Sunday 27 May 2007

SCART connection from DVD player to TV blanks the TV picture

The problem: when my cheap-n-cheerful 14" Philips portable TV was connected to my even-cheaper-n-just-as-cheerful Bush DVD player, the screen on the TV was completely blank when trying to watch ordinary TV. Sound came through OK, but no picture. Disconnecting the SCART cable or plugging out the DVD power cable cured the problem, so it was pretty apparent that the problem was something being sent up the SCART cable from the DVD player to the TV.

SCART pinout SCART pinout (female connector seen from the front). Image is taken from Wikipedia.




After a visit to Wikipedia (source of all wisdom) and a bit of poking around with a multimeter, I found a 2.5v signal from the DVD player to the TV on SCART pin 16, even when the DVD player was turned off. This should tell the TV to expect RGB (rather than composite video) from the DVD player but appears to have a negative side-effect. Snipping pin 16 in the SCART cable has cured the problem.

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