Focus

I have an RCA video out at the pulpit. When I fasten a TV to it, the picture seems to be okay, but when I connect a projector, the picture is noticeably out of focus. What's with that?

Try shrinking the picture down to the size of the TV. It may just be the larger picture shows the issue.

Another possibility is that the projector is doing a poor job of translating SD to its native resolution.

I wouldn't rule out a bad cable.

Does the projector have a switch to turn a Terminator on/off? Perhaps labeled as loop through? I haven't seen that in ages, but that doesn't mean it's not around.

Silly question: are you sure you're plugged into the input and not the out? It may work, but not well.

lajackson wrote:I have an RCA video out at the pulpit. When I fasten a TV to it, the picture seems to be okay, but when I connect a projector, the picture is noticeably out of focus. What's with that?

Yep, I've noticed the same thing. It very well could be our eyes getting spoiled to the crispness of HD that we've forgotten how "soft" a standard definition picture really is. One thing you can look for is a "sharpness" setting in the projector's menu.

russellhltn wrote:I wouldn't rule out a bad cable.

It's always the simple things. I ran the broadcast with the ever-faithful 15-pin VGA cable, then played around with the RCA plug afterward, griping to the PFR that the FM Group had just fixed it. (The problem was a loose connector in the A/V rack that had to be replaced.) When I checked it two weeks ago it worked just fine.

So afterward, switching cables, the projector worked just fine and the TV was out of focus. Sigh. I played with it and found that the actual RCA connector at the pulpit was loose enough inside that if the connecting cable moved a certain way it blurred, and another way it was crisp and clear. Gotta love technology.

Thank you for your insights. Any one of them could easily have been the problem.