John's Arcade Forum - Classic Arcade and Pinball Collecting and Restoring Discussion Forum - RETRO MAME - Nintendo Vs Forum

Arcade and Pinball Discussions => General Arcade and Video Game Discussions => Topic started by: OrioleFan on April 01, 2015, 12:03:06 pm



Title: CRT vs LCD
Post by: OrioleFan on April 01, 2015, 12:03:06 pm
CRT vs LCD when playing games from the 1980s and 1990s, which do you prefer?

For a MAME cabinet, is an LCD with MAME scanlines turned on give you the same effect/experience as a CRT?

Also, has anyone ever heard of this monitor: Weiya 29" CRT Arcade Monitor

It's a flat screen CRT being used in the X-Arcade. Is it any good or up to the quality of the Wells Gardners?

http://shop.xgaming.com/collections/arcade-machines/products/x-arcade-machine-cabinet-with-250-arcade-classics




Title: Re: CRT vs LCD
Post by: knaagi on April 01, 2015, 04:12:44 pm
Nice April Fools´ Day post :D


Title: Re: CRT vs LCD
Post by: iankellogg on April 02, 2015, 07:59:41 am
my experience with those monitors has been mixed. they look great but their reliability is no better than any other monitor i've seen so far. They are pretty difficult to fix, at least for me so far. Also the flat screen kindof kills the whole purpose. Its no better than an LCD.

For 1980's->1990s. Curved CRTs are the best way to go. IF you are going to do mame though. The LCD is not a bad option, the HSLS filters are really good and look pretty convincing.


Title: Re: CRT vs LCD
Post by: skykid on April 06, 2015, 12:12:31 am
For 1980's->1990s. Curved CRTs are the best way to go.

I agree, I think it adds a certain element of physicality to the display and it's also more authentic to the time, but I understand why people don't care about that either. I also think maybe I'm alone about the physicality thing, but feel free to agree with me.

Scanlines in no way replicate the look of an actual CRT. On my LCD I have filter turned off, "unevenstretch" disabled on MAME and all my games are set to "Pixel Aspect" under Video Options. I think this is the best option if using an LCD monitor, because it only stretches the image by a whole number of pixels eliminating any weird upscaling artifacts and it isn't at all blurry from the filter setting. The disadvantage is that the output from some games (like CPS games) aren't even close to 4:3, but at least you're correctly seeing the video as the game sees it.

Scanlines are useful if you're using a large computer monitor that's right up to your face, because the image then is gonna be too blocky to even comprehend. This is why: https://www.shadertoy.com/view/XsjSzR#

And if you're going through the trouble of converting to/building a MAME cabinet, don't go LCD if at all possible, you're only cheating yourself...  :)