Hello everyone,
it's been a long time since I've worked on my project. I've spent the last few days rebuilding the vivarium...
So far, the vivarium is fully assembled, The next steps are to stain/varnish it and install the glasses and do the electrical stuff...
As for the uroMAMEstyx, here's the progress:
- I've received the guts (pic#1).
I'm using my old PC monitor to do my testing/setup until I get a graphic card to output svideo to the TV.
BTW: I intend to go with an ATI radeon chipset. I was thinking getting a X1300.
Is that a good choice? Any recommendation?
- I've received my 2 EMS TopGuns (pic#2).
I will probably test them on my xbox this weekend. The PC test will be later when the
CPU is setup. As you may have read, the guns actually look more like plastic than metal
(like on the box picture). But I think they still look good.
When I babysit my nephews, the oldest one (9 years old) always want to play to Halo on my xbox, but since my sister don't really appreciate the "mature theme" of the game, he's not allowed to play (in fact, I'm not allowed to let him play). Wait till she sees him shooting zombies with realistic looking guns
(I'm just kidding sister...)
As for the cabinet assembly. In the original UAII plans, the first panels they assemble are the upper side panels screwed into the base of the cabinet with 6 screws on both side. Since I already laminated the upper sides with stainless steel, it's obvious I can't use screws through the SS, so I decided to use a combination of wood and metal brackets (pic#3).
It took me a long time to figure out where to install the brackets in order to simplify the final assembly of the upper and lower part of the cabinet and have a solid cabinet.
The wood brackets are used wherever I was able to since I consider them to be more stable that the metal one (more surface for support) (pic#4). I used glue + screws.
The metal brackets are used when the wood bracket might be too visible. I used the for the top panel and speaker shelf, since using wood bracket would have been visible in the marquee (pic#5).
Finally, I used a combination of wood + metal brackets for the side panel at the TV shelf level (pic#6). The wood brackets are there to align the upper part on the base when it will ready to assemble (the wood brackets will lay down on the TV shelf). The metal brackets are there to secure the top panel on the base. So far, I'm using 4 brackets per side. I hope this will be solid enough
However, I think when I'll need to move the cabinet (like across stairs) and need to incline the cabinet, I won't take any chance and will disassemble the 2 part on case something breaks... So I'll plan the marquee and side logo lighting connection accordingly....
Here I see my self with a friend moving that huge thing. I hold the base, my friend hold the top, then CRRRRAAAACK, the 8 screws give up, the cabinet split into 2 part, the CP is crushed, the TV explodes, The TV glass breaks, the speakers implodes, The CPU takes into fire ... and I ... start crying
If you have some recommendation for the assembly or for the graphic card, please let me know.
As you see, it's not much, but it's still progressing
That's all for tonight. I'm going to bed