black and white monitors

[paigeoliver]

I have a pair of old black and white arcade games coming that are missing game boards.

These games are in MAME. So is there any chance I could get a computer to put out some video that those B&W monitors could take? So, I could replace the missing boardsets with old comps?

[tom61]

It really depends on the games.

Some use vector monitors (Omega Race, Asteriods, etc.), you'd need a special interface for these to hook to up to a PC, and a modified version of mame to control it.

Some use a monitor with composite video input(Pong clones, maybe Space Invaders), you could just hook it up to a video card's TV-out (you can get an adapter if your card only has S-Video).

A few even use a B&W TV set to channel 3 or 4 (mostly Pong clones). You'll need to hook up a VCR to it and the TV out of a video card to the VCR.

[paigeoliver]

These are not vectors, nor televisions. These use that standard 23" B&W arcade monitor that was used in just about everything back then.

They are an Amazing Maze and a Checkmate.

I am going to search high and low for working boards first. But if that doesn't pan out I would like to know I could get them going the other way.

I'm picking them up tommorrow. So I will know more then.

[StephenH]

A couple of theories:

1) If you could find an old hercules graphics card, maybe that would be able to output to a standard res B&W monitor.      It is possible that AdvanceMAME may be able to drive it (you might ask their devs), or possibly in low-res mode, after loading the old TSR SIMCGA (which allows CGA data to be sent to a Hercules Card).   I beleive Hercules graphics is 720x350 Res, at 1 bit per pixel.

2) Try seeing if a Scan Converter can output a Greyscale signal.    

3) If you can get an S-Video out from the computer, see if there is any converters available that can convert S-Video to Greyscale video.

[tom61]

These use that standard 23" B&W arcade monitor that was used in just about everything back then.

Standard! Funny! Anyway tell us or better yet take a picture of how the monitor connects to the board. If it's a single BNC connector, that'd be composite.

[paigeoliver]

Ok. I got the machines. They both have a single square connector with a bunch of wires in it. Exact same connector that my old Shark JAWS monitor used to have.

But, it turns out that one of the games DID have a complete boardset. So I am just going to get that going instead.  Both monitors seem to work.

The Amazing Maze was the best looking cabinet, and it was the one that had boards. So I am going to keep it. Looks like there won't be any MAME in its future.

The other cabinet (Checkmate), is available if anyone wants a bronze age MAME cab.