Hi all,

I have a VAXstation 3100m38, with a VS40X 8-plane color graphics
board.  It's a nice old system to play around with, but unfortunately
I don't have a DEC fixed frequency monitor for it.  I do however have
several Sony Multiscan 15sf monitors -- it's not advertised much,
but these monitors do sync-on-green just fine.  They simply lack
BNC connectors to take real advantage of it.

So I've tried to make a VAXstation-to-VGA cable, using this pinout:

  VAXstation (pin #)                    Sony Multiscan 15sf (pin #)
  ------------------                    ---------------------------

                 9 ........ Red Hi ............ 1
                 10........ Green Hi .......... 2
                 11........ Blue Hi ........... 3
                 1 .........Red Return ........ 6
                 2 .........Green Return ...... 7
                 3 .........Blue Return ....... 8
                 Hood ...... Ground ........ Hood
  

I connect up the Sony monitor to the vaxstation, and... lo and
behold, it WORKS!  Almost....

Blue and Green/Sync work fine.  The text on the screen is stable and
clear with no ghosting.  But there's not _quite_ any red!  Every three
seconds or so, the screen pulses with a red tint all over, then the
red goes away.  It's not very bright, just a dim red background color,
like a flash.  Every three seconds.

If I disconnect the Red and Red Return lines, it goes away.  I have
tested for continuity and resistence, and the values are not different
than the other lines, so I have eliminated bad cabling as a problem,
as far as I can tell.

Is there something else going on with the red signal on the VAX end?
Is there some other sync signal going on I should take into account?
I don't have an osilliscope, so I can't really tell what's going on
at the signal level.

Does anyone have any ideas?  If so, please drop me a line, I'd greatly
appreciate it!  I'm soooooooo close, it would be great to use any
old Sony monitor on a VAX...

-Seth