Fixing old arcade cabinet to Mame cabinet

[MarkH.]

I purchased an old arcade cabinet that has all the controllers already still in the system.  there is no screen.  the controls are all wired into 1 connector (as you can see in the pics on my site), I was wondering if there is a connector that this can go into, which can then go into a usb for a computer?   If possible i would prefer not to replace all the controls.  any help would be much appreciated!

http://www.geocities.com/dude-ly/arcade

mark

dude-ly@rocketmail.com

[sidekick]

you can pick up an encoder and rewire the controls...

you may want to search around when it comes to deciding on a keyboard encoder

the two most common places for keyboard encoders are:

http://www.ultimarc.com

http://groovygamegear.com

what games do you plan to play for your system? You do realize that that CP is limited to 3 buttons per player, so if you plan on playing fighter games you may want to pick up 3 more buttons per player.

[MarkH.]

you can pick up an encoder and rewire the controls...

you may want to search around when it comes to deciding on a keyboard encoder

the two most common places for keyboard encoders are:

http://www.ultimarc.com

http://groovygamegear.com

what games do you plan to play for your system? You do realize that that CP is limited to 3 buttons per player, so if you plan on playing fighter games you may want to pick up 3 more buttons per player.

do i have to rewire the controllers?  i just got a message from somebody else saying to just buy one of these http://www.ultimarc.com/jpac.html and thats all i need.    he didnt say too much else.  i just want to have everything set out in my mind in how i want it before i go buying anything.  

thanks for the tip on the buttons.  i never thought of that.  

[NickG]

In case that guy didn't PM you again:
Yes. the jpac is all you should need, and you won't need to rewire them; just plug it into your jamma connector.  If you decide to add more buttons they can be wired to the screw terminals.

[CheffoJeffo]

Agreeing with NickG (assuming that is a JAMMA harness as it appears to be), except you will still have a monitor issue.

Now, if you plan to use a PC monitor, then you can ignore the video-on on the JPac and things will be fine.

If you want to use an arcade monitor, then you will need to connect your monitor to the JAMMA harness a video card that can drive the arcade monitor (standard arcade monitor runs at 15Khz, standard PC monitor at 31Khz) and will plug your VGA cable into the video-in on the JPac.

More info can be found in the wiki and the Monitor forum.

NOTE: The JPac has spots to connect buttons 4-6 (which aren't part of the JAMMA specification, so not on the harness), so don't worry about that.

Cheers.

[markh.]

Agreeing with NickG (assuming that is a JAMMA harness as it appears to be), except you will still have a monitor issue.

Now, if you plan to use a PC monitor, then you can ignore the video-on on the JPac and things will be fine.

If you want to use an arcade monitor, then you will need to connect your monitor to the JAMMA harness a video card that can drive the arcade monitor (standard arcade monitor runs at 15Khz, standard PC monitor at 31Khz) and will plug your VGA cable into the video-in on the JPac.

More info can be found in the wiki and the Monitor forum.

NOTE: The JPac has spots to connect buttons 4-6 (which aren't part of the JAMMA specification, so not on the harness), so don't worry about that.

Cheers.

thanks guys for your input.  

one last question, how big of a differnce would the video be for an arcade monitor vs a tv?  are arcade monitors easy to come by?

[shardian]

http://www.oscarcontrols.com/monitors.shtml

This article was very helpful when I first got into this stuff.