Question from a longtime lurker

[Turbo Ghost]

Greetings all! I've been a member here since 2017 when I had purchased a multicade in an old Star 95 cabinet which unfortunately, due to life situations I had to sell and I wanted to build my own arcade system. As is typical, life has kept getting in the way of things such as this and I've reached the conclusion it's not going to happen and other projects will take priority.
So, I still want an arcade but, I want one I can connect to my TV and play from the couch. I've seen the Pandora's Box units and I've looked into the RetroPie devices and to be honest, I have no clue which of the Pandora's Boxes are legit and the RetroPie just seems to be more than my old brain can figure out as far as ROM's and programming, etc.
I have no need for 10,000 games as many of the systems I've seen advertise. I really just want the games that were in my Multicade. It was the 48 in 1 JAMMA board with the classic arcade games. I never played any of the console games except for My Atari Jaguar so, those games (playstation, xbox, etc.) just don't interest me.
So, can anyone direct me to anything that sounds like what I want? I really like the idea of the Pandora's Box units that are in two pieces so you don't have to sit right next to your opponent but, I can't tell which sites for those are good or scams as I did get scammed by a seller a few years back. I thank you in advance for any help provided! I just want to be able to sit back and play the games I grew up on in the arcades of my youth!
Oh, unrelated but, the only arcade fix I DO get is I have an original cocktail of Space Zap which was my favorite game I played as a child when I would go to work with my Mom at the laundromat where she worked and that game was my babysitter! If you've never played it, I highly recommend it! Addictive!

[rackoon]

sounds like your into the old school arcade games which means your going to need a joystick. With this being the casel I would focus on getting a good control panel and buy the pandora box separate so you can swap out boxes later as they get better or you may even want a cheap mini pc later with mame on it.

[Turbo Ghost]

Very much old school arcade gamer here! Gold Mine, Aladin's Castle, U.S. Mint, etc.  I actually have a fake pandora that I got scammed on. It has nice hardware such as USB joystics and good buttons but, no software or connectivity to hdmi as promised. It will only connect to a PC via USB and will only work when the CD it came with is in the computer. I was planning on modifying it to work with either hdmi or wifi but, I've got so much other crap taking priority I was hoping to just buy something plug-n-play. I'll get it all worked out eventually. Thanks for the response!!