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On my Egret 2 I used emphatics guide to calibrate. Got decent results. Got better results with the arcadeotakus guide on my Nanao MS9.

What brad808 said is true. Every chassis+crt combo is a little different. A lot of these guides are general guidelines not exact formulas for maximizing.

Recapping is also a good idea like ShootTheCore states as capacitors can have a pretty significant impact on how well your tube CAN function. Another thing to keep in mind is a lot of these tubes+chassis probably have a lot of hours due to their commercial use + being over 20 years old.
 
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yea the chassis are recapped. @ChuChu Flamingo what exactly made the difference for you in the arcadeotaku guide? i mean all of them are kind of ok and with cps2 the picture is decent most of the time. things that bug me most are if the picture is just too dark or the black is too grey. but again the question is the approach. high or low screen pot for example seems the be quite controversy
 
If both don't show good results you might be doing it wrong, your cps2 A-board might need recapping (I have one board here that has dimer video than my others), chassis need recapping, or your tube just has a lot of hours. The later might just need a tube cleaning on the guns but this is the last thing you want to do before tying all the other options I stated.

A quick glance at the differences between the two guides

1.)Emphatics guide basically states to put everything rrgb gain/cutoff/brightness/contrast at a neutral state/12 o clock then adjust flyback volts then everything RGB gain/cutoff/neutral/brghtness/contrast.


2.)The arcade otaku wiki states turn RGB gain/cutoff/brightness/contrast all the way down to 0 then adjust flyback then adjust rgb gains/cutoff/brightness/contast.

The difference on my E2 was that using emphatics guide the cutoffs were at 50%. flyback was lower. Arcade otakus wiki the RGB cutoffs were at around 20-25% and flyback higher.
 
Yea I know. Basically the visible result should be the same. But the question is why do they approach total different. What is the benefit over the other. One guy states something like higher screen would result in let’s say less spread mir on point beam.
 
@ShootTheCore, would you recommend running the test patterns in 240p test suite in 480i during calibration?

I remember StickFreaks saying that in his CRT calibration videos but wasn’t sure if you’ve tested and found much of a difference. The thinking goes you’d get a brighter test pattern to read in 480i since it’s not “skipping” lines drawn on screen like a 240p signal.
 
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@ShootTheCore, would you recommend running the test patterns in 240p test suite in 480i during calibration?

I remember StickFreaks saying that in his CRT calibration videos but wasn’t sure if you’ve tested and found much of a difference. The thinking goes you’d get a brighter test pattern to read in 480i since it’s not “skipping” lines drawn on screen like a 240p signal.
I’d recommend against it since arcade PCBs are going to be rendering in 240p and you’re calibrating the CRT with that use-case in mind. Generally speaking, your calibration resolution should match whatever material you plan on using the most with the display.
 
I used my MiSTercade, colorimeter and procedure tonight to dial in an MS9-29 tube and chassis. Final result is less than 1.0 Delta E across the board, which is PVM/BVM levels of color accuracy.

It’s tricky to take clean pictures of a CRT with a cell phone, but trust me - this thing is gorgeous! :thumbup:

E392115E-6179-47CD-8BB0-26DE7437EEDD.jpeg9D018C4F-5BEA-4BFB-9C62-D411A0E60CAA.jpeg6BC9E576-63BB-4A0B-972D-D5D2F61FE52D.jpeg38C7B6BC-E04D-4AD9-B82C-E470D68768E0.jpeg44923235-D75F-47D3-A0EE-B717277090F8.jpegAF0485C8-1CD8-4751-897B-89B6FEDED0A8.jpeg
 
I used my MiSTercade, colorimeter and procedure tonight to dial in an MS9-29 tube and chassis. Final result is less than 1.0 Delta E across the board, which is PVM/BVM levels of color accuracy.

It’s tricky to take clean pictures of a CRT with a cell phone, but trust me - this thing is gorgeous! :thumbup:

E392115E-6179-47CD-8BB0-26DE7437EEDD.jpeg9D018C4F-5BEA-4BFB-9C62-D411A0E60CAA.jpeg6BC9E576-63BB-4A0B-972D-D5D2F61FE52D.jpeg38C7B6BC-E04D-4AD9-B82C-E470D68768E0.jpeg44923235-D75F-47D3-A0EE-B717277090F8.jpegAF0485C8-1CD8-4751-897B-89B6FEDED0A8.jpeg
Awesome! I’m waiting for a good deal on a colorimeter so that I can get on this. I’m really bad at calibrating colors so your guide has me excited.
 
@ShootTheCore how did you connect your Pi to the cab?
There are some solutions out there to install over Pi to catch player input signals and output 15Khz video and audio throught GPIO port to a jamma edge, such as: RGB-PI or PI2Jamma. Check them out
 
I picked up an RGB-Pi, and while the cable is well made, it's designed to use their specific driver and card image that boots up into a RetroPi front end. I tried to swap the RetroPi software out for the PGenerator calibration software but haven't had any luck yet - it just hangs. I need to to tinker with it some more.
 
There is a "Studio" level, which is below the Pro. I don't know the difference besides about $100...
I’ll have to see if this over works with refresh displays but looks promising.
 

From what I'm reading, the Studio model has the same main sensor, but it is capped in firmware to be 5X slower than the Pro, and it also doesn't have the secondary sensor to accommodate for ambient light in the room. The Pro sends an updated reading to the laptop about every second, and the Studio about every 5 seconds.

IMHO, I suggest spending the extra money for the Pro up front or else you'll probably end up buying twice. Getting an updated reading only once every five seconds would be really annoying and would really slow down your calibration process.
 
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