Connecting a DVD player to an old television
Niamh’s television is old. Old enough, in fact, that it doesn’t have SCART or S-Video or composite inputs. Just an RF aerial and a weird little 5-pin DIN socket, whatever that is. I wanted to connect a DVD to it. Now, I know that I could go out and buy a SCART-to-RF modulator, because I did buy one last time I connected a DVD player to that TV; however, it was thirty quid, and I don’t have the one I bought any more (I loaned it to my mother-in-law, who has lost it). So I thought: I’ll google to find out what the little DIN socket is, to see if I can connect it up that way.
On the front page of hits for old hitachi television 5-pin is a post I made explaining how I connected it up with a SCART-to-RF modulator last time. And in that post is a link to Dave Farquhar writing about the same problem wherein he says: connect the DVD player to a VCR, connect the VCR to your telly. So I’ve just done that and it worked perfectly.
I often use the internet for help on stuff. It’s not all that often that the help I get is from my own damned website.
So did you actually figure out what the 5-pin DIN socket was for?
I had a TV with one of those connectors on the front; it was actually an audio out socket.
7 hours later
Ah, the power of the interweb
9 hours later
I also have an old portable (Amiga 500 era) with exceptionally good picture quality, but no scart socket. I use exactly the same technique to wire a dvd player, xbox and other consoles into it: an expensive VCR which is only ever used for this purpose (I would have gotten a cheaper one, but the Royal Mail were buying having destroyed my last one.)
11 hours later
Xiven: nope. NFI what it is or what it’s for :)
12 hours later
Sil: Could be wrong, but don’t 5 pin DINs hark back to Amiga era attempts at S-Video? i.e. where chrominance and luminance are passed separately.
23 hours later
Gary: blimey, I don’t know :) I am woefully short of knowledge on this. Clearly since it works with the VCR I am never going to bother finding out about the DIN socket anyway…
25 hours later
I suspect that it probably is an S-VIDEO (aka SVHS IIRC) socket – they were popular on video cameras too.
I had the same issue when wanting to buy a combi-DVD/VHS player for my mothers 60th birthday, but was able to find one that was able to run through RF only, which was cool – £80 from John Lewis……
45 hours later
mrben: even I am not dim enough to not be able to recognise an S-Video socket. :) It’s a full-size DIN socket, like the ones that AT keyboards used to use to connect to the computer before someone came up with PS/2 sockets.
46 hours later
Dear Sil
I havr read your “connecting a DVD player to an old TV but it is as clear as mud. Could you explain in idots guide please.
Regards Jayne
51 weeks later
Gooday,
I have a old Sanyo TV which just has a video-in socket. I tried to connect my dvd player(video-out) with the TV(video-in) through a video chord but it doesnt seem to work. I have 3 frequencies on the TV: VH, VL and U. I tried to tune in the movie on all three freqs but nothing happens. Anything I should or shouldnt do?
Thanks for your time guys.
76 weeks later
i have a ferguson videostar recorder without a scart socket and want to connenect to a tv with a scart socket, what will i need for this
76 weeks later
Cheers for all the advice, im gona try connecting it all up right now
82 weeks later
If you check out ebay-uk there are people offering these devices for sale (not auction) for 15 -20 pounds sterling (website does not display pound sign).
Search for “rf modulator”.
Presumably they are available in other countries.
99 weeks later
Well here’s a puzzler for you.
I have a set up as decribed at the top of this page:
TV with old fashion arial input only
DVD Player with only Scart output and a Sky Plus Box.
A VCR with 2 Scart Input lines and RF output yto the telly.
Sky Pklus works fine, but the dvd player keeps coming and going to a blank screen, same when I try a playstation instead. Even when I use the same scart leads and sockets that work fine for the skyplus signal, the problem is always there for dvd/playstation.
101 weeks later
i have a old tv to. have no idea how to connect my dvd to my vcr to get it to play on the tv. pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeee help.
103 weeks later
Hey people, thanks for the advice, just upgraded to a media centre so wanted to make use of the old DVD player and freeview box. Managed to connect them up to the old TV with no Scart as follows:
Aerial into the freeview box
Scart from the freeview box (or DVD player) into a VCR
Aerial cable from the VCR into the TV
Once you’ve done that, tune the VCR into it’s AV channel and tune the TV up to the VCR. You are now viewing freeview of DVD’s on your TV :-)
108 weeks later