A different sort of a project

[pixelchallenged]

Hi all
I am an old gamer from the 80's spent many an afternioon in the local arcade playing those great classics.
  I was on a trip recently with a friend and he told me how you can play those old games still and make your own cabinet for it. wow!
 So I started researching. This was about two months ago. Since then I found all these new terms like emulator and rom. Loaded the Mame program and some roms and started to play them on the keyboard. Yea! these were the real games I remember controls suck but these were the games.
 So here is where I am, Tried the keyboard hack naa no good. Ordered the hagstrom ke-usb36 keyboard encoder.
 Worked like a dream. Stripped wires and hooked up some buttons. all went well. Contacted Quarter Arcade and ordered buttons, two joysticks 8 way and a two way.
 Everything got here about three weeks ago. The wife thinks that I am the mad scientist in the garage lately. Made a piece of wood with some of the controls mounted and tried to play a few games. Took me forever to find out the "input controls for this game" thing but now all is well. I then thought that I did not want this piece of wood on my lap all the time. So I built a pedestal that I could put in front of the television downstairs. with this gameboard on top. So how to connect the tv to the computer. I went with the s video hook up. It seems to work well except that asteroids is really dim and I cant see my own fire.
I will post some pics tommorrow. Be kind, it is still a prototype. The concept here is to build a podium style arcade control center that has multible controls. The controls I have in mind are joysticks one trackball, multible buttons and a gun. I will also have a pull out keyboard with the computer heart housed in the interior. The unit will only be 2 feet tall and about 18 x18. It will be heavy but I will be able to take it to friends houses for parties and all I willl need is an outlet and an s video jack..

[EwJ]

It seems to work well except that asteroids is really dim and I cant see my own fire.

The unit will only be 2 feet tall and about 18 x18. It will be heavy but I will be able to take it to friends houses for parties and all I willl need is an outlet and an s video jack..

For dim vector games, have you tried increasing values for vector beam width and intensity in mame.ini - vector options (near bottom)?

Sounds like you've got it well under way already.  Have you seen some of the portable projects here?
Here's a few fine examples for inspiration : 1  2  3  4  5  6  7
Happy building! (post lots of pics)

[severdhed]

good luck and welcome to the community.  it sounds like you are off to a good start.  I'm sure you are already figuring out that this is not a cheap hobby, but it is very rewarding.  make sure you take lots of pictures of your build, and be sure to check out the many wonderful examples, there are alot of projects on here that can be very inspiring (and also intimidating)

[TheGameFan]

good luck and welcome to the community.  it sounds like you are off to a good start.  I'm sure you are already figuring out that this is not a cheap hobby, but it is very rewarding.  make sure you take lots of pictures of your build, and be sure to check out the many wonderful examples, there are alot of projects on here that can be very inspiring (and also intimidating)

Like any other hobby, calculate your estimated cost, then multiply by 3.

[jtslade]

Take that final number and divide by 4 when pitching it to the wife.

[dynasty_trs]

On my project, I am using PSX controllers to be able to use with PS1, PS2, PS3 and PC (MAME, etc...).

When in use on the PS3, I want to use my LCD TV and not the TUBE I have for my cabinet.  For the stand for the CP, I am going to fabricate something that will allow me to utilize the drum stand for rock band as the main stand.  Then just plug into the PlaystationX system and Street Fighter 4 / Tekken 6 is on!!!! 

Then, for the MAME, the CP will connect up to the cabinet.

There are also "retro collections" you can get for the PS2 which I will use as an alternative to the emu stuff.


I can't wait to see some pics.  Sounds as though you are better than half way there.