NEED ADVICE on 27" Sony TV for Cabinet

[mr.Curmudgeon]

Hello,

Sorry if this is an inapproriate post for this forum, but I really prize this site for it's great user advice and I need some... quick.

I'm starting a Cabinet and I was probably going to go with a TV display. A guy down the street from me has a 27" Sony Trinition (Model: KV-27S66) for sale @ $100....is this a good TV for a cabinet and does that seem like a good price?


THANKS in advance!
mrC

[Sephroth57]

i dont know if youve checked out this page yet, http://oscarcontrols.com/monitors.shtml

but i always reccomend anything but a TV for a cabinet. as you can see from the comparison even with Svideo a TV still looks crappy compared to a PC monitor and of course a true arcade monitor cant be beat. plus to have Svideo on a TV means its probably expensive and for that money you can find a better solution.  i dont know what kind of budget youre on but if you go to a arcade auction or find on ebay a working arcade machine doesnt matter what it is, you can just take out the monitor and theres your authentic arcade monitor that would have cost 300+$ new. and you can do this for around 100$ sometimes less.

[mr.Curmudgeon]

Do arcade monitors do well with PC games?

I know, ultimately, a PC monitor is the best quality, but I want to go larger than 21" for MAME, since I can then play both Horiz/Vert games as large as possible (without rotating the display) and I may want to play Unreal, et. al. from time to time.

Btw, I'll look into that website. The reason I'm even considering the TV is that I'm not 100% sure that the cabinet will be purely dedicated to MAME...but I'm not even sure if that matters w/ an arcade monitor.

Plus $100 seems like a good deal for a 27" TV w/ S-Video....but I didn't want to jump before getting some advice here.

THANKS!

[mp2526]

Svideo on a TV means its probably expensive and for that money you can find a better solution.

With all the plasmas out there driving down the cost of TVs, S Video is not that all uncommon on even the cheapest of TVs these days.  If your going to go the TV route, which a lot of people do, a 27 " Sony Trinitron is probably not a bad deal if its in good shape.

[shmokes]

as you can see from the comparison even with Svideo a TV still looks crappy compared to a PC monitor and of course a true arcade monitor cant be beat.  

I disagree with most everything Sephroth said, but this, in particular struck me as odd.  To say that a TV looks crappy compared to a PC monitor in one breath and then to say that an arcade monitor looks better than a PC monitor in the next makes no sense.  The images produced by a TV are much closer to those of an arcade monitor than images produced on a PC monitor (because of a PC monitors super high resolution and little dot pitch).

Also there are many advantages to going the TV route over the others.  First, and probably foremost is price.  You can pick up a decent 27" TV with S-video for just a couple hundred bucks.  See what that kind of money will get you in the PC or arcade monitor marketplace...

In addition, with TV's you have the option of using dual guns with ACT-labs TV-out lightguns (their PC version only supports a single gun -- no two player).

TV's can double as, well, a TV if you have any interest in watching TV on your cab.  This is possible with a PC, of course, but you need an additional TV tuner card.

TV's can be interfaced, with no extra hardware required, with Gamecubes, PS2s, Xboxes, Dreamcasts, etc.

Certainly they have their downsides.  

Their cases (particularly ones with speakers built into the sides) make them difficult to fit into cabs.  It can be very dangerous to take a television out of it's case.  

Many TV's will not "remember" what input was being used last after they are unplugged, so it might turn on to channel 2 rather than S-video, or worse do an automatic scan of the dial to try to detect your station every time you shut off your cab and turn it back on.  

Many TV's will not automatically come back on after they lose power which is all but necessary if you want to have a single button or switch that turns on and off everything in your cab.  You will likely have to keep a remote handy, since the TV presumably will be covered up by a besel of some kind and likely glass as well.  It  doesn't feel very authentic to turn on your arcade cabinet's screen with a TV remote.

My particular TV has the smallest dimensions of any 27" (CRT) TV I have ever seen or heard of (and I did A LOT of searching).  The speakers are mounted on the bottom, and there is only about an inch of case on either side of the screen.  It also turns on automatically after power loss and remembers the last state (TV tuner, composite input, S-video input, or Compenent input).  Yes, that's right, it even has RGB component video inputs which will get you VERY close to arcade monitor territory in terms of your picture quality.  All this, brand new from Sears about ten months ago for $225, regular price.  It's a Toshiba 27A33 for anyone who's interested.  At just over $200 and with a slew of extra features I think this display gives even the coveted WG 9200 some decent competition.

[mr.Curmudgeon]

See!  It's just this sort of lively, informed debate that makes this forum such an internet treasure! Thanks all.

I think I'm going to grab the tube, if it works and it's sill available and go from there. If I don't like it, I imagine it can be offloaded on someone else just as quickly at such a cheap price.

Ultimately, I'd love to have a large arcade monitor, but I can never count on auctions, especially since I'm not very patient. I can always replace the display downthe road anyhow.

mrC

[Serpent]

If your TV has a SCART socket, then you have an authentic Arcade monitor. You can connect your ArcadeVGA directly to the SCART and have real separate RGB with the same quality as the best of Arcade monitors. So I agree with you that TVs suck for MAME, but NOT european TVs.

[Lilwolf]

I would take a SVid TV over a true svga monitor any day.

The better the quality of the monitor... the crappier it looks for arcade games.  

SVGA monitors loose color depth (no clue why... but they do).  They don't have scanlines so you add directx calls to drop performance to get them to look more authentic.

don't go composite.  Get a good svid card and your golden.  Great cheap solution.

Plus you can get a vcr working with it... xbox.,.. dreamcast.... ps2... ect... all working without any changes.

And if you ever find a good price for a true arcade monitor... you have yourself a good tv.

Great solution!

[mr.Curmudgeon]

And if you ever find a good price for a true arcade monitor... you have yourself a good tv.

Great solution!

...I ended up buying the TV today given this exact rationale.

One thing I've noticed though (since I've already hooked up a PC to it to test MAME), on both this 27" Trinitron and my 36" Wega in the living room, there tends to be some "bleeding" with the color Red. (ex: the Robotron attract demo)...I know it probably has something to do with acceptable NTSC "broadcast" color ranges. I can turn down the color and brightness settings and it clears up a bit, but it's still there.

My question now is, would a genuine arcade monitor be immune to this sort of "color bleeding"?

I've read through the monitor vs. TV site, but I haven't seen anything on color fidelity.

mrC