Homebrew Wii U HDMI RGB Range

[pavachan]

Hello

The Wii U outputs limited RGB Range through HDMI.
Because my screen doesnt handle that well, I wanted to ask if there is some soft of homebrew or hack that forces the wii u to output at full range.

I tried looking for one, with no luck.

Thanks

 

[jeannotte]

Hello,

Try to see with ==> https://www.amazon.fr/Convertisseur-HDMI-1080p-adaptateur-sortie/dp/B008H2IEW4

 

[KiiWii]

Hello,

Try to see with ==> https://www.amazon.fr/Convertisseur-HDMI-1080p-adaptateur-sortie/dp/B008H2IEW4

Are you saying the range that comes out the multi AV socket can be converted to HDMI for better results, even though the Wii U has a native HDMI socket??

 

[jeannotte]

@ kiiwii


I simply said to try

 

[pavachan]

I see, thank you

 

[Trylk248]

Well according to this... It's basically 720p, but it ALSO SUPPORTS 1080p. So, watch out!

 

[Wantija]

Hello

The Wii U outputs limited RGB Range through HDMI.
Because my screen doesnt handle that well, I wanted to ask if there is some soft of homebrew or hack that forces the wii u to output at full range.

I tried looking for one, with no luck.

Thanks

There is none, only way to deal with it is turn on limited RGB range settings on your TV/monitor when you're playing on the Wii U.

 

[fenderjaguar]

It may also be called "HDMI black level" in your monitor or TV on screen display settings. If so, set it to low.

 

[GerbilSoft]

The RGB range option only applies to HDMI. YPbPr (component video) doesn't have this issue, so if you're getting a washed out image on HDMI because your display only supports Full Range, try YPbPr instead.

I'm still annoyed that Nintendo did not add a way to configure RGB range on Wii U, and it's likely they never will. It might be possible for some homebrew to enable Full Range on the HDMI encoder, but that would require reverse-engineering the GPU and/or HDMI registers.

(Technical note: HDMI "Limited Range" is a holdover from SDI's YCbCr encoding where the Y channel is limited to 16-235; other values are used as control codes. YPbPr, aka component video, is analog, so it doesn't have this problem.)

 

[Trylk248]

What cables do you wanna use? And also, is it your monitor/screen that doesn't support some features or is it the cable?

Answering these questions will allow us to determine what we can do from there.

 

[fenderjaguar]

The RGB range option only applies to HDMI. YPbPr (component video) doesn't have this issue, so if you're getting a washed out image on HDMI because your display only supports Full Range, try YPbPr instead.

I'm still annoyed that Nintendo did not add a way to configure RGB range on Wii U, and it's likely they never will. It might be possible for some homebrew to enable Full Range on the HDMI encoder, but that would require reverse-engineering the GPU and/or HDMI registers.

(Technical note: HDMI "Limited Range" is a holdover from SDI's YCbCr encoding where the Y channel is limited to 16-235; other values are used as control codes. YPbPr, aka component video, is analog, so it doesn't have this problem.)

I noticed that on my PC, before I started using MPC-HC, when I used to use VLC media player, it would default at this washed out colours. And I had to override it in nvidia control panel like this:

http://imgur.com/a/UcXFk

 

[Kaneco]

The Wii2HDMI Analog (Composite/Component) to Digital (HDMI) converter only properly takes in 480i/p resolution dimensions... and upscales them to 720p or 1080p resolutions.

You'll be wasting your money if you try using this dongle to get a Full RGB range, when the picture will still look blurry when outputting at 480p while it's upscaled to a higher resolution.

If you try to set the setting to 720p and pass it through the converter, the converter will only provide with a 'part' of the screen. The converter doesn't actually auto-detect the full picture signal, it just pretends all signals going through it are under the 480p resolution size & upscales it from there... hence only cropping a part of the signal that's bigger than 480p.

Also, tweaking the 'screen size' option won't help... because it won't let you tweak width & height to however way you like because it has strict 'aspect ratio' constraints enforced.

Don't bother, I have one of these & play tested it. Not worth it. Better wait for a hardmod &/or softmod option for your troubles.

 

[nastys]

The Wii2HDMI Analog (Composite/Component) to Digital (HDMI) converter only properly takes in 480i/p resolution dimensions... and upscales them to 720p or 1080p resolutions.

You'll be wasting your money if you try using this dongle to get a Full RGB range, when the picture will still look blurry when outputting at 480p while it's upscaled to a higher resolution.

If you try to set the setting to 720p and pass it through the converter, the converter will only provide with a 'part' of the screen. The converter doesn't actually auto-detect the full picture signal, it just pretends all signals going through it are under the 480p resolution size & upscales it from there... hence only cropping a part of the signal that's bigger than 480p.

Also, tweaking the 'screen size' option won't help... because it won't let you tweak width & height to however way you like because it has strict 'aspect ratio' constraints enforced.

Don't bother, I have one of these & play tested it. Not worth it. Better wait for a hardmod &/or softmod option for your troubles.

It depends on the converter.
http://www.gearbest.com/cables-connectors/pp_295555.html
I bought this one for my old Wii and at first I was a bit disappointed when I saw that it didn't do any upscaling despite saying "1080p" on it. Then I plugged it in my Wii U and I was surprised to see it does actually support native 1080p from the Wii U!

It's kind of a last resort, though, as the quality isn't the best anyway. I recommend getting component cables (original ones, if possible).

 

[huma_dawii]

Reviving old thread, is there nothing still i imagine.. :/

 

[NoobletCheese]

TL;DR Some rambling followed by a possible workaround.

Nintendo is very silly indeed for forcing RGB limited range output over HDMI — I can't stress this enough. Virtually nothing uses this oddball signal format, and many TV's will not display it correctly without some intervention by the user. I have read anecdotes of Wii U owners gaming for years without knowing the colours were wrong the whole time.

Ideally the HDMI signal should contain metadata to indicate whether the signal is full or limited range, and the TV should automatically interpret it the correct way. For some reason this isn't the case in practice — either Wii U isn't including the HDMI metadata or the TV is not obeying it. Or possibly an earlier HDMI spec didn't include such metadata for RGB signals.

Without such metadata, it seems that many TV's will see an RGB signal and think something like: "ah ha, the colour space is RGB, so it is probably a PC signal, and PC signals are typically full range, so I will use full range tone mapping", and you get incorrect tone mapping because Wii U isn't outputting full range. I would even bet that Wii U is rendering internally in full range and downconverting to limited range for HDMI output, wasting code values in the process — 36 steps of dynamic range.

I consider myself a video enthusiast, and even I had trouble with this as my TV's 'HDMI range / black level' control is mislabeled (reversed) and I couldn't be sure if the wrong setting was just artistic intent. Well it isn't! So if your TV has the 'HDMI range / black level' setting, select the one which produces the darker midtones with the more contrasty image, as that is the correct tone mapping per the artistic intent of the game developers.

If your TV doesn't have a 'HDMI range / black level' or equivalent control, what you might be able to do is correct it manually by lowering the TV's other black level control (typically called Brightness) using a test pattern until you can barely see the first few tones above black. Then increase the peak brightness control (typically called Contrast / Picture / Backlight / Panel Light / Cell Light / Luminance Level etc.) until the overall brightness is subjectively satisfactory. This should correct the black level and peak brightness, however the midtones may still be incorrect depending on the TV's implementation of the aforementioned controls. In this case you might be able to correct the midtones using the TV's Gamma control, if it has one. Then go back and recheck black level (Brightness control).