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| TorgoHiggins:
Salutations, folks. Heaven help me, I'm going to try building a small cab. I know my way around pc parts a little bit, and zero woodworking skills. I DO, however, have access to all the necessary tools and workshop space, as well as expertise to tap for general construction advice and help. The goal, such as it could be called, is to build something that looks decent for as cheaply as possible (you know, as opposed to building something that looks like crap for as much money as possible). This is as much about doing and learning as it is about wanting an arcade cabinet, perhaps moreso. The tentative goal is a small-ish bartop. I want the screen to be a decent size, but probably no bigger then 17". Smaller/cheaper would be better. It must be LCD, for weight considerations if nothing else. Speaking of, I live in Hawaii, so size/weight of parts and shipping cost are a huge deal. Always. All the time. But before I can even think about the outside, I have to consider the innards. I picked up an old Jetway Mini-ITX board on the cheap. It comes with an embedded, passively cooled 1.2ghz processor; It needn't be powerful, just functional. If all it does it run an old NES emulator I'll be happy with it. The trouble is, I'm not 100% sure where to go from there. I've never put together a pc from scratch, so I'm driving a little blind here. I know I still need: - A power supply - RAM - Hard Drive - Some sort of removable media (I have a usb cd/dvd drive on the way) Does this more or less complete a list for barebones PC hardware? It sounds right, but again, this is uncharted territory for me. Furthermore, anyone have recommendations on power supply? I see lots of voltages and numbers, stuff with fans, PicoPSUs for mini-itx boards that DON'T have fans. It's a little intimidating. What do I need, and moreover, what do I want? For the arcade controls themselves I was considering simply springing for the X-Arcade DIY kit, since it seems straightforward and should be relatively free of any compatibility issues. A few other notes: - I will be installing WinXP Home on this system. - The specs on the motherboard. - I'm as yet undecided if it's going to be one or two players. - The smaller, cooler, and less power consumed the better. Any advice is appreciated. Hearty laughs at my ignorance will be less so, but understandable. :) Thanks! |
| dkersten:
I am sure others will offer up all kinds of good information, but I will throw in a couple things to think about: First, you may find you have better luck with older builds of mame when running that setup. Some people say that even going back only as far as .147 gives something like 20-30% improvement in performance on many games over the current .154.. I haven't experimented myself because I am not using a slower processor, but it is certainly worth looking into... Before building your controls, I would spend some time setting up mame on the computer, and play some games to see what you really want out of it. Ideally, build your game list and then go from there. You might find that you really want a solid 4-way joystick, or that you only care about 3 buttons and not 6 or 8. You might find you really want a trackball or spinner or both. You might find that you don't care about simultaneous 2 player games, and can get away with a single player control panel. For that motherboard, unless you are putting it in a case that has a fan, I would install a fan to blow some air on it. Once cooped up in that cabinet, without active cooling on the processor, it might start to get rather warm. A basic 120mm fan running at 5v should be more than enough to keep it cool. Just remember to put vents at the top and bottom of the cabinet so the heat can escape and pull in cool air in the process. I am sure others will comment on the x-arcade controller. If you are going to play any vs. fighters, I would listen to the advice you will get. Also read the wiki, it is very valuable when just getting started. Finally, even as cheap as you can keep it, you will get nickel and dimed on this, so pay attention to your hardware store runs, it adds up fast. My first cab had a $1700 budget and I am at around $2600 now.. doesn't take long. Good luck! |
| PL1:
Welcome aboard, TorgoHiggins. ;D You may want to read the FAQ to help you work through the design process and identify many of the "unknown unknown" factors. (a.k.a. "I need to know how to do what to make this cab look/work right??" :lol) For an overview of the woodworking skills needed to build a cab, check out this wiki entry condensed from Ond's Main Forum sticky thread. On the subject of choosing controls and hardware, you might want to read up on the "6-button USB limit" of the X-Arcade encoder. There is a workaround for that limit mentioned here, but you still have separate grounds for each connector which adds complexity to the wiring. :dunno Take your time researching and configuring the software like Dkersten mentioned and planning things out before you start ordering parts since you'll almost certainly end up ordering from multiple vendors. Make a bookmark folder for threads that mention useful info and vendors/products that look promising. Be sure to check out Ultimarc, GroovyGameGear, Paradise Arcade Shop in Waimanalo, and the many other vendors you'll find mentioned in various build threads. Andy (AndyWarne), Randy (RandyT), and Bryan (armi0024) -- the respective proprietors of these three businesses -- are regulars around here on the BYOAC Forums. Scott |
| TorgoHiggins:
Thanks for the tips guys! I've decided I'm going to put the system in a case of it's own. I found a nice compact mini-itx case with lots of ventilation and a power supply for forty bucks. As nice as the idea of mounting the hardware is, this very neatly solves a lot of the power issues and some of the ventilation issues, though there will still be the matter of cutting some vents into the cab itself. Plus now I can more easily get the system setup and running before I start work on the cab itself. :) I picked up a cheap stick-o-ram as well. I think all that leaves is a hard drive and maybe some various cables. Is going with a solid state drive worth the expense? The going rate for an 80gb on ebay seems to be between 30-40 dollars, which sounds decent enough. The case I'm getting has space for 3.5" or 2.5" hard discs though, which I wasn't originally planning on. I might just save the bucks and buy a small 3.5" drive. |
| TorgoHiggins:
So while I'm still waiting on the pc bits to arrive, I'm starting to noodle the cabinet side of things. The main thing I'm really roiling over is the screen. I know I want a flat-panel, but man I'm limited on options. Getting a screen second-hand on ebay is pretty much not an option: Most don't ship to Hawaii, and those that do will shaft me with parcel post (six week shipping time and who knows what kind of arrival condition). Amazon has a couple Acer 4:3 models with free shipping, but the starting rate is $100 for a 17". I'm willing to spend a hundred bucks (which I realize compared to a proper arcade monitor is still cheaping out), but if I can avoid it I will. Out of curiousity, is there anyway to buy a laptop screen and use that? For example: There's a 15.4" wxga screen for $52~. The screen size is actually pretty close to what I had in mind for a first project, and the price is right. Are there options out there to hook something like this up? |
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