More Act-Labs Lightgun / ArcadeVGA woes

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GamingGreg:
I'm still at my witt's end on this one. >:( I know the guns work, as I've hooked them up to my computer with a standard VGA monitor, and they worked without a hitch the first time.

However when hooked up to my ArcadeVGA and arcade monitor, they aren't working well. Usually after callibration, if I fire a shot, the cursor moves to the upper right hand corner of the screen. Also I noticed that in 640x480 the white callibration screen doesn't appear pure white. It seems to have a gradient in the horizontal axis (It goes from black to bright white by 1/4 way across the screen, and then from bright white to average white the rest of the way). In 640X240 it appears correctly with the entire screen showing average white, however the gun still doesn't work in this mode either.

I'm starting to think my monitor has some issues (It is after all nearly 25 years old). I'm starting to think of replacing my arcade monitor with a standard VGA monitor or TV. :'( Ugh!

StephenH:
Try running at a non-interlaced (Games Native Resolution). Additionally, amke sure the syncs are completly separated (no connection BEFORE or AFTER the gun decoder).

GamingGreg:
I think I've found the last item that's causing my problems. This time it appears to be the lexan (or plexiglass?) that sits between the monitor screen and the gun. After removing this for some testing, I was able to get the gun working in a mostly playable state. It's still not perfectly accurate, but a least the crosshair ends up within an inch of the sight after the trigger is pulled. However, accuracy gets worse when I put the lexan back on.

I'm not sure if my original issue was because the gun was not calibrated close enough to the screen (because of the gap between the lexan and the screen), or because of the many scratches on the surface of the lexan that are interfering somehow. Maybe both.

My cabinet is a conversion of an old Defender cabinet (which had already been badly converted a few times over before I got it), so that piece of 1/4" lexan has been used many years. You don't normally notice the scratches unless you look close.

Any ideas what I should do? Should I get a new piece of lexan or plexi? Should I just polish the lexan with that Novus plastic polish stuff? Should i get a piece of tempered glass instead? Smoked glass? Opinions please.

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