Main > Project Announcements
VECTORAMA--True CRT color multivector cab [COMPLETE]
alfonzotan:
TL/DR:
I’ve built a multi-vector cab from an empty Atari Space Duel using a Barry Shilmover XY Kit and a USB-DVG, as well as a revamped control panel to support almost every vector game.
It’s called VECTORAMA:
*Updated 12/17/2024 with final configuration
Introduction:
My DIY projects tend to hang fire for a long time. I started planning a plays-everything MAME cab not too long after first discovering arcade emulation on a Power Computing Mac clone all the way back in 1997. I didn't get around to actually building it until over a decade (and a couple of moves, and a wedding) later, and even then I built the control panel a couple of years before getting my act together enough to actually construct the cabinet.
Not long after that project was finished, I got it into my head to build another one, this time to concentrate on vector games. At that time, I had no idea it would ever be possible (to say nothing of affordable) to have a real vector monitor, and so I mapped it out intending to use an LCD with a Mac OS9 computer, as those early Mac emulators did what I considered at the time to be a nice job faking vector graphics on standard screens. Fortunately, I suppose, that project bogged down when the Mac Cube I picked up from a recycling center stubbornly refused to recognize an I-Pac controller board.
My arcade game collection had started just a bit before I discovered emulation, when I spotted a Donkey Kong, Jr. listed in the local want-ads for $35. The monitor didn't work, but a couple of work friends with EE degrees introduced me to the concept of "cap kits" and after I bought and dragged DKJR back to my rental townhouse, we got it operating before the first six-pack was drained. As a recovering 80's arcade rat, I was instantly hooked, and slowly collected more games as my budget and home space would permit.
Flashing forward (quite) a few years, I eventually got more comfortable with CRT tinkering. By the COVID epidemic, I owned seven arcade cabinets plus the homebuilt MAME cab, and I spent a good portion of 2020's down time getting all of them restored and working again. Around that time I also became cognizant of a burgeoning scene for new hardware enabling true vector gaming, and when I ran across an online offer of a new chassis set for a DIY color vector monitor, I figured it was time to jump in.
The Build: Monitor and CPU
Serendipitously, I bought that chassis at about the same time the USB-DVG became available. A modernization of an older MS-DOS based product called the Zektor DVG, the USB version, which provided MAME-driven game output from a tiny Raspberry Pi computer for a vector monitor, was not only affordable but also specifically intended to work with the XY Kit that I’d purchased, so I picked up one of those as well.
Here’s my account of building up a working color vector monitor from those two hobbyist products mated to a CRT from a Walmart Black Friday special that I’d bought about two decades earlier:
https://forums.arcade-museum.com/threads/complete-project-orion-from-black-friday-junk-to-a-color-vector-monitor.485931/
After getting this initial workbench version up and running, I was unhappy with the way the Spot Killer circuit in the monitor chassis reacted to certain games, particularly Asteroids Deluxe (which was kind of dumb on my part, considering I owned a perfectly good AD cab already), Space Fury, Space Duel and Rip-Off. The Spot Killer was too sensitive, and kicked in enough to make those games unplayable.
I monkeyed around with the resistors around the spot killer circuit, only to find that now I had permanent spot killer and no picture at all. Eventually despairing of my ability to ever fix this thing, I put the whole kit and kaboodle on the shelf and left it there for a couple of years.
Phase I: Cabinet, Controls and Initial Build
This project kept nagging at me, even after I added my all-time favorite vector game, Tempest, to my collection and got it working. I love vectors, and every year they are getting harder to find and more expensive, and nobody has made a new vector tube in almost 40 years. Even if I had an unlimited budget and time/skills to keep them up, I don’t have room for many more arcade games, period. So it was either a multi that I already had a whole lot of parts for, or bust.
I had pretty well resigned myself to building a DIY cabinet. Which I could do: I’ve done it before, but (a) I’m never going to be mistaken for a carpenter, and (b) it’s way too much like actual work, so I dawdled. Then around Thanksgiving of 2023, an old friend with an arcade repair and sales business in my area popped up with the ideal platform for a multi-vector project: a gutted Atari Space Duel.
(Dog not included)
After getting the cabinet home, I went back to the parts closet and retrieved the Orion vector monitor and the USB-DVG setup… which still didn’t work. Apparently I don’t have any benign gremlins living in my basement.
To my simultaneous chagrin and relief, I eventually discovered that the full-time spot killer and accompanying lack of a picture were not due to any tinkering I’d done on the XY chassis, but rather to a bad USB cable between the Raspberry Pi and USB-DVG. Once that was replaced, the picture came right up and I was back in business.
Let that be a lesson unto you, kids: always check the simple stuff. That monitor sat in a closet for two years, because it never occurred to me to swap out a $2 USB cable.
Even better, I learned shortly after getting the screen back up that Mario Montminy, the developer and last remaining official support for the USB-DVG, had also noted the spot killer issues with the XY Kit and added a new option to the DVG’s firmware that fixed the problem. Minus a few weird but workable issues with the Raspberry Pi software images (see here for details https://forums.arcade-museum.com/threads/usb-dvg-users-support-thread.538841/ ), I was now off and running.
I had planned for a long time to make a custom control panel for this game, and intended to have a local metal shop bend and cut out a design for me. But just as I was getting to the point of hacking out a CAD model (which I am really, really bad at), the esteemed Takeman of KLOV announced he was doing a new run of Space Duel replica panels, with the option to have them made with no holes. As I have a friend who’s capable of punching out the holes I’d need in no time, I jumped on this option.
Because it’ll be a while before Takeman’s work is ready to ship, I also decided to press on with a Mark I version of the cab, which I’ve dubbed Vectorama as a tip of the cap to the 1997 Mac vector emulator developed by Sean Trowbridge. Discovering Vectorama was not only my first real introduction to a reasonable facsimile of vector gaming at home, it was the first time I’d ever played (or even heard of) Major Havoc and Black Widow.
For the initial build, I needed to do… a lot. A partial list:
- Clean up and prep the cab for new parts
- Work up a means to control and configure as much as possible via the front of the cabinet—Space Duel cabs are beautiful and allow for a lot of customization, but they’re also heavy as hell and a huge pain to move. The less often I need to take off the back door, the better.
- Get audio working. The cab has all four speakers (after I removed a mouse nest behind the marquee light) but the Pi 5 has no analog audio output and certainly not a 4-channel amplifier
- Get power set up. The monitor already has its power supply built and ready, only needing a standard 120v socket. The marquee, Pi/DVG and associated parts (audio amplifier and a USB hub) will also need to be plugged in.
- Configure and wire up the OG Space Duel control panel to an I-Pac as a stopgap until the Takeman custom is ready to be installed.
- Add a spinner to the control panel.
- Get the Pi and DVG configured to run with the stopgap control panel.
- Add a USB port accessible from the front of the cab for maintenance and other options.
- Settle on coin up and menu control buttons, and get them installed.
- Work out storage for accessories: a small HDMI panel for Pi maintenance, external controllers, other occasional needs.
- Install and wire up everything.
I removed the coin box and also took off both the coin doors to refinish them. One coin return was broken, I decided to turn that one into a USB port. The other I fitted with a chopped-up 3D print bracket (the posted model wasn’t sized correctly for an Atari door) on the inside to turn it into a coin-up button for the cab. A little dry graphite helped there.
I didn’t want to alter the original Atari coin return bezel, so the USB port here is mounted in a 3D printed replica (which really needs to be sanded a bit more).
Really wasn’t sure what to do about a storage box accessible from the lower coin door (the original coin box is too small for what I had in mind), or for a bracket/shelf/box for the Pi and DVG. Then in one lucky Goodwill trip I found a storage crate and a small wooden CD crate that were both the perfect size. “That’s kinda half-assed,” I can hear the pro carpenters and/or metalsmiths say, and honestly I can’t argue. But they do work and were almost painless to modify for this project.
For the game boards I added a 3D print bracket for the Pi, a shelf, a 3D-print “drawer” and a fan (installation TBD) for the DVG, and attached the audio amp (el-cheapo aliexpress 4-channel) and a USB hub to the outside panels.
I also hacked out an old USB cable to draw 5V for LEDs on the coin door and control panel via a junction block, attached to the back of the upper box. Because the Pi 5 lacks an audio output, I recycled a USB dongle that had seen a lot of use in my Hackintoshing days; happily it was plug-and-play.
(Fan still to be installed)
I rewired all four speakers and replaced the original marquee light (which was shot) with an LCD strip.
I rewired most of the buttons on the SD control panel to get to a happy medium of playability for this first version, and added a drop-in spinner. It certainly won’t play everything in the menu, but it wasn’t meant to: this is a stop-gap while @Takeman does his magic (more on that later).
For power, I slid a 3-prong switched and fused power block into the former power cord slot on the back, wired that to a standard 120v socket in a protective box, and put a power strip next to it. I ran the earth ground out to a common connection point and grounding mesh up the right side to get the control panel and monitor bracket wired to Ground.
Yes, I left the original wiring harness in there. I’m superstitious about this kind of thing. (Original harness has now been removed and sold to a restorer.)
Finally it was Install Weekend. Besides the game boards and storage areas, the only large item that needed a new installation spot was the power block for the monitor. Once that was in I was ready to start moving everything over from the workbench to the cab.
(This is from the very first power-up; wiring has since been cleaned up and secured.)
Biggest hitch came when I discovered the USB hub I’d picked out for the build didn’t work at all. But after I swapped it out:
TO BE CONTINUED...
jeremymtc:
This is awesome, and great writeup! Looking forward to updates.
Ond:
There's some crazy good vector display knowledge floating around this forum between you and bobbyb13! *sigh* I can't start another project. This is awesome BTW and I loved the detailed write up.
alfonzotan:
--- Quote from: Ond on July 30, 2024, 05:48:07 pm ---There's some crazy good vector display knowledge floating around this forum between you and bobbyb13! *sigh* I can't start another project. This is awesome BTW and I loved the detailed write up.
--- End quote ---
I think Bobby would agree that he and I are at best vector amateurs who are still learning on the fly. Fortunately there are some true masters of that technology in the community who are generous with their expertise and assistance.
alfonzotan:
Preview of Coming Attractions:
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
Go to full version