Bartop monitor (vertical, horizontal, 15, 17, 19...etc widescreen??)

[maximebeauvais]

Hey,

Over the next month, I will start the building of a bartop mame.

After searching, I could not really find the answer. I know it is a personal preference but....

1) What is the norm to have 15, 17, 19, 21...etc monitor
2) Widescreen or normal
3) Should I install the monitor vertical or horizontal (if I go widescreen)

thanks a lot for your reply.

[HaRuMaN]

A lot depends on what you plan on playing...

Widescreen makes sense if you are putting an Xbox 360 in it...
4:3 makes sense if you are playing the classics.

a 19" or 20.1" 4:3 looks good horizonatally, and you can still have a big enough picture for the vertical games.

[maximebeauvais]

A lot depends on what you plan on playing...

Widescreen makes sense if you are putting an Xbox 360 in it...
4:3 makes sense if you are playing the classics.

a 19" or 20.1" 4:3 looks good horizonatally, and you can still have a big enough picture for the vertical games.

wow, that's a fast answer !!!

no xbox...etc, only classic game 80' and a few 90'

So I guess that I will go with a 19'' 4:3 screen.

Again, thanks a lot

[JDFan]

Depends on the games you plan to play and the control panel you plan to use as well as what parts you plan to build with (ie. a 2 player 6 button layout for a CP will require a wider bartop design and thus a wider monitor than a single player 2 button layout for games like Pacman, Galaga, etc. -- and if using a PC you'll need room for the MOBO depending on if using ATX , MicroATX or other as well as the power supply, joystick depth, Button depth, etc.) So be sure to consider what parts and the CP layout you plan to use when designing the bartop.

I used a 15" 4:3 LCD monitor for my single player dual joystick ( I like Robotron, Smash TV, etc. so need the 2 8-way joysticks ) but only wanted single player. -- thus made the bartop 16 inches wide (interior dimension -17" if you count the width of the side panels) and almost ran into problems due to using a regular ATX MOBO and full size PSU (wound up having to cut a hole in the back panel to gain 1\2" more room to fit the PSU into the bartop - and the Buttons barely cleared the CPU fan\heatsink once installed in the CP) -- so measure how much room you need before cutting !!

[maximebeauvais]

My intention was to do a 1 joystick with 3 bottoms. Before, I had an arcade mame and I did use 2 joystick with 6 bottoms each and I was not using the player 2 and I only only using 3 button maximum liken in track and field, bank panic.

However, when I saw your configuration of the control panel with 2 joystick, a bell ring in my head. One of my favorite game (Karate Champ) use 2 joysticks. So thanks for showing me the picture !!!!

And yes, I will have to consider enough space for all the PC hardware.

Let's the fun begin 

[JDFan]

However, when I saw your configuration of the control panel with 2 joystick, a bell ring in my head. One of my favorite game (Karate Champ) use 2 joysticks. So thanks for showing me the picture !!!!

And yes, I will have to consider enough space for all the PC hardware.

Let's the fun begin 

Yeah - when I was planning the CP layout I remembered several games that used dual joysticks that I used to play (Robotron, Smash TV, Battlezone, Crazy Climber, Karate Champ, Snake Pit, Rescue, Krull) so decided to go with a single player dual joystick setup. THen I found a design I liked but it was a bit bigger than I wanted so downsized it to 75% of the original size and forgot to make sure it would have the needd space for everything inside after the resize and when I went to install everything almost thought I was going to have to start over when the PSU wouldn't fit !! (Luckily it was close enough so that making the cutout in the back panel and installing the aluminum channel made enough space to barely fit it - Figure it sits with the back to a wall most of the time so it works but would definitely plan better next time !)

Also used a cheap ZD encoder ( $11 Shipped from Hong Kong) that only has 16 inputs so the 2nd joystick and buttons 3-6 share inputs since they are never used at the same time which left the space for the 6 admin buttons !