Best Monitor for RPi3 Arcade Machine?
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I ended up getting this for my arcade cabinet:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/aoc-23-lcd-monitor-glossy-black/8163044.p?id=1218864514315&skuId=8163044
Thanks for the tips !
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Dahh.. I tell yah.. this project keeps throwing wrenches at me. So the AOC i2269V is not going to work. My mounting board for the cabinet has 100x100mm VESA and this has 75x75mm VESA. I could do an adapter but my problem doesn't end there. This monitor has mid-rear ports for AC and video which absolutely do not have clearance against the mounting board. I needed it to have up and under ports.
So back to the hunt.. but I am wondering.. do any of you think 1ms will benefit on RetroPie? http://aoc-europe.com/en/products/g2260vwq6
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Lots of old school games were reflex driven games, so any reduction in response time would be welcome. The old CRTs had no lag at all.
I'm surprised you're using a mount at all. I plan to just custom mount mine with scrap wood!
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@GreenHawk84 Yeah, I see how a larger VESA mount would interfere with those ports. My 19" display has all of the ports pointing down, not out the back, so any rear plate mounting would be parallel to the cables, not perpendicular. I am surprised they designed it that way.
Of course, we can't see what you are building, but I agree with @Concat that custom mounting was the way to go for me. In fact, I unshelled my display completely from the plastic bezel and I have mine mounted around the perimeter, not from the back. If you like the display and already have it, why not simply use a 75mm mount?
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@caver01 I ended up returning it and got the G2260VWQ6. Its not an IPS panel like the other, which I really enjoyed as far as vibrancy, but the new monitor is faster (1ms, 75Hz). I have it all calibrated now and ready for the cabinet. I will be sure to post all sorts of pics of this thing when it is finished.
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Do you strip the monitor out of the panel before mounting in the cabinet?
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@Bilbo1161 We haven't seen any images from @GreenHawk84 of his project, at least not on this old thread. I stripped my monitor and mounted it as you describe. I have done that on at least 2 arcade systems over the years and I think it's truly the way to go. The displays typically have some kind of metal lip, bracket or something that holds it inside the plastic shell, so I have always just opened up the displays and worked with whatever I find.
The nice thing about taking the scree out of the shell is that you save space in the cabinet, you can leverage existing mounting points for a solid result. The downside is that you do need to consider the bezel in your cabinet design, as your monitor won't have one anymore. You also may need to relocate adjustment buttons etc. and by the time you are done figuring that out, it can be harder to put it back together again later if you decide you want your original monitor back again.
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Go to http://www.pcliquidations.com and get a nice 4:3 or 5:4 aspect 17 or 19" LCD. This site sells used but high quality displays which are slightly older. There is no reason to use a wide screen display for retro games. A good 19" 5:4 IPS display with under 5ms response time will look great and there will be no black bars.
Vector Artist, Designer and Maker of Stuff: Laser Cut Atari / Pixel Theme Bartop
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@Capeman Second that. I've used both PC Liquidations and Amazon for quality LCDs. For the latter, you can find some real gems in the underutilized "Used" listings. Picked up a NOS Dell 1908FP (19" 5:4 LCD) a few weeks ago for $45USD, shipped.
I'm using a hardware scanline generator on my end. It is not as close to the real thing as the shaders come, but it works well enough with a fixed resolution. Call me crazy, but I get almost as much a thrill in dropping to the command line and seeing scanlines, as I do in-game.
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@jmferris What type of hardware scan line generator are you using? Something still available?
In general, I generally just use old Dell flat screen computer monitors. Lucky me I have a nearly unlimited supply at work as hundreds of computers here at work get recycled here as people upgrade workstations that come with new monitors, the old, perfectly good ones just get thrown in the trash.
tl;dr any dell monitor that is right right size for the cab works perfectly and can be gotten super cheap from many sources.
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@Gosenbach I am using a readily available Focus Attack SCAN.DL VGA Scanline Generator. It is right around $20USD, and they shipped very fast. Very, very happy with it. Put a few pictures up on my blog (link in the signature, below). Have more captures that I need to put up today. Captures don't give it justice, though. Going to need to pull out the camera and take some real pictures.
Agreed on the Dells. Cheap, readily available, and they just work. I know that if I need to replace mine, I likely will be able to find the exact model in a condition that is acceptable.
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@Capeman just need to find something like that in the UK then 😀
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Can see plent of used Dell 19" monitors. But most have a response time of 5ms.
Are these any good, or does it need to be below 5ms? -
@Bilbo1161 For a lot of older monitors, between 3ms and 5ms is the normal response time. That is one advantage that a CRT will always have over an LCD, most likely. Some people say that 5ms is "intolerable", which I have never found to be the case, personally. Just taking it at face value, 5ms is 1/200th of a second. Unless biology has bred a new generation of superhumans, I think that is completely acceptable for this application.
You will see a lot of people using Dells for builds on the internet. They are inexpensively had and were pack-ins on a lot of computers in the time. That means that it is not uncommon to find one completely new in the box, like I recently did. Not sure if it is the same in the UK as it is over here in the colonies, but if you have electronics recycling programs, you can always check with them. Since those are destined to be destroyed, they usually do not have a problem giving them to someone who will extend its life. I have a friend in Washington state who checks his recycling center once per month, and has at least a dozen 4:3 and 5:4 monitors in his garage now.
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@Bilbo1161 Your games are probably going to be running a max of 60 fps anyway so that 5ms is going to get you several updates per frame. The difference between 5ms and faster will be un noticeable.
Unless you want to start an "analog vs digital" conversation lol :)
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@jmferris Oh that is awesome! Bookmarking that!
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I have a 19" LCD in my cab.
I actually have three spares too, because I don't believe anyone is making non-widescreen monitors any more. Every time I get the chance to grab a spare, I do so. -
I have a few 20" flat tube CRT TV's with component in and was planing to use a gert VGA to somehow get a signal to one of them in hopefully 240p for an arcade cabinet.
I also have some flat tube 20" crt tv's someone gave me with composite in.
figured i'd hold onto them just in case.
Kept declining free curved tube TV's because they only had composite & RF inputs.
kicking myself now because there is new firmware that will allow you to output 240p over composite.
I've tried it out and it looks good.
but, flat tube crt's have more of a grid mask opposed to the standard scanlines of an older curved CRT.
so now i'm thinking of all the curved one's i let go. -
@jamesbeat Same here. There are still some made, but a lot of them are touchscreen, seeing as they are meant to be used with POS systems. That makes them more expensive than this route. My problem is that I want to hoard monitors, despite not needing them right now. I'll just need to plan on building more. :-)
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@jmferris said in Best Monitor for RPi3 Arcade Machine?:
@jamesbeat Same here. There are still some made, but a lot of them are touchscreen, seeing as they are meant to be used with POS systems. That makes them more expensive than this route. My problem is that I want to hoard monitors, despite not needing them right now. I'll just need to plan on building more. :-)
Every time i goto a thrift store and find a 4:3 LCD i buy it. i've got anywhere from 15" to 20" square LCD monitors on a shelf in my basement. it's a big basement that i plan to turn into a gaming room so i'm going to also stock pile CRT TV's for classic consoles.
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