Rebuild of the break room-machine (new sketch 10/12)

[broberg]

Hi!

Since my Reload project is on hold at the moment I thought I would rebuild my first cab totally.. Well I never finished it so thats why. Since it's functional but ugly I have placed it in the break room at work

But you learn from your mistakes, So I'm rebuilding everything more or less, gonna make a new cabinet, a new cp-layout (going from 2 players to 1 player layout) and gonna get a new frontend.
I'm not proud of it, it looks terrible and ended up way to low.. And as stated, never finished.
Don't have any good pictures, but I have a video of the first test-run :




And this is my first sketch of the cab, I'm not in love with it, so I need input!



Since I'm stripping out the old cab I have the buttons and joysticks from that.
So I was thinking about a three button setup plus two pinball-buttons on the side of the cab,
one start, one exit and one button for coin.
The USB interface has the joystick and four button input, the three last buttons is a keyboard hack.


And I was thinkin, to flip the screen, is that a hardware thing or software thing? (ie can I make that work on any computer running xp?)

[drventure]

Wow, that first version does look like a back breaker 

What's the foot rest at the bottom of the new one? Will you be putting stools in front? if so will that really work well as a footrest?

Other than that, it looks pretty good, though, it looks like there's not much space to put the PC to run everything (or are you putting it all in the CP?)

For screen flipping, you can do that in software, though you may end up with black bars on the sides or top of the screen for games where the ratio doesn't match your monitor. I've never had a problem with that, but if you're a purist, you might.

There's also hardware solutions, actually rotating the monitor, but give the size of that cab, I'm not sure you'd have room to do that.

[broberg]

The footrest isn't really a footrest, it's a quick stability fix, The base of the cab is to small so it would otherwise probably tip over when in use.
The pc that is used is actually a small desktop client (15cm high), so it will fit in in tha back of the cab (mounted vertical) and the screen will be a 15" or hopefully a 17" tft.

[broberg]

Made a new sketch of the cab, with more accurate measurements so I could get a feel of the overall-look.
The screen in the sketch is a 15" (4:3), do the empty area above the screen feel... odd? Should I raise the screen?
And the control panel is now at it's lowest point 103cm over the ground, so aprox. 108cm where the joystick is.. Still to low?

[eds1275]

Raise the screen or... vertical???

I like it, the racing stripes are a nice touch. After thinking about it, the pinball flippers look like they would be pretty comfy. Will you be t-molding the inside of the windows?

[leapinlew]

That space shouldn't be above or below the screen at all. I suggest making the arcade wide enough that you can fill that space with a monitor or shorten the machine so the space isn't there. It'll look odd having that large of a gap around the monitor.

[Dervacumen]

Although many don't like it, I would raise the monitor up a bit and use some of the new found space below the monitor for admin buttons - p1/p2 start, esc, pause.  Only takes about 4 inches of vertical space to put those buttons in.
Then I would shorten the cabinet to get rid of the extra space above the monitor.  That way you still shorten the cabinet but not as much, which helps keep the tall sleek look intact.  Just another thought.

[javeryh]

Interesting design - I think those curved columns(?) connecting the marquee area to the CP will crap your style - you need plenty of elbow room!

[Rick]

Unique!  I'm watching intently!

[BlasterMaster]

What if you flattened  the curve (reduced the amount of curve or shorten the back?) then brought the control panel forward a bit out of the way of the cut out arch kind of like your toe kick on the drawing? And as for the monitor, center it and shorten the cab to make it symmetrical around the monitor.
Just my thoughts, looks as if the design has a lot potential with just a little more tweaking.

 

[shateredsoul]

poor tall guy 

[ballboff]

What are you using to sketch up that design?  I used google sketchup for mine, and it allows you to design in 3d, and to scale.  It allows you to get all the right measurements when building the cab. 

A brilliant frontend I would recommend is hyperspin, however it uses quite a lot of power, so a reasonably good pc would be needed, although saying that mine is running off a pentium 4.  Maximus arcade is also a good frontend which is a bit more slick for older machines.

[broberg]

Thank you all for your input! Love it!


The thing is if I shorten the cab I'm afraid the marquee will end up annoying the taller players, Or am I worrying for nothing? (right now the entire cab is 200cm high)
I thought I left enough elbow room (45cm between the vertical arches) but I'll have to make a mock-up of the panel and arches before construction to make sure I have enough room, I hope it's enough for a single player

Or I'll just have to find a bigger screen to fill the empty area! haha


ballboff : I'm using SketchUp 8, building at as I would in real life (ie 19mm mdf boards is marked up in the sketch)

[Nephasth]

You can find more elbow room if you lose the windows.

[broberg]

Well, the windows are actually what defines this cab at the moment, So If the mock-up tells me to loose em I will

Did some minor changes :

[BlasterMaster]

I like the windows, really need to try and keep them. Play style wise if you only have three buttons you are not playing fighters and wont be as aggressive with the controls I think.
It has kind of a retro vibe going for the design that I like. One question how do you think the design would feel if you cut the top back off starting at the top of the marque and
follow angle of the speaker section to the wall? I like the yellow stripes by the way keep them if you can.

[broberg]

Something like this?

[BlasterMaster]

Yep personally I think if feels better.

[yotsuya]

Wow! Much, much better!

[leapinlew]

I like it, but I wonder if those speakers are going to blast anyone out. Anyone have any feedback on how this type of speaker setup would sound?