Arcadevga alternatives

[Jox43w]

is their any alternatives to the arcade vga? id like to use a more powerfull card to play psx and dreamcast games and also some other pc games like house of the dead.

im not very techical so would like to avoid adcancemame if poss after something that can display a low resolution dosent nesseseraly have to be able to display all games at the correct res just low enough to still look good and it will be in media type pc  for under the tv here in the uk we have run rgb through scart so dont want to use svideo either

any ideas?

[S0L]

I guess it depends on what you want to connect it to (and how). If it's a LCD HD set, chances are you're likely to be fine, CRT is likely to be more tricky...!

There are a load of video cards now that offer other TV connections, i.e DVI, Component and HDMI - or even plain old VGA.

I don't think I've ever seen anything that does Scart though - that's a tricky one, you'd need to convert it somehow, which is doable I'd guess, but likely to need some prodding.

Have you tried S-Video? Whilst it won't be great for the desktop side of things, I've got a MAME box that connects to a bog standard telly through S-Video and it's not actually all that bad...

---
S0L
---

[Ninja-chicken]

Soft15Khz is a piece of software which will change the frequency for you.
It worked on my nVidia GeForce 8600GT...

[Jox43w]

here in the uk some people connect their arcagevga card to there tv as we have scart as standard the build there own custom cable vga-scart but the card has to output 15hz so it dont damage the tv

just looked at that soft15hz link and it looks impressive theres another program thats with it called quickres and omg i just change my desktop to  a real low res and played mame omg the diffrence is amazing!

with quick rez and this soft15hz whats the downsides compared to the arcadevga?

isit just you have to manuly select the resolution in quickres?

been as this will be a mamebox that wont be a problem for me at all, only thing is can you get soft15hz to boot at up 15hz so it wont damage my tv while its booting?

[mikefr]

I am using soft15Khz with an ATI X800XT video card on a 25k7195 arcade monitor.   So far I have not found a game that does not work.  The software works excellent for me.

I do run the video through a J-PAC which will allow me to see the bootup screen and it will prevent that accidental 31khz from getting to the monitor. 

[Luigi]

I once made a list of the tested graphics adapters for Ariane (Sailorsat, who wrote the Soft15kHz-tool)..

You can see it here : http://www.thludwig.de/arcade/Getestete_Grafikkarten_Soft15kHz.htm

Sorry, only in german

Ja = works
Nein = doesn't work
eingeschränkt = there are minor problems like resolutions that don't work with Quickres

Hope it helps

[Ninja-chicken]

I think the downside in soft15khz is the fact that it's only in windows and therefore boot screen won't display in 15kHz (small price to pay to be honest).

Personally I use ArcadeVGA just because I don't want the hassle

[Jox43w]

iv downloaded it not sure what my current card is but the program loads and i cant click or install anything, is this because its not compatible? card is

matrox d200 sd (pci)

is there something im doing wrong?

i was thinking of getting an nvidia 8800gt but im unsure if it will work, dose it work with intergrated graphics?

iv just noticed my card is in that link! but i when i try soft15khz i cant click anyof the options?

[Ninja-chicken]

iv downloaded it not sure what my current card is but the program loads and i cant click or install anything, is this because its not compatible? card is

matrox d200 sd (pci)

is there something im doing wrong?

i was thinking of getting an nvidia 8800gt but im unsure if it will work, dose it work with intergrated graphics?

iv just noticed my card is in that link! but i when i try soft15khz i cant click anyof the options?

try posting on the soft15khz topic

[Luigi]

I cannot find Matrox D200 on my list.......but did you install the Powerdesk software for your Matrox?? This is very important for Soft15kHz doesn't work with Windows internal drivers!!


Of course, until Soft15kHz is loaded the 31kHz signal goes to your monitor....you can avoid that by using a J-Pac which is also helpful for increasing the signal level to +5V......otherwise you might get a dark picture.

[Jox43w]

I cannot find Matrox D200 on my list.......but did you install the Powerdesk software for your Matrox?? This is very important for Soft15kHz doesn't work with Windows internal drivers!!


Of course, until Soft15kHz is loaded the 31kHz signal goes to your monitor....you can avoid that by using a J-Pac which is also helpful for increasing the signal level to +5V......otherwise you might get a dark picture.

hi i installed powerdesek and the program installed  haventt been able to test it on my scart tv need to build aaaa vga to scart cable now this will saave me a fair bit of money now i dont need the arcadevga thanks soo much!

one thing id like to ask is how will mame know how to seelect the resolutions from quick res?

[ahofle]

one thing id like to ask is how will mame know how to seelect the resolutions from quick res?

They're not quickres resolutions, they're Windows resolutions.  MAME looks through the available Windows resolutions and attempts to pick one that best matches the current game if you select 'auto' resolution. 

[Luigi]

There might be resolutions that don't work on your monitor and there's a way to erase them from Quickres so Mame (Windows) doesn't use them.....but I don't know how 

[BASS!]

There is no way that I know of to remove them from windows. The way that we do it is a tool like avres. You can choose what resolutions that you want to be displayed and it will go through each game and set the default resolution to the closest resolution available. I used it to block out all non Xx240 resolutions. http://www.ultimarc.com/avres.zip

[Lilwolf]

Soft15k is a great way to go... but you need a bit of fiddling..

like I removed all the interlaced modes myself... 

But if you find a game that doesn't work, you run that game on a command line with verbose set on (-verbose?) and it will show you all the video modes, and the one it picked... you remove that mode (easy with soft15k) and try again...

BTW, if your monitor can't handle vga resolution without damage.  Get a second video card (crappy pci video card or something) and have that as your primary video...  Then have your main as your secondary video card...  It wont turn on until after windows comes up...  Then you can also plug in a second monitor at any time and have one for configuration and one for the game... very nice way to remove the 'initial screen !@# up my monitor' problem.

[Ummon]

BTW, if your monitor can't handle vga resolution without damage.  Get a second video card (crappy pci video card or something) and have that as your primary video...  Then have your main as your secondary video card...  It wont turn on until after windows comes up...  Then you can also plug in a second monitor at any time and have one for configuration and one for the game... very nice way to remove the 'initial screen !@# up my monitor' problem.

I've been waiting on a load of cards, some of them PCI, to test this. Do they have to be working?