PC Requirements

[TJ335]

Hello,
I’m incredibly new to arcade emulation and have been doing a lot of research, between Google searches and watching YouTube videos.  Originally I heard about RetroPie from a general Raspberry Pi Facebook group which really peaked my interest.  The more I looked I soon realized that using a PC with MAME would be the better choice.  I’m planning to build my own full size cabinet.
I’m mainly interested in the Golden Age of arcade games up through the types of games like Street Fighter 2.  Ideally I’d also like to have the original Atari and Nintendo games too.  LaunchBox looked great to have an easy interface for selecting the games to play.
What would be recommended for the PC requirements?
- Intel i5 or something better?
- 4gb, 8gb or more?
- Would I benefit from a dedicated graphics card?  If so, any recommendations?
- Win 7 or 10?
I’ve seen HLSL mentioned but do I really need that?  I was planning to use a 27” LED monitor, I’m not overly concerned with getting as close to the original arcades meaning a CRT.
For the original Nintendo console, any advice on what I should do when building the cabinet?  Is there a way that I use that controller through MAME?

Many thanks!

[KenToad]

Any modern PC will do what you want, faster processor is better.

What you want to avoid is buying crappy knockoff arcade hardware on Aliexpress or Amazon.

Buy from trusted arcade part sellers like Groovy Game Gear, Ultimarc, Paradise Arcade Shop, FocusAttack, Arcade Shock.

And don't buy a zero delay encoder or anything that looks like it, often bundled with aforementioned knockoff junk.

Welcome to the hobby.

[Phreakwars]

How much ya lookin to spend? There is cheap, and there is elaborate. Just a matter of doing it properly no matter the budget. I have way too many recommendations and combinations for PC based builds that it isn't funny. Personally, I prefer PC over Pi. As for requirements.. yeah, don't sweat it or worry about it. Just to be funny, here is an arcade cabinet I built a few months back that runs on an old Pentium 4 with Windows XP.



So pretty much,... in a nut shell.... if it will PC, it will arcade. If it arcade's, then it can run emulators. Before going any further, again, I ask.. so how much you looking to spend? You have something now you are looking to convert? Want to try your hand at new?

Welcome to the hobby.

[TJ335]

so how much you looking to spend? You have something now you are looking to convert? Want to try your hand at new?

Welcome to the hobby.

Thanks, I’m pretty psyched to build my cabinet and get this setup.  I also have two young kids and think it would be awesome to let them play the same games I did at their age.

I had an old Core Duo 2 system with Vista  that I pulled out of my closet and was going to try out, but I couldn’t even get it to boot so I’m going to have to buy something.  Ideally I’d like to keep the PC around $200-250 if that’s doable.  That should leave enough in the budget for the monitor and cabinet.

[TJ335]

Any modern PC will do what you want, faster processor is better.

What you want to avoid is buying crappy knockoff arcade hardware on Aliexpress or Amazon.

Buy from trusted arcade part sellers like Groovy Game Gear, Ultimarc, Paradise Arcade Shop, FocusAttack, Arcade Shock.

And don't buy a zero delay encoder or anything that looks like it, often bundled with aforementioned knockoff junk.

Welcome to the hobby.

That’s good to know, I actually had the joysticks and buttons in my Amazon cart but I will check out these companies instead.  Thanks for the advice!

[Phreakwars]

Ideally I’d like to keep the PC around $200-250 if that’s doable.

Oh most certainly. If you want something new, I would recommend something like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09DKTSCT9

[Vocalitus]

Ideally I’d like to keep the PC around $200-250 if that’s doable.

Oh most certainly. If you want something new, I would recommend something like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09DKTSCT9

That processor is weak.

Try and locate a 2gb Pi4 or Pi3 and setup Retropie.  The OS is free, software is easy to use. Its a far better solution.

You will be up and running playing classic arcade games with your children in no time.

Your kids will love you for thinking ahead and getting something that has a miniscule carbon foot print than huge one.

 

[Yenome]

Personally i use an i5 4670k with 16gb but i never see more than 4gb of memory usage when running mame. Mame wont use a gpu for emulation but it will use it for scaling and hlsl if you decide to use it. I also have an old amd a6 that can play killer instinct and pretty much every game mame runs before KI was released.

[slybunda]

I using a pentium 4 925 with 4gb ram and runs all neogeo, cps1-3, killer instinct etc with full speed no issues. There are probably some games that will need more cpu power but for the stuff i use it for its working great.

[Phreakwars]

Ideally I’d like to keep the PC around $200-250 if that’s doable.

Oh most certainly. If you want something new, I would recommend something like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09DKTSCT9

That processor is weak.

Try and locate a 2gb Pi4 or Pi3 and setup Retropie.

You are SERIOUSLY calling the J4125 weak and are suggesting a Pi of all things as a better replacement?? I will not disagree that the J4125 is on the lower end of hardware, but SERIOUSLY a PI??? You should recommend BETTER hardware then the weak j4125, not worse... sheesh.

OP, Here is a video I did a while back talking about using the mini PC's

Yes, they are on the lower end when it comes to power, but they are a cheap, compact solution if you wanna get into making arcade cabs.

[slybunda]

I have an old Lenovo q180 that runs a intel atom d2700. It runs mame fine for stuff like neogeo, cps1 and 2 and all old games liie pacman etc. Havent tried it for stuff like 3d games etc but its impressive in the stuff i used it for.
Iv got a tv in the kitchen and a lenovo q190 on it which runs mame and does very well with its celeron 1017u cpu which is sandy bridge or ivybridge architecture.

[Ond]

The Pi 4 should not be dismissed too quickly as a solution for running classic 80s era Mame games. I wouldn't have considered Pi anything as a serious option up until the Pi 4.  I have a bunch of old PCs, laptop boards etc lying around. One of these days I'll do a shootout of identical games across these.  They range from Core 2 Duo, I3, I5 and I7 CPU based boards. I already know that the performance % specs for the games I mentioned across those PCs and the Pi 4 are going to be almost exactly the same (assuming the same basic settings, no HLSL etc.).

No need to get outraged at my assertion  I know there will be small % performance differences across these but in practical game playing experience - negligible.

@ TJ335 - check out some of javeryh's video examples of a Pi 4running Mame games.

[slybunda]

Similar to pi4 price is a nvidia jetson nano board. Seems to have more grunt cpu and especially GPU wise.
Nvidia shield tv does well too i find.

[Phreakwars]

Personal preference is using a socket 1155 era board, Core i5 3570, 8 gigs of ram, Passive cooled GT 1030. Of course, these days you'd be hard pressed for a setup like that for under $250, but performance on one is outstanding not just in emulation, but front end as well. If you want the ease of Windows, for sure go PC. Can't say enough about Attract Mode in a Windows shell.

[Ond]

Personal preference is using a socket 1155 era board, Core i5 3570, 8 gigs of ram, Passive cooled GT 1030. Of course, these days you'd be hard pressed for a setup like that for under $250, but performance on one is outstanding not just in emulation, but front end as well. If you want the ease of Windows, for sure go PC. Can't say enough about Attract Mode in a Windows shell.

The bonus of this setup is that it will easily handle any shader settings in emulation with that GPU.  MAME GLSL and HLSL are quite good these days at getting a nice looking simulation of a CRT on a digital display.  It's still no match for an actual CRT but desirable in some builds.  For the OPs info you can also make use of hardware scan-line generators to get a nice scan-line effect without the need for software processing of the image. The little scan-line generator boards are cheap to buy and easy to plug into a VGA cable. They have dip-switches and pots on-board for various settings.

The OP also asked about Win 7 vs Win 10.  Despite Win 10 being better supported with improved drivers etc I still favor Win 7 over it in MAME builds.  This is mainly because of Win 10s aggressive update and notification behavior intruding on the system.  There's lots you can do to minimize this but ....it's a pain. If you don't care about such things then Win 10 is the way to go IMO.

[Beretta]

Pretty much any system will do what you want.. if you ignore the 3d games in Mame you can drop all the way back to the 64bit p4's.. basically any socket 775 cpu.

Im currently working on a project im going to be using a old dell e5150 (e510) Intel 820 (2.8ghz dual core p4)
You can get these complete systems at your local thrift store for about 10 bucks.. or the closest dumpster.

I had to replace a few caps on the board though as many p3/p4 boards from that era have leaky caps.. Dell inparticular was so bad they got sued.

anyway this system will handle almost every 2d game with the current 0.236.. I think Narc ran only about 110% and I don't recall if KI ran 100% but I noticed a stuttering problem on audio and video with anything over 145 (might be a "this" system specific quirk).. so Im just gonna have a split with 145 as a back up for any games that it can't handle 236 which should be few from my testing.

Paired up with 2 sticks of 512ddr2.. im going to use a slimmed down win7 install which takes up about 2gb of hdd and 300mb of memory.. so that leaves about 700mb for any software.. if you're using a simple frontend like mamewah that leaves plenty of memory for loading those big neogeo games.

I honestly don't expect you to want to use such a old system, what you can do with a 15 year old system.. so newer will have no issues.
I have stacks of old systems and If I don't use them in projects like this they'll never see another life so I try to use the oldest system that will do the job for a given project.

Make sure you're using 64bit windows though cause the performance benefit is very large.


games to test for benchmarking.. I find these to be the most intensive 2d games and will generally give you a quick determination of how the system will preform.

Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3
WWF Wrestlemania (midway)
Rampage World Tour
Narc (despite it's age it has a lot of chips in it and is a pretty intensive game as far as 2d goes)
Street fighter - The Movie
Killer Instinct
Knights of Valour (Optional)
SFIII (CPS3)
King of Fighters 2003 (memory testing.. if it can load this it can load pretty much anything)

You can probably see a pattern there.. midway games tend to be the most demanding in my experience..
Id also throw Primal Rage in there but the protection still hasn't been broken so it's not really worth playing imo.
Use a copy of PC or PS1 if you need a dino Kombat fix.. although I think someone was working to sort of "hack" it for things like red blood.

If you want to dip your toe into 3d try tekken, doa++, VirtuaFighter.. these are bottom rough 3d games.
Or if you want to skip all the above games and go for the one and done.. (other than neogeo memory testing)

Then load up Tekken 3.. it's one of the easier to emulate 3d games but is demanding enough essentially any 2d game (im aware of) will run flawlessly if you can run it.

I have never used HLSL or anything I actually turn filtering off and the only thing I use is screen line effect which is just a overlay png file.
I don't even like bilinear filtering (usually) Im sure requirements go up with that stuff.. Video card might start being important.. not sure.

Try to use the integrated graphics because adding cards to a board kinda sucks.. you have to secure it and it makes the overall foot print larger.

[Phreakwars]

I agree 100% about using Windows 7. Not just because you can bypass updates, but because you can also keep it attached on the network with updates off and do all the work and maintenance on your cab in Team Viewer. Plus, you can customize the bootup animation and shut down screens. My cabs run Windows 7 x64 with current mame, 0.111, & HBMame using Attract Mode. Try running Home Brew on a Pi. I have cheats enabled and high scores enabled in every version as well as artwork and bezels. When running, you would never guess underneath of it all is Windows 7.

[Beretta]

If you're worried about windows updates messing with your setup you can just blacklist it at the router, or keep the gateway blank.. it wont' be able to talk to anything outside the local network..

Im not sure if you can configure windows firewall to block it self or not lol.. I always just disable that anyway.

the only thing you might want network access for is NTP to keep the time on the system accurate.. typically it wouldn't matter unless you're using time for something like auto off and on.. some routers can be setup to act as a time server in which case you don't really need to leave the local network.

I agree though that their really isn't a good reason for it to have access to the internet but having network file sharing can be very handy, I suppose someone out there probably has a netplay setup but most won't.

[nipsmg]

You can kill windows 10 updates through a group policy setting, as well as kill all notifications.

[slybunda]

Just some performance metrics, i ran street fighter 3 3rd strike on my mini pc in mame its got a intel 1017u cpu and unthrottled the game runs at  around 300% speed.
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/75192/intel-celeron-processor-1017u-2m-cache-1-60-ghz.html

[csnow]

I wouldn't do a Core Duo considering a Craigslist i3, i5, or i7 are readily available for cheap and have been out for over a decade now.

[Ond]

I wouldn't do a Core Duo considering a Craigslist i3, i5, or i7 are readily available for cheap and have been out for over a decade now.

I've mentioned Core Duo because it's about as far down the list of PC hardware that Mame will run on that I'd go. I'm running one of my builds using Core Duo because it was a free option i.e. they show up in peoples trash now and then and it suited that particular build just fine.  Common sense suggests always using the fastest PC you are willing to use/pay for emulation gaming.

If I was actually paying for old hardware I'd definitely be aiming at I3 or I5 as a good (cheap) base for Mame emulation.

You guys are so literal some times 

[slybunda]

I got spare cpus sitting here but no motherboards lol. Old i5 750, a i3 4150 and some random pentium CPUs. Will have to hunt down a motherboard at some point.

[Zebidee]

I wouldn't do a Core Duo considering a Craigslist i3, i5, or i7 are readily available for cheap and have been out for over a decade now.

I've mentioned Core Duo because it's about as far down the list of PC hardware that Mame will run on that I'd go. I'm running one of my builds using Core Duo because it was a free option i.e. they show up in peoples trash now and then and it suited that particular build just fine.  Common sense suggests always using the fastest PC you are willing to use/pay for emulation gaming.

If I was actually paying for old hardware I'd definitely be aiming at I3 or I5 as a good (cheap) base for Mame emulation.

You guys are so literal some times 

I'm still using core2duo because it is enough and is what I have, but I'd prefer even an early an i3 or i5 because they'll perform better and use less power. That last advantage, less power, isn't necessarily true for an i7. With MAME there really isn't much advantage with from multicore/hyperthreading, so you may as well choose a low-power i3 (or i5, whatever you can get) build.

[Yenome]

I have never used HLSL or anything I actually turn filtering off and the only thing I use is screen line effect which is just a overlay png file.
I don't even like bilinear filtering (usually) Im sure requirements go up with that stuff.. Video card might start being important.. not sure.

what effect are you using i been thinking about dropping hlsl

[Beretta]

I have never used HLSL or anything I actually turn filtering off and the only thing I use is screen line effect which is just a overlay png file.
I don't even like bilinear filtering (usually) Im sure requirements go up with that stuff.. Video card might start being important.. not sure.

what effect are you using i been thinking about dropping hlsl

mame comes with a few different ones.. try -effect scanlines

they're just PNG files in the artwork folder.

You can also make your own, pure white is transparent when applied..

I've attached some different variations I've come up with.

typically I will use scanlines_2 or scanlines_2b

there doesn't seem to be a performance penalty as it just overlays it on the screen.

I also turn off bilinear filtering cause I don't like the blurry fuzzy look it gives things.

see if you like it

put those files in your artwork folder and added to your command line options:  -nofilter -effect scanlines_2b

[slybunda]

-effect scanlines
thats the one iv been using for over 10 years. only now iv just found out about shaders etc (if its not broke dont fix it lol). i use bgfx now with crt-geom, it does look nicer than just the old scanlines effect.