First Cabinet, STG Strike Gunner conversion to MAME

[InfraredMonkey]

Hi there,

I've been a lurker for quite awhile.  I've dreamed about having my own arcade since I was 9 years old.  I've always wondered what it would be like to have an arcade in your home and how awesome it would be to have all my friends over playing until 4 am.  At first, I was a bit turned away because the likelihood of cost to buy a decent arcade and/or build one from a couple pieces of MDF.

I'll start with some background, sorry in advance for this winded thread.  Originally I thought about having an arcade, so curiously I started to glance on craigslist to get an idea of cost.  I didn't have idea of what exactly of an arcade I wanted.  I thought about buying a dedicated arcade and leave it as that.  Until I found some videos on YouTube of other projects turned into MAME.  I already knew what MAME was, but was kinda unsure how exactly it would work in an arcade.  As I continued watching more videos, I started to stumble onto BYOAC forums, then I started to read other projects and ideas.  I started to fall in love with the idea of an arcade.  What really put the nail on the head of this MAME idea was the YouTube video, Project MAME:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvgFYoz2qpc[/youtube]

I started to figure out the budget for this project.  I'm a college student and work part time.  Cheaper the better, I said to myself.  I started bargain hunting on craigslist and found many cabs.  Most were damage and required more money and work to get it where I wanted for this MAME cab idea.  Until one day, I found this:

For about 200 dollars, it wasn't too bad at all.  A couple things cosmetically here and there, other than that, it was fully functioning.  I drove out to where it was at, played for about 15 minutes and bought it for 150 bucks.

I got it home and the monitor got messed up on the transportation.  Bummer!  I wanted to play it for awhile to get can idea, but unfortunately I got screwed on that.  I started stripping it down and gutting all of it's components.  Inside the cabinet, included a piece of board that exactly the right width, so I used it as a shelf for the monitor or tv.  I worked on stripping it down, priming, then painting it Satin Black.  I reconfigured the control panel and added some buttons.  I got the X-Arcade BYOAC kit and bundle set of 20 buttons and 2 joysticks.  I had my marquee and control panel overlay printed up down the street.  Maximus Arcade is the front end of the MAME cabinet.  My idea was to reuse everything I have around the house that I don't use.  The only things that I've purchased was:
-Casters
-Paints and rollers
-Bi metal drill bit (for the metal control panel)
-L brackets (to mount the computer and subwoofer)
-19" LCD monitor (for 50 bucks)
-X-Arcade BYOAC and bundle set
-Printed Marquee and Control Panel overlay
-Plexiglas

Here is the picture of the cab taken recently (as of last week):

Full Album available for view at my Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=136231&id=547316179

Here is the quick specs on the cabinet:
Computer Components
Free Computer (originally was a lab computer for, Intro to PC)
Intel Celeron D - 2.4ghz (free from ITT Tech, my college)
512mb of RAM (out of an old Dell tower)
80gb SATA Hard Drive (free from the school too)
Windows XP 32bit
Maximus Arcade

Sound
2.1 Computer Speakers with Sub
Onboard Realtek

Controls
X-Arcade BYOAC
Buttons and Joysticks

Visual
19" LCD Monitor
HAPP LCD bezel

I spent about 700 dollars total and this is my first cabinet.

It's not yet, I still want to get some instruction cards.

In future, I would like to rebuild the control panel, because the buttons are alittle too close.

What do you guys think?

[emphatic]

From just looking at that one picture: Nice work! 

The orange T-Molding is a very nice touch. I also really like that HAPP LCD bezel, it makes the screen look much more "arcade-y".

[InfraredMonkey]

From just looking at that one picture: Nice work! 

The orange T-Molding is a very nice touch. I also really like that HAPP LCD bezel, it makes the screen look much more "arcade-y".

Thank you, honestly I didn't think I could do this on my own.  It's absolutely amazining.  I'm still shocked seeing my arcade in the garage, knowing I did this.