The NEW Build Your Own Arcade Controls

Main => Main Forum => Topic started by: mvolke1 on October 04, 2006, 06:40:42 pm

Title: iMac bartop
Post by: mvolke1 on October 04, 2006, 06:40:42 pm

I have an old iMac I thought would be great for a bartop. It has all the sound and video ready to go, plus it would be compact inside a cabinet.

Does anyone know if arcade controls can be programed for macs, and would it be easier to make them USB and run the whole thing USB, including the trackball? I don't know if that's possible.

Let me know if you guys have any suggestions.

Thanks.

Matt

Title: Re: iMac bartop
Post by: DrumAnBass on October 04, 2006, 07:24:10 pm

Yah I know I have seen a few people post mac based projects like this one: http://www.bishopzone.com/bishopzone/projects/tabletops/galaxian.html

As a long time Mac user, these always catch my eye! However for my project I opted to piece together a cheap PC

I would think USB would be the way to go. The GPWiz from http://GroovyGameGear.com should work fine in a Mac. I don't know if there is a Mac equivilant to "Joy2Key" that can re-interperet gamepad button inputs into keyboard  keypresses but I bet there is... That might be essential for triggering admin commands like 'esc' etc. I have a GPWiz based control panel that I built but I have never hooked it up to my Mac to test it. Standard USB trackballs should work as well, but again I have never tried it - I am using the same kensington trackball hack outlined in the above link.

Title: Re: iMac bartop
Post by: mvolke1 on October 04, 2006, 08:14:51 pm

Awesome! Thanks for the pointers. I'll definately look it up. Seems like it should be pretty simple once I have it figured out in my brain.

Title: Re: iMac bartop
Post by: Stingray on October 05, 2006, 10:27:38 am

My cab runs on a Mac with a USB iPac. No issues.

-S

Title: Re: iMac bartop
Post by: MinerAl on October 05, 2006, 10:45:17 am

Quote from: Stingray on October 05, 2006, 10:27:38 am

My cab runs on a Mac with a USB iPac. No issues.

-S

Me too. USB Optipac for the trackballs, and USB Oscar spinner. Works like a champ.

If you're running MacOS 9 the Launcher makes a decent poor man's front end.  Just make aliases to all the ROM files, and make MacMAME the default for opening ZIP files and you're good to go with nice one click interface.  You can even set the Launcher to open full screen at startup, so that other than the MacOS startup screen it's a dedicated MAME machine.

Title: Re: iMac bartop
Post by: gnateye on October 05, 2006, 11:49:49 am

3 cabs runnin macs with usb ipacs, i find the pre-os x mame runs fastest, just on my setup at least....