Raspberry Pi full size cabinet

[VDfreesince1983]

So I just joined the forum. I recently bought a raspberry Pi for the purpose of Universal emulation not just arcade emulation. I have a programmer working on a intuitive GUI that will let me choose from various emulated CPUs (SNES, Arcade, NES, Sega and so on). the Cabinet and wood work isnt an issue. but the control im finding difficult to devise a plan, since everything needs to be done as cheap as possible, so no specialized controllers everything made from scratch or spare parts. i guess my major limitation is the two USB ports that the raspberry pi B uses and the 4 joysticks and 22 buttons i want on the controller. my first idea was to use 4 6 button USB controllers tear them apart and wire the buttons onto those, use a USB hub to connect all four connections to the Pi. Then I thought it might be more prudent to tear a keyboard apart and wire the buttons onto that; keyboards are wired in serial and have a low bandwidth that would cause a Time delay during a 4 player game. Ive read several articles on various controllers that will do the job I-pac4 and others, but these are to pricey for the project and to specialized. can anyone refer me to maybe another forum post or offer any ideas. i know 65 dollars is isnt that much for a solution but my experiment is based in Frugality. here is my price list so far.

22 happs buttons and 4 8-way joysticks: $50
Raspberry Pi B: $35
Wood and laminating materials: $50
32 inch 4:3 CRTV from a thrift store: $20
4 chilled cup holders: $20 

[Unstupid]

Questions:
How are you going to go from Happ Buttons to USB?
What 4 player games do you expect to be able to play on a Pi?

[raungst]

Unless you have laminate/wood already, I think you'll find MDF/MDO and laminate will run much more than $50 for a full size cabinet.

[DaveMMR]

If you want to save money, a four player cab ain't the best way. You'll be spending more on the wood and laminate than $50 as raungst stated (closer to $100+.) Then to get everything to work together nicely, you're going to need more than just a Pi.

Ditch the Pi and cup holders, use part of those savings to pay for the wood and a cheap encoder and find someone to give you an old computer that was just going to be tossed anyway.

Or better yet, re-evaluate your priorities. I've seen cabinets done inexpensively, but more often than not, a lot of the materials/hardware was already on-hand. Starting from scratch, it's going to be really difficult to get satisfying results from a really tight budget.

[VDfreesince1983]

im running the microswitches just like they normally would be for the control and then sending them through multiple USB connectors, and writing the drivers in linux or im going to solder them to a device that already uses USB and into the pi. on the wood my neighbor is a carpenter and has some large scrap pieces he is going to give me, and the rest ill just buy from lowes. I want to be able to do the TMNT games the simpsons, the D&D game. nothing past 1995. and im not looking for doing any high end emulation like MAME. because i don't think the pi is there yet


also ive got a local artist who wants to paint the sides, so they might end up vanished instead of laminated

[DaveMMR]

so they might end up vanished instead of laminated

Then how will you find it when it's time to play. 

(Sorry, feel free to groan now. We knew what you meant.)

[shponglefan]

I agree with ditching 4 player, in favor of two player.  If on a budget, best to simplify.

[kahlid74]

im running the microswitches just like they normally would be for the control and then sending them through multiple USB connectors, and writing the drivers in linux or im going to solder them to a device that already uses USB and into the pi. on the wood my neighbor is a carpenter and has some large scrap pieces he is going to give me, and the rest ill just buy from lowes. I want to be able to do the TMNT games the simpsons, the D&D game. nothing past 1995. and im not looking for doing any high end emulation like MAME. because i don't think the pi is there yet


also ive got a local artist who wants to paint the sides, so they might end up vanished instead of laminated

Unless you overclock to 900-1000 you're going to see stuttering in most of the emulators you mentioned on the Pi.  If you do OC to 900-1000 you're going to shrink the life of your Pi quite a bit.  If size/power consumption isn't an issue, go and find a computer being thrown away.  You'll be much happier both with compatibility and performance.   Last I heard there wasn't a Sega emulator available in the Pi world, so yeah.

Your best bet encoder wise, if you don't want ghosting/latency, is to either roll I-Pac or Vigo's encoders or to design/build your own board.  This guy built his own encoder from scratch http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,114816.0.html see page 4/5.

[MTPPC]

I can't understand using the underpowered pi when you can find a curbside P4 that will do what you are asking of it.

[VDfreesince1983]

I've noticed that a lot of the arcade build community  is focused on re-creation of arcade experience I'm only doing this project as an experiment to see if it can be done. That's why I want to try the pi. I wonder if a controller can be built on an arduino as well any thoughts 

[DaveMMR]

Just noticed your username. Congrats on being VD Free since 1983.   

As for your experiment: If forging ahead, I would just get the Pi first and try running emulators before worrying about controls, encoders, building cabinets and whatnot (all that's already been proven it can be done.) You don't want to find that you blew your entire budget on something you can't tolerate playing due to the limitations.

[RandyT]

I've noticed that a lot of the arcade build community  is focused on re-creation of arcade experience I'm only doing this project as an experiment to see if it can be done. That's why I want to try the pi. I wonder if a controller can be built on an arduino as well any thoughts

All of that can be done, so it's not much an experiment (unless it is "personal victory" oriented).  There are well established controls, ways of making panels and cabinets, as well as a complete tutorial out there for running MAME on a Pi.  Putting these together doesn't really prove much, other than it is possible to "put tab A into slot B" and that's already known.  The folks here are saying that a freebie PC will work in the same cabinet you build, and be many more times capable than the Pi.  They just want you to be happy with the end result, as the cabinetry tends to be the part which challenges most.

The good news is that you probably won't have to do a lot to change it over 2 weeks after you get it done, when you decide that the Pi isn't up for the job.

[VDfreesince1983]

I'm not useing mame I'm writing the software

[RandyT]

I'm not useing mame I'm writing the software

You are going to write your own Pi optimized emulator for all of the systems you mentioned?  Or are you just planning to write a Pi front end for existing emulators?  If the latter, then you are still using MAME, and everything stated so far regarding performance issues still holds true.

[EvilNuff]

There is either some serious misunderstanding here by VD or we are not hearing the whole story.  Creating all the mentioned emulators from scratch for pi would be a huge undertaking.  Not to mention in the original post he commented that he has a dev working on the GUI which implies that he is not the developer.  I suspect VD that you don't really understand what you are undertaking?

[sandheaver]

There is either some serious misunderstanding here by VD or we are not hearing the whole story.  Creating all the mentioned emulators from scratch for pi would be a huge undertaking.  Not to mention in the original post he commented that he has a dev working on the GUI which implies that he is not the developer.  I suspect VD that you don't really understand what you are undertaking?

I think he's talking about the front-end.  Either way the Pi will have a hard time with anything but games from the early 80s.

VD, the lesson we're all trying to get you to hear is this: Don't cheap out on one-time expenses.  Don't.  It won't work out like you think.  Cheaping out most definitely will not get you an acceptable system for less.  It will get you an unacceptable system for less than an acceptable system would cost, and that's about it, unless you're not starting from zero (you already have a lot of materials or hardware on-hand.)

Don't cheap out.  Don't cheap out.  It won't work like you think.

[ridicrick]

Just a little video I made, still a lot of progress with getting mame to work 100% on the PI but it is getting there. The sounds has some issues.

[Haze]

and based on your video you're using a really old version and it's *still* struggling with the 16-bit games (and even some of the later 8-bits)  Ghouls and Ghosts clearly isn't hitting 60fps there by a long shot.

which just confirms what everybody has been saying