Path: utzoo!utgpu!cunews!bnrgate!bigsur!bnr-rsc!mwandel
From: mwandel@bnr-rsc.UUCP (Markus Wandel)
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: Re: NTSC->Composite
Message-ID: <4661@bnr-rsc.UUCP>
Date: 20 Jun 91 16:57:18 GMT
References: <OTHOMAS.91Jun18121556@e40-008-11.mit.edu>
Reply-To: mwandel@bnr-rsc.UUCP (Markus Wandel)
Organization: Bell-Northern Research, Ottawa, Canada
Lines: 25

In article <OTHOMAS.91Jun18121556@e40-008-11.mit.edu> othomas@athena.mit.edu (Oliver J. Thomas) writes:
>
>Hi.Does anyone have plans for an NTSC to composite converter? I would need
>something that takes coax VHF output from a Cable box and converts it to a
>composite video and audio signal. Sort of a VCR without the..well..VCR.
>Perhaps Radio Electronics ran something like this?
>

As someone already pointed out, you need a TV tuner.  The stuff that comes out
of the cable is not NTSC, but the "composite video" is.

The most convenient thing to do is to get a cable box with direct audio and
video outputs.  These seem to be present on most of the cable boxes with
volume controls on the remote, probably because to implement the volume 
control, sufficient decoding is necessary to make these signals available
for free.  Attach this to the monitor left over from your old 8-bit
40-column computer (C64/1702 monitor in my case) and get a GREAT TV!
Expect to pay about 1.5 times as much for a volume control cable box as for
one without a volume control.

Myself, I use a "VCR without the... well... VCR".  It's the tuner half of a
portable VCR/stationary tuner combo from before the camcorder days.  Got it 
the tuner half only) cheap in a surplus store.

Markus Wandel