Help with control board

[JuddWack]

Hello everyone.  I am very new at this and have a few questions for my first cabinet.  Im planning on running mame in my cabinet so I can play the games I rememebr growing up.  NBA Jam, Mortal Kombat, The Simpsons, etc.  I found a link to a cabinet which I am going to follow as a guide but he did all the controls himself.  I have tried to soder things before and learned I am not very good, and would like to avoid this altogether.

I was wondering if there was a place I could just buy a controld deck.  I definatly want to have 2 player stations with 6 buttons each.

I found this link on ebay
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3677&item=1946872629
does anyone know anything about this?  

Now for these games I think I need a joystick availabe for 8 directions but I am also going to be playing others.  Do many games use the 49-way joysticks?

Im hearing more about joysticks being hacked into keyboards, is this the way to go?

I think thats it for now.  THanks

[Brad Lee]

Hacking keyboards & joysticks- most all that I have seen examples of have been soldered

I just completed a control panel using the Ipac and joysticks & buttons from ultimarc(Happ's are the same) and didn't need to solder a thing. The IPac is all screw terminals, and the buttons and sticks all take the same size quick connects that are just crimped on the end of wire(or spade terminals for the correct words)

Drilling, covering it in contact paper, attaching the controls, wiring and conencting to the PC all took just about 1 hour

I havent really looked at the "ready-made" joysticks other than at the pretty pictures to help with layouts and stuff, but I've heard good things about them

[CCM]

You can build your own control panel without soldering anything.  Just buy the parts from Happ's and use the quick disconnects to attach the wires to the switches.  It's actually very easy to do.  I just finished my first cabinet.  

I've heard that the X-arcade panels are good, but they are a bit expensive, if I were you I would build my own.

I wouldn't hack a keyboard, just buy an i-pac from ultimarc, http://www.ultimarc.com/ipac1.html  it's the best investment I made!  It's so easy to setup!  There is no way I would waste my time hackng a keyboard.

I really don't know much about the 49-way joysticks.  I have to 8-way supers from Happ's.

[eightbit]

Its going to cost you $100 or so to build your own, the advantage is you can build it to fit your cabinet and customize it exactly the way you want it. If you build, use an Ipac, It makes it simple. I've done 2 and still haven't had to solder anything.

X-arcade is going to cost you $150 and you'll have to work around their dimensions if you want to build it into a cabinet. An advantage to x-arcade is that you can buy different adapters for different game consoles (xbox, ps2, ect...) and use it with games that don't require analog input.

There are other companys that make ready to use control panels but I think x-arcades in the cheapest.

I would recomend you build your own but the x-arcade is a good alternative.

[BASSOFeeSH]

www.hanaho.com  also sells a pre-made control panel called the "Hot Rod".  Last time a checked(several months ago) it was also $150.

You'd probably only need to buy (2) 8-way joysticks(Happs competitions & Supers are the most popular).  www.ultimarc.com also sells joysticks as well as the I-PAC and Opti-PAC.

My advice would be to check out the pre-manufactured Control panels & then check out the prices at www.happcontrols.com

I built my own & spent more than $150, but I also spent quite a bit on money on things like a USB trackball from Happs & a mini-USB hub to put in my CP.