POUNDHDMI HD Link Cable - Compatible with PS1 and PS2 - HDMI Cable with RGB Display, 720p Resolution, Plus Micro USB Cable for Power

I don't generally write reviews - but had planned on doing so for this item if it lived up to half the hype it did when it was first being initially developed with engineering feedback on Reddit (very cool, down to earth communication and interaction with the retro gaming community from Pound) - to the generally to very positive reviews - there's always going to be a nitpicky outlier - but these cables are no joke.First off - it's a tight, quality fit into the back of the PS2 machine; very snug, and feels like a quality connector. Even the USB cable they include to power the converter ASIC/PCB in there feels Apple like. It's great. Not some cheap China special.The image quality - excellent. Absolutely superb. Very, very clean, and the jaggies almost seem somewhat reduced due to their completely understandable use of RGB and 240P only - to make it compatible with PS1 games, but the silver lining in regards to NOT being able to use 480P (I really don't care, it's 480P, it's a PS2 game, not going to look dramatically better regardless) - is a softer image with still extremely clean detail, but less glaring jaggies and THAT'S what ruins a game for me - a pixelated looking mess. Not the case with this cable.Now, compared to the cheap Chinese junk adapters and converters on here - this cable blows them away. Like someone else mentioned on here in a review; this cable out performs the KanexPro - that's a $100 adapter, and doesn't include the necessary S-Video cables for the PS2, nor an HDMI cable. Crazy. It's not built from the ground up for the PS2 like this Pound cable is.I'm stoked - I've always wanted a genuine PS2 HDMI cable, and this is it. The PS2 is - by far - my favorite piece of tech ever engineered and developed, besides the Macintosh computer.Finally - and this has to be mentioned - Pound's customer service, well, 'pounds' every other company I've ever dealt with. Excuse the pun - but they're incredible. WAY above and beyond what I'd consider even normal; I had a faulty cable initially shipped to me (fast shipping time btw) - and without a SECOND'S consideration, they immediately shipped me a new one with a simple message through their own website to them mentioning my issue. No need to send my bad cable back, either. I'm still in awe.That's the reason you choose companies like these, like Apple, like BOSE - customer service, and an awesome product.Well done Pound - you're my go-to for a quality retro-pro cable for an older system.

I tested this little fella against another converter to HDMI I had purchased, the KanexPro - which costs close to $100 if you bought an AV cable like I did. This product by pound, at only $30, produced a FAR SUPERIOR image that the KanexPro.I tested an Original PS1 with Silent Hill 1 - even just the menus and the game intro sequence are good enough to give you an idea of what the game will look like. Though, really any PS1 game should work.My first impression of this PS1 to HDMI (as that's how I used it) was fantastic: very simple to setup, very few things to deal with when installing this product. Although it did not come with a power adapter, I had a 5v 2amp one lying around. Hook that to the micro-usb cable to the unit, and the unit to the back of your PS1's video out, and using the HDMI cable included I got a nice 720p image to my Vizio flat screen. No issues whatsoever.The upscaling is done surprisingly well for such a small device, no lines or weird artifacts from the conversion to HDMI are present, and the image in-game still looked nice and sharp. I didn't notice much lag at all, just the terrible control scheme of SH1. And, there was little to no cable clutter - the most I had to do is tuck the HDMI cable a bit.To test the KanexPro, I removed this device and replaced this simple setup with the AV component cable, the KanexPro, and the HDMI to the TV. It was worse from the getgo, the Playstation splashscreen when the console boots was already distorted and awful looking - like the KanexPro upscaled using interlacing, but didn't de-interlace the final output before going to the TV. It looked terrible at 720p in comparison to the Pound cable, and even worse at 1080p. I immediately removed that setup, and went back to the Pound HD Link cable (what I dubbed the PS1-2-HDMI).I really enjoy this product. As a new PS1 owner myself, I wanted to get it setup in the simplest way for the modern era of TVs and HDMI signals, and this was the right way to go about it. An easy recommendation from me to any PS1 owner. I cannot speak of it for the PS2 however, keep that in mind.

This product is amazing, I dont know why they sell this for $30, when quality like this is usually double the price for most consoles. I previously used top quality component cables from HD retrovision ($30) into the retrotink (480p output, $100) and the quality was ok. Not great, motion was good but text was a bit blurry and images were very soft. The jump in quality to 720p with these cables is MASSIVE. Text is crisp, images are clear, and lag is not perceivable. It requires external power, but since its through USB you can just put it into one of the front USB ports and itll be on only when you want it to be.There are 2 drawbacks to an otherwise excellent product:1) The screen is stretched by default, and the ps2 settings dont help this. For me this is a non issue, since my TV can change the picture size to 4:3 and it looks perfect, but if your TV doesnt have this functionality it might be a dealbreaker. It is REALLY stretched.2) It only takes 240p/480i and outputs 720p. That's it. So the (few) games that natively play in 720p or 1080i via button commands will not look as good as they otherwise could have. I dont care cuz the upscaled 720p looks beautiful and I dont know what games this would even apply to, but if anyone is used to component at 1080i for certain games the downgrade may be a drawback for them.All in all, these are minor issues, and the upside here is amazing. I LOVE HD retrovision products, but I think pound wins the ps2 battle, and that's saying something.