So the building part of the project is done. I'm still dealing with setting up emulators and lists and such. Frankly, software could be a forever project. It will be done when I decide to stop working on it. However, I reached a couple of milestones. One, I got multimouse on MAME working. Apparently, directinput doesn't work for multimouse. You need to set mouseprovider to rawinput. Mine was set to auto, but I think my specific build was set to force directinput, so it recognized all the different mice as one mouse, which was frustrating and difficult to research, since it doesn't seem to be too common of a problem.
I didn't document much of the build process, mainly because I don't think the process that I use is very professional or repeatable. I don't use plans. I downloaded sketchup, but couldn't be bothered to learn it. All my measurements were approximations based upon what felt right. I'm not overly concerned with exact anything. I smoothed things out with a random orbital sander and filled gaps with wood filler. Frankly, I'm not much of a woodworker. I'm impressed if anything ends up plumb or square.
Even if you fly by the seat of your pants like me when it comes to woodworking, I would still suggest hanging or propping up your monitor at the correct-ish height, mocking up your CP, testing different seating and standing positions with other people, and then keeping in mind that you can always alter the plans on the fly and that you should do so, if necessary. Also, I suggest not blind mounting your controls under the CP. Just go with carriage bolts drilled all the way through. If you're not countesinking them under an overlay, maybe spray paint them black with a good spray paint made for metal, like rustoleum. Definitely use slagcoin button and joystick templates. Print out a bunch, paste them onto your mockup CP, and go with the layout that feels right. Plan on a 5 degree slope on the front. If you have a big panel, just use regular hinges and don't worry about latches or fancy supports. At that slope, it will stay shut and you can easily prop it open. If you have a 4 player setup, square all of the joysticks up with the monitor and don't try to squeeze more than 4 joysticks onto your CP. For wiring, order one jamma harness per 20-ish buttons. I ordered one harness from
www.pyb-arcade.com (through ebay), but I wish I had ordered three harnesses for my 56 inputs. It made wiring so much easier and neater.
I'll just use this space to say a big thank you to those who helped out during the planning part of the thread, especially Scott (PL1) and NIVO, but also anyone who took the time to post a reply. I appreciate this community very much and it feels good to be visiting again on a regular basis.