Williams High Impact MAME project

[ArtMAME]

OK...I have been working on this Williams High Impact MAME project for several months, and it is time to post some pics and progress, so here goes:

I went to SuperAuctions in Atlanta back in February.  It was my first time at an arcade auction.  I went there wanting to purchase a dedicated classic like Asteroids, Tron, or Robotron.  There were no Asteroids, Trons, or Robotrons, so plan B was to get a nice non-working general purpose cab and MAME it.  There were plenty of big cabs like NBA Jam, Street Fighter, Blitz, Mortal Kombat, etc. 

I ended up purchasing a Williams High Impact Football that had a 25

[ArtMAME]

Here is the marquee and control panel:

[ArtMAME]

For this post, I will just hit the highlights.  Later I may do a full hosted webpage with constructions details, etc... but for now I will keep it brief...

Next step was to remove the monitor.  Huib1 came over and we started poking around the cabinet.  We removed the speaker panel and it revealed the top of the glass.  We could not get a good grip on it so I got an old PC Raider Joystick with the little suction cups on it.  It worked, and we got the glass off, exposing the 25" monitor  .

We then took out the nuts from the monitor brackets and got a hold of frame and gently lifted the monitor out of the cabinet.  Then we dropped it on the concrete...JK...

We gently laid it on the concrete and then packed it up in a box to store it.  Someday I may look into getting it fixed for cheap...

[ArtMAME]

Removed the board-set, harness, isolation transformer, etc.  from inside of  the cabinet.  Nice looking board-set.

We unhooked the latches holding down the control panel. Four nice Wicos in there and 8 Leaf switch buttons.  These will make a killer Robotron-style control panel.

[ArtMAME]

I put in a 21" Nokia VGA monitor to see what it would look like.  Looked OK for horizontal games, but WAY too small for vertical games.  So off to find a suitable 25" or 27" TV to put in there.

[SirPeale]

Might be able to help you fix that monitor if you post the model.  I see it's a WG, I *think* it's a K7000.  K7000's are dead easy to fix, if you can narrow down the problem.  Is it not doing anything at all?

[ArtMAME]

I had 25 1/8" clearance inside the cabinet for my monitor.  A 25" TV would have fit in there quite well. Unfortuantely, you can't really find new 25" conventional CRTs in the stores anymore.  But plenty of 27" were available. 

I tried to test fit a Sharp 27" TV that I had already, it was 25 3/4" wide, I did not get it all the way in, but I could tell it would go in with some persuasion.  I could not used that Sharp TV because my wife wanted it. 

So I ended up getting a new 27" TV (JVC AV-27530) that had comonent video inputs for under $200.  I had read good things about using component video inputs so I wanted to try them out.  If I could not get them to work, at least I had S-Video.

This JVC TV I got was also about 25 3/4 wide, but I did not want to de-case it.  So I had to modify the TV case a little bit.  First I took off the back cover.  Then I went over to the bandsaw and cut a 4" slit in the middle of the cover on top.  Then I sanded the corners so that they would give a little when shoved into the cabinet. 

I installed some 2x4 crossbeams so the TV could rest on them.  I called Huib1 up and he came over to help me install the TV in the cabinet.  We got it in there with a little persuasion...and it came to rest on the 2x4 crossbeams perfectly    We put on the original bezel and it was a perfect fit  , even though it was made for a 25" monitor. 

The front cover of the TV had quite a bit of flex to it, but it stayed intact.  The rear cover was a little stiffer, especially at the corners.  But the mod worked and the 27" TV fit in there snuggly.

[ArtMAME]

Well we got it in there.  I fired up the High Impact Football game on the MAME.  It looked awesome!!! 

The monitor bezel was perfect too. 

Here is a full view of the machine with the TV installed and the High Impact game running.   

Sorry about the fuzzy picture, my camera is an ElCheapo brand.  But the picture on the TV is great.  This was using S-Video I think.  Later I was able to hook up the component inputs, and the TV picture looked even better, especially for older games.

[ArtMAME]

In order to have swappable control panels, I made a base on which to lay the swappable  control panels.  This base would stay on the cabinet and I would just insert the different CPs on top of it.  It is basically a panel about the same size as the original with a rectangular slot cut in it (about 11"x22" I think).

The base also has the Admin buttons: 1 and 2 players, left, right, up, down.   This worked really well with the MAMEWah front end to navigate, and also adjust the game settings once you are in the game.  I am using an old IPAC2 with default configuration.

I wired RJ45 cable and connectors to the joysticks and IPAC and used female to female RJ45 connectors to mate them together.  This gave me flexibility to experiment and swap different joysticks with out having to re-wire a lot of stuff.  You can see in the picture that I have 4 RJ45 pigtails, one normal USB, and one USB for the GPWIZ49.

The first swappable CP that I finished was the Trackball.  You can see on the underside the two strips of wood that fit into the rectangular slot in the base and keep the swappable CP steady.

[ArtMAME]

The second swappable control panel that I completed was a 49-way to play SINISTAR.  I used an ArchRivals 49-way joystick I got from Ebay and a GP WIZ49 (economy model).

BEWHARE, I LIVE!!!

[ArtMAME]

The third panel I completed was a general purpose panel that is optimized for Robotron, Asteroids, Defender, Phoenix, Ms.Pacman, etc.  pretty much all the normal old-school games.  It has left and right 8-way Wicos and a Suzo joystick in the middle configured as a 4-way.

[ArtMAME]

And...here is the full view of the machine pretty much completed...for now anyway...

Looking at the cabinet, it does not look much different than what I started with, except for the control panel.  I kept the original control panel and all the components and hardware, so if I ever wanted to convert it back to High Impact Football, I will be able to do that. 

I am running component video input now and the old-school games look amazing!!!
Except for Asteroids  ..., but I remedied that problem by going out and buying a dedicated Asteroids... ...

But all the other games look great, even the color vector games look good.  I love having that big playfield for horizontal games.  For vertical games, the picture is about the same size as a vertical 19" monitor.

I had PC speakers shoved into the back at the top, but I re-installed the original speaker and hacked the PCB off a cheap set of PC speakers and connected that to the original speaker.  It is plenty loud enough.

I have actually been playing the cabinet more than tinkering with it lately, so that told me it was just about complete and it was time to post it.

So here it is 

[Buddabing]

I am running component video input now and the old-school games look amazing!!!
Except for Asteroids  ..., but I remedied that problem by going out and buying a dedicated Asteroids... ...

There are a few settings you can tweak on the vector games to make them look better. Try playing with the -beam, -flicker, and -intensity parameters.

[Hiub1]

Sweeeeet.

[ArtMAME]

One thing I forgot to mention is that when running component video inputs, you have to run the games at 640x480 resolution.  This really sucks for Asteroids  , especially on a big monitor, you see a lot of scan lines and it is not smooth at all  . I could run S-video and get 800x600 or 1024x768, but then all my other games would loose a little quality  . 

I tried tweaking those setting on my desktop PC using a 21" VGA monitor and a 29" VGA monitor.  Got it looking better, but this was using 1024x768 resolution.

I tried tweaking emulated Asteroids a lot before I finally got a real one.  I even tried that AsteroidsGL emulator from http://caesar.logiqx.com/php/emulator.php?id=asteroidsgl

This one is really cool because you can substitute different bitmaps for the shots so they look more like the real thing.  You can sort of "emulate" that "electron bath" glow that you get from a vector monitor.  You can even edit the shot bitmaps, make them different colors, textures, sized, etc...

I even got a 27" presentation monitor    like the readme file said to get for the best visual perormance.  This emulator is really good vissually, but the gameplay jitters ocaisionally. 

After a lot of tweaking, I got a chance to see a real Asteroids, it had been 20 years or more since I saw a real one,... man I am OLD  ... anyway, after seeing that, I said:
"I don't even want to play the emulated Asteroids no more, I want the real thing!!!"

So now I got a dedicated Asteroids sitting across from my Williams High Impact MAME cabinet...ahhhh...LIFE...IS...GOOD!!! 

[ArtMAME]

Sweeeeet.

Huib1 in the HOUSE!!! Yeah  boooaaaeeeeyyyy!!! 

[MYX]

Good work man! Glad you were able to make a working solution.

[Zeosstud]

The joystick / button layout you made for your Robotron / Defender panel is the most unique and functional I have seen in along time.  I think its awesome.

Zeosstud

[Hiub1]

I'll vouch for the layout. It works absolutely awesome for Defender and Robotron.

[johnperkins21]

I like this modular panel. The simplicity of it seems like it would work really well. The one question I have, is how do you keep it down? I know that pulling up on a joystick isn't a very common motion, but I would think it might have a slight tendency to pull up and move a little on you. Or is it so tight of a fit with those two cross bars that it takes a lot of pressure to get it off?

[ArtMAME]

Might be able to help you fix that monitor if you post the model.  I see it's a WG, I *think* it's a K7000.  K7000's are dead easy to fix, if you can narrow down the problem.  Is it not doing anything at all?

Yes it is a WG, K7000 or something close.  I have looked into this a little bit.  Me and Huib1 tinkered with it a little, we made a discharge tool and took the neckboard and chassis off.  We are going re-flow the solder joints, do a cap kit, and replace the part that we need to fix it, can't remember what part I needed, but it is posted here somewhere.  I have not gotten around to ordering the parts, but I am not in a big hurry about it since I got my cabinet working very nicely with a TV already. 

The monitor was turning on, but would turn off after a split second. You could not see anything on it when it turned on, except  maybe a line or something before it faded. You  could not hear the tube humming either, it would hum for a split second, then it would stop.  But as far as I could tell, there was 120AC voltage going to the chassis.  I need to look up those old posts, or maybe Huib1 remembers the part I am supposed to get. 

Anyway, me and Huib1 are just playing around with this for experience.  I am not in a big hurry to get it working right now.

[ArtMAME]

I like this modular panel. The simplicity of it seems like it would work really well. The one question I have, is how do you keep it down? I know that pulling up on a joystick isn't a very common motion, but I would think it might have a slight tendency to pull up and move a little on you. Or is it so tight of a fit with those two cross bars that it takes a lot of pressure to get it off?

Thank you everyone for the compliments.   

The base panel is held on with the original CP clips that came with the machine. When I make a new panel I cut it and round the corners, then lay it down and lay the base upside down on it so that I can install the two strips of wood that hold it in place.  I cut the strips a bit long, then I carefully shorten them with my miter saw until they fit.  Once I screw in the strips, I can re-install the base on the cab,  drop the panel into the base and there is no play whatsoever.  It is not really super tight, but I am able to drop it in and pull it out with out having to force it.
   
I have no problems with the trackball or Sinistar panels.  Gravity does the trick with those.   With the Robotron/Defender panel, it stays on there pretty good too, unless Huib1 comes over and starts jammin' on a game of Robotron...

When I prototyped the panel, I used some short blocks of wood screwed to the two strips, so that when I drop the panel on the base, I just reach up into the coin door and turn the short blocks 90 degrees and they keep the panel from lifting up.  The pic show my prototype panel with the short wood block in place.

[johnperkins21]

Somebody else on here is using velcro for their modular panel (I can't remember who, sorry). I wonder if that might work for your application just to give it a little more security. Much easier than the clips through the coin door. If I remember correctly he even said he needed to pry it up, so it's very secure. Just a thought.

[SirPeale]

The monitor was turning on, but would turn off after a split second. You could not see anything on it when it turned on, except  maybe a line or something before it faded. You  could not hear the tube humming either, it would hum for a split second, then it would stop.  But as far as I could tell, there was 120AC voltage going to the chassis.  I need to look up those old posts, or maybe Huib1 remembers the part I am supposed to get. 

Sounds like your B+ is too high.  Remove the glue from the B+ adjustment pot and adjust.