Anyone running MAME on an arcade monitor?

Post by **Dave_K.** » Sun Jul 01, 2007 7:30 pm

Anyone here running MAME on an arcade monitor @ 15khz? If so, do you get Cave games like DDP to play at native 57.550645Hz refresh rate?

Battlesmurf · Post by **Battlesmurf** » Mon Jul 09, 2007 9:44 pm

I am curious about this as well. Dave- are you referring to the Ultimarc ArcadeVga card by chance? (I have a Neo Candy I want to flop a shuttle in with that card).

Post by **Dave_K.** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 12:04 am

I'm actually running an ATI 7500 (or there abouts) which can do 15khz output via some tweaked drivers. But I'm interested in the Ultimarc card as well. From what I've learned so far, even the ultimarc card does not support the native cave driver refresh rates.

destructor · Post by **destructor** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 9:57 am

Go to BYOAC forum if you want to help.

ReKleSS · Post by **ReKleSS** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 11:40 am

Dave_K. wrote:I'm actually running an ATI 7500 (or there abouts) which can do 15khz output via some tweaked drivers. But I'm interested in the Ultimarc card as well. From what I've learned so far, even the ultimarc card does not support the native cave driver refresh rates.

Using a TV rather than an arcade monitor, but my radeon 7500 mobility can create the cave video mode, or at least something very close to it.

Does anyone know what the significance of the 57.550645Hz refresh rate is? I can't find any nice numbers for horizontal refresh and vertical scan that give that number exactly.

Post by **Dave_K.** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 3:16 pm

destructor wrote:Go to BYOAC forum if you want to help.

I asked this on BYOAC a couple years ago (monitor forum), with no answers other than there is no such thing as perfect video emulation. I'd have to use one of the 60hz modes, and when I do that I get vertical tearing (the options to wait on refresh don't fix this for me). Even going into the game cheats to change the refresh to 60hz, still give slight tearing.

ReKleSS wrote: Using a TV rather than an arcade monitor, but my radeon 7500 mobility can create the cave video mode, or at least something very close to it.

Does anyone know what the significance of the 57.550645Hz refresh rate is? I can't find any nice numbers for horizontal refresh and vertical scan that give that number exactly.

The 57.550645Hz refresh is the actual game speed. Since no video card can get this accurate refresh means you can never emulate a cave game exactly. I'm not being anal here, I actually see a vertical line running through the picture indicating a mismatch between the emulation and video mode. I've never tried s-video, but don't really feel like trying to enable that input on my arcade monitor.

I was kinda hoping there was some advancement in video modes/cards over the last year, and was wondering if anyone here has seen these problems on a real arcade monitor too.

destructor · Post by **destructor** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 3:38 pm

Dave_K. wrote:
destructor wrote:Go to BYOAC forum if you want to help.
I asked this on BYOAC a couple years ago (monitor forum), with no answers

Ask in Main Forum, not Monitor.

Battlesmurf · Post by **Battlesmurf** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 7:51 pm

I know I, for one- am terribly interested in the outcome. I was under the impression that the ArcadeVGA card could do that. I was considering building a mame computer to tide myself over while I save up for some new pcbs.

elvis · Post by **elvis** » Wed Jul 11, 2007 12:03 am

The ArcadeVGA supports only the ten or so most popular modes out there in MAME land. The only way to generate perfect modes for all games is to use AdavnceMAME and the SVGALib drivers (either under DOS or Linux).

With that said, you can write your own modelines with PowerStrip and any card it supports (most ATI and Nvidia cards will happily spit out 15KHz modes). You can use PowerStrip to create extra modes for an ArcadeVGA that it would not normally use, including the 57.whatever vertical refresh rates of some Cave games.

BYOAC have a PowerStrip guide in their monitor section that's worth checking out.

For me personally, I can't stand Windows at all. I use Linux + SVGALIb + AdvanceMAME with an old GeForceMX200 video card to generate 15KHz modes, and it works quite well. A good guide to get you started is here:
http://easymamecab.mameworld.net/html/linux.htm

Post by **Dave_K.** » Wed Jul 11, 2007 3:12 am

elvis wrote: With that said, you can write your own modelines with PowerStrip and any card it supports (most ATI and Nvidia cards will happily spit out 15KHz modes). You can use PowerStrip to create extra modes for an ArcadeVGA that it would not normally use, including the 57.whatever vertical refresh rates of some Cave games.

Maybe I wasn't using powerstrip correctly, but I could not get it to go down that many decimal points for the cave refresh rate, which again yielded vertical tearing. Maybe I wasn't using it correctly? I'll try checking out that guide.

I also tried the AdvanceCD (live linux cd), customizing the advmame.rc file, but could not seem to get it into 15khz mode.

ReKleSS · Post by **ReKleSS** » Wed Jul 11, 2007 9:13 am

The 57.550645Hz refresh is the actual game speed.

It's the game speed, but there has to be some other significance to it - it's the relationship between the pixel clock, scan width and scan height. I want to know what numbers went in to get that. The nearest I can get is 57.550645Hz * 274 lines = 15768.87673Hz.... it's about right, but it's still a weird number.

To avoid tearing make sure vsync is on. I usually do vsync on, frameskip off, throttle off. This means the game speed is only limited by the display refresh rate, i.e. the video mode.

elvis · Post by **elvis** » Wed Jul 11, 2007 10:40 pm

Dave_K. wrote:Maybe I wasn't using powerstrip correctly, but I could not get it to go down that many decimal points for the cave refresh rate, which again yielded vertical tearing. Maybe I wasn't using it correctly? I'll try checking out that guide.

As mentioned, you need to feed it the right pixel clock, front porch, active video, blanking lines, etc. The vertical refresh is the last thing that is worked out by the input numbers.

Read this guide start to finish:
http://easymamecab.mameworld.net/html/monitor1.htm

In there is a modeline calculator which will explain how the numbers are derived.

Battlesmurf · Post by **Battlesmurf** » Fri Jul 13, 2007 9:29 am

and definetely keep us posted ; )

invzim · Post by **invzim** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 8:44 am

*shameless plug*, You might find this informative:
http://kirurg.org/emame/

Something I play with once in a while.