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PS1 PSX Undither v1.0

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alexfree

alexfree

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alexfree submitted a new resource:

PSX Undither - Generate GameShark Codes Or Patch CD Images To Turn Off Dithering

https://alex-free.github.io/psx-undither
https://github.com/alex-free/psx-undither

Dithering is a graphical effect that exploit the blur of a CRT set in combination with a composite signal in order to create transparency or texture related detail/color illusion effects. Most PS1 games were explicitly designed with the expected setup of a CRT TV using a composite signal (be that S-Video or standard AV RCA cables) in mind.

Without a CRT TV dithering can make some games...
Click to expand...

Read more about this resource...
 
Cool! :smile: Anyone know if this works on original hardware?
If I make a backup copy of one of my games, patch it (drag and drop the .BIN file?),
then burn the modified .BIN file to a blank CD,
it will eliminate the ugly cross hatching patterns?
I think that's dithering, or possibly some of it could be analog cable interference.
I suppose I could check on an emulator.

Are there any downsides to this?
I'm guessing the dump RAM thing on the github page is a way to do this
undithering on an emulator without having to keep a modified duplicate of each game (thus saving space)?
 
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ps1cd said:
Cool! :smile: Anyone know if this works on original hardware?
If I make a backup copy of one of my games, patch it (drag and drop the .BIN file?),
then burn the modified .BIN file to a blank CD,
it will eliminate the ugly cross hatching patterns?
I think that's dithering, or possibly some of it could be analog cable interference.
I suppose I could check on an emulator.

Are there any downsides to this?
I'm guessing the dump RAM thing on the github page is a way to do this
undithering on an emulator without having to keep a modified duplicate of each game (thus saving space)?
Click to expand...

Sorry about the late reply...

Yes it works on real console hardware. I'd never make something that didn't, because that's like the whole point.

No downsides, except for games that use dithering as a 'feature'. Some look really, really bad without it. But the whole point of this patcher is 'user choice' of if you want it or not. TBH this is some of my best 'cd image patcher code' ever. I'm very much wanting to make this into a C library, which while I'm sure almost no one will use (because I'm the only person messing with this stuff this decade) it will be great as a reference and if the former changes (I feel like I don't have much left to contribute here but that is something else kinda personal) it would be very useful.

To be more clear, the dithering effect is much more noticable on 'late' model consoles. If you use like a SCPH-1000 and disable dithering on i.e. Ridge Racer Japan yes I swear you will see a diference, but you'll see more of a change on like a SCPH-5501 with that sweet upgraded SGRAM GPU. The GameShark feature is also applicable to real hardware. The idea with it is to allow real 'imports' or legit PSX CD users to enjoy the same thing as us pirates...

Enjoy yall.
 
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No matter the BS politics of if dither is good or bad (which i firmly stand on that fence for), this is the best, most advanced way to enable/disable it. And that was always the point... I'm not here to tell anyone to do it or not, just to give them the best tool to decide for themselves (and it was very fun to do so and 1up the competition)...
 
Try the Syphon Filter games, on glass & Gabe's outfits it gives a cross hatch grid & colour banding, probably the same on Tomb Raider games also, but now we have the PS4/5 remasters with HD textures & higher polygon models like GTA.
 
arcadekidflo said:
Can you give some examples of improvement, from your own testing ?
Click to expand...

There's a bunch of YouTube videos showing side by side comparisons. I can't do any real hardware screen captures to really do it justice at the moment. You can also use DuckStation's software renderer to see the changes (and I do have at least one picture with that on the webpage/github repo).

Actually, here's some good ones: https://www.chrismcovell.com/psxdither.html

And the pictures on the page is actually ok too in showing it via the DuckStation software renderer (Zoom in!):
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/alex-free/psx-undither/master/images/tekken-3-dither-on.png
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/alex-free/psx-undither/master/images/tekken-3-dither-off.png
 
Interesting. Would this have much effect when running the games on the emulators on a PSP or PS3?
I was thinking if it was something I should add to pop-fe.
I already patch games for various other reasons when generating the EBOOT/PKG anyway so this would just be another round of modifications done to the image during conversion.

Maybe I should just do it manually and see what impact it has.
What would be the best game to compare the difference with?
 
Ronnie Sahlberg said:
Interesting. Would this have much effect when running the games on the emulators on a PSP or PS3?
I was thinking if it was something I should add to pop-fe.
I already patch games for various other reasons when generating the EBOOT/PKG anyway so this would just be another round of modifications done to the image during conversion.

Maybe I should just do it manually and see what impact it has.
What would be the best game to compare the difference with?
Click to expand...

I'd go with games that use alot of visual splatter effects like fire, fog/smoke, blood, snow/water etc maybe Silent Hill.
 
Ronnie Sahlberg said:
I have embedded this nice tool in pop-fe now so you can activate psx-undither when packaging the games for psp or ps3.
It is in the master branch and in current scratch builds like:
https://github.com/sahlberg/pop-fe/actions/runs/19417367349

Thankyou alexfree for another great little utility!
Click to expand...

Thanks for integrating it! LibCrypt Patcher update is in the works next. Seeing my programs get used by a wider audience is always nice, C lang is alive and well!
 
Soon everyone will be able to use this method of non-hardcoded offsets patching, and much more in their own programs if there is any interest anyways. It is so hard not to reveal more about what I'm about to stealth drop
 
For Gran Turismo 1 (NTSC), I drag and dropped the bin file into psxund.exe but the output file "has not been modified, nothing patched!"
according to the CMD window. I even tried renaming the bin file so they have no spaces. It makes no difference.
Am I doing something wrong? :uncomfortableness:
Spider-Man (2000) (NTSC) worked fine but I don't notice much of a difference in ePSXe emulator compared to the stock bin file.
Maybe it's just one of those games where it didn't use dithering much. Or it's the emulator itself? :confused3:

For a specific game even if you don't notice any visual difference, could there be any slight performance advantage in removing dither?
Maybe I should do framerate tests in the emulator.

Also it would be great to have a table or list the community can contribute to, reporting their findings on which games are worth
applying undither to and which might look worse or no difference. Preferably with screenshots in case it's subjective.
This could save a lot of time, and helps recommend the best games to take advantage of the un-dithering.
 
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