2011-03-29

The updated site is available here from now on: http://www.emphatic.se/?category_name=news
Please update your bookmarks!

2011-03-28

Just wanted to tell you who visit my site that it will soon(ish) be improved. I'm moving to WordPress, just gonna learn to harness it's power first. I'm looking forward to being able to update the site more often (I won't spam with complete garbage though, don't worry) and adding a search engine and perhaps even a small forum. We'll see.

So, what's in store for future updates? Well, I think I might add some more YouTube stuff (If I get time, I'll record some MAME replays for the games I currently own) and also expand the information about my PCBs to include all the cool trivia you'd want to know about them. I wanted this update to be posted now rather than spring an April 1:st update, as nobody will take that seriously. :D I have very little knowledge about how WordPress works, what plugins are available etc, but I might try to get integrated with social networks etc.

I might also add some cool how-to guides as I enjoy writing stuff up, taking pictures etc. I want to offer some cool content as well.

2011-03-20

Finally was able to get hold of a Battle Garegga PCB! This has the modified roms (zakk) that will reset the rank on each credit and permanently unlock the hidden characters. I hope to put many hours into this gem.

2011-02-27

Successfully tried the JLF PCB mod that I figured out yesterday. It was very easy to do. Read my 5 step guide by clicking the image below.



2011-02-26

Updated the JST guide I added this morning with a better solution based on the use of a JLF or LS-32-01 PCB.

2011-02-26

Realized that the news.html was getting pretty damn big, so split it into more documents instead of just jumping down. I hope this will load the site faster.

2011-02-26

Some of you out there might at one time have considered putting something other than the SANWA JLF or Seimitsu LS-32 in your cabinet or arcade stick, but the lack of a 5-pin connector has turned you off the idea. I made a short guide on how to hook up a SUZO 500 to my EGRET II's controller harness. This should however work with any switch based joystick. Click the image below to read on.



2011-02-24

A visitor from Italy made me realize that the 360 backgrounds I've made doesn't work as .png files, so I have converted them to .jpg instead and replaced all the links. I added a bonus item at the bottom that's handy to have in the cabinet for tweaking your 360 picture.

          

2011-02-24

A couple of days ago, I fell in love. See pictures below:











Hand made, all metal, extremely short throw/engage, super-sweet goodness. Nicer than a tweaked SUZO 500 even. This is my stick of choice now. If these go into production, look no further for that perfect joystick if you're into shmups. I've suggested some (size) changes so it can be a drop-in replacement for that crap HORI put in their sticks. If the maker of the beauty above can get the height down I can put one in my Guwange stick.

2011-01-31

Took a few more pictures of my Dreamcast running through the SLG3000 on my Acer LCD screen:



Also a pretty large picture of Mars Matrix. Click here to view it. Also tweaked the settings on the SLG3000 to give me a better result on my NANAO 24kHz display (I had the dips set to even lines this time, looks much better:







2011-01-28

Added a couple of new pictures of my cabinets. Insides are showing! AND MORE!

2011-01-27

Today I got my hands on something that's very cool. The SLG3000. It's a tiny dedicated unit that produces scanlines for game consoles or emulator setups where you don't have a scanline option in the video settings, or when you don't want to put extra processing strain on your emulator setup. It will accept VGA source video through it's VGA input (female) and output it with added scanlines through it's VGA output (female). This thing doesn't need external power, as the video sources' sync line can make it work anyway. Pretty damn cool.





It has some nifty settings that you can access by setting the DIP switches on the unit. For example, you can choose to apply these scanlines to even or odd lines. This comes in handy when you have an interlaced Dreamcast game, as the scanlines can mask this effect leaving you with a flicker/interlace free picture. It can also add that missing "CRT" feeling for recent console ports of arcade titles. Some ports don't upscale the graphics or use ugly filters. A linear upscale of lowres graphics, such as pulling 320x240 to 640x480 (2x scaling, see) with added scanlines will look almost as good as a low res monitor outputting 240p with the real hardware scanlines a true arcade monitor can only provide.

I spent most of today's free time testing this on my 22" Acer LCD screen with my Dreamcast, a quick MAME test from my laptop and finally in my EGRET II running 24kHz. Below are some pictures. Some of these games are 31kHz ones, and don't usually show scanlines on optimal arcade hardware, but I had it hooked up, so I might as well shoot some extra pictures.

Karous (Dreamcast) (Left: scanlines pot turned to zero, right scanlines pot on maximum setting)



Mars Matrix (Dreamcast)



Twinkle Star Sprites (Dreamcast



Shikigami No Shiro II (Dreamcast) (Monitor is slightly tilted, hence the non vertical lines)



Zero Gunner 2 (Dreamcast): (Top part has scanlines)



Ketsui (MAME) in (800x600 resolution (lowest my Windows7 laptop would output, left has scanlines)



Another shot of Ketsui (MAME), this time I faded the image composition in Photoshop to show the difference between SLG3000 (top part) and just Direct3D output in MAME:



That concluded my testing on the LCD screen. I now moved the SLG3000 over to my EGRET II and put it between the XBox 360 (480p output) and my Ultracade Universal Video Converter (640x384 at 24kHz output) to see how it looks on the low res ports. I just had time to check out Do-Donpachi Dai-Ou-Jou Black Label Extra, but it wasn't looking as hot as the LCD had done unfortunately:



Keep in mind that the above has the scanlines turned all the way up. By setting it to "just visible", the scanlines were actually pretty nice. But I don't think I'll waste the SLG3000's potential on this. I might try some other DIP settings and see if I can get a better result sometime in the near future.

You can buy the SLG3000 from www.arcadeforge.de for a price of €49 + shipping. If you want to experience the arcade look on your current gen screen, then don't wait for these to disappear. My only real gripe with the unit is that it has female connectors at both sides, meaning that it'll need an extra VGA cable at the end. You can argue that if this thing is hooked up directly to a screen, the heavy VGA cable on the INPUT side might snap it in two etc. But that's probably just me.

2011-01-14

Received this awesome RGB Scart to JAMMA adapter today from Australia. A couple of days ago I also got a pair of Akihabarashop's P360 so tonight I finished wiring it (no soldering nor crimping needed) them up like this:



The RGB to Scart adapter picture have a nifty ribbon cable that you can move from the screw connector board (where I hooked up the P360, green screw connectors) to the one on the far right with the JAMMA controls passthrough board. I plan on using this setup for my low res only cabinet. I tried some quick PS2 hookup just to see the picture quality. It is brilliant!



2011-01-03

Today was kinda a great day. I received a Hacha Mecha Fighter PCB, and two new (with correct colours) EGRET II 1-player CPOs that I'll be applying ASAP.



Update: I have applied the CPOs above now: