, he's looking a lot healthier for sure
He’s on a steroid created by Sega called “blast bulking.”
That one swole boi
this kind of noise minimisation affects projector a lot especially those from the early days without a sturdy internal chip for image enhancement. it is recommended to give these cables a try especially if you care about the picture quality and you have one of the really good projector from the early days but just lacking some powerful processing features for the images like the sony X1 Pro. I have no idea how well it will work on a projector yet but certainly will try it later with my new second hand projector later after it is fixed form the repair shop and finding my way to buy this cable as it is unavailable in my region at the moment.
Sounds like it's the official PlatinumGames HDMI cable, haha.
It does work with psvr and works well. you can not have the screen size set to large or the image will not show in headset. I use it with my PS4 pro almost every day makes the games sharper and look much nicer in vr.
what about the colours?you didin't test that
If you buy directly from the company you could get a special discount, especially if you buy more than one, I bought one and was offered a second one half off, both are 3ft cables
$120-$150 for just a slight AA..
I don't know about people who want to buy this Cable (even rich shouldn't pay for this)
But I think my HDMI 2.0 is more then enough ($5)
With $120-$150 you can buy like 3 new games.. or 10 games with discounts
Still, not justifying $120 for old PS3/ 360..etc
A new PS3 costs $150 in my country, slab it with extra $120 for minor AA is ridiculous
Just pay $299-$250 for a PS4 and you will get better results with higher native resolution
If it was like $30-$50 I would consider it, but $120-$150 is extremely costly compare to results
If you bought one of these 6 months ago when the rest of the internet reviewed them, you could get one in the UK for £30 on amazon. Now they are proven to work the price has jumped massively but they do drop to the sale price periodically, you can get them cheaper if you shop around.
It just blurs the whole picture slightly, I don't think that it looks better.
Mr Fathead all types of AA blurs the image in one way or another
120 $ SMAA*
except rendering at a higher resolution then downsampling
MSAA, SSAA and Downsampling don't blur image, contrarily they sharpen and cleanses the image.
It looks smoother as a result sometimes, which can be misconstrued as blur. And RUclips compression isn't helping much in this showcase
The other main problem with this is that it can't be turned on and off manually, and that it isn't suited non-gaming content : they make a separate cable for that. As impressive as the technology is, at that price point it would have to do much more than one non-configurable filter.
Lots of folk use for psvr and with good results so don't understand your tiny analysis other than ignoring vr yet again
VR VINCAT BEANSELGAME
Yeah thats what i have heard too
Dont understand why he says it dosent work
Alex The GameCat it does work. It needs power to it first before switching on I believe
Yes, i can confirm this. Strange or just sloppy how they ignored PSVR since that and Switch is probably where you'll gain most of the cable.
yep I commented I use it every day on psvr. it will not display an image in your headset if you have screen size on large.
The difference is so minor that simply adjusting the sharpness setting, or switching off game mode on some TV's will improve the image just as much
That cable looks THICC
I've been watching this cable for some time and with my setup it honestly wouldn't be bad. I have all of my consoles running through a receiver, so making the mCable be the cable that goes between the tv and receiver would be optimal, no need for another cable or constant swapping. If I ever catch the cable in some sort of deal (eBay 20% off etc) I'll probably pick one up.
$120 uhh no thanks I think I’ll keep to my basic $20 cable😬
DK Baller ill stick to my free cable!
I wait for yous make this video all my life. love digital foundry
yea on pc it is useless you better invest that money in a better GPU instead
This cable does offer improvements to PSVR. Digital Foundry did not hook it up correctly. Directions can be googled.
How do you see the input lag, what is the device name?
I believe it's a Leo Bodnar lag tester
Thank you ^^
Noticed the old Onlive Microco sole in the background...RIP Onlive
I would consider this for my PS3 oldies if it wasnt so overpriced
I've heard that it actually performs BETTER in 480/720p scenarios. Would make sense, the lower the resolution, the more to gain from PP anti-aliasing like this. On that same note, expecting something in 4K seems silly to me.
$20 HDMI cable is good enough for me. Im not spending more than that.
$20 hdmi cable? You're overpaying by a factor of 4x.
Webbie because to me it does make a bit different from $5 cable to $15-$20 cable. I have a base ps4 on 1080p tv and my $15 cable give it a bit better color and more brightness then the cable that came with the ps4. Not all my HDMI cable are all $20 but from $15-$20.
This is cool and all, but why on earth did they put it only on HDMI? Pop that thing in a displayport as well.
It probably works with a hdmi to displayport converter right ?
I dont see a difference. No joke.
Yeah same here, the fins on the rocket don't change at all?
Its not something that translates well to a youtube video.
lol excuses we all know its over priced and literally doesnt work IM ALL FOR HARDWARE SMOOTHING OPTERMIZING AND THINK ALL CONSOLES SHOULD HAVE IT when its better and works have it built in
RUclips compresses everything to hell, so it's not all that easy to see, but if you look for jaggeds when the image is in motion you can see a difference - it's somewhat subtle in most cases, but again that has more to do with RUclips softening and compressing everything.
@@victwenty2324 We all know it literally doesn't work? Odd considering all the reputable review outlets, which have bashed the fake, super-expensive rip-off cables in the past (Monster cables, etc), have reviewed it and said it does work, and even show it, like in this video. Of course you have to know what AA does, and have reference for what the image would look like without RUclips compression muddying the results (which it does)...
Wow, it's pretty expensive but the latency is really insignificant. I believe it is an ASIC running hardware processing and this should explain the high cost. Did you get to test in older games of PS2 and PS3 for example, especially those who do not use anti aliasing like Demons souls?
This cable is most certainly not worth the price. Especially if the only console that really benefits from it is the Switch where half the time most people play it in handheld mode. $150.00 that’s ridiculous.
Gabbiadini my comment refers to the consoles mentioned in the video. Until I see the cable used with retro consoles, I’m not dropping $150 on an HDMI cable. I can guarantee it costs a small fraction of that to produce in a Chinese factory somewhere.
That's nice and all but how come neither you nor Linus Tech Tips mention the added artificial sharpening coming from the mCable? Besides that: Great work as always!
Using an invisible hammer?
franscartoons Underrated comment
Will you guys be checking out the mClassic soon?
So they slapped Reshade into a cable and fed it to the console peasants for a hefty price tag... How laughable sad. You can do this for free on the PC lmfao.
Marseille have said that there is a 4K gaming version of this cable coming - I've got one of these and quite like it so will definitely be getting the 4k model too.
mCable? $120? More like scamCable.
I definitely want to see this thing get improvement in the future