Arcade Monitor vs TV for MAME cabinet.

[euclidean]

Hi,
Just wondering if I could ask the opinion of the people that have been there and done that.

I am underway of planning my MAME cabinet, although I keep having this debate in my head.

I am in love the Sega Megalo 410 cabinets.  I love the Japanese arcade cabinets.  The 410 is becoming difficult to find (in Australia), and some people are telling me there worth around $2000 AUD while they are around $900 AUD in the U.S.

I would like a large monitor for my cabinet.  If I'm spending around $2000 for a Megalo 410 I could buy a 109cm Wide Screen Rear projection TV.  Thus the debate in my head of which way to go for a monitor in my cabinet.

Just wondering what people find as the pros and cons of using a TV vs an arcade monitor.  I will be playing mostly recent fighting games, and some old Nintendo games in MAME,  I will also be hooking my dreamcast up to the cabinet, and possibly in future another console.

I keep reading that arcade monitors support true 15kz and TV's don

[Teknique]

Basically came down to price for me and thats it.  If I I could simply not justify buying a $800. WG 27" monitor for a cab as well as special arcade card video to use it.   I decided instead to go with a $200.  27" Panasonic w/ SVideo- that is coincidentally also hooked up to cable and is used as the spare bedrooms TV.  

Saw some benchmarks on TVs vs. Arcade monitor quality and do not think I am really missing much by going with the less expensive but more versitile TV.

[b3atmania]

I keep reading that arcade monitors support true 15kz and TV's don

[StephenH]

TVs are cheaper, but the image quality will be lower than an arcade monitor, or PC Monitor, when used with Composite or S-Video.  S-Video and Component video will be better than Composite though.  

However, if you have a TV with SCART IN, you can use its SCART connector, as if it were a Standard-Res arcade monitor.  In fact, SCART actually turns it into an arcade monitor running native RGB.  

Real Standard Res arcade monitors (and SCART TVs), are low-res, but good for MAME, because most arcade games are standard res.  Arcade Monitors are more expensive, and may mount better in cabs than TVs, though.   Note: these both run at 15KHZ, and you will need to configure your video card to run at the lower scan rate, or use an ArcadeVGA card from Ultimarc.com as it is designed for Arcade Monitor / SCART TV use.


Multisync Arcade monitors (such as the Wells Gardner D9200), can display both PC games and MAME games at their native resolution, and can go up to 640x480 (and in some cases 800x600).   With these, an ArcadeVGA or Trident Blade card is recommended.  Additionally, you can also use AdvanceMAME to get the right resolution and refresh for each game.


PC CRT Monitors are cheap and readily available, but will not look authentic in MAME.  Due to their higher scan rates, you will need hardware stretch for many games.  The advantage to these are easy setup, full compatibility with non-emulation applications, and to be able to run windows at high resolutions for PC games, word processing, or other applications.  Also, Light guns work well with them.

PC LCD Monitors (Such as flat screens and laptop screens) have fixed resolution, which often results in running hardware stretch for almost every game.  Additionally, light guns do not work, either.  Additionally, these often have lower color fidelty.  The advantages to these are small space, and good for portability, too).

[Vampyre]

I went with a Fixed Res (Workstation) 20" CRT Monitor.
I got one cheap off a mate ($50aud).
It looks great and is big enough for my galaga cab.
Only issue is it doesnt display the bootup for windows (out of its resolution range).

It only does 1280x1024 but for the price im happy. I didnt use a tv because it just looks bad imo.

[Harry Potter]

Nice size but won't it be a bit of a slowdown having to stretch all the games to that resolution?

Good luck anyway

[Vampyre]

I'm running a 2500xp, 512mb ram on a VA-10 microatx board. It handles the load just fine. Everything Ive tried works great. whats a good one to test ?

[rchadd]

i've just got myself an 19" arcade monitor from ebay.co.uk for

[euclidean]

Thanks for the info guys.

I think im going to go with the arcade monitor.  There is a local in Australia who said we would hook up a Namco Exleena cabinet with a 29" monitor that does 15, 24, 31, and 41hz.  
I guess this would be able to run all most anything and future consoles.

The only thing I wanted was a larger monitor but I guess 29" will do.

He also said that he can hook the arcade monitor to a vga input which will make it pretty easy attaching it to my PC.

Thanks again.