Cabinet choice for 1st MAME conversion?

[tela_pathetic]

Like so many before me I've been a big lurker here trying to gather as much info as I can before I dive feet first into my own MAME. Initially I'd thought to make my own cabinet but after talking with some buddies about my ideas one of them mentioned a friend that happens to run a Jukebox/Arcade gig on the side who's looking to get rid of some cabinets. After checking out the stock he's got multiple cabinets in various states of repair and I can have my pick of the litter(either stripped clean or with any amount of working parts) and wanted some input from the more experienced out there on if any of these might present unseen pitfalls or the overall convertability of the existing cabinets. Currently I have my choice of an NFL Blitz Gold edition, Golden Tee, Golden Tee 2005 or PGA Tour Gold challenge(pics are as close as I can find to actual cabinet model). Thanks in advance for any feedback and thank you for all the stuff you share, it really does help us novices.

[Malenko]

if the blitz is a dedicated I'd pick that one.

[tela_pathetic]

Yeah it's a dedicated cabinet any particular reason that one, other then maybe the game itself?

[Ginsu Victim]

Made a MAME cabinet for my friend with a PGA Tour cab. Here's some pics
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=90725.0

[Havok]

The Blitz cab is Mame friendly; good amount of space and nice size control panel to easily add more controls. Plus, you get a beefy system and you can still play the game within Mame.

[Paul Olson]

Definitely the Blitz cab. As mentioned, the CP is a great size. It is also only held on to the cab with three bolts, so it easy to remove. You can put any type of cp you want on there if you want to build a custom one. Or you can just build a new top piece for it and be up and running quickly.

I have had one of these for 7 years now, and I think it is a perfect cab to use. I can't think of any cab I would trade it for. I am not sure what monitor Blitz used, but if you can get it with a 25" std res, or maybe a tri res for cheap, grab it.

[Malenko]

should be held on with 4 bolts, 2 vertical & 2 horiztonal.

I MAMEd my KI2 once the guts commited suicide, other then how heavy the cab is, I love it you c an see pix in the link in my sig

[DashRendar]

NFL Blitz is the cab I have that I'm working on converting at the moment.

What others have said, it has a perfect control panel (with a ledge, so you can use the existing one or mount a new one easily), as well as lots of room to work with inside of it.  I couldn't imagine a better cab for a MAME conversion.

 

[tela_pathetic]

Thanks for all the great feedback guys it's been great to get some personal experiences to help with the picking!

[ark_ader]

I would target one of those Atari Digdug/Centipede/Kangaroo cabinets - they are perfect to MAME.