Atomiswave is BRIGHT (plus warning to atomiswave shoppers)

dpful · Post by **dpful** » Thu Jan 01, 2009 3:09 pm

I've been juggling some games amongst cabs, and just discovered that the atomiswave system, which looks amazing on the two monitors I've ever used it with, looks INCREDIBLY BRIGHT on every other monitor I've got. I mean, totally overbright- almost a white screen (when monitor is set for other jamma stuff). I can't believe I've been lucky enough to never plug it into one of those cabs the whole time I've had it- seems like most of the bright monitors are a little older, too.

Two questions
1. does anyone know the reason for the diff between the atomiswave and other JAMMA? (or the diff between the monitors?)

2. does anyone know of a video mod that will bring the atomiswave back into the realm of sanity?

I've searched the net, and couldn't find anything about it, just light mention. I had no idea the atomiswave was such a wierd board! I've had jamma boards with varying contrasts and brightnesses, but never a board that arbitrarily put out a blazing white screen.

Do I have to keep a dedicated cab just for the atomiswave (it looks fine on any monitor after severe dialing in)?

Post by **Dave_K.** » Thu Jan 01, 2009 7:48 pm

Weird, I never noticed this before, yet I just plugged mine into an Astro City and noticed the same overly saturated colors. Could be because I've only played my AW at 31khz on a tri-sync monitor, and usually have to adjust the brightness anyway when switching beween 15/31khz.

Are you saying you are annoyed with adjusting the monitor controls every time you plug in the AW, or that you can't adjust the controls to display the AW adequately on at 15khz monitor?

D · Post by D » Thu Jan 01, 2009 9:27 pm

When I plugged my saturn 240p, ps 240p and dc 480i into my old woodie 15hz cab I got a very unbright image. So whenever I plugged these in I had to crank up the contrast.
So what could be the case is you had consoles plugged into your other cabs, which you probably didn't and probably have other jamma pcb's plugged in them. But that's the only thing I can think of. Hope I was of any help. Might want to ask this @ http://www.arcadeotaku.com

twalden · Post by **twalden** » Fri Jan 02, 2009 10:27 am

The Atomiswave looks like crap at 15k on my Impress cab. It's really bright and washed out. No amount of adjusting can make it look decent. The Naomi through a Capcom IO, which converts VGA to 15khz, looks great. I've read about other people complaing about the 15khz video quality of the Atomiswave over at the AW forums a while back. So it seems to be a known issue.

dpful · Post by **dpful** » Fri Jan 02, 2009 3:10 pm

Maybe they intended it to always run at 30k, then put in a 15k mode without working out the bugs.
It looks OK after adjustments, it's just obnoxious.

neorichieb1971 · Post by **neorichieb1971** » Fri Jan 02, 2009 6:32 pm

Does anyone have any idea of what adjustments need to be made?

dpful · Post by **dpful** » Sun Jan 04, 2009 2:15 am

To get it normal, I think it's a brightness reduction plus a contrast reduction-- I think I ended up with the R,G, and B, gains all the way down, with the brighness on the flyback way down.

I wish I knew more about monitors and video signals. Maybe there's asome resistors or capacitors you could just throw into an adapter. It would be totally worth it if you need to swap boards ever.