Suggestion for a New Forum - NEWBIE Forum??

[GGKoul]

Just a suggestion...

I've been a frequent visitor to the BYOAC forums for the past few months.  It appears that more and more people are discovering the MAME experience.  And so, more and more people are wanting to build their own cabinet.... and therefore people flock to this forum to ask their questions to help get them started.

As this forum is an excellent place for people to post their MAME questions.  Because it's an great source of information and there's a strong dedicated group of individuals that are available to answer practically any question that gets posted.  

Which takes me to my suggestion:

Would a "newbie forum" help people get the information there looking for to get started much better and fast then the New MAMEer using the "main forum" to ask the same type of beginner questions that have been answered before in a prior post?
IE: Button configuration, TV vs PC Monitor, How do I setup my panel, where do I find plans to build my cabinet... Things like that?

My vision for this "newbie forum" would be as follows:
Each item below would be like sub areas (posts) under the newbie forum.  These cover the following areas:
- PC Specs & basic configuration
- CP layouts (various examples and trackballs questions)
- Graphics (Art Work)
- MAME Cabinet Specs
- Video (Monitor vs TV, best TV-Out card...)
- and I'm sure there's lot of others...

But the main focus of each sub area (posts) would be specific to that area.. and the all the answers and suggestions will be housed under the sub area.  So a new MAMEer, if they wanted to know about some different CP layouts and how do get started.. they could just read the various information that's in that area.

Which would answer the basic planning questions that all new MAMEer's have and then the "main forum" could be used to handle the advance type questions that one has after finishing the planning stage...

And then from this "newbie forum" ... one could go on and created an updated MAME FAQ.  Which would then act as "NEWBIE Guide to MAME"  

What do you think?  Is this a good idea?  I just the main question too raise is.. BYOAC, how hard is it to create a new forum??

Again,  it's just an idea... as it would help get people the information their looking for to get started right away, and it would help solve the same type of questiong being asked over and over.

-GGKoul


(Granted, I know if someone were to do a search for prior posts ... they'll probably find this starter information.  But did you know what to ask or look forward when you first started??)

[cdbrown]

That sounds like a great idea ggkoul.  I find searching through the existing forums and the archived forums sometimes difficult and don't always end up finding the answers I need.  

The newbie section would only be good if those out there that have the knowledge will visit this forum and provide the answers (which I'm sure will be the case ).

Cheers
cdbrown

[Rocket2600]

This is pretty much the "newbie" forum. I mean, this is the board to ask anything. The whole site is a springboard to get started. After reading some of the examples and still have questions this is the place to ask. No matter how trivial it may seem, just ask. As long as it's not a rom request or the same post 20 times over (IE- "what is the best video card") you'll get the answer. Even us that have been visiting the site for years now still have questions that we post here to get help with. After posting also visit the chatroom. Most poeple pop in around 9PM'ish Eastern Time. There you'll get the best straight answers anywhere. Welcome to the hobby and good luck!

And as always....Game On!
~Rocket2600

http://www.geocities.com/rocket26000/mamecab.html