Killer Instinct cabinet monitor problems????

[teartray]

I am new to this hobby and have just aquired a Killer Instinct cabinet which I have hooked up a PC to, using a Jpac and ArcadeVGA card. I'm not sure what monitor it is.

There are a few problems that I am experiencing:

1. There are horizontal lines that appear at the top of the screen and they seem to be affected by the brightness of the screen. They appear more on brighter colours and the space between the lines sometimes increases, and the ammount of lines does too. I can make them disappear by adjusting the birghtness pot, but they will reappear for other games. To keep flipping the control panel to adjust the brightness on every game is annoying! I'm sure that this is something to do with the monitor itself as they are present when using the Killer Instinct Jamma Board.

2. There is a wave moving vertically through the sceen and is more prominent on the left side. I'm sure this has something to do with the connection from the PC to the cabinet as this problem doesnt happen when the Killer Instinct board is connected.
If i put the jumper on 'Test' on the the monitor control panel, it brings up the on screen grid and the vertical lines are wavy. If i use this test mode when using the Killer Instinct board, the vertical lines are still wavy but static, not moving. With the PC connected, the wave is in motion, which is very distracting when playing games. So I assume this has something to do with the Jpac or Arcade VGA card?? I have also noticed that this didnt happen when using the 640x480 resolution, but due to the interlacing, flickering did. This is why I switched to 640x288 resolution, which solved the flickering but revealed the waving picture.

3. I gather when starting The Killer Instinct ROM in Mame, that its native resolution is 320x240. However, if I try to set the resolution to this in Windows or Mame, the monitor will not accept it and it flickers dramatically as if it is receiving the wrong frequency. I have even tried 321x240 but this also doesn't work.

If anyone has any solutions to the problems I have described, please can you advise me. I would be very grateful indeed.

Thanks.

[SirPeale]

To help answer your questions, and fix your issues, please give this a read:

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=62016.0

[Malenko]

the lines, sounds like Vsync. my KI cab has a break out board for adjustments, tweak that. read the monitor faq thingie, and the best help is posting pix

[teartray]

Thanks for the replies guys.

This is the picture of what I think is my monitor chassis.



I still haven't solved any issues. The waving picture on the left handside is my main concern, it makes me feel quite dizzy! The only way I know how to get rid of it at the moment is to change the resolution but then it causes the picture to flicker which I find even more unbearable.

the lines, sounds like Vsync. my KI cab has a break out board for adjustments, tweak that. read the monitor faq thingie, and the best help is posting pix

The lines are still present, I have tweaked the screen adjustments which removes the lines for one game, but then they will appear on another game. The settings remain the same for each game, until I tweak them for another game. It is a pain having to tweak the settings for each game.

Does anybody have any suggestions please?

If further pictures are required, please tell me.

I live in UK.

Thanks

[grantspain]

thats a hantarex polo monitor,the lines at the top maybe flyback lines caused by the screen volts on the flyback being too high
as for your wobble the only way to prove that is feed a dedicated 15khz signal into the monitor

[Malenko]

I coulda sworn KI (and KI2) used 640x480  can you post pic of the screen itself showing the problems?

[teartray]

This is my Arcade cabinet.



The following pictures show the cabinet running Super Mario Allstars. You can see the horizontal lines at the top of the screen. These lines are always more prominent on brightly coloured backgrounds, such as the bright blue sky in Super Mario Allstars. The lines are present across all emulators and is also present when using the original Killer Instinct Jamma Board, so it is definitely a hardware issue. I can remove the lines almost entirely by adjusting the brightness, but the lines may be present on another game or even a different level of the same game where the background colour is different, and so requires further adjustment.





The problem with the rippling/wobbling screen is hard to capture on a still image, but the following picture shows the start screen for Super Mario and if you look at the left side of the Super Mario logo, you can see it is slightly skewed and is not parallel with the right side.

thats a hantarex polo monitor,the lines at the top maybe flyback lines caused by the screen volts on the flyback being too high
as for your wobble the only way to prove that is feed a dedicated 15khz signal into the monitor

I have tried the cabinet with the original Killer Instinct Jamma board and the horizontal lines are still present. Regarding the rippling on the left side of the screen, one thing to note when using the original Jamma board is that the ripple motion is not present, but the left side of the screen is still slightly skewed. This is easily identified when I bring up the on-screen test grid. When actually playing the original board, you don't notice the skewed image. This also applies when the pc is connected and I use a resolution other than 640X288, but as I have stated, this reveals flickering.

I still also don't understand why MAME states that the Killer Instinct resolution is 320X240, yet I cannot successfully set the PC to this resolution without extremely insane flickering?

Thanks guys

[Malenko]

what happens if you shrink the image just a bit vertical (V-SIZE) ?

Also, when the screen is flicker have you tried to adjust Vhold at all?

I had similar issues when I MAME'd a NeoGeo and had to get a Vsync "sweetspot" but I was using Soft15k and a VGA break out cable

[ericksonline]

Try to adjust the "Screen" adjustment pot. It isn't on the remote adjustment board. It will be located on the flyback transformer. You can see it on the pic of the monitor chassis that you posted.
If you look on the far right of the pic, look at the rectangular cutout in the L-shaped metalwork. There are two adjustment pots there (just to the left of the red wire). The bottom pot is likely the screen adjustment. Try to turn that down a hair. These adjustments are very sensitive.
Also, be careful while poking a screwdriver back there! You'll have to use a mirror to see the monitor while adjusting that pot.

[grantspain]

they don't look like flyback lines,i bet if you use the vertical size and bring the picture right down(like malenko suggested) then they start to go-seen this issue with leaky caps on the vertical frame ic circuit
on the polo that would be c139,142,144 and checking at TP31 you should have 25volts DC or very close

[teartray]

Thanks for the replies.

what happens if you shrink the image just a bit vertical (V-SIZE) ?

Also, when the screen is flicker have you tried to adjust Vhold at all?

I had similar issues when I MAME'd a NeoGeo and had to get a Vsync "sweetspot" but I was using Soft15k and a VGA break out cable

I have tried shrinking the image which does remove the lines but only when the image is too small. The contrast pot seems to effect the lines too, but this is because when adjusting the contrast, it also blows up the image when turning it up and shrinks it when turning it down. Is this normal?

I have tried adjusting V-Hold when using other screen resolutions to no avail, the flickering still persists. The only resolution I seem to be able to work with is 640 X 288 which is also the only resolution that the wavy picture occurs. So it is a trade off between flickering or a wavy picture on the left side of the screen!

Try to adjust the "Screen" adjustment pot. It isn't on the remote adjustment board. It will be located on the flyback transformer. You can see it on the pic of the monitor chassis that you posted.
If you look on the far right of the pic, look at the rectangular cutout in the L-shaped metalwork. There are two adjustment pots there (just to the left of the red wire). The bottom pot is likely the screen adjustment. Try to turn that down a hair. These adjustments are very sensitive.
Also, be careful while poking a screwdriver back there! You'll have to use a mirror to see the monitor while adjusting that pot.

Would this solve the wavy picture or the lines? Is it safe to do this while it is switched on. I have no experience with electrical stuff!!

they don't look like flyback lines,i bet if you use the vertical size and bring the picture right down(like malenko suggested) then they start to go-seen this issue with leaky caps on the vertical frame ic circuit
on the polo that would be c139,142,144 and checking at TP31 you should have 25volts DC or very close

I have no idea how to check the voltage etc? If it is leaky caps, is it an easy fix?


Another issue I must point out is when I'm in a game, when the game transitions from one screen to the next, say from the title screen to the character select screen, then to the gameplay, the previous screen will shrink before the next screen gets bigger as it comes on until it fills the screen. I think this has something to do with the contrast again as it seems to occur when the screens are fading in and out. I have just noticed that this happens dramatically on the title screen to 'Marvel Superheroes Vs Street Fighter'. The lightning in the background causes the screen to flicker dramatically, with the image getting bigger each time the lightning strikes. Up until now I thought this was supposed to happen on this game, but I have just checked it on a computer monitor and it doesn't happen. :/

[grantspain]

caps are easy to change if you know what you are doing

as for you contrast blooming issue that could be down to the video signal being too high

[teartray]

caps are easy to change if you know what you are doing

as for you contrast blooming issue that could be down to the video signal being too high

If the issue is being caused by the video signal being too high, how would I correct it?

[grantspain]

caps are easy to change if you know what you are doing

as for you contrast blooming issue that could be down to the video signal being too high

If the issue is being caused by the video signal being too high, how would I correct it?

you would need to put on resistors on each signal line-i am not sure that is the issue though but for the time and cost of doing this its well worth a go