My MAME Cabinet Project
I've known about MAME for quite a few years, but didn't seriously think about building a dedicated cabinet until late 2002. I spent quite a bit of time looking at other peoples projects, and psyching myself up (and getting the ok from the wife) to spend the time and money it would take to build one. BYOAC(Build Your Own Arcade Controls) has excellent information in the form of guides, tutorials, FAQs, and an excellent message board. This is THE place to learn about building a MAME cabinet.
I began by looking around for parts that I knew I would need for my cabinet, before even deciding on a final construction plan. I saw a message posted on the BYOAC forums that Radio Shack was clearing out discontinued stock of Crayola trackballs for a good price, so I picked one up cheap. I bought a cheap used ATI 8MB PCI video card with s-video out from e-bay for $6 (works great). I also picked up a used Williams coin door (no coin mechs, but had everything else including working lights) and 25' of yellow 3/4" t-moulding off e-bay as well (yellow would match the trackball).
I ordered an IPAC from Ulimarc and have been very pleased with it.
Joysticks (Happ supers), & Buttons I got from TheRealBobRoberts. Strongly recommended for arcade parts. Bob even threw in a free Happs button wrench for me, which came in handy.
The first thing I did was build a prototype control panel out of some left over wood that was laying around in the garage (sorry no pics). I didn't include the trackball in this prototype because I was too lazy. I did however play test for many hours and made some spacing changes on the buttons. Building a prototype was a good excersise and helped me learn some things about wiring up the panel, and let me realize that the player 1 and 2 buttons had to be spaced out more than I had them on the prototype so the microswitches could fit in . I opted for the "ergonomic" 6 button Capcom type layout, and a trackball. The control panel (and the rest of the cabinet) is made of 3/4" MDF, primed and painted black with 3mm lucite(lexan) covering it. The Joysticks and trackball have space routed out from the bottom of the panel in order to mount them properly. The only buttons on the cabinet are the six buttons for each player, player 1 & 2 buttons, and 2 black mouse buttons mounted between the P1 and P2 buttons. With the IPAC's shift function, there is no need for additonal buttons to clutter up the control panel, and I think it looks more 'classic' without all the extra buttons. The red, orange and yellow colors look pretty good against the black, I think.
Control Panel
The cabinet design is a modified version of Lucid's cabinet plans. I made my cabinet a little bit wider to accommodate a 27" TV (but it is still only 28 1/2" wide so I can move it through a doorway easily), and changed the control panel style to a more classic 2 player non-overhanging style. The cabinet front does not open (coin door access only from the front), but I can remove the entire back panel easily.
Cabinet with back panel removed
The base is made from 3/4" OSB (laying around the garage) resting on 2x4 supports and has fixed castors in the rear that can be used when the cabinet is tilted back. I also used contact cement to glue a layer of felt to any surface touching the floor to prevent scratches and make sliding the cabinet around easier.
The cabinet is made from 3/4" MDF with 2x4 supports and held together with coarse drywall screws. Its heavy but very sturdy. It only has one coat of primer and one coat of glossy black paint, but the finish turned pretty good( I would have done 2 coats but needed to vacate the garage where the cabinet was being built/painted).
Various Cabinet Views
The Marquee is a design taken from OSCAR's page and edited to change the colours and size. I got it printed at a local shop and sandwiched the paper between 2 sheets of lucite and back lit it with a florescent tube. The bezel is a piece of smoked plexi-glass with black posterboard cut & taped to the back of the plexi. The speakers are just ordinary little computer speakers that I've had for about 10 years.
Marquee Pics
I was originally going to use my old PII 300 to power my cabinet, but it lacked the horsepower for a few games that I liked to play quite a bit (NBA Jam, Mortal Kombat, MK II). So I still use my old PC to surf the web and put together a newer box for the cabinet with an XP2200+ 512MB RAM and a 40GB HD running Win98. The guts are all plugged into a switching power strip, so that when the computer is shutdown, everything is automatically powered down too. It is also setup to start up on any keystroke, so its a simple matter to push any button on the control panel to turn the whole thing on.
Inside the cabinet
Cabinet from Outside
I do want to get a TV light gun when they come out, and I think I will build a dance pad for the cabinet that I can use with StepMania next. And maybe afterwards, somehow work a spinner and steering wheel add on, or removable control panel to the cabinet.
If you are in the Edmonton area and are interested in building or purchasing a MAME cabinet feel free to contact me at: atrick @ freenet.edmonton.ab.ca