Stealthy's 'Back2School' Upright Cab - Start Dec2009 - Design Phase

[stealthy1]

Hey everyone, been viewing these forums for a couple of weeks now, and after looking at various frontends and seeing how awesome some peoples cabinets looked, I couldn't help wanting to build one.

About Me:
I am a 20-year old male from Melbourne, Australia and am currently working as a Electrical apprentice and have been for the last 2 years. Love playing games, whether they are old or new.

My Project
Overall: Wanting to build a 2-player machine, that is capable of running games up to PSX if that's the road I want to go down. I have some old playstation games, that I can no longer play because my play station is broken. Either way, I am considering using the system as a jukebox every know and then when I have mates around and we ain't playing the arcade. Not sure about specifics of the design of the cab, but I am currently planning that as well as my control panel setup. I am thinking I will build my control panel first, and then move onto the cabinet later on. I will be using my old computer to run the arcade.

Controls: Hoping to build a 2-player control layout with 6/7/8 buttons each, as well as a 4/8 way joystick. Also would like to put a trackball on the panel, but that may be added further down the line, as per finances.  I would like the trackball to glow and be white, with 2 buttons to be used as a mouse (leaning towards 7 buttons because of this).
I would like to put a player 1 and player 2 start button and admin buttons such as Power, Pause and a volume control mounted somewhere on the cabinet, the power and volume will probably be hidden.

Gear
2 Mag-Stick Plus 4/8way Joysticks
IPac2 Keyboard Encoder
18 Illuminated Buttons - Various colours, and undecided on the very one
LedWiz
Electric Ice Trackball
2 Player Coin Door

Frontend: I will be using Hyperspin as it is an amazing looking program and is very customizable.
If anyone has any advice I would be happy to take advice off anyone.

Questions
Will be updating questions here with answers throughout the project.
What is the best place to get control panel gear(buttons and joysticks) from in Australia?
www.ozstick.com.au, www.in2amusements.com.au
If I will be using 18 buttons plus two joysticks what is the best keypad encoder to use, may need spares for later on?
I-Pac
I am a 6ft tall bloke, I am not postive on how to mount the control panel, anyone have any heights to have the control panel at, as well as how high to have the entire cabinet?

Updates

14th December 2009
Have been really busy, but continually sketching control panels when I can, really struggling to find something that I like, size wise. At the moment looking at Knievels Neon Mame layout, and Gamesters Arcade Galaxy.

15th December 2009
I have found a design I like for the arcade, as well as the name for the cab 'Back2School'. It will have a blackboard type side art with sketches of characters from favorite games and a desk like control panel to make you feel like your back at school. Photo-shop work being done now.

[n88n]

no real advice to give but good luck and make sure to post your build process.  Ask away with any specific questions.

[TonyDanza]

no real advice to give but good luck and make sure to post your build process.  Ask away with any specific questions.

What he said.

Also, bump.

[Turnarcades]

As a regular cabinet builder myself who has always had to consider build budgets and 'working with what's available, I have a few pointers:

1) PSX is now easily possible. Using the pSX emulator (instead of the plug-in/hardware dependant ePSXe), you can get perfect performance and about 90% ISO compatibility on a simple P4 system as low as 1.8Ghz. A common recurring echo on this forum is to overkill the PC, but we are masters of eeking performance from lower-spec machines so trust in this advice. Same goes for MAME.

2) HyperSpin is very nice, but is very resource-dependant and currently has a bit of an awkward list generation method. You may want to consider something a bit more 'lightweight' to begin with as there are simpler front-ends out there that still have many features and can look good. It's my belief an FE shouldn't need as much resource to run as games do.

3) If going as far as 5th-gen emulation (PSX, N64), don't clutter your panel with extra gameplay buttons you will rarely use. I used 8 buttons per player on my first cabinet (actually incorporating a hacked PSX) and you soon find you don't really need them all. Many games rarely used more than 6 for main gameplay on PS1 or were re-mappable in-game, so I'd say ditch L2+R2. Similarly with N64, you can frequently map rarely-used buttons to other buttons on your CP. I usually mapa few on player 2's controls or like with other consoles, map certain buttons to the 'coin' and 'start' buttons on the control panel.

4) If building a panel first, make it a size and shape that will easily integrate into a cabinet design at a later date. Also, never scrimp on control panel parts and the interface, as these will ultimately 'make or break' your machine.

Good luck with the build!

[stealthy1]

Thanks turnarcades,

I was thinking about buttons, I do realise 8 may be too many, I think I might go with 7. With a 4 button layout on the top line, and 3 down the bottom. I am really busy at the moment, and havent had a chance to map out a control panel, hopefully do this next week. I will be updating with links to the control panel parts I will be looking into buying.

[stealthy1]

Hey, does anyone have a working link for CPSketcher that will work in windows 7. I am trying to use this to get a layout for my control panel. But cant seem to get a working download. Also updated questions at the top.

[Lo_Wire]

Try http://www.ozstick.com.au there pretty good, most of its chinese stuff though...

might have to go american if you want the pro gear, but if your casual its all good.

[Turnarcades]

Genuine cabinet and control panel heights varied within a certain range, though you may find these original dimensions may not be ideal for you as a grown adult (playing as kids we were fine). Rather than have a very tall cabinet to get the monitor at an ideal eye-height, use a more slanted monitor section to improve the viewing whilst looking down slightly.

Comfortable control panel heights are between 30-38" from the floor, usually with a slight incline from the front to the rear (say, around 1" increase in height for every 6" of panel front-back depth). The way I've always worked it out is to set the average control panel height at the distance from the floor to your elbows with your forearms at right-angles to your body. In order for it to remain comfortable for others though, try and keep it within the range I mentioned.

In terms of height, it will depend on the width you want to make the cabinet to keep it in proportion, your available space and your preferred style. For example, our standard 2-player is based on the generic 2-player cabinets that were commonly found in the UK, which others would consider closer to a 'cabaret' cabinet size. Our cabinets are around 68" high, wheras American and dedicated cabinets could be had up to about 78" tall, so it depends on your cabinet style.

[Kman-Sweden]

Welcome and greetings from Sweden! We're almost on the opposite sides of the globe. That's freakin' awesome! 

Controls: Hoping to build a 2-player control layout with 8 buttons each, as well as a 4/8 way joystick. Also would like to put a trackball on the panel, but that may be added further down the line, as per finances. I would like my pushbuttons to be illuminated with 1st player having blue lights and a blue joystick, and 2ND player having a green lights and green joystick. I would also like the trackball to glow and be white.

-Here I can only recommend the Magstik+ joysticks. You can change from 4- to 8-way just by pulling and twisting the joystick from above. No opening of the control panel to twist some restrictor plate.

-On the Trackball side I use the 3" Electric ICE. With the mounting plate (not included) it's really easy to mount. The trackball is in the above $100USD range but I'd say well worth it. Just connect buttons of your choice for "mouse buttons" and connect the USB cable and you're in business. It's lightable also...

-If you get blue and green translucent buttons and light them with one-color-LED's you could light everything using only one LedWiz. You could choose to just light the buttons (no blinking, turning off and on, etc.) using 5v or 12v from your PC and save some cash by skiping the LedWiz. But if you like to add some WOW-factor on your cabbie I'd say -"Get the LedWiz."
 

Frontend: I will be using Hyperspin as it is an amazing looking program and is very customizable.

I haven't tried it but I also think it looks great. I use Maximus Arcade. You can download a 30-day free trial and test the FE out if you haven't already.

Questions
What is the best place to get control panel gear(buttons and joysticks) from in Australia?

I got most of my stuff from www.groovygamegear.com and www.ultimarc.com

If I will be using 18 buttons plus two joysticks what is the best keypad encoder to use, may need spares for later on?

Have a look at the I-Pac's at Ultimarc.com

Good luck now. / Kman-Sweden

[Kman-Sweden]

4) If building a panel first, make it a size and shape that will easily integrate into a cabinet design at a later date. Also, never scrimp on control panel parts and the interface, as these will ultimately 'make or break' your machine.

+1 on this. I built the cab first and it sucked... If you build the CP first you can always plug it in to your PC and play mame on rainy days. 
I could only go into the garage and open a bottle of beer and look at the paint dry on my cab on days like that.. 

[Ond]

Welcome, good to see another Melbourne bloke on here   .  In Australia I get my controls from http://in2amusements.com.au/catalog/Arcade_Buttons-3-1.html their express post service is excellent, even though they are in Perth I had my stuff the next day.  Like Kman says groovygamegear (I Haven't ordered from Ultimarc yet) is also a great overseas resource especially for things like trackballs or spinners, LedWiz etc.  My only other advice would be to read as much of the 'How to' info on here (many questions have been asked and answered many times) as you can and to consider Mala over Hyperspin, maybe test out a few of them before deciding, I just like Mala because it's easy to set up.

 

Ond

[stealthy1]

Thanks for the advice, the sounds of that new joystick is amazing, and will definatly probably choose that 1.
As with trackballs, what does everyone think of adding that in later on, with space left in the middle to install

[stealthy1]

Wow, didn't realise how hard it would be to design one of these bad boys, struggling a bit with Sketch-up at the moment, will however try and get something up after the new years. Been really busy so not much work achieved, been checking every Arcade supplies site looking at which buttons I want. If anyone has any suggestions on programs to use for designing just a Control panel it would be great as that is quite tough at the moment. I think I know they layout I want. Just trying to design it nicely.

[stealthy1]

Hey everyone, I haven't really done much, but I am still in the process of designing the arcade. The following will be done....

Side Art - Will be painted with Black Chalkboard Paint, and have white sketches of certain characters (Mario, DK, Sonic and the like) of rather large sizes scattered on each side. This will also have the name on it in a white sketchy/chalkboard writing. The black spaces will be able to be written on using chalk, hopefully without ruining the work of the white painted characters.

Name - To go with the sides I will be naming the arcade, Back 2 School, as it will be used to play mostly old school games as I would call them.

Control Panel Overlay - Will probably be a wooden desk look, not sure how this will be implemented yet. But it will give you the feeling of a old school desk that you used to sit on when you were a kid.

Marquee - Will have the name 'Back2School' on it, but not sure about much else.

Working on a photoshop of how it will look at the moment.

Also, is it possible to implement a working coin door for 2-players that even works with emulated games. I am quite new to coin doors and there features.
Please send me as much advice as possible.