Classic Macintosh Video Signals Demystified, Designing a Mac-to-VGA Adapter with LM1881

In the late 1980s When Apple released its first Macintosh models supporting external color monitors, the company made some design choices that continue to cause trouble even today. Computers like the Macintosh IIci supported 640 x 480 video resolution, the same resolution as the VGA standard that was common in the PC world, but they used a different physical connector for the monitor cable, a different vertical refresh rate, and a different method of encoding sync information. It’s those sync differences that have proven to be most problematic over the years. Let’s look at what all is required to use my Macintosh IIci with a modern LCD monitor. Grab some coffee and get comfortable, because this will be a long one.

 
Monitor Connector Comparison

The classic Macintosh video connector is a DB-15, with two rows of pins. The correct name for this is actually DA-15, but nearly everybody calls it DB-15 and we’ll follow that convention. The VGA connector is a DE-15 with three rows of pins. This is sometimes called HD-15 owing to its “high density” arrangement of pins. Despite the physical differences, the video signals on the two connectors are mostly the same: (pinout data from sfiera)
 

This difference in physical connectors is fairly easy to solve with an adapter. During the 1990s and 2000s you could find a Mac-to-VGA adapter at any computer store. Today they’re more rare, but still available from surplus electronic suppliers or eBay.

 
Signals and Sync

A very brief primer on video signal formats: A video signal is composed of a series of lines, organized into frames. The lines are output from the video hardware one by one, at a fixed rate, and the timing of each line is indicated with an HSYNC pulse from the video hardware. After all the lines in a frame have been output, there’s a VSYNC pulse before the start of the next frame. The monitor needs these sync pulses to keep its display operating in lockstep with the video signal.

The 640 x 480 VGA standard uses 60 frames per second – its vertical refresh rate is 60 Hz. But Apple chose a 67 Hz refresh rate for its 640 x 480 video format (actually 66.666666…), which could be argued is slightly better than 60 Hz because the higher rate results in reduced flickering on CRTs. The difference is negligible, however, and the 67 Hz rate only serves to complicate things. Fortunately most modern moderns support a fairly wide range of vertical refresh rates, where a range like 50-75 Hz is common. This means that the 67 Hz refresh rate usually isn’t a problem. If you know of a counter-example, please tell me.

What about those sync signals? In the VGA standard, HSYNC and VSYNC are provided as separate input signals on VGA pins 13 and 14. It’s nice and simple, end of story. But in the classic Macintosh video world, sync is… complicated. There’s a fair amount of misunderstanding and myth about this topic floating around the web, so I’m here to explain the truth. From the table above we can see that the Mac has outputs for HSYNC and VSYNC, but also for CSYNC composite sync (HSYNC xor VSYNC). Many people have also heard about sync on green, where composite sync is mixed directly into the green video channel. So what exactly is the Mac video sync standard? Does it output separate HSYNC and VSYNC, or CSYNC, or sync on green?

The answer is yes, the Mac generates all of those sync standards at different times, depending on what type of monitor it thinks is connected. But it doesn’t generate all of them all of the time. The video hardware checks the voltages on the connector’s three sense pins, which form a 3-bit monitor ID for the connected monitor type. If it’s a supported monitor type, the video hardware configures itself for an appropriate output signal and sync method. If it’s not a supported monitor type, the video hardware shuts off and outputs nothing.

Here’s a page from a Macintosh IIsi hardware developer note. The IIsi’s video hardware is nearly identical to my IIci:

We can see that four different types of monitors are supported, but two of them share the same monitor ID and signal format. For a 15 inch portrait monitor, the Mac outputs separate HSYNC and VSYNC signals exactly like VGA requires, but at the mostly-useless portrait resolution of 640 x 870. For the 13 inch RGB monitor standard that we’re interested in, with 640 x 480 resolution, HSYNC and VSYNC are stuck high and the sync information is provided via CSYNC.

What about sync on green? Although it’s not mentioned anywhere in the developer note, the Mac also outputs sync on green any time it outputs composite sync. It outputs both CSYNC and sync on green. In fact, it also outputs sync on red and sync on blue too – all three color channels have embedded sync information when composite sync is used. This was recently proven conclusively with a video hardware schematic analysis followed by a series of tests by dougg3 (Doug Brown), who kindly gave me permission to reproduce his oscilloscope captures here.

Doug hotwired his IIci’s monitor connector, grounding pin 4 (sense 0) to produce the monitor ID for 640 x 480 RGB. He made this scope capture showing the Mac’s CSYNC output (yellow trace) and red video signal (cyan trace). On CSYNC you can see the shorter HSYNC pulses and the longer VSYNC pulse combined with the HSYNC pulses during it. On the red channel, you can see some red video data on the left, with the sync info clearly also present in the lower voltage range.

Looking at the green channel also showed the same thing – embedded composite sync in the green video data. Doug then looked at the VSYNC output (cyan trace):

Nothing. VSYNC was just a constant high voltage. Nothing to see here. This confirms the information from the developer note: when CSYNC is output, VSYNC and HSYNC are turned off.

 
DIP Switch VGA Adapters

Now we know enough to begin peeking inside the common Mac to VGA adapters, with their confusing arrays of DIP switches, to understand how they work. If you’ve been around classic Macintosh computers for a while, you’ve surely seen many variations of these:

Obviously they are physical adapters from DB-15 to HD-15, but what do all those DIP switches do? For nearly all such adapters, the guts are simply a passive switch matrix, controlling how the Mac pins are connected to the VGA pins. There’s no signal processing of any kind. The DIP switches typically perform two functions:

Monitor ID – Configure how the sense pins are connected to ground, or to each other, to set the desired monitor ID. This tells the Mac what kind of video signal to generate.

Sync mapping – VGA VSYNC can optionally be connected to Mac VSYNC. VGA HSYNC can be connected to Mac HSYNC or Mac CSYNC.

They’re pretty simple devices. Maybe you’re wondering why you’d ever want to connect the Mac’s CSYNC to the VGA monitor’s HSYNC. Many newer monitors are able to accept composite sync as an alternative to HSYNC and VSYNC, and if they have that capability, they will normally expect CSYNC on their HSYNC input. Providing a DIP switch mapping for this will enable the Mac to work directly with such monitors.

Note that there are no DIP switch settings related to sync on green. If the monitor supports sync on green, it will use the sync info in the green video channel with no extra configuration needed. If the monitor doesn’t support sync on green, too bad.

 
The Sad Tale of One Macintosh IIci, Four Monitors, and No Joy

Are you still awake? With all of this background exposition finished, we’re finally ready to tell the story that inspired this whole investigation. It’s the story of my Macintosh IIci, four different monitors, a host of different Mac-to-VGA adapters, and a lot of frustration leading to eventual understanding and the design of a new video adapter.

For several years I’ve been using my Macintosh IIci with the Griffin Mac PnP adapter pictured above and a Dell 2001FP LCD monitor, and it’s worked great. This particular monitor also has a composite video input that works with Apple II and other classic computer hardware, so it’s an excellent tool for computer collectors. As to exactly how the Mac IIci video worked with this monitor, I never gave it any thought. I just plugged it in and got a picture.

A couple of weeks ago I went on a shopping spree and purchased a ViewSonic VG900b 19-inch LCD, a Viewsonic 6 TX-14H30 14-inch CRT, and an E-Machines ColorPage T16 II 1108DT16MR 16-inch CRT. These are all multisync displays, with a max resolution of 1024 x 768 on the CRTs and 1280 x 1024 on the LCD. But when I connected them to my Mac IIci with the Griffin adapter, I got no picture from any of them. I tried zillions of DIP switch settings, I tried different adapters, but nothing helped. All three of these fussy monitors simply refused to show any image from my IIci. They behaved as if nothing were connected.

Now that we understand the video signals and the inner workings of the DIP switch adapters, we can see the likely reason that nothing worked. In 640 x 480 mode the Mac IIci outputs composite sync and sync on green. My 2001FP must support one or both of those sync standards, but the new monitors probably don’t support them. In the case of the VG900b this was confirmed in the hardware specifications listed in its manual, where it lists support for “H/V Separated (TTL)” video sync. Other Viewsonic LCDs from the same era specifically mention composite sync and sync on green in their specifications, so this isn’t likely just an accidental omission from the documentation. I haven’t been able to find detailed specifications for the two CRT monitors, but I’m guessing it’s the same issue. These monitors require separate HSYNC and VSYNC signals, and won’t support any other sync format.

 
LM1881 to the Rescue

What do you do when your computer outputs composite sync, but your monitor requires separate HSYNC and VSYNC? Say hello to the Texas Instruments LM1881 Video Sync Separator.

This chip is designed to extract composite sync from composite video, a video standard in which composite sync is mixed with RGB color data. In our case the composite sync is already separated from the color data and doesn’t need to be extracted, but the LM1881 has another feature we can take advantage of: synthesis of a separate VSYNC signal from the composite sync input. Unfortunately the LM1881 doesn’t have a complementary HSYNC output. There are other rarer and more expensive chips that can extract both HSYNC and VSYNC, but I haven’t investigated these.

Fortunately for us, I’ve learned that many (most?) monitors will accept CSYNC as a substitute for HSYNC, so long as a separate VSYNC signal is also provided. So all we really need is VSYNC, and the LM1881 can do the job.

Armed with this information, I set out to build a Mac to VGA adapter with an integrated LM1881 that would enable my Macintosh IIci to work on those three fussy monitors. I would use the LM1881 to extract VSYNC from CSYNC, passing the VSYNC to the VGA monitor, and I would pass CSYNC to HSYNC with my fingers crossed.

I began with a DB-15 breakout. I connected up all the grounds, and grounded pin 4 (sense 0) to request Mac 13 inch 640 x 480 mode. I plugged the breakout into my Macintosh IIci, and connected a logic analyzer to all three sync outputs. CSYNC showed the expected composite sync with a period of 15 ms (66.67 Hz), while HSYNC and VSYNC remained high.

Next I soldered some wires to an LM1881 breakout PCB. The LM1881 requires a 5V supply, which isn’t present on the monitor connector, so I stole 5V from the floppy disk port. Later I intend to try self-powering the LM1881 using the (otherwise unused) VSYNC and HSYNC signals as a power source.

Examining the LM1881 composite sync output, I saw that the output followed the input as expected.

But zooming in, the signals were not quite the same. The LM1881 output lagged the CSYNC input by about 100ns, and included a very short low pulse before going high and low again, for each pulse on the CSYNC input. This might have been an artifact of using a logic analyzer to view the signal, rather than an analog oscilloscope.

Then I soldered another wire to LM1881 pin 3, the synthesized VSYNC output. It worked! But the extracted VSYNC lagged the input VSYNC by a whole line, and extended several lines past the end of the input VSYNC. This was unexpected, but I believe the exact timing and duration of the VSYNC signal isn’t critical, so long as the refresh frequency is correct.

So far, so good. I finished the adapter by adding an HD-15 breakout. I connected the LM1881’s VSYNC output to VGA VSYNC, and LM1881 CSYNC output to VGA HSYNC. Remember, this second connection isn’t really correct – CSYNC is not HSYNC – but we’re relying on the premise that monitors will accept CSYNC on their HSYNC input as long as they also have a separate VSYNC signal. Thanks to the LM1881, we now had that missing VSYNC signal.

Here’s the finished adapter, including the floppy port adapter for stealing 5V: it really is a big mess o’ wires, and something so ugly that only a mother could love it.

I’ve mentioned that I have one monitor that’s worked with my IIci’s built-in video all along: the Dell 2001FP. And three monitors that do not work, no matter what settings I have tried on the VGA adapters: the Viewsonic VG900b LCD, Viewsonic 6 CRT, and E-Machines CRT.

As a sanity check, I tried the Dell first:

It still worked, but the video quality was lousy: there was all kinds of shimmering and noise in the image. Maybe it was a result of my messy nest of wires snaking everywhere? At least there was a usable image.

Next I tried the Viewsonic VG900b LCD. This was the real test, since this monitor had refused to sync with my IIci video before. Would it work now?

Whomp whomp, so sorry. There was no love from the VG900b, which still complained there was no video signal and then went to sleep. That was disappointing. Maybe the VG900b doesn’t like CSYNC as HSYNC substitute, or maybe it’s confused by the CSYNC that’s also still present on the RGB channels.

OK, how about this Viewsonic 6 CRT? It never worked with the IIci video before, but how about now?

Success, it worked! The image quality was pretty good too. There was still a little bit of shimmer, but much less than with the Dell 2001FP. I’m not sure why there was such a difference, maybe something about digital versus analog video circuitry?

The final test was the E-Machines 16 inch CRT. This was the third member of the fussy trio that had refused to work with my IIci built-in video before:

Huzzah! It also worked (minus some image centering). The image quality was similar to the Viewsonic CRT: some shimmer, but not too bad.

 
Design of a New Mac-to-VGA Adapter

That’s a score of 2 out of 3 for this Mac-LM1881 adapter. I think that’s useful enough to deserve being made into a proper PCB kit, for other classic Macintosh computer owners who’ve faced the same monitor challenges. Since it’s such a simple circuit, I’ll probably share the whole PCB design for anybody who wants to make their own, and also stock a few in the BMOW store for anybody that wants a pre-built adapater.

To assist with troubleshooting, I’d also like to include some LEDs in the adapter to show which of the Mac sync outputs have activity, and maybe also which of the RGB outputs have activity. I haven’t quite figured out how to do this. The RGB outputs are only 0.7V, and may have negative voltage swings if sync on green is used. The sync outputs are standard TTL levels with 0 to 5V swing. I’ve been brainstorming how to build an “activity detector” circuit to turn on an LED without involving a microcontroller. Maybe something with a flip-flop where the sync signal is used as the clock input, and there’s an RC circuit with appropriate time constant connected to the flip-flop’s asynchronous clear. If you have any great ideas for this, please share them.

Some questions about the LM1881 remain. I belatedly read the chip’s data sheet only after I’d finished my experimentation, and realized that I may be using it incorrectly, and that many of the similar circuits seen on the web are using it incorrectly. Referring to the canonical LM1881 circuit diagram shown above:

1. Why didn’t the Viewsonic VG900b work with the LM1881 sync signals? Is there something simple I could do to fix it?
2. The datasheet says the recommended input voltage on pin 2 is 1.5V and the absolute max is 3V, but I’m feeding it a 5V sync signal from the Mac.
3. A different RC filtering scheme on input pin 2 may be needed – the 0.1 uF blocking capacitor is just an example. “Typical Applications” in the datasheet shows an alternative design with an RC lowpass filter on pin 2.
4. The value of the R-set resistor may need to be adjusted, depending on video timing. The default value of 680 kOhm may be inappropriate for this.
5. The LM1881 output pins can only source a few mA of current, but if I’m putting 5V into a 75 ohm terminated monitor input, won’t that be 67 mA? Do I need to buffer these signals? 67 mA is a pretty large amount of current, and more than even most buffers can provide. Perhaps I’ve misunderstood this. Do I also need a 75 ohm resistor at the source? Does 75 ohm termination even apply to the sync signals, or is that only for the RGB signals?

The investigation continues. More updates soon, I hope!