ArcadeCab
2/28/04
BarCade Progress Update (Continued...)
Spent several hours packing
the components into the cabinet. Discovered, once again, that what
looks good on paper doesn't always translate well into the physical world.
The useable interior space was much less that I had calculated.
Despite that, I disassembled the PC and determined where each piece would end up.
I secured each, using metal 'strapping'. The fourth picture shows
it all packed in. I
painted the insets of each side that will show after I vinyl the top and
back, and applied vinyl to the top. The fifth and sixth pictures shows where I am at.
I still have yet to decide how to build a single on/off power switch to the
cabinet but that is for another day.
2/26/04
BarCade Progress Update (Continued)
I have been delving into the various configuration files of ArcadeOS
and Vantage these last couple days in order to better understand the options available to me.
These are two very nice applications that I would recommend to anyone
contemplating a cabinet such as this. In order to make the cab as
user-friendly as possible, I have modified the Autoexec.bat startup program
to open Arca
deOS
upon startup. This exploration has been a bit slow, being hampered by
my general disdain of the DOS command line interface. I'm a huge
mouse fan.
Here are two pictures of Pacman running on the BarCade's monitor. As is apparent from these two shots, the cabinet still has a way to go. Tomorrow I hope to install the computer into the cabinet, which should be an adventure in of itself. It will be interesting to see how the parts end up wedged in. I also plan to finish the top and back off, as well as design and install the speaker area. I have a long unused pair of speakers that will find new life within. I still have yet to finalize the control panel layout so it is unlikely that will be tackled until later. Expect an update in the next two days.
2/22/04
BarCade Progress Update
Found time to work on the cabinet for a bit. Cut the two back boards and
rough cut the control panel board. Cut a hole for the fan to sit and
screwed it to the board. Still have another half-day of work to do on
it, at least.
A friend, who is much more familiar with DOS than myself, stopped by to assist with the PC setup. In a little more than an hour, he had installed MS Dos 6.x, had the sound card working, and installed Vantage instead of Dos MAME. It turns out that Vantage (Vertical ANTiquated Arcade Game Emulator) is exactly what I should have installed in the first place. It is made for low(!) end hardware (486/33 with 8meg RAM anyone?), but has a limited number of games it supports. No matter, that short list is still more than I intended to install. It has a finicky .cfg file to set up but after a little research, it was done. I will post my final .cfg file when I complete this project and add the plans to the site. My friend also pointed out that the machine was a P75, not the 90Mhz I thought it was. Oops.:-)
2/20/04
BarCade Progress
The last couple evenings I have been working on the PC
that will go inside the cabinet. The P90 will fit,
which originally was a concern. I found that it did
not have an audio card but, as luck would have it, a
486 that was sitting in the basement had one that
worked. When I went to install the Win
dows
drivers for the card, I trashed something so
Windows will boot but then hangs. Not good. I
installed DOS drivers with no problems then pulled a
CD drive from yet another spare machine and hooked it
up in anticipation of reinstalling Win98 on it.
Although I intend to run the machine with FreeDOS, I like
the comfort of knowing another OS is waiting in the wings. Using information
from
Oscar's Bartop site as a model, I plan to run DOS MAME v.37, which I found here. I
also picked up a case fan and two fan covers for the cabinet today.
I hope to have the PC working by the end of the
weekend. Perhaps even installed in the cabinet.
Received the ebay button shipment
I thought I would mention the shipment of buttons I won on the
11th arrived. Although the buttons closely resembled the many I have purchased
from Happs and
Bob Roberts, they
were obviously of inferior quality. They felt cheaper even before I
did a side-by-side comparison with my existing stock. Even the
switches were cheaper. The player-1 and 2 buttons are easy to spot as
the players have a wider stance than on the higher quality, Happs button. I'll take this as a lesson learned: stick with
the best!
2/16/04
Began work on the BarCade
Took today off work and began work on the cabinet. With a little patience I
was able to find boards on-hand that were sufficiently large to cut the
sides from. The shell went together quickly. However, once I began to mess
with the freshly spray painted monitor, progress slowed. I couldn't
decide on an elegant method of attaching the monitor, so I just did my best.
The other examples I looked at didn't mention having any difficulties with
that so it must have just been me.:-)
By afternoon's end I had secured the monitor (see third picture) and placed the top board. There is still much to do including figuring out how to fit the innards of the PCs I have on hand into the small cabinet, and hacking a keyboard for the control panel. My next weekend is filled already so it is very doubtful I will have a chance to work on it for at least another week.
2/12/04
Laminate arrived!
Talk about fast. I ordered it on Sunday night, the 8th, and the
package arrived this afternoon. It was packed very securely (see
picture) in two layers of cardboard and strapping. The six sheets that
I ordered were 'tightly' rolled up inside, with more strapping binding them.
Cardboard pieces protected the back of the laminate. An all around
excellent packaging job and exceptional delivery speed.
I ordered the thinner (.030) black laminate as an experiment. I intend to try it on the BarCade first, before I laminate a full-size cabinet.
2/11/04
Ordered buttons for the BarCade
Okay, I broke down and bought
something already for my "bartop". I needed some player start buttons
so I went in with a buddy and picked up a few from an ebay
auction. At $1.29/ea and shipping free with a purchase of only twelve,
it was a very good deal. I took advantage and purchased several sets
of Player 1/2 start buttons. In addition,
I have discovered more "bartop" examples that should help me with my
cabinet. I am torn, though, with whether to stain and poly the cabinet
or use some of the laminate that should be arriving soon. Decisions,
decisions.
2/10/04
CabinetParts.com
I am testing out an online laminate source for my cabinets. I have Lowes and Menards near me but both charge a premium
for Wilsonart laminates. Lowes charges $96 per sheet!
CabinetParts' order works out to a
little more than $43/sheet, shipped to my door. After it arrives, I will
let you know the details on delivery speed and packing. I'm optimistic.
2/08/04
Bar top arcade cabinets
I am mulling over the construction of a 'mini
cabinet' for playing the classics such as PacMan, Dig Dug, Donkey Kong and Galaga. I have
recently seen some excellent examples
of these "bartops". Three of them are: Oscar's
Happy Hour Bartop MAME, Menace's cabinet, and
this one.
I intend to use only the materials I have
on hand for this project. I have a P90 and 15" monitor that have been
gathering dust for several years that I hope to use and some leftover
plywood from various projects. I will post my progress here.
2/07/04
Relocating to my new home
I have been migrating my tripod site
(mtrello1.tripod.com) to here the last few days. You should update your
bookmarks accordingly. This new site affords me much more flexibility than
ever before. The 25meg of storage at Tripod was a constant headache.
If you have been to the old site, you will notice I
have taken the time to update the site's look. The layout is still
being tweaked but I hope you can find information more easily now. The
MAME cabinet plans remain in place on
ArcadeCab, providing
owners of the X-arcade with a viable cabinet choice.
I have rearranged some of the other pages, consolidated some, and added this News section. I
have also temporally removed the Sales page pending the
completion of exciting new additions.
This News page will be updated regularly with items such as ongoing projects, plans, and other MAME news
that might interest you.
Have a look around the site. If you have any questions, feel free to
contact me.
2/04/04
Welcome!
The new site is finally 'up'! Over the next several days I will be
migrating my old website here to its new home. There will likely be a
lot of changes in format in the coming days, so please bear with me. I
wanted to get the cabinet plans moved here so I can begin moving traffic
here.
I have been communicating with two visitors (strangely enough, both named Chris) about various aspects of my design. One area that we are trying to improve is how the marquee glass is supported. When the final design modifications have been worked out and tested in an actual cabinet, I'll update the appropriate pages and post a notification here. If you have found something you think is wrong or missing from my plans, please don't hesitate to let me know. I want these plans to be as useful as possible to everyone. Thanks!