Best version of mame to use for a n00b

[8Bit Villain]

Hello all,

I just now got a cabinet and before I wire up my new CP or install the arcadevga, I wanted to get familiar with Mame. So my question is, whats the best version to use for a n00b?

Also with Maximus Arcade no longer getting support, whats another simple front end I should try?

thanks for the help!

[Hoopz]

Those are pretty broad questions and the answers will depend on a variety of factors.

When you say best version of Mame, do you mean like Mame .36, .94, or .145?  The answer to that will depend on the computer specs that you plan on using, what games you like to play (classics, fighters, everything, etc), etc.

Or do you mean like MameUI, MisfitMame, etc which are variants of Mame itself.

Regarding front ends, there are a lot of different ones that you can try.  There's a stickied poll in the Software section that shows what's popular.  I'd suggest taking a look at some of the themes for the various ones and see what you like.  You can customize them all very much too. 

Not the most helpful answers I know, but if you give a little more insight on what you want/need, you'll get a lot of suggestions.   

[Rando]

8Bit,
As a fellow n00b, I used the most recent version of regular MAME, and have it working using the MALA frontend.  There is a MALA forum on this site and points you to some helpful WIKI's and such.

Luck!

[8Bit Villain]

I meant what version is easiest to use. Such as MameUI, or Mame32. My computer is pretty beefy, quad core, 8 gigs of ram. I know its over-kill but a customer didnt want to pay me for the work I did so after 60 days of no payment I can legally keep it, so I am.

[DaveMMR]

8Bit,
As a fellow n00b, I used the most recent version of regular MAME, and have it working using the MALA frontend.  There is a MALA forum on this site and points you to some helpful WIKI's and such.

Luck!

+1  Recent MAME is the way to go for someone just starting out. This way, you're not worrying about things like ROM versions or bugs that may have already been fixed.  Once you're familiar with it, you can start trying out older versions for performance issues, etc.

And MALA is fairly straightforward for new users with many pages of documentation available on these forums and on their official site.

EDIT BASED ON YOUR REPLY: Just regular MAME is the best as it works best with Frontends.  MameUI (or 32, whatever), are training wheels you don't really need - running regular MAME is easy enough without a frontend; a frontend makes it a no-brainer as long as the options are configured correctly.

[8Bit Villain]

Thanks for all the replies!