Great X Scape, College Mall, Bloomington

Amp Divorax · Post by **Amp Divorax** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 7:47 pm

I never said that it was horribly laggy. Even you said it was a bit desynched yesterday. As for Lab, that song is about 10 levels of wackiness to say the least syncwise.

Post by **MonMotha** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 8:29 pm

I said it was desynced when I played LAB. LAB just seems screwed up. Given the number of AAs that showed up on rather difficult stuff, it can't be too off in general.

Everything else seems about the same as 8th style, really. I think the video may just be slightly different from what it was on the old setup. It's 6 versions newer and running on totally different hardware, so I think that might be expected.

lgolem · Post by **lgolem** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 8:39 pm

Everything seems fine to me, I am not that good at the game so I can't really tell, but the timing seems ok. The only thing I noticed is one of the songs sound really odd, I dunno why, I managed to ignore it and pass the song just as well but it sounds wierd (not like it is loading the key sounds but like the part you don't play) on the song North on Light7 does this wierd sound twice during the song, but still I love the Gold machine and it works great. Thanks Brandon for bringing it to the arcade

Now I have something to do when it is dead in there.

Merk · Post by **Merk** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 9:39 pm

Is the monitor an HD monitor? I've heard somewhere that HD monitors lag on Gold, don't know why or how it's possible.

Regardless you do have to hit the buttons visually a bit earlier than you normally would on console, assuming you're playing with the same high speed and Sudden+ set-up that you are on console. You can compensate for it by either using Hidden+ (yes, hidden) to "move" the red bar up. Or you can use lower speed mods and more Sudden+

Pictures:

Amp Divorax · Post by **Amp Divorax** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 9:51 pm

The Plasma Monitor is HD if I am not mistaken (MonMotha has more information about it) but I will state that it's also a hell of alot better than some of these arcades that chuck on a cheap LCD that has substansial lag. I will also mention that having both hidden+ and sudden+ on doesn't really work too well as both are altered together and not separately.

Merk · Post by **Merk** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 10:36 pm

Yeah, not Sudden+ Hidden+. It's mutually exclusive, using both would just be a mess.

Post by Ho » Sun Feb 24, 2008 11:23 pm

Merk wrote:Is the monitor an HD monitor? I've heard somewhere that HD monitors lag on Gold, don't know why or how it's possible.

There are reasons this can be true, but this kind of blanket statement is much too broad to be very useful.

If you are displaying a signal on any digital monitor that is not its native resolution, that monitor will have to scale it up to fill the screen. This takes processing time. Some monitors do it fast. Some do it slow.

As the technology has matured, I have found that more and more are getting much faster to the point where it is becoming easier to find a monitor at a reasonable cost that will provide a very satisfactory IIDX experience.

Amp Divorax wrote:The Plasma Monitor is HD if I am not mistaken (MonMotha has more information about it) but I will state that it's also a hell of alot better than some of these arcades that chuck on a cheap LCD that has substansial lag.

I believe that is in correct. MonMotha can confirm, but to my knowledge that monitor is 480p or EDTV, if you prefer.

And from a timing perspective, LCD is capable of doing just as well as plasma. Again, it's all about the how quick the processors in the set are--be it LCD, plasma, or any other current digital display technology.

And don't be fooled by advertised response time numbers. This is ONLY a measurement of how fast a pixel can be changed and NOT how fast the set can actually tell the pixels to change. You can have a monitor with a blazing fast response time that would still lag. Response time is important, but it is not the only consideration for IIDX.

Unfortunately, there is no good standardized single or set of specs that will tell you if a monitor will be satisfactory for IIDX other than simply testing it out for yourself. I've done this extensively and I can inform you that there is a wide variance and price alone is not a particularly good indicator of results. I've seen cheap sets do fairly well and expensive sets do horribly (and vice versa).

Post by Ho » Mon Feb 25, 2008 7:52 am

And in case you missed it, I left my NX2 kit installed at GXS after the tournament. This is only a temporary loan, but I intend to leave it there for at least the next week or so. Enjoy!

BigBadOrc · Post by **BigBadOrc** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 8:21 am

Ho wrote:And don't be fooled by advertised response time numbers. This is ONLY a measurement of how fast a pixel can be changed and NOT how fast the set can actually tell the pixels to change. You can have a monitor with a blazing fast response time that would still lag. Response time is important, but it is not the only consideration for IIDX.

So I understand offsync but what do you mean by lag? Like, skipped frames? Jerky graphics?

Think a projector could be "satisfactory for IIDX" ?

Post by Ho » Mon Feb 25, 2008 10:35 am

Lag is the delay between the game sending an image to the screen and the screen actually displaying that image. This gap of time can be quite problematic for games that require precise timing as the visuals the player sees on screen are lagged behind the game itself.

Basically, if a display is lagged, what you see on screen will have "already happened" according to the game and your timing will be late.

A projector is functionally no different with regard to timing. Some projectors may be fine for IIDX--some won't. It's just a matter of whether the technology it contains is fast or slow.

Riot · Post by **Riot** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 2:06 pm

BigBadOrc wrote:
Ho wrote:And don't be fooled by advertised response time numbers. This is ONLY a measurement of how fast a pixel can be changed and NOT how fast the set can actually tell the pixels to change. You can have a monitor with a blazing fast response time that would still lag. Response time is important, but it is not the only consideration for IIDX.
So I understand offsync but what do you mean by lag? Like, skipped frames? Jerky graphics?

Think a projector could be "satisfactory for IIDX" ?

The IIDX 4th style (that's now Ho's) at Putt Putt in Fort Wayne used to have a projector in an almost movie-theater-esque little area. It worked fine and was kinda cool.

BigBadOrc · Post by **BigBadOrc** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 2:54 pm

hm...

So offsync is when the video and audio aren't synced..

and lag is when the video and keyboard aren't synced? So.. autosync wouldn't help with lag >_<

I think guitar hero has a way to fix "lag" though.. but i don't think stepmania does and of course i have no clue about iidx.

and riot, that is awesome! I'm going to get a projector myself whenever I can save up the money for a decent one >_<

Post by Ho » Mon Feb 25, 2008 3:15 pm

When people say off-sync or de-synched, they're usually referring to a problem with the game itself where the note scroll (and therefore the timing window) is not properly synchronized with the game audio.

Lag is when the display of video on the screen is delayed from when the game actually sent it. The game system has no way of knowing (at least not automatically) how long it takes for the video signals it generates to actually be displayed on the screen. The system just tells the screen what image to display. It doesn't know how the screen will actually do it or how long it will take to do so.

Merk · Post by **Merk** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 4:25 pm

What type of monitor is it? Like brand name and type. Someone asked on the thread on AIJ and I have no idea -- a link to the product's info on the manufacturer's website would be dandy.

Post by **MonMotha** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 6:07 pm

According to my records, the monitor is a Maxent MX42-V1 EDTV (480p) plasma display.