Michael Aivaliotis Posted October 15, 2006 Report Share Posted October 15, 2006 I realize that about only 2-3 people will appreaciate this bit of info here but what the hell. I was looking around yesterday trying to find a better audio player\jukebox software for my arcade cabinet. I stumbled across GameEx. This is simply awsome. It rivals other software like windows media center and it even handles mame: http://tomspeirs.com/gameex/ So if anyone is thinking of converting a PC to a media center, try it out. Quote Link to comment
crelf Posted October 15, 2006 Report Share Posted October 15, 2006 I realize that about only 2-3 people will appreaciate this bit of info here but what the hell.I was looking around yesterday trying to find a better audio player\jukebox software for my arcade cabinet. I stumbled across GameEx. This is simply awsome. It rivals other software like windows media center and it even handles mame: http://tomspeirs.com/gameex/ So if anyone is thinking of converting a PC to a media center, try it out. This is truly AWESOME! I've been looking for menu software for MAME for a few weeks (we're building one here at work - another great incentive to join VI Engineering!) and had settled on MAMEwah or writing my own (actually, I'll still have to write some code as we've got a scrolling LED display that we're going to integrate to show high scores, etc), but GAMEX looks like the perfect alternative - much slicker than MAMEwah! Thanks Mike! :thumbup: Quote Link to comment
Michael Aivaliotis Posted October 15, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 15, 2006 This is truly AWESOME! I've been looking for menu software for MAME for a few weeks (we're building one here at work - another great incentive to join VI Engineering!) and had settled on MAMEwah or writing my own (actually, I'll still have to write some code as we've got a scrolling LED display that we're going to integrate to show high scores, etc), but GAMEX looks like the perfect alternative - much slicker than MAMEwah! Thanks Mike! :thumbup:Ya, I've been using MameWah exclusively, toggling between that and winamp. Also Itunes doesn't run too well on 640x480 displays .Care to share the specs? What cab layout? What controls? What monitor?... One suggestion is to use the right parts for the job. Having been through the process, I can give you some pointers. The LED display will show high scores of the current game in progress? Sounds cool. Will you be parsing the highscore.dat file? Quote Link to comment
crelf Posted October 15, 2006 Report Share Posted October 15, 2006 Care to share the specs? What cab layout? What controls? What monitor?... One suggestion is to use the right parts for the job. Having been through the process, I can give you some pointers. I certainly would appreciate any advice you can give. It's a team effort (we're running it as an internal project - just had the "customer" kick-off meeting a few weeks ago) and my part is (of course) the software. That said, any advice on all the components will be very-much apreciated. We're (sort of) following this guy's plans (but hopefully a little more professional since we have a fully-capable build shop on site ), but with a different control layout (probably this one - there's a populated photo here) and bigger screen (did you use CRT or LCD? how did you handle odd resolutions?) The LED display will show high scores of the current game in progress? Sounds cool. Will you be parsing the highscore.dat file? Yup - that's the plan, plus it'll display random messages about the ROMs that are installed, etc... Quote Link to comment
Chris Davis Posted October 15, 2006 Report Share Posted October 15, 2006 I realize that about only 2-3 people will appreaciate this bit of info here but what the hell.I was looking around yesterday trying to find a better audio player\jukebox software for my arcade cabinet. I stumbled across GameEx. This is simply awsome. It rivals other software like windows media center and it even handles mame: http://tomspeirs.com/gameex/ So if anyone is thinking of converting a PC to a media center, try it out. care to share some system specifications for your media center / arcade setup. Of course pictures would help to visualize the setup as well. I don't have this setup (yet) but I have looked at doing it many times... Quote Link to comment
crelf Posted October 16, 2006 Report Share Posted October 16, 2006 care to share some system specifications for your media center / arcade setup. Of course pictures would help to visualize the setup as well. Check out Mike's MAME Blog (I'm gettin' excited!) Quote Link to comment
Michael Aivaliotis Posted October 16, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2006 I certainly would appreciate any advice you can give. It's a team effort (we're running it as an internal project - just had the "customer" kick-off meeting a few weeks ago) and my part is (of course) the software. That said, any advice on all the components will be very-much apreciated. We're (sort of) following this guy's plans (but hopefully a little more professional since we have a fully-capable build shop on site ), but with a different control layout (probably this one - there's a populated photo here) and bigger screen (did you use CRT or LCD? how did you handle odd resolutions?)Yup - that's the plan, plus it'll display random messages about the ROMs that are installed, etc... Cabinet: This is what I built. Control Panel: The SlikStik control panel is the best! That's the one I will be upgrading to, soon. I'm swaping out the one I have. Quad playing rocks. You'll also need one of these, and one of these. Monitor: As far as the monitor, I used this one: Well-Gardner D9200 Arcade Monitor. This is now discontinued but it's been replaced by the D9400 (WGM2794-U0TS40E). It's a massive 27" giant, but it makes playing vertical games more enjoyable. This eliminates the need for special rotating setups. If you overlay the front with tinted plexiglass (which you probably will anyway), you can't see the vertical black lines in the vert. game. The D9200 is an arcade multisync monitor so it can operate at the native arcade resolutions and frequencies. In order to make this work properly, you must buy an ArcadeVGA video card. The video card I had was version 1. It seems now they have a version2 which supports native resolutions on non-arcade monitors (standard PC monitors). I haven't tried the v2 card so I don't know how well it will show on a PC monitor. I can tell you however, that the D9200 (and probably the D9400) are awsome monitors for arcade cabinets. The games look exactly like they do at the arcade, back in the day. All the other stuff is not as important but here are some tips: Pay attention to how loud the cabinet will be. PC cooling fans become annoying loud after a while. Check out fanless power supplies and high performance CPU cooling fans that you can lower the speed of the fan but get same cooling. Think of the main cabinet as THE PC. treat it like an instrument rack. It will get hot. Make some provisions for cooling the main cabinet. Again, low speed fans (quiet). Buy one of these: SmartStrip, Review. Then remote the PC powerdown to an external easy access spot. Put-In an external volume control knob. The easiest way to do this is to buy PC speakers that have a remote volume knob. I hacked up my own setup for this. But it's convenient. When you are playing a game, you don't have access to the windows software volume control. Speaking of speakers, buy PC speakers with a base box. Put this inside the cabinet. Makes explosions sound better. Edit: Almost forgot... Beer Holders Quote Link to comment
crelf Posted October 16, 2006 Report Share Posted October 16, 2006 Cabinet: This is what I built... Thanks a lot Mike - timely advice indeed! :thumbup: (especially the fan noise issue - never would have though of that!) Quote Link to comment
Chris Davis Posted October 16, 2006 Report Share Posted October 16, 2006 You don't mention the computer you are using, but I would think that something like this might work. Low noise because its all passive heat sinks.. Quote Link to comment
crelf Posted October 16, 2006 Report Share Posted October 16, 2006 You don't mention the computer you are using, but I would think that something like this might work. Low noise because its all passive heat sinks.. nice find, although a little slow (?) to run some of the MAME roms? I think passive is a great idea... Quote Link to comment
Chris Davis Posted October 16, 2006 Report Share Posted October 16, 2006 nice find, although a little slow (?) to run some of the MAME roms? I think passive is a great idea... NewEgg's whole Mini-itx collection to save a little time check out this as a possibility, or this. I'm still curious as to what (computer) hardware Mike's using... Its not mentioned in his blog. Quote Link to comment
Michael Aivaliotis Posted October 17, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 17, 2006 Ok, so I've decided to make this the official Classic Arcade thread... Just because. Look at this find from 1972, Australia. Why chose between Beer or Pong? Now you can have both! Barrel Pong Click on the pics for a close up. You too can score these hot chicks by playing Pong-Tron. Quote Link to comment
crelf Posted October 17, 2006 Report Share Posted October 17, 2006 Why chose between Beer or Pong? Now you can have both! Bloody Aussies - mob of drunks! You too can score these hot chicks by playing Pong-Tron.They only cost 380,000 each! Quote Link to comment
Yair Posted October 17, 2006 Report Share Posted October 17, 2006 They only cost 380,000 each! That's in Yens - I can help you with that if you want. :2cents: :2cents: :2cents: :2cents: :2cents: :2cents: :2cents: :2cents: Quote Link to comment
dragonblaze Posted October 29, 2006 Report Share Posted October 29, 2006 Mike, thanks so much for the advice -- it's very useful to me, as I'm building my first MAME system. One thing isn't quite clear to me: Monitor: As far as the monitor, I used this one: Well-Gardner D9200 Arcade Monitor. This is now discontinued but it's been replaced by the D9400 (WGM2794-U0TS40E). It's a massive 27" giant, but it makes playing vertical games more enjoyable. This eliminates the need for special rotating setups. If you overlay the front with tinted plexiglass (which you probably will anyway), you can't see the vertical black lines in the vert. game. I wanted to play some vertical games, but the cabinet I'm considering (made by slikstik) is a horizontal setup. I'm gonna use D9400, but how would it help me play vertical games? Or do you simply mean that the reduced area (after vertical aspect ratio is applied) is still good enough, due to the monitor's large size? Also, what are those black lines that you are referring to? Thanks! Quote Link to comment
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