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Buy vs Build vs Buy & Build
koolmoecraig:
I tell you what. You are much better off buying a competely "dead" cabinet.
You can get a dead classic for dirt cheap. I picked up and painted over and converted Mad Planets cabinet at auction 2 weeks ago for $37. The coin door is there, the control panel is there(ready to be modified) and the lighting and power is usually there.
Strip the sucker and repaint and you are good to go for dirt cheap.
Roughy:
I'm not really concerned about the coin door or the this-or-that.
I don't want to strip down an old cabinet and try and figure out how to make things fit.
I do believe that I am very much at the "Buy" stage of things.
I like the UAII and I like the Dream Arcades kits.
I am leaning more toward the UAII because of the immediate lower-end cost. Coincidentally, DA upped their price $50 tonight, which also creates an impact.
So, if I'm leaning toward a UAII, is there anyone who'd be willing to do some off-thread, email coaching for the control panel? I was serious when I said that I'd make it worth your while--that is, I'll probably be a mildly annoying person as I try and learn AND get what I think I want/need all at the same time so I don't think anyone should take that on for free.
Mostly, I want to plan what I need, figure how to design it, design it, order *all* the parts I need and understand how to slap those together. If it's as easy as most of you make it seem, then I'm not real worried.
Anyone?
SOAPboy:
--- Quote from: Roughy on December 02, 2005, 03:13:56 am ---I'm not really concerned about the coin door or the this-or-that.
I don't want to strip down an old cabinet and try and figure out how to make things fit.
I do believe that I am very much at the "Buy" stage of things.
I like the UAII and I like the Dream Arcades kits.
I am leaning more toward the UAII because of the immediate lower-end cost.
--- End quote ---
Roughy:
Ill do you one better.. buy saints book..
http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0764556169.html
Myself, havent bought it, but its worth it for someone just starting out, and even people who have done a little work on machines..
Still have questions, people here will help
--- Quote ---
--- End quote ---
Sure, I could buy the book--not a bad idea at all, but again, I don't want to build something.
Now I'm asking to pay someone for their time to help me articulate what I want/need from a Control Panel perspective. So I could buy that book or put that money to someone else with more expierence than I who could say something to me like "don't put the trakball there; you'll only smash the sh@t out of your palm on that <thing>" and save me additional costs down the road.
Hey, it's the holiday season; just trying to help and be helped!
quarterback:
Hey Roughy,
I can totally understand not wanting to 'build'. I bought a 'project cab' over a year ago and still haven't found the time to fix it up. I can't imagine how behind I'd be if I was starting from scratch.
As far as your offer/request for help, I'd say that you should just take advantage of the resource known as BYOAC. There's really no reason to pay somebody to help you with deciding where and how to layout your cab; I mean, that's what this forum is all about.
If you really would rather compensate somebody for one-on-one email advice instead of forum-posting advice, then that's fine, but I think it's unnecessary AND you're limiting yourself to one opinion. Some of these things are subjective and very knowledgable and trustworthy people will still come up with different answers to the same question. OTOH, if you post your questions here in the forum, then you get multiple sides of the debate.
Examples of things that are debateable:
(1) Angled joysticks for players 3 & 4?
(2) 2player CP v. 4player CP?
(3) LCD v CRT?
(4) Microswitches v. leaf?
(5) Dedicated 4-way or waste of CP real estate?
etc etc etc
I can tell you my firm beliefs on all of these, but you'll find that others completely disagree with me. In fact, your original question is a good example of this. "Build or Buy"? I (and others) would recommend "buy", while others CLEARLY think that "build" is a better choice. By posting here you get both sides of the coin and get to determine what's actually best for YOU.
My opinion is that you should save your money and compensate some of the great ARTISTS on this board to help you with your marquee, CP art and side art. There are some really talented people here and, if I had the money, I'd totally throw some their way to design my CP artwork instead of ME trying to find the 100+ hours it'll eventually take for me to put together something I like.
If you haven't visited the Artwork forum, you should. I remember the first time I went there and/or the Project Announcements forum and saw what people were designing themselves and I was blown away!
My 2-cents.