Any good monitor recommendations?

MKtrill

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Hey, ive been searching for the past 2 months to find a replacement monitor for my MKII cab, and ive heard horror stories about the only ones i could find. example, makvision 24.8 inch $339.00 sounded good, untill i talked to a couple people that work on chassis rebuilds, and told me to stay far far away from them. there is also 8liners.com that builds monitors for 200 bucks, sounds awesome, but i have not the slightest clue about what i would get, and its been tough trying to get info from them.

So im asking.......begging.... does anyone have any suggestions or sources that they could reveal to help me in my quest to finding a replacement 25'' curved crt monitor.

Thank you
 
Rebuild the monitor you have, or buy a used K7000 series monitor. Newer monitors are built like crap, have poor documentation and that is why techs don't want to mess with them.
 
What are the best older model 25 inchers? I've been wondering about this as well. Is there a community approved best model? Kind of like how most people like G07's in the 19 inch range?
 
What are the best older model 25 inchers? I've been wondering about this as well. Is there a community approved best model? Kind of like how most people like G07's in the 19 inch range?

The K7000 is probably the best 25" monitor out there. The problem with them is that the tubes dont last as long as their 19" counterparts.

I agree about the 24.8" Mak's. I've got two in a pair of Fast and Furious Drifts that were Cruisin USA's in a previous life. I dont really care for the image they produce and will be replacing them with 26" LCD's here shortly.
 
Rick Neiman at www.niemandisplays.com sells 25" tubes I think. Not sure if they are curved or flat tubes.

I bought a 27" flat tri-res monitor from him and I think the flat tube looks fine, although you'll have to swap the plastic bezel.
 
I think I will give Rick's company a shot. He did good br me when he worked for Makvision so lets hope that this is more of the same.

At least when he worked for Mak the monitors were very similar to Neo-Tec's which have proven to be fairly good monitors.
 
The K7000 is probably the best 25" monitor out there. The problem with them is that the tubes dont last as long as their 19" counterparts.

+1. I've seen many weak 25" K7000 tubes - especially the ones with the Zenith built tubes. Actual 25" TV sets are a bit harder to find (most are 27"), but swapping the tube isn't bad.

-Ian
 
i believe the earlier K7000's usually had better tubes than the later ones. the bad Zenith tubes i thought were on the K7400/7500's made in the late 1990's (i've had 'em in both my Midway Skins game and CarnEvil; had to rejuve CarnEvil.)
 
The 1990s zenith tubes were bad even outside of arcade monitors...I had a couple 27in Zenith TVs where the tubes just up and failed on them. Turned green w/scan lines.

25in TVs aren't as hard to come by around here...just try to do some Craigslist searching and see what you come up with. May even have to try one of those wooden console tvs.

Edit: Did some searching and HAD to post this LOL: http://philadelphia.craigslist.org/wan/2066299873.html
 
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You guys need to realise that many of us arent monitor techs, or even have the know-how on 'rebuilding' a new monitor. Personally, it scares the shit out of me. My showcase cab's monitor is going out and i have no idea what I'm gonna do about it. I was thinking about buying a replacement lcd monitor, but they are incredibly expensive!
 
You guys need to realise that many of us arent monitor techs, or even have the know-how on 'rebuilding' a new monitor. Personally, it scares the shit out of me. My showcase cab's monitor is going out and i have no idea what I'm gonna do about it. I was thinking about buying a replacement lcd monitor, but they are incredibly expensive!

Exactly what I was thinking. "Just re-build it" or "get a cap kit" gets thrown around a lot here, but I am afraid I will electrocute myself or seriously injure myself while attempting something like this. I am still starting at 4 or 5 monitors that need work and wondering what I will do with them...
 
If you have an irrational fear of electricity, or just don't want to try repairing anything yourself, you can simply send your monitor chassis out for repair to someone like Chad at ArcadeCup. It still costs less than a brand new monitor, and if you start with a quality monitor like a K7000, it should last a lot longer than some cheap Chinese thing.

-Ian
 
If you have an irrational fear of electricity, or just don't want to try repairing anything yourself, you can simply send your monitor chassis out for repair to someone like Chad at ArcadeCup. It still costs less than a brand new monitor, and if you start with a quality monitor like a K7000, it should last a lot longer than some cheap Chinese thing.

-Ian

+1.

You guys need to dive into these monitors to get rid of the fear of them. Yes, they can zap the shit out of you but that goes with learning. They wont kill you (unless your licking the monitor) so they worst you'll get is a zap.

Learn the rebuild the older monitors and dont bother with the new garbage.
 
Exactly what I was thinking. "Just re-build it" or "get a cap kit" gets thrown around a lot here, but I am afraid I will electrocute myself or seriously injure myself while attempting something like this. I am still starting at 4 or 5 monitors that need work and wondering what I will do with them...

Welcome to my world, I'm sitting on at least 4 I need chassis rebuilds on.

I've no fear of electrical, however I have very unsteady hands and a distinct fear of throwing away money by trying a repair.
 
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I share your monitor pain...

I tried to do the right thing to fix my 25" polo.
1. Cap kit - spent a lot of money getting all the stuff for soldering.
Watched lots of you tube and practiced de soldering and soldering.

Learned I suck at soldering.

2. Bot a new chassis from Alva. Found out the hard way you do not plug it in with the provided plug.

3. Donor tube 2: learned that I messed up the tube trying to flip the image. So I got 1 then another TV for donors. Nothing about this was fun or worked.

4. Tried to find another working chassis and tv - eventually bot another cabinet. When I got it home - monitor crapped out. So now have 2 big cabinets with messed up 25" monitors.

5. Read up on lcd's. Finally bot a 25" from geeks.com. ON sale for $149 delivered.
Installed it in the first cabinet using some brackets from home depot. Also got a converter from Jamma Boards. Looks good overall, but want to get a wider ie 16:10 for the next one.

Good luck and let us know what way you go.....
 
I tried to do the right thing to fix my 25" polo.
1. Cap kit - spent a lot of money getting all the stuff for soldering.
Watched lots of you tube and practiced de soldering and soldering.

Unfortunately Polo's are not the monitor that you want to practice on. They have all sorts of mysterious problems that will make one crazy trying to track down.

K7000's are flat out the easiest monitor to fix (the GO7 might be a bit easier).

That sucks that you had to find all that out the way you did.

FWIW, I sucked at soldering and was worried about monitors when I started in the business too. That was 1984 and I'm still in it...
 
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