My Own Arcade/MAME Cabinet

Not So Creative:

I am probably not as creative as many because I purchased my cabinet, brand new and already assembled.  HanaHo has a really nice cabinet called ArcadePC mini and after adding up all of the expenses of making a cabinet myself or refurbishing an old one, I believe this is my best bet.  It includes the cabinet, 19" high resolution monitor, interchangeable control panel with HotRod technology (buttons and joysticks), coin door, hidden pull-out keyboard drawer, lighted marquee, leg levelers, etc.  Just like a real arcade machine.

So here is exactly what I ordered from HanaHo:

• ArcadePC mini

• 19" Monitor option (17" is standard)

• Coin Door

• 9" cabinet stand (raises the entire unit up by 9")

First things first:

Before I found the HanaHo ArcadePC cabinet, I had already placed an order for a couple I-Pac's and Opti-Pacs.  The I-Pac is a small Keyboard Encoder board that sends keypresses to the PC when a button on the control panel is pressed.  The Opti-Pac provides a interface for a tracball or spinner to the PC.  Although the ArcadePC comes with a control panel, I plan to design my own.  HanaHo will sell blank interchangeable control panels for custom designs, or I may make my own.  Although I like the layout of the ArcadePC panel, I am sure that some games would be better played with different controls and I want a panel that has a Tracball on it.

Look at what I got!

After only 1 week after ordering it, I received a call that my HanaHo ArcadePC would be delivered in a couple days.  That was fast! When it arrived, it was very professionally packed.  Cardboard boxed on a pallet.  After we wrestling it off the truck and safely inside, I started the unpacking.  The cardboard was removed to reveal the game safely wrapped in heavy duty shrink wrap.  It was held to the pallet with plastic banding material.  Well, it took a while, but I finally got it unpackaged.  Prefect condition!  I guess I should have taken a few pictures of the packaged product, but I was too anxious to get it opened up.   

I initially did not have time to put together my new PC, so I quickly loaded my MAME files into a Gateway PC that I have.  I then hooked it up to the cables provided with the cabinet.  The back of the cabinet has a removable panel that reveals where the PC normally sits.  I just pulled the cables out of the back and hooked them to the PC sitting beside the cabinet.  The ArcadePC cabinet includes the monitor, speakers, Hotrod Keyboard controller, etc.   It also includes a neat hidden pull-out drawer to put a keyboard and mouse on.  Connections were a snap and all of the cables were included.  

Plug it in, plug it in!

After verifying all of the cables were secure, I plugged it in and powered on the PC.  WOW.  It is really impressive seeing the ArcadePC video monitor come to life.  I am initially running the Windows version of MAME until I have my new computer up and going.  After a few seconds, windows was up and going.  A quick click on MAME32 and there it was.  All of my favorite games ready to play on my new ArcadePC cabinet!  But the controls don't work.  I quickly found that you must specify that you are using a HotrodSE control in the menu.  After setting this, everything worked perfectly in Windows.

It works great so, Let's take it apart!

The Computer:

After lots of checking, I decided to assemble my own PC.  I am using the following:

• Abit Kt7 Motherboard

• Athlon Thunderbird 1.1Ghz Processor

• 128 MB Memory

• Creative Labs SoundBlaster 16 ISA 

• ATI Rage 128 Video Card

• Mini ATX case

• Loaded DOS 6.22

After spending a lot of time playing games on my desktop PC hooked to the ArcadePC, I assembled the parts for the new PC, since I was needing my desktop PC back for work.  I loaded DOS6.22 on the PC so that I did not have to worry about Windows.  This makes the startup much quicker and since MAME is the only thing on the PC, it should be easier to update and use.

Sound Card Blues:

I originally purchased a SoundBlaster 128 card but was told that would not work in DOS.  I wanted to run the PC on DOS and not Windows for boot speed and ease of use.   So I bought a SoundBlaster Live card.  Several people said that it "can be made to work" in pure DOS.  "Can be made to work" are the key words here.  I worked for 5 days trying to make this work.  I had lots of suggestions from folks on several of the MAME forums but the PC would always lockup or have some problem.  Sooooo, scrap the PCI sound card idea.  Don't even think about it.  I found someone on Ebay selling the  SoundBlaster 16 ISA cards for a good price so I purchased several from him.  Within 10 minutes (really!) of opening the package, my system was working perfectly.  Great sound and no locking up.  I cannot emphasize this enough, don't waste your time with a PCI sound card if you are wanting to run MAME in DOS.  It is just not worth the time.

The Soft Side:

I have DOS 6.22 installed.  I also have MAME and it's supporting files (Flyers, Cabinets, Icons, etc) on the C drive along with ArcadeOS.  Since DOS 6.22 only allows for 2GB drive sizes, I created a D drive to house the ROMS.  You edit the mame.cfg file to tell it where the ROMS are.  ArcadeOS is a really nice front end and allows a very fast way to pick what game you want to play.  I edited the autoexec.bat file so that it automatically starts up ArcadeOS when the PC is booted.  

Next Up

I am going to build up a control panel to fit my cabinet that has one 4-way joystick and buttons and a tracball.  I want the one joystick to be closer to the center of the control too.  We mostly like the older games so this should work.  I also want an ESC key on the panel too.  I will put the I-Pac and Opti-Pac stuff to work.

More to come later...