Vendetta cabinet for first MAME setup?

[deezdrama]

I bought a 4 player vendetta cabinet 5 + years ago with the plans on building a mame cabinet.
Im just now starting to think about building it again. Its been in my garage the whole time, everything works.

Problem is.... I dont know if it would be better to build it from this cab or start from scratch?

The vendetta cab i have is in good shape but the side art is pretty scratched up and the bottom of the cab has some bubbling of the wood from water damage. My main concern with the vendetta cab would be the weight.... it weighs a ton.
Would have to do some body work and get new art. The control board has 4 player but only 2 buttons per player and would need to add 4 more per player. Its already crowded for 4 people so maybe just a whole new control board design is needed.

I had did tons of research on mame cabinets years ago but have forgotten everything.

I dont know wether to keep the large crt i have in there or go with lcd?
i remember something about  jamma or pac adapters or something like that for getting button controls mapped to keyboard shortcuts.

I have a old quad core gaming pc with a gt 650ti i 2as going to use.
I would like to use. I would need a 4tb hdd and would like to run hyperspin or whatever frontend is the best looking right now.

I wondered if there was ready to go preloaded harddrives that could be bought? I remember it being a pain in the *** to setup preview vids and artwork to games and having hundreds of games the wrong version or duplicates and would just like to buy a harddrive already setup with the mame library and not have to deal with getting preview vids to work etc.

Sorry for all the questions but need a point in the right direction to what i should use/ what I will need etc.

I have the vendetta cab, the computer, the original crt. I have some car speakers id like to use.

so besides the hardrive/frontend/roms......
do i just need the extra buttons (or would you replace all with new?),
how could I use the original crt with a gt 650ti? Or would i be better with lcd?
what do i need for buttons a jpac or whate er its called?

anything else ive overlooked?
I am a mid 30s guy just wanting to relive my child days in the arcade and give my kids the experience....I plan to take my time finishing this and making it look good or else tbe ol lady wont allow it in the house lol..... Im just trying to get a general idea of the partlist i need.

thanks!

[deezdrama]

So i cleaned my garage out and dusted off the vendetta cab.

Everything still works good. The crt is a wg 25k7191... picture  looks good except a small purple tint in the upper left corner (any idea what this indicates?)

the cab is solid except along the bottom about an inch up on the bottom sides of the cab the wood is frayed and jagged.
I remember seeing guys work on them like a car.... with bondo... I just dont know how I could repair a bottom edge??

Alot of the guides and research im doing is outdated. I dont know if I should stick with the crt or go lcd or led.


Any help or suggestions are appreciated.... I took pics but dont know how to upload on this forum from my phone

[Locke141]

First off welcome,

I have never owned a real arcade monitor, I do know that people go to great lengths save them. Real monitors arcade monitors are the gold standard to manny. Read this to see why. There is a lot you can do to fix many issues, but I'll leave that for people that know better then me. If it does not have bad burn in I would keep the CRT even if I needed to recap it.

If the cab is original and works (look here) I would try to restore it and as original as posable. You could put a Jamma switcher in it and switch between Mame and the original board. As Vendetta is a 4 player game any way adding one or two additional button per player will give let you play a lot more 4 player games with minimum alterations. If its a porly done conventions and it in bad shape keeping it original is less an issue.

I would look at Groovy Mame It's made for use with arcade monitors. Hyper spin won't be an options, but Attract mode may do for your tast.

There is also the Arcade VGA that would let you use Windows and hyper spin.

Ether way I would buy a J-pack as well. It will be a lot less work to set up you setup and it will protest your monitor from you accidentally sending the wrong signal.

For posting pic, when you start a post click on "attachments and other options."


Then click on choose file.


Then navigate to the image you want to post.

[deezdrama]

Heres some pics of the cab.
Its solid except for the jagged bottom and some edges.... To guys who have restored or converted old cabs to mame- Is this cab too far gone to fix up?

In the pics of the screen image- It doesnt show but after being on about an hour the top left screen corner turns a purple tint. If anyone ever held a strong magnet to a tubed tv before thats what it looks like, but it only does it after the screen has been on for some time.

I just dont want to start ordering stuff and wasting money if this is too far gone to work with.

Any opinions are appreciated!

[Locke141]

It does not look like it's in bad shape to me. Again I don't know much about monitors but it sounds to me like it fixable. A cap kit perhaps  . People here will know or you could ask over at KLOV.

It I was you I'd probably add a JAMMA switch, a PC for Mame, and the hard/soft ware needed to protect the monitor. 

[deezdrama]

ok... thanks for the replies. I might just sell it and use the money to go towards a 40" lcd. I like the idea of having a true cabinet but it weighs a ton and the footprint really is too big for my living room.

[harveybirdman]

Where are you? US? Is that a wells gardner monitor?  If you are determined to build a small footprint LCD cab, don't throw out the monitor,  sell it to another enthusiast and use proceeds towards parts.

[deezdrama]

Yeah its the 25k7191 wg 25"

i had another one from a lethal enforcers cab but tossed the cab.
if i dont use this cab i will probably sell on cl.

[Locke141]

You can post it for sale in the Buy/Sell/Trade section.
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/board,2.0.html

You could do the same at KLOV I think? I'm not a member there.

[PL1]

If you want to list it at KLOV, the Trading Post sub-forum to use is Videogame - For Sale (Whole Games).


Scott

[pbj]

I always liked Vendetta because you could kick the enemies when they were down.  A metaphor for life.