Q. im new to building my own arcade cabinet. are there any tips that anyone wishes to share to a bignner? like where to shop? safty precautions? or how much money and time and space it could take up?
A. I am assuming you are building from scratch. Best advice is plan, measure twice, cut once, Use quality controls, and Take Your Time.
Let me start off by saying the end product is what every thing is based on:
Money:
The wood: What you use to make the cabinet needs to be sturdy and one side finished for a good look. (I have used HDO plywood in the past very good product http://www.freemansupply.com/HDOFirPlywood.htm)
The computer: It needs to be fast enough to run the games you wish to play. You can go overboard here and just buy to fast of a cpu that you just didn't need. Remember hard drive space.
The monitor: This can very also. Mainly 3 types to use. 1 a CRT type like the original arcade games used. 2 a flat screen plasma or lcd TV/Monitor. and 3 a regular TV 20+ inch. (Note that orientation is a factor also for the install and overall size.)
The controls: You will need to know how many buttons, joysticks, rollers, spinners, ect you will need for the games you will have loaded. The control panel is what I always built my Cabinets around. I determined How many player and the needed controls and placement. Made a mock up with cardboard to see the size and function ability of the controls. Knowing this size allowed me to know how wide the cabinet would be and then the size of the monitor. Also it showed what king of hardware I needed to connect the controllers to the computer.
The Hardware: You will need wire and at least one ipac/jpac. I always added two fans, a power strip, lighting, speakers, wireless keyboard and mouse.
Cost: from scratch can run from as low as $800 to over $2000 from my experience.
Time:
As stated before TAKE YOUR TIME! plan, plan, plan. I never finished one on a set time schedules, but did make goal points.
1 acquire the computer, hardware, and controls.
2 while still acquiring parts,start design as mock build ups.
3 acquire the wood and other materials to assemble the cabinet.
4 build the cabinet.
5 build the control panel.
6 install the monitor.
7 install the wiring
8 Install the CPU
Not really that easy but generally the order.
Space?: To build? I use an 8x10 Shed. Cabinet size, I've only made one monster that was almost 4foot wide and deep. I built one that was a sit down that was two parts and they pinned together and took up about 3.5 wide and 7 foot long. But most are gust over 2 foot wide and just under 3 foot deep. All sizes are footprint size, control panels not added.
Here is a great resource sight for a lot of you needs when building. http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?board=1
More reading:
http://arcadecontrols.com/arcade.htm
http://www.dave-gallagher.net/arcade/porn/page17.htm
http://web.tampabay.rr.com/arcade/
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2006/10/mame_cabinet_build_photos.html
http://thydzik.com/mamecab/
Now the Meat and Taters:
http://www.happcontrols.com/index.html?http://www.happcontrols.com/pushbuttons/5891xxl.htm!
http://www.ultimarc.com/
http://groovygamegear.com/webstore/index.php?main_page=index
http://midwestgames.stores.yahoo.net/
http://www.hagstromelectronics.com/
http://www.ozstick.com.au/
http://www.thrustvector.com/products.html
http://www.conntrol.com/default.html
http://www.mikesarcade.com/cgi-bin/store.pl
http://www.arcadeshop.com/parts.htm#Monitors
http://www.twobits.com/parts/
http://www.quarterarcade.com/Default.aspx
http://www.highway.net.au/parts/wiring.html
http://www.thebuttkicker.com/
http://www.elektronforge.com/parts.htm
http://stores.ebay.com/TWISTEDQUARTER
http://www.t-molding.com/store/home.php
http://www.directron.com/mods.html
http://www.svideo.com/displayvideo.html
And lastly a good tip is use a front end program such as GameEX http://www.gameex.net/ and use mame32 version. It makes for a clean install and easy for anyone to find a game and plat, very programmable.
Congrats on on your build, take your time and have fun.
Yahoo questions closed about MAME Cabinets http://answers.yahoo.com/search/search_result;_ylt=AoNzY_JsDy56jbDPJsJm_OQnzKIX;_ylv=3?ps=2&p=mame+cabinet&pn=&scope=&mc=&fltr=_en&tab=1&asktime=&save_search=1&st=1
Let me start off by saying the end product is what every thing is based on:
Money:
The wood: What you use to make the cabinet needs to be sturdy and one side finished for a good look. (I have used HDO plywood in the past very good product http://www.freemansupply.com/HDOFirPlywood.htm)
The computer: It needs to be fast enough to run the games you wish to play. You can go overboard here and just buy to fast of a cpu that you just didn't need. Remember hard drive space.
The monitor: This can very also. Mainly 3 types to use. 1 a CRT type like the original arcade games used. 2 a flat screen plasma or lcd TV/Monitor. and 3 a regular TV 20+ inch. (Note that orientation is a factor also for the install and overall size.)
The controls: You will need to know how many buttons, joysticks, rollers, spinners, ect you will need for the games you will have loaded. The control panel is what I always built my Cabinets around. I determined How many player and the needed controls and placement. Made a mock up with cardboard to see the size and function ability of the controls. Knowing this size allowed me to know how wide the cabinet would be and then the size of the monitor. Also it showed what king of hardware I needed to connect the controllers to the computer.
The Hardware: You will need wire and at least one ipac/jpac. I always added two fans, a power strip, lighting, speakers, wireless keyboard and mouse.
Cost: from scratch can run from as low as $800 to over $2000 from my experience.
Time:
As stated before TAKE YOUR TIME! plan, plan, plan. I never finished one on a set time schedules, but did make goal points.
1 acquire the computer, hardware, and controls.
2 while still acquiring parts,start design as mock build ups.
3 acquire the wood and other materials to assemble the cabinet.
4 build the cabinet.
5 build the control panel.
6 install the monitor.
7 install the wiring
8 Install the CPU
Not really that easy but generally the order.
Space?: To build? I use an 8x10 Shed. Cabinet size, I've only made one monster that was almost 4foot wide and deep. I built one that was a sit down that was two parts and they pinned together and took up about 3.5 wide and 7 foot long. But most are gust over 2 foot wide and just under 3 foot deep. All sizes are footprint size, control panels not added.
Here is a great resource sight for a lot of you needs when building. http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?board=1
More reading:
http://arcadecontrols.com/arcade.htm
http://www.dave-gallagher.net/arcade/porn/page17.htm
http://web.tampabay.rr.com/arcade/
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2006/10/mame_cabinet_build_photos.html
http://thydzik.com/mamecab/
Now the Meat and Taters:
http://www.happcontrols.com/index.html?http://www.happcontrols.com/pushbuttons/5891xxl.htm!
http://www.ultimarc.com/
http://groovygamegear.com/webstore/index.php?main_page=index
http://midwestgames.stores.yahoo.net/
http://www.hagstromelectronics.com/
http://www.ozstick.com.au/
http://www.thrustvector.com/products.html
http://www.conntrol.com/default.html
http://www.mikesarcade.com/cgi-bin/store.pl
http://www.arcadeshop.com/parts.htm#Monitors
http://www.twobits.com/parts/
http://www.quarterarcade.com/Default.aspx
http://www.highway.net.au/parts/wiring.html
http://www.thebuttkicker.com/
http://www.elektronforge.com/parts.htm
http://stores.ebay.com/TWISTEDQUARTER
http://www.t-molding.com/store/home.php
http://www.directron.com/mods.html
http://www.svideo.com/displayvideo.html
And lastly a good tip is use a front end program such as GameEX http://www.gameex.net/ and use mame32 version. It makes for a clean install and easy for anyone to find a game and plat, very programmable.
Congrats on on your build, take your time and have fun.
Yahoo questions closed about MAME Cabinets http://answers.yahoo.com/search/search_result;_ylt=AoNzY_JsDy56jbDPJsJm_OQnzKIX;_ylv=3?ps=2&p=mame+cabinet&pn=&scope=&mc=&fltr=_en&tab=1&asktime=&save_search=1&st=1
How can i make my screen smaller? i.e shrink what i can see.?
Q. what i mean is how can i make the actually size of the picture displayed smaller?
With old monitors you could resize with knobs etc so that the picture didn't take up all of the screen., but is there a tool or anything that can do it on an lcd screen.
i ask because i have a 15 inch monitor placed vertically inside a mame cocktail cabinet and it's a bit hard to see whats going on in the corners of the screen, id like to be able to resize a full screendos mame window from within windows just a little smaller so you can see the edges.
i am running windows xp.
otherwise i think i need a slightly smaller monitor, which seems like an expense for something so simple.
hope someone understands and can help.
No i'm afraid you've misunderstood. thanks though.
how do i respond to dom below???
With old monitors you could resize with knobs etc so that the picture didn't take up all of the screen., but is there a tool or anything that can do it on an lcd screen.
i ask because i have a 15 inch monitor placed vertically inside a mame cocktail cabinet and it's a bit hard to see whats going on in the corners of the screen, id like to be able to resize a full screendos mame window from within windows just a little smaller so you can see the edges.
i am running windows xp.
otherwise i think i need a slightly smaller monitor, which seems like an expense for something so simple.
hope someone understands and can help.
No i'm afraid you've misunderstood. thanks though.
how do i respond to dom below???
A. Right-click on a blank part on your main Windows desktop area, select "Properties". Click on the "Settings" tab. You'll see a slider that you can move left or right. You can move this slider left or right accordingly, then "Apply" and "OK". You may be asked if you want to make the changes without restarting..
I usually choose this option, as I can see right-away how things will look, also, if for some reason your monitor and/or graphics card can't handle this setting, you may see a corrupt screen display... if this happens, don't panic and don't touch anything as in about 10 seconds, the settings will automatically return to it's previous selection.
If however you like how the new changes look, then choose to "Yes, keep this setting" before the timer-countdown reaches 0.
I usually choose this option, as I can see right-away how things will look, also, if for some reason your monitor and/or graphics card can't handle this setting, you may see a corrupt screen display... if this happens, don't panic and don't touch anything as in about 10 seconds, the settings will automatically return to it's previous selection.
If however you like how the new changes look, then choose to "Yes, keep this setting" before the timer-countdown reaches 0.
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