First attempt at a CP and need advice

[Swatwolf]

Hello all, first off the kudos for you all leading the way and getting me on track with my first MAME build.  So the question or request I have is to look at this CP and give me your advise.  The Cab it is going into is an old Taito Double Dragon that was gutted.  The area from the old CP was about 23' wide and 8' deep.  Well as you all know that is not big enough so decided to go with the "T" shaped CP and came up with this.  The button under the Trackball is a Turbo Twister spinner.


All advise and remarks are welcomed.


 

[xmenxmen]

You might want to consider cutting the cab like other and myself to be more like the lucid style.  Then you can build a box and put a regular cp like alot you see here.  This would also make it easier for you to layout the controls.

Okay, after a little looking, i found one.  severhed did an excellent job.

http://www.severdhed.com/arcade.html

[unclet]

I would recommend:

1) Move the spinner to the left of the trackball.  It is surely going to get in the way if people are playing "Golden Tee" and other trackball games.  I would think it would hit the forearm of the person spinning the trackball.

2) Put left/right flipper buttons on the side of the control panel so you can play some Visual Pinball and Future Pinball tables.

3) You did not mention what buttons 24,25,26,27 do.  I am assuming they are player1 coin/start and player2 coin/start buttons.  If this is the case, you might want to consider putting left/right click buttons so you can use your trackball as a mouse.  Some people may say to simply have a pullout drawer in your control panel which has a mouse in it, but I find having mouse left/right buttons on the control panel itself a necessity when playing some PC games on the cabinet (ex: Feeding Frenzy).   Also, the buttons are just useful when you are configuring stuff.

4) Make sure you have a PAUSE button on there so people can go refill their beer or get rid of the beer they already consumed

5) Some admin buttons like Quit and Reset would be nice as well .....


Oh yeah .... welcome to BYOAC !

[Swatwolf]

xmenxmen, well I was thinking at first to cut into the cab but wanted to save that as a last resort.

Unclet kind of like these pics is what your thinking?  With buttons on the side.

BEER button.....excellent choice, did not think of a pause, but ohhh yes it will be there hehe

[unclet]

Looks good, but I would recommend putting the spinner on the left side of the trackball so the layout to play Tron (spinner left hand, joystick right) will be better.   This way when you decide to switch out the right player joystick with a Happs Super Top Fire button joystick, then you can play Tron.        Ok, perhaps this will never happen, but you never know.

I would also drop the center mouse button .... no real need to ever have three buttons, just a left/right one.

[severdhed]

You might want to consider cutting the cab like other and myself to be more like the lucid style.  Then you can build a box and put a regular cp like alot you see here.  This would also make it easier for you to layout the controls.

Okay, after a little looking, i found one.  severhed did an excellent job.

http://www.severdhed.com/arcade.html

first of all to xmenxmen...thanks

and to get back on topic..


your panel layout looks pretty good, i'd say ditch the middle mouse button.  also having the spinner directly above a joystick can make it awkward to use.

pinball flipper buttons are always a good choice, even if you decide not to play pinball on the cabinet, they make nice pause buttons.