Consolized Atomiswave

kc

Belnar Institute Student
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Oct 13, 2002
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ok ok, so how would thing work? has anyone tried or even started a projects related to this?

the video part sould be easy, vga to s-video or componet, you can get stuff like that at frys or somethin

as for the sound and controls, is the jamma pins all the same, how many buttons does it requrie, also is there anything change in the power outline or the sound out line?
 

norton9478

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I think NGT has done one of these. or is working on one.
 

Decepticon

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norton9478 said:
I think NGT has done one of these. or is working on one.

I know someone did one but can't remember who.

Shouldn't be that difficult and if the price dropped I would be glad to try one out.
 

Amano Jacu

Charles Barkley
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VGA to s-video or component? Would the image look any good this way? I think it would be a waste of money anyway. Why not just use a PC monitor or a TV with VGA inputs? Although if I remember well NGT had some trouble using the VGA output on the Atomiswave.

What I mean is that it doesn't make sense to play hi-res games in a low-res TV.
 

Bishamon

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I really don't see much point in consolizing an AW.

It's such a nice, compact setup the way it is; all it needs is a power supply and controllers, which are supplied via my SuperNova, and the video is handled quite nicely by the VGA output.
 
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Amano Jacu said:
VGA to s-video or component? Would the image look any good this way? I think it would be a waste of money anyway. Why not just use a PC monitor or a TV with VGA inputs? Although if I remember well NGT had some trouble using the VGA output on the Atomiswave.

What I mean is that it doesn't make sense to play hi-res games in a low-res TV.
It would look just fine in Component on an HDTV.
 

NGT

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Well, I was working on this but I don't have enough money to do what I wanted to... or the right case .... so I put it on hold.

Things I ran into.....

I was told that it would need more amps then the sc200 could put out so I had to use the full-size power supply and I wanted it to be external...(so the super gun part wouldn't be too bulky. So I'm working on making that look half decent, while still keeping the power supply a close and connected through 18 gauge wires. Then I needed to make the vent and fan cooling system for that power supply...... blah blah blah :)

(I was just told the sc200 would not work, but I never tried it)

Next thing I ran into was the VGA signal being weak and not working through VGA on my television or any monitor and my house (3 of them).... as far as I know, the only people that have gotten it to work are using an LCD monitor because it has a built-in VGA amplifier on it.

There was where the money ran out, because LCD monitors are kind of expensive....

Why I had to put it on hold...... I needed good case....

The atomiswave looks so cool that I didn't want to cover the entire thing up and since I was making an extra power supply I wanted to make the body of the supergun flat and wide so I could put the atomiswave on top of it. I didn't want the harness to be sticking out, so I'm still looking for a flat wide enclosure that I can attach a very small harness size box that would stick up.

This way I could plug the atomiswave into the harness, not have the harness show at all, have the atomiswave's body show while being securely screwed down to the top or in the middle of the case, have the full-size power supply to carry enough amps for the system, have the VGA output still available...... and that would be a nice consolized system after I made the controller ports for five button games....

But, if money would permit it....... I would like to make a different case with a 17 inch LCD monitor as the top of the case that folds out and one that folds up... the nice exterior of the atomiswave would be shown...... this way... I just plug and play. Of course I could always leave the screen folded down and just use the plugs from the super gun part for either RCA out or as video out.

Right now... I really don't have the money to go on with any projects but that should change next month when I get paid again :)

In the end... there are so many things to think about.... and if I can get that single line and VGA signal amplifier at the end of this month... I will not be looking to do the LCD monitor thing because I want to hook it up to my 32 in. television that has VGA input. If this thing actually works when I shell out the 70 bucks to get it and try....... I will most likely go with the first option or find a better way to keep the atomiswave visible and still have a consolized and extremely nice looking....

If anybody wants to try this... I say go for it and I would love to see pictures. In the meantime...... I usually go out to different stores one or two times a week to look for a thing possible case.... but never really find anything that would be perfect... only things that would be ok...... and I'm really not want to settle when making something myself.

So good luck to whoever goes for it...... and if I end of being the first around here..... I'll definitely post pictures of all that good stuff, but it probably won't be until mid-February at the earliest as I don't get paid until the 10th and would have to wait for that amplifier to get here.
 

Amano Jacu

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galvatron said:
It would look just fine in Component on an HDTV.

Oh well, I'm not familiar at all with component because I think it is still not available here in Spain. So does it support hi-res, 30 khz video?

Anyway I guess I was right when I said s-video woulf suck for this.
 

Asure

Captain Dick,
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Sep 14, 2001
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644
vga amp here

$15

It boosts vga levels up to arcade-r/g/b standards. I have one built in on my j-pac, and the picture on my arcade monitor looks perfect. If i unhook it, the monitor is extremely dim / sometimes doesn't sync or gets no signal.

I still need to order a separate one for my dreamcast to jamma project. I'm thinking this might be just what you need to boost the atomiswave video for use on normal r/g/b tv's.

This is a standalone video amplifier which converts the 1 Volt output from a VGA card into 4 Volts required by most arcade monitors.


http://ultimarc.com/images/videoamphi.jpg
videoamp.jpg


Click for high res pic.
 

Nomax

Kula's Candy
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Consolized Atomiswave?

Well, it has already been done under the name: Dreamcast ;)

A cartridge reader plugged to a DC should make it as Atmiswave are just Katana PCB bought from Sega. Exactly the same as the one used as a motherboard for the Dreamcast. I imagine the chip that handle peripherals interface is different since it uses cartridges instead of GD-ROMs.
 

John_Smith

B. Jenet's Firstmate
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Jun 9, 2003
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Hi all! I’m just wondering about the horizontal line frequency on the Atomiswave. There’s all this talk of VGA and obviously 31KHz HLF but is it selectable from 15/24/31 KHz?

Also I'm familiar with the weaker RGB signal from things like some consoles when used on Arcade RGB monitors, but why does the Atomiswave output an inadequate signal being arcade hardware?

Cheers!;)
 

Reznor007

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Amano Jacu said:
Oh well, I'm not familiar at all with component because I think it is still not available here in Spain. So does it support hi-res, 30 khz video?

Anyway I guess I was right when I said s-video woulf suck for this.

Component supports 480i(15KHz), 480P(31KHz), 720P, and 1080i.
 

Yeti 0f Doom

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Jan 6, 2004
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Sorry, this is kind of off topic, but Atomiswave still does standard Jamma Video out too right? Becuase, I was kind of planning on getting one, and hooking it up to my standard JAMMA set up. (cabinet).
 

Zebra

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Hi

I have been working on a mame project recently and decided to use a 27" CRT tv instead of an arcade monitor (because it was free). Connecting something with vga output to S-video is not as straight forward as it sounds. There are loads of scan converters but most will output only 480i from whatever resolution is input. Finding one that doesn't change the resolution is more difficult.

I am using an arcade vga card to get 15khz. I just purchased a jrok encoder to convert the rgb output to s-video. The JROK device is by no means "plug in and play". It is designed to take power off a jamma pcb so I had to make my own PSU's (well repurpose one). It also requires a custom cable to connect a vga port. Nobody seems to sell these so I have to make my own. Ultimarc say that their cards output a negative sync which apparently means that the seperate horizontal and vertical sync wires from a vga cable can be joined together to give you the composite sync (without any issues). The rgb input on the jrok uses combined sync. So far, I have found that to be problematic. I get no picture when h and v sync are joined and a split image with only h-sync connected.

I am going to pick up one of the $25 rgb interfaces off ebay because some allow vga in and rgb with combined sync to be output. They also have other controls that may be needed to clean, boost and reduce the signal as is required by the monitor or tv.

I couldn't find many devices that do it all in a plug in and play way. The emotia scan converters can output a form of 240p from vga to S-video but arcade games come in a wider range of resolutions than that and those devices are becoming rare and expensive. The last one sold on ebay for $200.

Using an rgb interface to create a 240p output from other models of scan converter, only works if you have a monitor with rgb input. They don't output S-video so you would still need a jrok or equivalent.

Some people are happy with those 20" broadcast monitors but they are too small for my taste and they don't look authentic to me so it has to be a crt tv or arcade monitor.


If I was starting my project again, I would have got a crt tv with component input. Devices that convert rgb to component, without changing the resolution, are far easier to find and people say the conversion looks almost identicle to the original rgb. Some of the later model sony tv's with component, can't handle native refresh rates for games like mortal kombat so a little testing is wise.

With that being said, I have found that the s-video output from by devices, looks very good on my Sony trinitron tv. S-video is a high quality connection and will look great on a decent tv. I grew up in Europe using rgb scart cables for all my consoles so I know the difference very well. S-video on a high end crt tv can look better than rgb on a low quality worn out arcade monitor or a cheap scart tv. Rgb will normally look better than s-video on the same tv but (in my opinion), the difference is not significant enough to spoil your enjoyment unless you use a tv that does a bad job with S-video (some cheaper models can look terrible).

If you are not technical and finding the cheapest solution is not important, buying a JPAC to go with a JROK will save a lot of time. As someone with no soldering experience, I found making my own cable to be a very frustrating process. The pins on a vga connector are so close together. if you cut open an existing vga cable instead, the wires are not labelled and trial and error is not an option... Most of the online diagrams of a vga breakout, do not even tell you if you are looking at the front or back of the connector or if it is male or female (where the pins are mirror opposites)....

The JPAC has a jamma and vga input and rgb wires go into screw connectors so no soldering. It also takes out the risk of breaking your monitor by outputting the wrong signal. It can boost a vga signal for arcade monitors too.

My $25 vga to rgbs converter hasn't arrived yet but when it does, I will post if it is a good solution for combining sync and boosting the vga signal. I will still have to deal with the BNC connectors that it outputs the rgb signal on. I am not 100% sure where I get the ground wire from on BNC's.

As an FYI, if you want to build an emulated project instead of using original hardware, the arcade vga cards allow original resolutions to be selected even when using a vga (not 15khz) monitor. On a vga monitor, this does not make games look authentic because the dot pitch is too fine. I tried outputing that 320 x 240 vga signal through my extron SRC scan converter to my crt tv (through S-video) and it looks amazing. I am not entirely sure what I am looking at in terms of resolution and refresh rate. The graphics fill the screen using direct draw with no hardware stretching and scanlines are clearly visible. The image looks very different to what I get from the extron when using a regular graphics card.

I am fairly sure that the image is 240 lines but I can't tell if it is refreshing at 60hz or 30hz (like a regular 480i image). I may be getting a 240i image but I will know more when my jrok is up an running and I can compare it to a real 240p 60hz image. Without the arcade vga, games output with the wrong resolution do not fill the screen without hardware stretching when I use the extron so I am fairly sure that the full screen is not from the extron upscaling the image to 480i.

An easier way of making your own vga to rgb cables is using a $10 vga breakout board which has screw connectors to attach rgb wires without soldering (just like the JPAC). Google "vga breakout board" and you will see. I wish I would have known about these before I tried soldering!


I would avoid any of the $5 vga to s-video cables that you see on ebay. They are meant to work with these mythical graphics cards that can output S-video through their vga port but nobody has ever actually seen one. i tried 15khz vga to S-video using one of these adapters and got no image at all. Vga to s-video is almost never a job for a simple passive cable adapter.

Apologies if this is info that you already knew but if not, it might save you some time and money. I found it very difficult to get reliable information on this. Converting vga or any rgb signal to s-video, for games, is a frustrating problem. 25"-27" arcade monitors are $400 these days. Using a free 27" Sony Trinitron off craigslist is an increasingly attractive proposition. Considering the fact that American tv's have no rgb input, there should be better solutions for producing an s-video signal.

The only plug in and play solution that I have seen advertised is a 15khz rgbhv to video converter that is for sale on ebay for $80. It has a 15khz vga input and an s-video output. It doesn't state if it outputs 480i only. It just says standard NTSC so I didn't feel like taking the risk when the JROK was cheaper and known to be good.


If anyone knows anything about those rgbhv to video converters or any other plug in and play solution for 240p vga to 240p s-video, I would love to hear about? Soldering chips and wires to pcb's is a little beyond my skills.
 

GohanX

Horrible Goose
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Back up a second, you're doing something wrong. The Atomiswave can natively output 15khz RGB and composite sync, which is exactly what the Jrok wants. People usually have sync problems through VGA because the sync isn't separated into H/V sync and have to come up with solutions for compatibility.
 

Xian Xi

JammaNationX,
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Back up a second, you're doing something wrong. The Atomiswave can natively output 15khz RGB and composite sync, which is exactly what the Jrok wants. People usually have sync problems through VGA because the sync isn't separated into H/V sync and have to come up with solutions for compatibility.

Correct. He can either use RGB(15khz) or VGA but use a sync separator ala LM1881 or EL4583 and solve it in better ways than a VGA to RGB.

Also just so you know, going via the JROK will downgrade the picture to 240p when the native res of the AW is 480p via the VGA port, iirc.
 

Pasky

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the native res of the AW is 480p via the VGA port, iirc.

Yup, this is correct. It's also the native resolution when using the jamma pins as well. Flipping the dip switch to 'hi-res mode' makes it out put at 640x480 but interlaced.
 
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