MAME Arcade

[Cmtz]

I've been thinking about making a MAME Arcade. I think I can make the cabinet by myself and use my old computer to run MAME. I just can't get of my butt and get it started. Does anyone have a MAME arcade and if you do is it the best thing in the world?

[kaustik]

I wouldn't say it is the best thing in the world, but I sure love(d) mine. I moved recently and had to take a very large hammer and saw to my first cab. It was a little too large to fit in the new apartment layout. Still in the process of building my second one. Go to www.arcadecontrols.com if you haven't done so already. Whatever you think you are going to spend... double it for a realistic amount.

My cabinet always seems to go over well during parties. There is something always satisfying looking over and seeing the Robotron attract playing in your own home.

[Cmtz]

I'm ready to spend up to 3,000 dollars. What things should I consider besides the Computer, Monitor, Cabinet, Controlers, Paint and Wires?

[kaustik]

The biggest consideration I would say you need to make is the plans you are going to use and making sure you fully understand how to read them. The problem I was having was working off of projects others had used and trying to fill in the holes of the things they forgot to mention.

I quickly realized how many tools I was going to have to purchase. I also assembled some things too quickly before doing the finishing work.

Also do some serious thinking about what kinds of games you will be playing the most. It is next to impossible to make a setup to play all of them perfectly. I personally used 2 8 way joysticks for the head to head action and the afformentioned Robotron/Smash T.V. Added a 4 way for Ms PacMan and Galaga and a Trackball for navigation. I really like playing Tron, but was not going to add a trigger joystick just for that game.

$3000 should be more than enough. My control panel rang in for just under $400. A real keyboard encoder makes things a lot simpler and cleaner. (I cannot say enough good things about Hagstrom Electronics. Bought their KE72T model. Plus their tech support is aces.) The materials for the cabinet was around $200. Few odds and ends like a coin door and lights another $100. I lucked out on a Pixelview 23" monitor for 75 bucks at an industrial resale shot. Came in a steel case, weighs a ton, but looks beautiful in the cab. 2.1 sound system... 50 dollars. Computer, another $500. Time spent... many a weekends.

If you can swindle someone into helping you for a case of beer, even better. Some of the assembly phase was almost impossible by myself.

[shvnsth]

$3000 is a lot to spend on a mame cabinet. im in the middle of building mine, and would say that with $1000 you could build a tight cab. spend the other money on a projector and screen for playing games on. check for cabs locally or on ebay, buy prob prebuilt controls (much easier, either x-arcade or hot rod), buy a cheap computer and put a vid card that has s-video out, and get a nice cheap 20-25in flat screen tv, and your set. ill show mine off in the arcade alley forums when im done, def check out there for more info.

[Cmtz]

Thanks for all the help guys. I already have a projector so I don't need to think of that. My dad can build pretty much anything so I know I can count on him to help me build the cabinet. My brother and I are pretty good wiring stuff. I'm pretty good at setting up computers as well. What kind of Monitor should I get. Should I get a flat screen or a regular tube monitor. What about the controler, what controler gives it an old school feel?

[shvnsth]

i would just buy a old empty cab and convert it. and for the monitor, i would just use a s-video tv, it will look better in my opinion

[Pantechnicon]

$3000? $1000? O_O . I built my first one for $47 net and the next 5 for only $250 - $300 each. No, they're not the greatest cabs in the world but they do the trick. A couple of words of advice:

1) If you're going to have MAME only then run it in DOS 6.2 with a decent front-end app like ArcadeOS. If you really feel the need for Windows then use Win98SE. The basic rule here is less OS = more freed system resources.

2) Do not sweat having a bunch of high-end hardware if you're going to be running mostly old (pre-1990) ROMs. These are the games I primarily play and they run just fine on a PIII with 8MB of video. Likewise, chances are good that a high end sound card will need Windows drivers, blah-blah-blah see point #1.

3) I-Pac controller adapters and Happ arcade controls are your best bets for the control panels.

4) Instead of working out some complicated drawer mechanism for your keyboard/mouse I suggest just going wireless.

5) A cab conversion might be the thing to do first as you'll spend less time on the saw and more on how to put everything inside nicely. If possible I would suggest conversion before building a cab from scratch (unless you're a carpenter, then have at it).

6) Do not waste your time with any monitor smaller than 19".

BTW I have no problem with people who spend big $$$ on your cabs, but a project like this can be done much cheaper and still wind up looking pretty good in the end.

[Phosphor Dot Fossils]

One thing you ought to do is consult the experts lurking in DP's own Arcade forum (http://www.digitpress.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=39) - much wisdom will you gain there, young padawan.

[Time]

) A cab conversion might be the thing to do first as you'll spend less time on the saw and more on how to put everything inside nicely. If possible I would suggest conversion before building a cab from scratch (unless you're a carpenter, then have at it).


I total agree, do a cab conversion if you can find a good cab. Then you can spend all you time on converting and setting it up instead of trying to copy a cab. If you get the right cab, your controls & monitor problems will also be taken care of at the same time. Also an I-pac is a must. Very easy to set up and use.

[midgey]

Pantechnicon:

$47 for an entire cab? I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume you had lots of parts lying around. If you managed to get: monitor, PC, encoder, old cab/wood, control panel with joystick and buttons for $47 please tell me how.

I spent roughly $300 on my mame cabinet.
$25 for an empty space duel cabinet
$100 for a 20" TV
$100 for control panel
$100 for a PC

I'm going to go ahead and echo everybody else and suggest getting an old cab if you have the means. I was fortunate to have a vendor/collector in town (Arcades 'n more, for those in St. Louis area) so I didn't have to pay shipping or anything. If you don't have somebody local to you, you may want to build it yourself since shipping can get really high up there.

Good luck.

[Nature Boy]

I introduced a buddy to MAME a couple of years ago and he ran out and built his own cabinet. It's definitely a thing of beauty. He has it in his dining room (he's a bachelor, living in a house with 2 other guys) and it gets a *lot* of play, both by them and by visitors :)

One of these days I'll build one too, although I think I'd prefer a cocktail cabinet to an upright.

[Pantechnicon]

Pantechnicon:

$47 for an entire cab? I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume you had lots of parts lying around. If you managed to get: monitor, PC, encoder, old cab/wood, control panel with joystick and buttons for $47 please tell me how.

I spent roughly $300 on my mame cabinet.
$25 for an empty space duel cabinet
$100 for a 20" TV
$100 for control panel
$100 for a PC

I'm going to go ahead and echo everybody else and suggest getting an old cab if you have the means. I was fortunate to have a vendor/collector in town (Arcades 'n more, for those in St. Louis area) so I didn't have to pay shipping or anything. If you don't have somebody local to you, you may want to build it yourself since shipping can get really high up there.

Good luck.

Quote from my own website about the first machine:


Now I’m the first to admit that this is due to some incredible luck on my part. There just happened to be a guy in my neighborhood with a cheap cabinet for sale and I’m fortunate enough to work in a job that graciously allows me access to derelict PC hardware. But still, if there’s one lesson I learned in this project is that you have to apply the right mixture of innovation and frugality if you want to do this right. I have seen people sink between two and three thousand dollars into their custom cabinets and I honestly don’t think they’re any better than this sub-fifty dollar beast of my own making. Hey, if you’ve got that kind of $$$ to invest, then more power to you…happy gaming! But to those (the majority, I think) who are operating on a more – shall we say – sensible budget I am here to tell you that you to not be deterred.

You can read the specifics here (http://www.geocities.com/zenoszone/mame7.htm) if you want to. At any rate, as I said, the next 5 cabs I did (conversions again) were between $250 and $300 apiece. It's not unrealistic either way depending on what you do exactly and - more importantly - whether you can content yourself with not using bleeding edge components.

[MegaManFan]

Here's what I've spent on my MAME project so far:

* Vintage Double Dragon cab in great condition - $50
* Buttons, J-Stik, panel to PC interface - $125
* 19" monitor - $85
* Video card compatible with monitor - $45 total
* Old computer I didn't need any more - totally free

$305. I expect a few more expenses as a fellow hobbyist who is also building himself one is paying for lumber, wiring and parts as needed, and keeping a tab so I can pay him as needed. Still I expect to finish the whole process for well under $500, and I budgeted a thousand initially. If you do it right you don't have to spend a fortune, especially if you can buy parts with somebody else doing one and split shipping.

[Sylentwulf]

Here is my COMPLETE walkthrough, CD, pricelist, EVERYTHING....

http://www.electricquarter.com/arcadecab/arcadecab.htm

Pricelist:
http://www.electricquarter.com/arcadecab/price.htm

You WON'T find a more complete pricelist for building your own cab ;) And as someone else mentioned, www.arcadecontrols.com is THE BEST website there is.

[Sylentwulf]

One more quick comment, if you're using an old computer, and will be doing everything from scratch, replace the damn CMOS battery. I had a power failure 2 days ago, the CMOS battery died, and it screwed something up. I just re-installed windows xp yesterday morning :( It saved all my settings and stuff because I didn't format, but I don't think it's running quite as smooth now.

[felix]

What are about the min specs for a cpu to run mame?

[ddockery]

How does losing your CMOS affect your Windows XP install?

[Sylentwulf]

How does losing your CMOS affect your Windows XP install?

No idea, but after getting the cmos back to normal, it wouldn't boot into anything but safe mode. I tried to do a repair install and it STILL happened. Had to do a full install then it worked fine. I think it was the radeon drivers somehow so I haven't re-installed those.

Works fine so far since I re-installed though, so here's to hoping it stays happy.

[shvnsth]

What are about the min specs for a cpu to run mame?

i know that for mine, it is playing genesis, snes, nes, turbo, neo-geo, and mame, but i would not go with anything less that 1ghz for mame only and 1.5ghz for ones that will run other consoles. now these are very high estimates, (it will run on a 733mhz system, but i have never tried, so i don't know how well), so you def safe with this.

[Cmtz]

My dad and I are building the cabinet as we speak. I haven't touched mame since 98. What kind of computer should I get. Should I get something with win98 and get rid of win98 and let it run on dos or should I just run it on win 98?

[ddockery]

There's no real reason to run on DOS unless you just have a really old machine that can't handles windows. Win98 would work, XP would work too. I'd just make sure to avoid ME at all costs. As for what kind of machine to get, go with the fastest CPU you can reasonably afford and a nice chunk of RAM. Those are the only 2 things that really affect MAME performance.

Sylentwulf, are you sure all your bios settings are the same as before? I'm not sure why any of those would affect booting into windows but you never know.

[Cmtz]

Well, I'll go out and by myself a new computer with 512 of ram and 3ghz. I think that willl do.

Thanks

[Sylentwulf]

With a P4 1.8ghz I can ALMOST play killer instinct 1 and 2. They're playable, but choppy. I'm using around Mame .87 or so currently (I STILL don't really know how to upgrade mame versions without wrecking settings and high scores)

[Sylentwulf]

Sylentwulf, are you sure all your bios settings are the same as before? I'm not sure why any of those would affect booting into windows but you never know.

Slight double post. No, I have no way of telling what the bios settings were before since it's been like 4-5 years since I've changed em :) It probly enabled the onboard video (if my mobo even has it) and it conflicted with the radeon card.

[ddockery]

UNless they happen to change the settings or high score structures (which isn't often), you just drop the new .exe in the same directory. It really is that easy.

[Peale]

I've done several cabinets now. One for as little as $50. Albiet a very simple cab, but that included an arcade monitor, coin door and all the trimmings.

It also took me a long time. I bided my time, waiting for parts to drop into my lap. A keyboard hack instead of an encoder. Running DOS on an older machine.

It really all depends on what games you want to run. *Most* older games can get away with older hardware.

[Teamatomics]

Hi, I've included a picture of my cab so you can base my suggestions on your taste.

I recommend:

1.Decide what your favorite games are, play them on your PC, this will determine your controls, and much of your cab's design.

2.Get an already made cab. Building a cab is nice, but you may feel overwhelmed and over budget, I was glad I didn't build one, cause by the end, I really just wanted to finish it, and play the thing. Besides, once you put the first one together, you can always build a cab, and you can change all the things that you'd like to change from one you've built!

3. Another thing I'm glad I did, Artwork. If you're going to spend 3 grand, drop $200 on some artwork from some of your favorites, you, and other people that see your cab, will be stoked at the results.

4. Measure the Monitor you're planning to put in it!!! THEN, get the cab!! this will save you aggravation beyond belief.

Hope that helps, here's the one I built.

http://www3.sympatico.ca/jennifer.matsunaga/

[Flack]

I have around 20 arcade cabinets at the moment, but the one that continually gets the most use is my MAME cabinet. If I had it to do all over again I would build two or three MAME cabinets and leave it at that. I'd definitely build one horizontal montior and one vertical monitor, and maybe a third with a joystick, spinner and trackball for those random odd games.

Also if I had it to do all over again I would use either an arcade monitor or a television. A PC monitor just doesn't do it for me. I've tried adding scan lines and all those other little tricks but it just doesn't look right to me. I have a cabinet with a horizontal monitor that's about to become MAME cabinet #2, so we'll see how that goes.

Like others have said, I'd finish the control panel last. If the cabinet is functioning, you'll never get around to finishing it!!!