Possible to run 2 or more cabs from single PC?

[Afterburner]

With PC's now coming in dual and quad core flavors, and few applications that take advantage of the extra processors, it seems like being able to run multiple instances of mame on a single PC should be possible.

I was thinking a PC with a dual core CPU and at least a dual monitor setup, if not multiple video cards, could do the job.

Has anyone done this?

Keeping the controls separate might be a bit of a job, but if each cab was a dedicated platform with different style controls, it seems possible.

Cab 1 - Upright with standard buttons, 4/8-way joysticks, trackballs.....
Cab 2 - Sit down driving cab with analog wheels, pedals, shifter, and analog joystick for flight sims
Cab 3 - Walk-up style with large screen for lightgun games.

Shouldn't be too much overlap in those controls should there?

Would I need to run each instance of mame under a different user in XP?  Some video card drivers/software let you define which apps go to which displays.   Can you define a specific display for a specific user?

Just seems like a single PC would be much easier to maintain than 3 separate ones.

Has anyone done something like this?  Am I missing something?

[TOK]

My issue has always been that if I had a computer powerful enough for that, it'd be my main desktop.
My MAME cabs have traditionally been dumping grounds for my old hardware, from the P3/866 in my bartop, up to the 2gzh P4 in my main standup.

Other than a 7 year old power supply crapping out in the bartop, all of the machines have been maintenance free. They're really only on for a few hours a week. I also always know that if one machine won't run, they're all independent so another will. 

[Afterburner]

Yeah, my current upright cab is the receptacle for old hardware.

I've got another 3yr old desktop that is my primary one, but I almost never use it anymore.  My laptop has become my primary PC for day-to-day use.

Unfortunately my desktop is old enough it doesn't have the horsepower to run a lot of the PC-based games I'd like to play.

So I'm looking at a new PC build specifically dedicated for gaming.

[FhM]

Not arcade related but heres a computer that supports 6 monitors and keyboards so its along the same sort of principles that your on about:

http://www.tldp.org/LDP/LGNET/124/smith.html

[crummy]

You'd need a *lot* of trickery to get that working, and it's probably not possible in plain Windows.

The biggest obstacle I can think of is input. In a normal cab you'd have the equivalent of two mice and two keyboards hooked up, both inputs would have to be restricted to a single core and not leak over to your other screen. I don't know how to do but I would guess it'd be far more hassle than it's worth.

[Afterburner]

My thinking to get past the input problems would be to have each cab as it's own user in XP.  I was thinking that might be a way to segregate the inputs.

But I suppose that means I'd probably have to set up a specific hardware profile for each "user" account to lock out controls from one cab to another.

Not quite sure how all that would work out though.  Keep the thoughts coming though....I'm looking for a showstopper and I'm sure there are things I haven't considered.  The input problem might very well be the big one.

[Afterburner]

Not arcade related but heres a computer that supports 6 monitors and keyboards so its along the same sort of principles that your on about:

http://www.tldp.org/LDP/LGNET/124/smith.html

Yep, I knew this was possible in Linux....that's what I run on my desktop.  Been a linux user since about 1992 and have always run it as my full-time OS.

But I was hoping to keep things simple with XP...I really don't want to try and run a really intense driving sim game for windows on wine.

[Daniel B.]

I would think it would be possible with a simple kvm switch if you weren't trying to play them all at the same time. I have a sweet 10 port belkin one that does dvi/vga/usb/ps2. I would look into them if I were you.

[SavannahLion]

NVM

[u_rebelscum]

AFAIK, keyboards and mice aren't any more difficult to see separately than joysticks & gamepads (in mame; about 0% of other apps use RawInput which make it possible in mame).  Mame currently supports multiple mice & keyboards, and can tell them apart (disabled by default, though; options -multimouse & -multikeyboard).  "Just" map mame1 to use joy,mouse&keyboard 1, and mame2 to joy,mouse,key 2 (but see next PP).

The biggest problem is sharing the video, inputs, and especially sound outputs between two applications.  DirectX (video, sound, joysticks) and RawInput (mice & keyboards) aren't really designed for two apps to be actively running at the same time.  And you'd need two sound cards to keep the sound outputs separate as (AFAIK) all sound cards are designed for Personal Computers with one speaker system.  Heck, windows is designed for a PC, so there's the "active window" thing to get around.


A FWIW, some mameDev are thinking about complete getting mame able to run multiple instances of itself at the same time (mostly for emulating linked cabs).  I've heard it's already "pretty far along the way in current mame" over at mameworld.info forums.  Don't hold your breath though, I'm guessing it'll be in the twenty teens before done.

[blueznl]

So all I have to do is twenty teens and mame will be multi instanced? (Well, so will I after doing 20 of 'm  )

[crummy]

So all I have to do is twenty teens and mame will be multi instanced? (Well, so will I after doing 20 of 'm  )

Would you mind blogging your progress? I've been interested in something like this for a while and I'd like to see your take on it.