Any CP layout suggestions anyone ?

[Mamezilla]

Last year I got my hands on an old cabinet which was a bit beaten up.

[Flinkly]

if your low on real estate, i'd get some 49-ways.  then you can play whatever you want without having to flip any switches.  as for having them cut your holes, i'd check the prices, but they might be horendous.  if you had them drill them, you'd obviously have to know ahead of time what you wanted.  i'm using three admin buttons myself, but you could always just use a shift command to not use any, but it wouldn't be intuitive for guests to play.

layout depends on if you want to keep it two player or if your ok playing games by yourself.  if you went single player, i'd do a robotron layout for the buttons.  good luck with the project though.

[Mamezilla]

Thanks for your reply Flinkly.

[Hoagie_one]

if you wanna have a new panel made, contact Gamedork, on these boards.

[Tiger-Heli]

Here's a render of the layout I'm using.  It's approx 22" wide with dual prodigies, but I doubt you'd have room for the trackball with it.

[Mamezilla]

Thanks for your input TH.

[Tiger-Heli]

Thanks for your input TH.  Now I'm wondering if I should try to patch that control panel up, or have another one made.

If it were me, I would ditch the metal panel and build a replacement out of wood.  Wood is much cheaper to work with, and you don't need great skills.  I.e. the button flanges cover the holes if you get them slightly off center/out-of-round, etc. 

By the way, I found that my cabinet was at first an Atari Gravitar that was converted a few times.

Nice style cab.

As for the layout, Tiger-Heli is right and there probably won't be any place for a trackball, unless I get rid of the buttons for player 2.  Since I'm the only one playing games, I probably don't need those buttons, and the second stick would be used for games like Robotron, Karate Champ, etc...

Any comments or suggestions anyone ?

That would be an option.  However, if your anything like me, you 14-month-old may be 5 or 6 by the time you get this converted and working.  Even if I'm wrong, there'll probably be times that friends will come over and "Hey cool - We can play Double Dragon, <Twin Cobra, 1943, Street Fighter, MK, Top Gunner, other two player game> - oh wait, only one set of buttons.  Better in my opinion to add one panel like mine now and mount the trackball on a second swappable panel, but that just my suggestion.

PS: Sorry of my english is a little screwed up since I'm a french-canadian

I hadn't noticed.  Reads fine to me.