Curing Arcade Envy: 9” CRT PVM iCade, iPad 3/4 LCD with Mister FPGA

I had a nasty case of Arcade Envy, and a modified iCade made by Ion was the cure. Originally designed to house an early generation iPad, they make for a fun DIY mini arcade cabinet. You can spruce them up as much as you like with a marquee, speakers, new buttons and joystick, and cram in a MisterFPGA or Raspberry Pi. If using the iPad 3/4 LCD, ensure to buy a known low-lag driver board (typically WITHOUT a VGA input). The RetroTink 5x can output the iPad 3/4 1536p native resolution to upscale any 240p retro game console or arcade board if you choose to go down this route. The Mister FPGA can also output this resolution via HDMI, otherwise any 1080p input will work well as the input lag is less than 2msec as demoed by RetroRGB (link below). The CRT used in the second iCade build is a Sony PVM 9L3. The footprint of all 9” Sony PVM and BVM’s are essentially the same so they will all fit into an iCade. I haven’t tested other brands of pro CRT/CCTV monitors like JVC, Panasonic, Ikegami and Pelco, but I would assume they are a similar fit. Let’s turn this Junk into Jank!

A BIG thank you to Martin Hejnfelt AKA Skumlos/Immerhax for sending me a prototype BKM 129x RGB/yPbPr input card for the PVM 9L3 for absolutely free! Checkout his blog with plenty of intuitive mods: https://immerhax.com

Links to the parts used in both the iPad LCD and Sony PVM CRT projects:

Ozstick (Australian retailer)
28mm GoldLeaf switch buttons
https://www.ozstick.com.au/product/go...
Sanwa JLF Joystick replica
https://www.ozstick.com.au/product/sa...
Octagonal restricter plate
https://www.ozstick.com.au/product/sa...

Daemonbite arcade encoder by MickGyver
https://github.com/MickGyver/DaemonBi...

tty2tft by RealLarry/ojaksch and Ahmadexp
https://misterfpga.org/viewtopic.php?...
https://github.com/ojaksch/MiSTer_tty...

Touch sensor
https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/285151310...

iPad 3/4 9.7” LCD and driver board
https://a.aliexpress.com/_mNNE7VS
*note on the screen: powering with 12v gives full brightness, but the screen gets REALLY hot. Powering by 5v keeps it cooler but is only 50% brightness, and CRT scanline effects further darken the picture. I placed a 5v exhaust fan behind the screen which pushes air past the back and through the driver board to keep it a few degrees cooler.

iPad 3/4 LCD screen and driver case 3D print by Sigismond0
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:472...

iPad 3/4 screen with 1080p input lag test by RetroRGB (use time stamps)
   • LaserBear's "LCD CRT" Kit  

12V/5V UPS battery
https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/384705257...
*note that the 5v output barely powers the Mister and gamepad. As I also have the tty2tft screen, I use the batteries 12v output to power a 12v to 5v regulator to deliver steady power to the mister.

Collapsible and Adjustable 9” CRT stand
https://amzn.asia/d/2uWIriq

#crt #arcade #retrogaming

00:00 Intro
01:01 LCD iCade
03:19 PVM iCade
09:59 Final Thoughts