Hantarex MTC900 & advance Mame

[tsjarlie]

Hi,

I'm new in this world & I want to make my own Mame cabinet.

I bought and old Arcade Cabinet (100

[b3atmania]

1. Can anyone give me a appropriate advmame.rx file, for use with the hantarex monitor, I think mine isn't that good and that's causing my bad picture.

You cannot use someone's advmame.rx file. The timings in this file are unique to the video card and monitor combination. Feeding your monitor sync signals outside its specification might damage it.

About the blurry picture (please post a picture)... Generally speaking blurring has more to do with monitor controls and calibration than AdvanceMAME settings.

[Ken Layton]

Hantarex monitors are well known for bad flyback transformers. The flyback generates the high voltage of approx. 20,000 volts for the picture and 4,000 volts for the focus voltage. If adjusting the focus control mounted on the flyback doesn't help then the flyback likely needs to be replaced. Be careful when working on monitors as the high voltages can be lethal!

[DaveJ-UK]

What are your advcfg settings?

I got my Hantarex 9000 working great with advMAME and a Matrox G200 with the following settings:

pclock "8-90"
vclock "15.62"
hclock "50"

The 900E also uses the same settings so I would be willing to bet yours is the same.

Are you wiring directly to the monitor or are you using a JAMMA finger board? Wiring a finger board is a piece of cake. I got video and sound working great (using a simple mono amp circuit for sound) but in the end opted for an ArcadeVGA and JPAC.

[tsjarlie2]

I tried to take some pictures, but they aren't good enough to show anything.

I've already managed to have a picture, which is centered on the screen, but it's very blurry, I can recognize hardly anything, I can't read a letter/number.
I'm wiring directly to the monitor.

Before I buy me a I-pac, I want to know for sure the monitor is working allright and I can use one of these videocards I have, otherwise I would by and I-pac and a ArcadeVGa card.
Any other reason why I should be using an arcadeVGA ?

About the flyback, any sources where I learn more about it ? Any other ways I can 'tune' the monitor ?

Or is it caused by the wrong settings in advmame.rc ?
I didn't try the settings by DaveJ-UK, I will try them tomorrow.
thx anyway for the help, went buying me some black paint to repaint the cabinet  

[tsjarlie]

Dave-J-UK can you list your full advmame.rc
(or mail it 2 me " karl.becue@bigfoot.com),

I think (haven't got time to try it cause I'm at work) this setup will work,  hopying my image getiting a little bit better

[b3atmania]

I tried to take some pictures, but they aren't good enough to show anything.

I've already managed to have a picture, which is centered on the screen, but it's very blurry, I can recognize hardly anything, I can't read a letter/number.

Are you sure you have a problem? If you are expecting text in DOS to be just as readable as with a SVGA PC monitor, well, it won't be.

Just fire up some games and see if the in-game text is readable.

[DaveJ-UK]

I phoned Hantarex to get those clock settings so i'm sure they're correct.

I got a perfect picture on my MTC9000 using a VGA -> JAMMA finger board as well as sound through the cabinet speaker using a little mono amp circuit. The keyboard hack looked like more effort than it was worth so I just bought a JPAC. I also bought an ArcadeVGA in the end since I understand higher end PCs and games run a lot better under Windows.

Text will not look any where near as good on a TV/Arcade monitor as it does on a SVGA PC monitor, but it should be legible. The BIOS screen and everything up til your in advmame will look like scrolling white lines.

What I did was set up advcfg on a PC monitor, apply the settings and then change to the arcade monitor. You shouldn't be able to damage your PC monitor using a scan rate too low for it.

Load a game and if that looks fine then you're good to go. If you have used the clock settings I gave (assuming your using an MTC9000) you should be able to get a good picture by tweaking the pots on the back of the monitor. Use the custom option in advcfg.

You need to configure advcfg yourself since the .rc file is specific to the monitor and video card.

Good luck.

[Popcorrin]

I am just curious.  What are you doing to prevent damaging the arcade monitor from the high scan rates while the computer boots up?

[tsjarlie]

to Popcorrin : I'm not doing any special things to prevent my arcade monitor, I just don't use windows.

to the rest, thx for trying to help me, I didn't have much time lately ...

today , I've got a more recent pc (Dell GXa, P II @ 266 Mhz with ATI 3D Rage Pro On board), I've tried different things, but I've managed to get a picture on the arcade monitor :
http://users.pandora.be/karl.becue/arcade/foto09.jpg
I did have to play with the pots on the back side of the monitor
Then I tried to play a game (pacman) : but the picture became very blurry : http://users.pandora.be/karl.becue/arcade/foto05.jpg
I have then tried with 1942, the picture was 'acceptable' on the opening screen, but when I started the game, it became again very blurry ...

Anyone who knows a solution to this ?
to DaveJ-UK, I'm not using a MTC9000 but a MTC900
I suppose this is somewhat an older model.

I have here a 'electronic contact spray', can I use this on the contacts of the monitor ? Don't I take a risk that it will explode ? I didn't dare to discharge it, and I'm always very carefully not to thouch anything ...

Could it be I need a capacitator kit ?

Ken, do you still think it's the flyback ? (what the hell is the flyback, and can I replace that by myself ?)

Thank you guys for helping me out, I've already got 6 replies ...

I also have some pictures of my arcade cabinet as I bought it :
http://users.pandora.be/karl.becue/arcade/arcade_front.JPG
http://users.pandora.be/karl.becue/arcade/arcade_back.JPG

[tsjarlie]

At least I got some result ....
I have put some electronic cleaner on most of the contacts, then I saw that the board on the back of the tube (I hope you understand me) wasn't sitting very good. I then start the PC, loaded arcadeos, put the arcade monitor on and moved a bit the board (is it called the flyback ?),
When I moved, the picture came a bit clearer in moments ...

So I shutted down the PC and the monitor, and I tried to get of the board on the back of the tube, I cleaned with electronic spray and putted it back in place, now my screen is much clearer and the letters much sharper.

Then I tried advmame, some games where acceptably sharp, others weren't, I mean, when I started the game the picture was fine, but within seconds it became blurry ...

Anyone a solution to this ? Do I have to replace some parts ?