My 27" WEGA Project

[Gilrock]

The whole machine is black so I'd spray it black.

[MiteWiseacre]

I’m not wanting to accept that I’m wrong... I’ll probably see this through with a clear coat, won’t be hard to redo later - I hate just painting over nice wood. 

[Mike A]

[Gilrock]

If you don't like painting over nice wood you should have used nice wood for the whole project and stained it all the same.

[yamatetsu]

I’m not wanting to accept that I’m wrong... I’ll probably see this through with a clear coat, won’t be hard to redo later - I hate just painting over nice wood.

Now go ahead and tell me in all honesty that the stained CP would looker better than a painted one.

[leapinlew]

It can totally work with the wood if you put some black elements on the cp and a couple other wood elements to the cab. Check out knievels woody here for how he integrated black on the cp:
https://knievel.webs.com/thewoody.htm

Don’t get me wrong, all black is fine but it seems to me if you are pushing for not traditional side art you should also consider other non traditional elements.

Consider 1/4” stainable sheets that you could cut out and create your own design for side art.

[yamatetsu]

+1 for adding more stained wood elements. The CP alone doesn't work.

[MiteWiseacre]

Damn you and your truthful renders, Yamatestu!

[yamatetsu]

We live in wondrous times. One can actually use a computer to emulate reality 

[Mr. Peabody]

Once you go black......  I like it with the green T-molding. The panel corners need rounding. Also, while the sticks are at the same parallel (no one noticed!), they are way....way......high on the plane. Unless you're sitting, at the right height, your wrists will not be touching the panel. It looks cramped as well, and of course too close to the admin buttons.

[MiteWiseacre]

Lol. Not quite ready to build a new panel, but the crowd has spoken and I’ll want to use the power tools again soon enough... placement so far feels pretty good, I can rest my palms comfortably on the panel. Should player two be dropped down a little?

[Mike A]

The best way to figure that out is to try it out with two players.

[MiteWiseacre]

This is what ordering things in Canada is like. I order marquee and side art from the US Jun 3rd and a gfx card from Hong Kong June 7 for a third the shipping cost and just arrived today. Not sure where the art is
https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.ca%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F163722092895

[Locke141]

In my cocktail cabe built form a wind case, I am going to try India Ink on some scrap. Then I'll decide if I'm going to do so for the CP. It should let you keep the wood look but match the black stile of the cab.

[MiteWiseacre]

That’s pretty nice Locke, definitely a consideration

[MiteWiseacre]

I am seriously struggling with groovymame
I was able to get crt_emudriver up and running windows in 640x480 from the amd card > vga to component converter > crt tv. That was pretty exciting.
But trying to figure what to download and how to get Groovy MAME to run s convoluted

[Arroyo]

Did you follow one of Calamity’s guides?

If your card is HD 5000 or newer then follow this:

http://geedorah.com/eiusdemmodi/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=1052#p1052

If older then this:

http://geedorah.com/eiusdemmodi/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=1016#p1016

[MiteWiseacre]

Followed the guides, the emudriver guide was great got that going.
Working through the groovymame guide is not going well, MAME will not launch. I may have forgotten how to install MAME. My existing mame 137 still launches fine, attract mode is messed, and trying to install mame .159 (that was oldest I could find)

[Arroyo]

Working through the groovymame guide is not going well, MAME will not launch.

I'm willing to bet it's because you are working with MAME beyond 0.170 and you changed in the mame.ini the:

"video    d3d9ex"

It actually should be set to auto.  Just overwrite the d3d9ex to auto.

There are subtle notes in the tutorial that link the changes but are easy to miss.  It really should be update to make it more obvious.

The link to the changes is here:

http://geedorah.com/eiusdemmodi/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=1235#p1235

[sealcouch]

Build is looking solid. Hell of a screen to use here. I'm about to start a build and I'm thinking about using a big ass consumer tv with component in.

Keep it up. 

[MiteWiseacre]

Build is looking solid. Hell of a screen to use here. I'm about to start a build and I'm thinking about using a big ass consumer tv with component in.

Keep it up. 

Thanks! If I ever get this sorted out I’ll try to explain how
Still can’t get a version of groovymame to launch, I’m going to try on my normal PC tomorrow, probably easier not using a big 480i tv screen connected to a dinosaur

[sealcouch]

Build is looking solid. Hell of a screen to use here. I'm about to start a build and I'm thinking about using a big ass consumer tv with component in.

Keep it up. 

Thanks! If I ever get this sorted out I’ll try to explain how
Still can’t get a version of groovymame to launch, I’m going to try on my normal PC tomorrow, probably easier not using a big 480i tv screen connected to a dinosaur

I'm watching intently for the GroovyMame stuff. I have a compatible card but I feel like I see so many threads of people giving up on it.  Seems like it's a hassle to get working but when it works, it's awesome. 

I've considered going the (ever blasphemous) Pi route simply because there are so many plug and play video solutions like the pi2scart or rgbpi.

[MiteWiseacre]

I’ve got groovymame running easily on my main PC, copied it over to the arcade and it doesn’t want to launch. It seems my problem is totally related to the resolution I’m running. No time now will get back at it tonight.
RetroArch seems to work quite easily with crt emu.. but it’s a little clunky and I’ve set up everything around attract mode, but if you went ground up with RetroArch and did the research I’m sure it’s a more up to date solution.

[MiteWiseacre]

I did finally get groovymame to launch by running it in compatibility mode, windows 10 tries to force it into 480p I think and that's why it won't work unless windowed or if I switch to 648x486 res
Now the problem I have is that switch res keeps resorting to 480i on everygame, I have all these super-resolutions loaded but it won't use them.

[MiteWiseacre]

Got groovymame working by going to a new version, v.205, Calamity helped me realize that these old versions of Mame aren’t compatible with this setup. So now with a recreated game list I’m up and running in 240p, got some work to do on the picture yet. Looking for some advice:
Can anyone recommend a front end that works well in SD? I’m not sure Attractmode will continue to work
Where do you find nice hardware? I’ve checked the Home Depots and other box stores and can’t find nice bolts/Allen screws or anything I want to mount my joys and trackball with.

[Arroyo]

Can anyone recommend a front end that works well in SD?

Congrats on getting Groovymame working.

I use Hyperspin for a frontend and it works great on 15khz. monitors.  There's a bit of a learning curve, but it's great when setup.

As for mounting hardware I'd probably wait for Scott's (PL1) links but most people seem to use threaded inserts:

[PL1]

Where do you find nice hardware? I’ve checked the Home Depots and other box stores and can’t find nice bolts/Allen screws or anything I want to mount my joys and trackball with.

Are you looking for carriage bolts for both or threaded inserts from GGG or Ultimarc for the joysticks and carriage bolts for the trackball?

You almost certainly won't find off-the-shelf nice-looking carriage bolts at the big box stores, but you can use Spyridon's approach here to grind off any text/markings then polish or paint the head.

For off-the-shelf, your best bet is to look at arcade vendor sites like  ArcadeShop, GGG, Mike's Arcade, Paradise Arcade Shop, Twisted Quarter, etc.   

Since you're in Canada, it may be worth the effort to try the grind/polish/paint approach instead of dealing with customs delays and expenses.   


Scott

[MiteWiseacre]

Looking at the results I think I’ll try the polish/paint method on some carriage bolts

[MiteWiseacre]

And with now 70% more “meadow muffin” plastered all over it!

Down the road I will look into an original theme, I’m thinking “The Lizard” around my favourite marvel badguy and colour... sorry Mike it’s on there.
Toying with software and service menus right now, then I’ll replace those crappy mounting screws and experiment with maple trim around the glass and a black CP.. One of those projects I’ll tinker with for some time, perpetual hobby. Maybe I’ll even play a game , never did beat TMNT... 
(Yes if it looks like I took a break from finishing my basement for this project, it’s because I did )

[MiteWiseacre]

Here’s the picture I’ve tried to link through Dropbox eight times in the last post 
Anyways..

[Arroyo]

Overall I like it, and damn you move quick.  Still would be interested to see the control panel in black, and see you make use of the slots in the side panels.  I still say it deserves some original artwork, and if you could incorporate the slots with the art that would be even better!

[javeryh]

Nice job but why are all of the pics sideways???  It would be much easier to look at what you've done without tilting my head 

[MiteWiseacre]

This forum hates my phone pictures... I’ll re upload from media fire later 

[yamatetsu]

I’ll [...] experiment with maple trim around the glass and a black CP..

Now that would just be transferring the problem to another place. That CP should be black because one random piece of maple on an otherwise mostly black cab simply looks out of place. If you paint the CP black and do a maple bezel, then the CP will blend in and the bezel will look out of place. There's nothing wrong with using maple, but you should look for a way to incorporate it into the design rather than just slapping it on.

Take a look at my cab, this is mixing stained wood and black acrylic.



Now imagine how it would look like if the front and the bezel were made of wood and the CP was made of black acrylic. You'd look at it and go "Why is there one piece that doesn't fit?"

[MiteWiseacre]

That’s a very cool cab.
But what I meant of course was try different options like add more maple trim by replacing the mouldings on the sides of the screen and marquee with maple strips or if that doesn’t work go all black and redo the CP.

[yamatetsu]

Seriously though, I think that adding some maple strips won't be enough. I hope that you'll prove me wrong. 

[arfink]

Nice build.  I like your design, and the balls to pull off a CRT on the first build.

Back in 2002 when I did my first build, it was all I had. I should take pics of that cab, it's still at my parents. First year of high school, I had *no* clue what I was doing.

[MiteWiseacre]

Looking at recycling the two extra 27s I have here as rejects for my build. One of them is a decased Wega same model.. do you folks recommend I hang onto certain spare parts?