Display buying advice required

[tumppii]

Hello all!

I have dreamed of my own arcade cabinet (my son also ) for a long time. Now I have been ordered raspberryJAMMA!

I have sourced almost everything around Ebay except display which I'm going to find from local used-things website. I have searched information but can't get exact answer what specifications display needs to have to work finely.

I'm going to use Bitcade tabletop arcade cabinet which says it can house 24" display.
Also later on I want to buy some cheap scanline generator to get things authentic!
For sound system I have bought arcade speakers and WM-333 stereo amplifier.
Does this suggest VGA connection? So no need for RGBS connection at monitor?

I want to play vertical and horizontal games so would this request 4:3 display or is something more modern ratio almost as good?

What resolutions I'm going to use if I just play arcade games(and some NES) made before let's say 1992? As being not professional I'm asking what resolution and picture ratio you suggest for previously given setup? What is most common resolution used in arcade games and which kind of modern displays can handle the resolutions required?

Thank you very much in advance for replying newbie!

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Finland

[dee2eR]

The best display for playing any of these older games is a low res CRT. The games were designed for these older monitors and will both look and play their best on CRT. Unfortunately CRT monitors are no longer made and are large and heavy and may not fit in any cab designed for an LCD (as they're a lot deeper than LCDs).

VGA scanline generators work OK but still don't look perfect/authentic, if you like the result they may be a good option for you.

If you are using a modern monitor the VGA (RGBHV) connection is the way to go. Using RaspberryJAMMA VGA can be sourced directly from the DAC, RGBS at the JAMMA edge won't be needed. You will need to also set the ARpiCADE software to run in high res mode.

I'd recommend you get a 4:3 ratio display, all older games were made for 4:3 and will look the least stretched in this format. If you cannot find a big enough 4:3 a 16:10 will be closer to the right aspect than 16:9. 16:9 is probably the most common these days but will look more horizontally stretched, some people are more bothered than others about this. Definitely avoid anything wider than 16:9, it will just look silly.

Most modern monitors will not display in the original game resolutions (that's why the software has a high res mode). The vast majority of older games ran low resolutions somewhere between 204 and 274 lines at refresh rates from just under 50 Hz to just over 60 Hz (actual refresh rate varies from game to game). Modern monitors use fixed pixels rather than lines and often also have fixed refresh rates.

Some people use a scaler board to run original game boards with modern monitors (the scaler makes the old signal work on the new monitor, often through line doubling). For emulation based setups like RPi you're better off outputting a high res signal directly than using an extra scaler stage in the video signal path.

Another thing to consider is a modern monitor will have more lag than a CRT (CRTs don't lag). Actual amount of lag will vary monitor to monitor, the lower the better.

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Quick response highly appreciated!

Searching used 4:3 display... I found some displays but they seem to be quite old so probably electrolytic capacitors need replacement after year or two.

I’m going to add bezel to acrylic plexiglass so could I go to wider screen and use full height and kill(crop) leftover pixels at sides?

Does that kind of mod(if possible) hinder me to see everything at attract-mode or if I use PI command prompt(or whatever this term) with usb keyboard.

My idea would be that after installed I don’t need to see cropped part of the screen behind bezel. So no need to remove acrylic plexiglass on any case.. just some blackened pixels left&right.

[dee2eR]

You could adjust the sides of the image in the way you describe using a RPi based system but not using most boards (unless the controls are built into the monitor, most gameboards won't have this option). RPi can bring the picture in (or out) at the sides to manually adjust for overscan on different monitors, it will work for everything including the command prompt.

[tumppii]

Thanks dee2er!

I ended buying two 4:3 screens at bargain price.

Just paid my duty for HSS shipment...

Now designing custom control panel with CAD for right hand joystick action as being sure +40 dog doesn’t learn new tricks (being originally c64 guy🤪). I’ll design custom 3D-printed button layout block to be able customize controls as ergonomic they can be later on...

Tuomas