Irish arcade machine builders

Optimus Prime

Ill stick one or two up tommorow if i can its just the side in plywood. Ill be taking pics of everything for the guides im putting up on the site. I have plans drawn up too!

Kidchameleon

Just looking at the IPac and JPac and noticed this:

Important Legal Note.
For legal reasons we must state here that the J-PAC is not designed to be used in revenue-earning applications where a credit mechanism is used. The J-PAC contains no specific interface functionality for any credit device. Although it has inputs which connect to the JAMMA coin signals, these are designed such that activating a switch connected to them causes the MAME "coin" keycodes (5 or 6) to be sent. These are designed to be used with panel pushbuttons not coin doors or note acceptors.

While I have no intention of making money out of my Mame cab, id really would love to have a working coin mech. Is there any way to acheive this? I thought the "coin" connection on the IPac would sort it, seems its just for a button.

Note to Mods:

Feel free to remove this post if there are any legal implications.

Myrddin

Kidchameleon wrote: »

Just looking at the IPac and JPac and noticed this:

Important Legal Note.
For legal reasons we must state here that the J-PAC is not designed to be used in revenue-earning applications where a credit mechanism is used. The J-PAC contains no specific interface functionality for any credit device. Although it has inputs which connect to the JAMMA coin signals, these are designed such that activating a switch connected to them causes the MAME "coin" keycodes (5 or 6) to be sent. These are designed to be used with panel pushbuttons not coin doors or note acceptors.

While I have no intention of making money out of my Mame cab, id really would love to have a working coin mech. Is there any way to acheive this? I thought the "coin" connection on the IPac would sort it, seems its just for a button.

Note to Mods:

Feel free to remove this post if there are any legal implications.

Coin mechs do still work with the JPAC. The coin mech is simply wired to a pin on the jamma connector, & functions as Mame key 5. I think what the disclaimer means is that there are no specific inputs on either xPAC for a coin mech.

Optimus Prime

The two side panels are now cut out and looking well! Its coming together now, next week the tv bottom, pc and tv shelve.

Optimus Prime

Just bought this off ultimarc, i was wondering if you guys could let me know if im missing anything ill need??

ArcadeVGA 3000 Card PCIe
Daisy-Chain Harness Cable Type: 6.3mm (1/4in) Connectors
I-PAC 2 Interface.Cable Type: USB Cable
J-Stik x2
Joystick Mounting Kits x2
PCB Mounting Feet
Ultralux 5 Volt LEDs Color: White x2
Ultralux 5 Volt LEDs Color: Blue x12
Ultralux Chrome Illuminated Pushbuttons Color: White x2
Ultralux Chrome Illuminated Pushbuttons Color: Blue x12
Ultralux Logo Inserts Logo: Pack of Start1,2,Coin ($)
UltraStik 360 Extra Tops Color: Blue x2
Wiring Kit 1

Bought a vga to scart cable off ebay the other day too.

Kidchameleon

keithgeo wrote: »

Just bought this off ultimarc, i was wondering if you guys could let me know if im missing anything ill need??

ArcadeVGA 3000 Card PCIe
Daisy-Chain Harness Cable Type: 6.3mm (1/4in) Connectors
I-PAC 2 Interface.Cable Type: USB Cable
J-Stik x2
Joystick Mounting Kits x2
PCB Mounting Feet
Ultralux 5 Volt LEDs Color: White x2
Ultralux 5 Volt LEDs Color: Blue x12
Ultralux Chrome Illuminated Pushbuttons Color: White x2
Ultralux Chrome Illuminated Pushbuttons Color: Blue x12
Ultralux Logo Inserts Logo: Pack of Start1,2,Coin ($)
UltraStik 360 Extra Tops Color: Blue x2
Wiring Kit 1

Bought a vga to scart cable off ebay the other day too.

Putting similar order in soon, how much did all that come to?

Optimus Prime

300 quid including delivery and tax, make sure you order off there in $ though, for some reason its more in € about 50 quid more..

Kidchameleon

keithgeo wrote: »

300 quid including delivery and tax, make sure you order off there in $ though, for some reason its more in € about 50 quid more..

Cheers for the tip man. Keep us posted on your progress

nacimroc

Did you consider your control buttons if you are using a PC? What I mean is the buttons to select the game, 1 player, coin button, escape button, back to menu buttons etc ?

Optimus Prime

1 and 2 player buttons i have, dont have esc etc i thought you can do stuff like that by holding down say 1 player and it makes the other buttons do others stuff, like holding down shift?

I was thinking about it last night alright, im going to have a wireless keyboard too though because i found a great jukebox app too that needs a keyboard.

Myrddin

P1 & P2 Start buttons pressed simultaneously functions as escape with an xPAC. I cannot express fully the awesomness of those devices :cool: You can of course change the button mapping/combos to anything you want too.

Optimus Prime

heres what i got in the post yesterday..

nacimroc

Yes you can! You can hold certain buttons for a shift function, but it might make it a bit complicated for someone who doesn't know how to do it ? (All opinion I suppose so no biggy)

For wireless keyboards this little thingy is great if you havent seen it before
http://www.chinavasion.com/product_info.php/pName/wireless-keyboard-touch-pad/

Myrddin

keithgeo wrote: »

heres what i got in the post yesterday..

Wow, I'm jealous even though I have one Building it is so much fun, trying, but fun. Fair play :cool:

Andrew76

keithgeo wrote: »

heres what i got in the post yesterday..

Nice! I have half that stuff packed in boxes waiting to be put together also, plan to get started after chrimbo. Thanks for the updates keith, keeping my eye on this thread.

Optimus Prime

building the cab is holding me up, i planned to have it finished at this stage, but at the minute i just have the two sides cut out.

o1s1n

Oooh, that looks lovely alright. Nice colour choice!

Optimus Prime

Cheers! Love that wireless thing Nacimroc , might have to get one of them too!! Just been messing around with the pc here, ive pulled the motherboard out of the box and the powersupply and hard drives.

Put it back together on a chopping board for now, have the pc mounting kit screwed into it etc. My power on button was wired up to the motherboard using what looks like a smaller IDE cable. the power button itself was on a small board with a few leds. its directly on the board though and not connect with a cable so i tought i might have a problem wiring up a power on button. But!! I then was messing in the bios and discovered the "Turn on, when the pc recieves power" setting, so im just going to use that. Ive now removed the power button completely from the mother board as its not needed... for now..

Optimus Prime

My vga to scart cable finally arrived from fleabay. 24 euro delivered, its expensive enough but needed. So i can finally plug in my arcadevga card tonight and install soft15hz and hook it up to my tv for the cab!

Andrew76

Pretty sure you don't need soft15hz with that ArcadeVGA card you got from Ultimarc. Says it natively outputs to 15Khz (or 25Khz if needed).

Optimus Prime

Happy days, thats even better!

Myrddin

Andrew76 wrote: »

Pretty sure you don't need soft15hz with that ArcadeVGA card you got from Ultimarc. Says it natively outputs to 15Khz (or 25Khz if needed).

Thats correct, that card has a native output of 15Khz. I'm not sure of the implications of putting 15Khz into a tv though, maybe it's the normal frequency is it? I've no idea. Actually considering my jamma test rig was connected to a tv via scart I'm sure its fine

Optimus Prime

I guess ill know later when i plug it in and see if the tv blows up in my face! haha..

I think its ok this is off the Ultimarc website

there is one way we can use a TV very satisfactorily, which is going in via the RGB pins on a SCART connector (US readers look away at this point, SCART is a European standard!). This actually turns the TV into an arcade monitor because it by-passes all the signal-degrading PAL or NTSC decoder, We can even run native resolutions providing the TV is happy with non-interlaced screens. Beware of RGB "dongles" which attach to some VGA cards. When fitted these tell the VGA card to always use a TV-out fixed resolution so our chance of driving the monitor at the native game resolution is lost.

EnterNow wrote: »

Thats correct, that card has a native output of 15Khz. I'm not sure of the implications of putting 15Khz into a tv though, maybe it's the normal frequency is it? I've no idea. Actually considering my jamma test rig was connected to a tv via scart I'm sure its fine

Myrddin

keithgeo wrote: »

I guess ill know later when i plug it in and see if the tv blows up in my face! haha..

I think its ok this is off the Ultimarc website

Cool, looks like it will be down to if the tv likes the signal or not. But considering I once had a jamma SF2 board running on a 15 year old 14" Sony portable, you'll be fine man.

Optimus Prime

yep fingers crossed the tv works or ill have to go find another 20 quid tv! I would be interested to hear if anyone else here has experience of connecting an arcadevga up to a crt tv?

Optimus Prime

well tv one didnt work! had a mad line across it. tv two worked though, although not completely happy with it. max arcade looks blurry, the games look great except the top seems to be cut of em, eg no score in pacman, no press start up the top of street fighter 2. its really fustrating!

Optimus Prime

Sorry for triple posting here but i have a question re the Joystiq in the Control panel.

When i screw the joystiq in underneath and the handle comes out through the top i have a small plastic disc thing that im assuming is to cover up the hole in the wood. Does this just normally sit loose on the joystiq shaft or is it drilled glued into the wood?

o1s1n

You can just let that sit freely. It'll stop gunk getting in under the control panel.

Myrddin

Yep, just a little gaiter to cover the hole & stop dirt etc getting inside. It should float nicely across the cp when the joystick moves.

Kidchameleon

keithgeo wrote: »

Sorry for triple posting here but i have a question re the Joystiq in the Control panel.

When i screw the joystiq in underneath and the handle comes out through the top i have a small plastic disc thing that im assuming is to cover up the hole in the wood. Does this just normally sit loose on the joystiq shaft or is it drilled glued into the wood?

Well in my local arcade, they used to sit loose...

Optimus Prime

Thanks lads, another one for you.. anyone got any experience putting T-Moulding on to a cabinet.. Im thinking about doing it, weighing up if i should just leave it or not. Is it hard to cut a channel up through the wood to bang it in?

Kidchameleon

keithgeo wrote: »

Thanks lads, another one for you.. anyone got any experience putting T-Moulding on to a cabinet.. Im thinking about doing it, weighing up if i should just leave it or not. Is it hard to cut a channel up through the wood to bang it in?

I thought T-Moulding was self adhesive no?

Optimus Prime

no its shaped like a T and the bottom part gets banged into the wood into a slot cut up the wood with a rubber hammer.

Kidchameleon

keithgeo wrote: »

no its shaped like a T and the bottom part gets banged into the wood into a slot cut up the wood with a rubber hammer.

Ah Ok. I was looking for some yesterday in B&Q and Homebase, no luck there. Would you know where I could get hold of some?

Optimus Prime

you can buy it off the internet no problem, i only really started looking at it a day or two ago. I had a look for an adhesive type cover myself briefly but couldnt find any. if you spot any let me know it certainly an easier option.

MontgomeryClift

keithgeo wrote: »

Thanks lads, another one for you.. anyone got any experience putting T-Moulding on to a cabinet.. Im thinking about doing it, weighing up if i should just leave it or not. Is it hard to cut a channel up through the wood to bang it in?

You need a router, which is expensive enough, but the right router bit is difficult to find, and costs about €25.

Older arcade cabinets used a metallic t-molding that seems not to be available now. I don't know how that was fixed in place. I'd like to see some of that removed from the cabinet, if anbody has pics.

nacimroc

You absolutely have to put on moulding IMO! It will look odd otherwise. The best place to get it from is t-molding.com.
http://t-molding.com/store/home.php?cat=7

You will need a router to cut the slot and you can see the slot cutter bit on this page
http://t-molding.com/store/home.php?cat=6

Make sure to get the right width slot cutter for the t-molding you are getting. (it says the slot width required in the t-molding colour section.)

After to cut your slot exactly in the centre of the edge (use test pieces to try it), use hot glue and hammer home the t-molding. It has to be hammered as it will go in further than you think. Remember to cut V shape grooves out of the molding bit to get around corners.

Heres is the way I did it

P.S. Dont forget the add the thickness of laminate if you are laminating the cab!

Optimus Prime

Thanks for that, theres some great info there on doing it. what sort of skill level is required to do this? just to give you an idea up until now my only experience of woodwork is putting together tables out of ikea and argos!

edit: how do you cut the slot on sharp angels, how do you get right into the corner?

nacimroc

Common sense goes a long way. I never done much woodworking until I starting building cabs but its not as hard as it looks. There are alot harder parts to building a cab than the woodworking.

As regards the pointed edges, I placed other scraps of wood beside it to support the router. Its hard to explain but imagine 2 pieces of flat wood pushed together. Test everything on scrap pieces until you are completely happy aswell.

If using hot glue do lengths of about 1 foot at a time otherwise the glue will set permanently in the groove before you push the t-molding in and its almost impossible to get out.

***DISCLAIMER***
I used a cheap crap lidl router and the hand tightener slipped half way through cutting a few weeks ago. The slot cutter shot across the room and buried itself in a piece of MDF! It would half taken a nice chunk out of me if it went my direction. So be very careful as routers have a high RPM. Here is a pic of the slot cutter after its dash for freedom.

Optimus Prime

feck that, would have given you a nasty scratch alright!

LoGiE

Thinking of striping and back my old cabinet (or I may sell it) That would include replacing the 19" in it at the moment. What do folks recommend replacement wise?

EDIT: The monitor is working but I was thinking of going the touchscreen route

Optimus Prime

how much does it cost for the average 19"? Im messing around with arcadevga on crt tvs at the minute but i can never get the resolution right, the top and bottom of games is always cut off. how do you get around this?

o1s1n

It's a right pain in the arse but you just can't get arcade monitors here cheap. It'll cost you. I think I remember reading that Mitchomagic said he could get Wells Gardner 19 inch ones.

Optimus Prime

ah it was wrecking my head, i ended up just going with a 21" lcd because i wanted to run a jukebox on it aswell and it just wasnt displaying right on the tvs. im half thinking now that im going to build this mame cab to use an lcd (which is what i have running on it at the minute)Then get an old arcade cab, maybe a cocktail and do that next but with a proper monitor. there is just so many games to deal with on a mame cab that using a crt tv just isnt an option because of all the different resolutions.

nacimroc

You can use a program called quickres assuming your graphics card allows! This gives the option to go to very low resolutions. I think I run mine at 640x480 and this suits a CRT TV perfect.

I really just don't like LCD's in a cab! It loses the whole retro feel you get. Plus the fact alot of the MAME games have such bad resolutions they look alot better on a blurry (ish) CRT. Just my opinion of course. But you are right that it is alot easier to set up with an LCD.

Optimus Prime

I have an arcadevga card in the pc would that do the job, i bought two tvs and i couldnt get it going on either. top and bottom of screen was cut off on games.

Optimus Prime

Ive decided to have another crack at getting a screen other than an lcd for the cab. Im going to get a crt pc monitor and see how that works out, seems to be a better option than just using an old tv in it. Im hoping it will jump between resolutions without cutting off parts of the game screens, anyone got an old pc monitor running in there cab that can shed some light on it?

LoGiE

How about an arcade monitor and cabinet? No buttons, jamma harness or sticks as I use them for spares but the arcade monitor comes with it's power supply. I'm moving and can only take one cabinet with me and obviously that my MKII cab! Will stick it up on adverts or may swap/trade it for something.

Jack burton

How much would you be looking for it? And its it just a plain cab?

Optimus Prime

I have the cab pretty much built ill stick up a few photos later in the week. basically the frame is done, i just need to paint, put it together then get graphics, glass and make the control panel. post the adverts link when you put it up though and ill take a look, will be looking for a cocktail more than likely when i finish this..