
analogue.co 11 / 18V4.7 March 2019
Video Settings
Recommended Scaling Settings
If you are outputting your Super Nt to a 1080p or
4K native display, you should use the 5x vertical
scale to ll up as much of the screen as possible.
You should be able to see all essential information
in most games and should not need to adjust
the vertical position often. A 5x scale gives you
essentially a 256×216 unscaled resolution, so you
can use the horizontal and vertical positions to
adjust the graphics if any vital details are lost.
If you want perfectly square pixels, choose a
5x horizontal scale. If you want the “ideal” pixel
aspect ratio, choose the 8:7 option, preferably with
horizontal interpolation enabled. 8:7 is arguably
the intended aspect ratio for Nintendo games like
Super Metroid and Super Mario All-Stars, which
have circular objects which look like circles with
the 8:7. Not all developers took the 8:7 ideal aspect
ratio into consideration and circular objects in
games like Chrono Trigger and Mortal Kombat 2
may look a little squashed. In that case, you would
be better o choosing the 4:3 for 16:9 or the 6x
option.
The Super Nt works with the Super Game Boy
and Super Game Boy 2, which send the Game Boy’s
video output through to SNES PPU. The proper
pixel aspect ratio of the Game Boy, the pixels are
truly square, giving a 160×144 resolution image
slightly wider than tall. On original hardware and
a CRT, the image would be stretched somewhat
and this stretch will be seen with the Super Nt
unless you are using a 5x/5x horizontal/vertical
setting for 1080p, a 3x/3x for 720p and a 2x/2x
for 480p. Disable all interpolation for the sharpest
image.
Screen Size
In the simplied Screen Size setting, height settings
are given only for 1080p modes. Horizontal and
Vertical Interpolation is enabled.
Cropping
You can use the sliders to crop each edge of the
screen by up to 32 pixels.
Cropping on the SNES is less crucial than it was on
the NES. The NES always output 256×240 while the
vast majority of SNES games only output 256×224.
Most CRT displays in the SNES area could come
pretty close to displaying the full 256×224, but you
can use this option to try to replicate the cropping
characteristics of a particular CRT. Note that many
CRTs had curved bezels and tended to crop more
pixels at the corners of the bezel than in the middle.
Graphical glitches and junk tiles that could be seen
with cropped NES video will rarely be present in
SNES games. NES games also had oddly colored
tiles on the horizontal edges of some games, but
the SNES hardware is fast enough that glitches
are not present on the left and right edges of
the screen either.
Scalers
Several scalers are available if you wish to
apply them. “No scaler” uses nearest-neighbor
interpolation where the color of a pixel is repeated
horizontally and vertically as often as is necessary
to get to the desired scaled resolution. This results
in the sharpest, “pixel purist” graphics.
The HQ2x, HQ3x and HQ4x scalers interpolate a
pixel based on the surrounding pixels. The result
is generally a smoother image. The 2x, 3x and 4x
refer to blocks of pixels, and the larger the block,
the fewer colors will be used. Scale 2x and Scale 3x
use a somewhat dierent algorithm but produce a
similar result. X-Ray uses a simple algorithm to give
inverted black and white graphics.
Using scalers may shift the image slightly, alter the
colors considerably and will cause a little extra lag
due to the processing of the image required.
The Disable H and V Interpolation options are
useful with 8:7 and 4:3 for 16:9 or 16:10 modes with
no scaler. These modes subtly blend the edges
of pixels to make uneven nearest-neighbor scaled
pixels less noticeable.