Cab v1:
PII 400mhz, 256mb RAM, running DOS/Arcadeos with standard res arcade monitor
Cab v2:
Athlon 1600, 512mb RAM, running stripped down Ubuntu (Hardy) on framebuffer (no X), booting straight into advancemenu and running advancemame 1.06.
Special comments:
(a) The Ubuntu install was sorta by default - I had planned to use vanilla Debian Etch but I didn't have an install CD handy!
(b) I have been meaning to switch to sdlmame for several emulation improvements since 1.06 (eg Bubble Bobble) but seems I have some mucking about to do before I get sdlmame running on the framebuffer (one problem is getting SDL to work at all without a mouse being plugged in to the system)
(c) Advmenu works well with one exception: its default keymapping is not really ideal for cab use. This could be addressed I suppose either by remapping keys for advmenu (involves editing the advmenu.rc file by hand) or a 2 step process of reprogramming the IPAC then updating keys for MAME. Neither option is very attractive so I am muddling on with the defaults..
Another thing that gives me the irrits with advmenu is that pressing a letter will jump to that letter in the gamelist. As the player 2 controls (including joystick) are by default mapped to letter keys on my IPAC, this leads to lots of silly jumping around when my enthusiastic 3 year old whacks the buttons while I'm trying to start Bubble Bobble!
(d) To overcome the issues in (c) I have started playing with lemonlauncher and pyrecade, but am having some difficulty in setting these up. The issues mostly seem related to SDL or missing config files - I haven't put any time into resolving these yet but any pointers on running either fe (or another fe that runs without X) would be handy!
(phew! sorry for long post!)