Building My Arcade Machine log

Optimus Prime · 19-01-2011 5:04pm #1

Not sure if this is a good idea or not but here goes, im going to post in this thread the process of building my arcade cab from scratch. This is the first time ive built one and i have zero experience with wood work, wiring, anything other than building the pc. Ill start off by posting here the guide to booting your pc into a frontend, as well as the plans i used to build the cab itself. just to note i wont mention anything here about where to get roms etc.

Heres the guide to autobooting your pc into windows, in the bios on most pcs you can set them to boot when they recieve power, if you have this feature consider yourself luck because you will save a lot of hassle turning on your pc when its in the cab. I had this on my pc so happy days.

The first thing you need to do is get a pc. I went with a 2.6ghz, 3 gigs of memory and a 160gig hard drive, I just happened to have the parts lying around for that but you don’t really need a beast of a pc for this at all.

I also installed a seperate 250gig hard disk that i have my music collection on. The frontend max arcade has a jukebox setting which im using which is great. it scrolls album covers like a pub jukebox!

Once you have your pc, setup Windows XP. I kept the default American keyboard setup and language, I read on the internet that this was necessary so I decided not to rock the boat and just go with it as ill only be playing games on it anyways.

Once XP is setup install all your drivers, Sound, Graphics, and Chipset etc.

The next thing I did was setup a folder structure for my frontend and emulators. I decided to go with the below but its up to you how you want to do this, there is no wrong way.

C:\Arcade (Top Level Folder)
C:\Arcade\Frontend (For my Frontend)
C:\Arcade\Emulators (For all the Various Emulators)
C:\Arcade\Emultators\Mame
C:\Arcade\Emulators\INSERT EMULATOR NAME HERE! – All your other Emulators

You get the idea, just keeping everything in an easy to understand format and structure.

Next I went off and got myself a copy of mame and extracted it to:

C:\Arcade\Emulators\Mame

I downloaded some “Free to play” ROMs and added them into the folder:

C:\Arcade\Emulators\Mame\Roms
I will go into a more detailed look at configuring Mame in a separate entry in the Project Arcade Series (I haven’t go it the way I want it yet)

Next thing I did was take a look at the different frontends available. Some of the ones I looked at are free – Hyperspin and Mala, others you have to pay for like Maximus Arcade. The front end you pick is going to be the first thing you see when your Arcade machine boots up and really it comes down to personal preference again. They all have unique features and their own look so I urge you to check them out for yourselves. After installing and looking at the 3 above I decided I wanted to go with Maximus Arcade, the one you have to pay for. I think its €20. I just found it easy to setup and looked good, it supports multiple emulators and has a good interface. So I download Maximus Arcade from the website here and installed it to the folder:

C:\Arcade\Frontend

I will go into details on setting it up again in another entry because as is with Mame, I don’t have it 100% configured as off yet.

Once you have that installed open it up and just configure it work with Mame (It’s pretty straight forward but again ill go into in more detail later)

Now that I have brushed over the Frontend and Mame for now, I’m going to go into some detail on Configuring XP to auto boot straight into Maximus Arcade but changing the XP boot up and windows login so it DOES NOT look like windows is booting up. A lot of this info I got off the web Im just putting it all together in one place here for ease of use.

So you have your pc with Xp installed, Drivers installed.

Lets change the windows XP boot Screen.

Firstly go here http://www.stardock.com/products/bootskin/ and download Bootskin and install. It’s a great app that lets you change the familiar windows XP boot up logo. Once installed you have two choices, you can create your own boot skin or download one off the web.

If you decided to create your own its has to be 640×480 with a max of 16 colours, any more and it just gets messed up. I just downloaded a nice one of the web with the mame logo and a blue loading bar on the bottom.

Once you have the boot skin you want simply run the bootskin application, click import, select your boot skin, click ok and then apply.

Now if you reboot your machine you will see your shiny new boot logo replacing the XP one and we are on our way to hiding XP.

Change a few windows settings

Next I changed around some windows settings. Change the taskbar from the new blue one back to classic.

Right Click Taskbar>Properties>Start Menu>Classic Start Menu>OK

Change the Theme to Windows Classic

Right Click Desktop>Properties>Themes Tab> Drop down list> Select Windows Classic>APPLY

Next get rid of the background picture

Right Click Desktop>Properties>Desktop>Select None for Background>Change Color to Black>APPLY

Turn off Screen Saver

Right Click Desktop>Properties>Screensaver>Select none from dropdown list>APPLY

Change appearance

Right Click Desktop>Properties>Appearance>Windows Classic Style>OK

Next setup another Admin account and change the login screen to classic. You can do this in Control panel>User Accounts I called my second Admin account Admin2 (Genius i know!). While your in there, You can change the login screen as well to the old style one>Change the way users log on and off.

I set the background to black on both my admin accounts; I networked my pc too, in case I ever need to remotely access the pc in the future.

Reboot your pc at this stage and see how it looks, it will boot up to login screen but the background etc there will probably still be blue. Let’s fix that.

Change the Background Colour on the logon screen.

Log in to the PC as admin and click Start>Run

Type in “regedit” in the box and click ok – don’t type in the “”

Browse to HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Colors

Double click “background” and type in 0 0 0 and click ok to change the background colour to black.

Reboot and test if the background is now black.

Next lets Auto Login to windows

Log in to the PC as admin and click Start>Run

Type in “regedit” in the box and click ok – don’t type in the “”
Browse to the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon

Double-click the DefaultUserName entry, type your Admin user name, and then click OK.

Double-click the DefaultPassword entry, type your Admin password under the value data box, and then click OK.

If there is no DefaultPassword value, create the value. To do this, follow these steps:
In Registry Editor, click Edit, click New, and then click String Value.
Type DefaultPassword as the value name, and then press ENTER.
Double-click the newly created key, and then type your Admin password in the Value Data box.

If the DefaultPassword registry entry does not exist, Windows XP automatically changes the value of the AutoAdminLogonregistry key from 1 (true) to 0 (false) to turn off the AutoAdminLogon feature after the computer is restarted.

Double-click the AutoAdminLogon entry, type 1 in the Value Data box, and then click OK.

If there is no AutoAdminLogon entry, create the entry. To do this, follow these steps:
In Registry Editor, click Edit, click New, and then click String Value.
Type AutoAdminLogon as the value name, and then press ENTER.
Double-click the newly created key, and then type 1 in the Value Data box.
Exit Registry Editor.

Now restart the pc and it should boot up with your nice Boot Image and log straight into the windows desktop with the black background!

Next lets get rid of those annoying pop ups on logon like “loading application data” etc

Go to, Start Menu -> Run and enter regedit
Browse the registry to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE>Software>Microsoft>Windows>CurrentVersion>Policies>System

If there is an entry for “DisableStatusMessages” set it to 1 (the digit one)

If there is no entry, right-mouse click the “System” word, and select New->DWORD value, and enter “DisableStatusMessages”, right-mouse to edit the value of it, and enter 1 (the digit one).

Next let’s remove ALL pop up bubbles from windows!

Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then press ENTER.

Browse to the following subkey:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced

Right-click the right pane, create a new DWORD value, and then name it EnableBalloonTips.

Double-click this new entry, and then give it a hexadecimal value of 0.

Ok Next lets set our front end to load up automatically instead of Windows Shell

Click Start>Run type in “Regedit” again and click ok

Browse to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\IniFileMapping\system.ini\boot

Find a string entry called Shell.
Change the first 3 letters (which should read SYS) to USR.:

Next browse to

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon

Here look for the value “Shell”

If you can’t find Shell create a string entry and name it Shell.
Set the string entry to the name and directory location of your front end, for example

C:\Arcade\FrontEnd\MaxArcade.exe

If you are using a different frontend or a different folder structure just make sure you have the correct path in to the frontends exe file.

Now exit the registry and reboot the pc and you SHOULD boot straight up with your fancy boot screen, log straight into windows with no loading boxes and Your Frontend should start up straight away with no signs of the Windows XP OS at all, well except for the mouse cursor but you can get rid of that too, we need it for now but I will tell you how to do that later on.

If you need to exit your Front end and get back to windows, which we will at this stage, just hit ALT-CTRL-DEL, select task manager – end task on your front end, then click “New Task” type in explorer in box and hit ok and it will start up the windows task bar etc and you can work away.

Optimus Prime · 19-01-2011 5:10pm

Here are the plans i used, i got the side one off another site and edited them myself, and created the other side view and front view. You can obviously change these around to suit your own needs but they are a good starting point.

Also to note originally i was going to use a tv in it which is why the side panel below has a sloped shelve to hold the tv at an angle, since then i changed that slightly its now completly horizontal because i have a lcd on a stand and the screen tilts to the right angle.

I used 3/4 inch mdf for the sides and front panels, i used a slightly thiner wood for the back to try keep the weight down a bit as it wont be seen. I also cut a 4" by 4" hole on the back bottom right to allow plugs and a volume control to come out behind it and drilled a couple of large circular holes in the back for ventilation which i will cover on the inside with a sprayed black mesh.

And here is my buttons, J-Stiqs, LEDs, wiring, arcadevga and various other bits and pieces that will eventually go in the cab.

As of now, i have the side panels cutout with lats attatched where i will be joining in the back panels, top panels, front panel, and overhead panel where the speakers go. Also ones to attatch the bottom to. I also have lats on the inside middle that the monitor shelve will attatch to. and ones that the glass front will lean on. (Is lats the right word? not sure.. bits of wood!)

To do:

Paint
Build Control panel
Route for T Molding (This part is worrying me the most in case i mess it up, dont even have a router!)
Graphics for Marquee, sides and control panel.
Plexi for marquee and control panel
Light for marque
wire up the control panel.
and probably other stuff im forgetting.

ill update with actual photos of the cab soon.

I also bought this for ease of use and because the jukebox requires you to enter numbers to pick a song, its tiny fits in your hand and has a lazer pointer built in!

ondafly · 19-01-2011 10:11pm

good read - I did similiar a few years back.

BandQ have a good selection of plexi glass, and also have circular drill bits, which are excellent for getting your buttons slotted into the MDF. Don't forget to wear a good mask/goggles, and if possible outdoors when cutting the MDF, its quite dusty and extremely nasty if you inhale alot of it !

I also used a sheet of black A2 mounting card from Easons, to create a frame around the monitor, and behind the plexi glass.

Optimus Prime · 31-01-2011 12:00pm

Quick update, I will be posting images of the cab tomorrow night in its current state, which is pieces that have to be painted and routed.

I just bough 40 feet of 3\4 inch TMolding aswell as a Whiteside Slotting Cutter 1/16"and Whiteside Slotting Cutter Arbor 1/4" Shank.

So hopefully will make some real progress over the next few weeks with routing, painting and making the control panel.

Jack burton · 31-01-2011 12:04pm

MDF is like butter to work with so you'll fly through the routing and stuff

good luck anyway, cant wait to see the finished one

Optimus Prime · 01-02-2011 10:29pm

Finally got around to taking some images of the cab. looks a bit off in some of these but its just the angle its up against the wall.

This is pre routing and painting and control panel isnt done yet either. as i mentioned T-Molding and router bits are on the way so hopefully be done with that in a week then onto the painting..

You can see the pieces on the inside of the side panel where the other ones will be attatched.

The round holes are for ventalation and the plug out the square one.

Optimus Prime · 18-02-2011 3:10pm

Quick update, Finished the Routing for TMolding!

Drew up the control panel template to be cut into 3/4 mdf this week. pic below

Just the painting, artwork, wiring, plexi to go!

weeder · 18-02-2011 4:47pm

very nice.

CiDeRmAn · 18-02-2011 5:15pm

Looking forward to the finished article.

Thejackson · 18-02-2011 6:09pm

Hey
I like it ,nearly finished my Marvel themed cab too.
Where did you get the keyboard and touchpad ?.
What is its brand..

Keep up the good work

CiDeRmAn · 18-02-2011 6:40pm

I have seen that touch/keypad online, expensive enough!
Saw a dodgy version online though, some chinese version without the laser pointer but with a torch (!!) instead.
No idea if it works as well as the original but hey!
Here's another dodgy version:
http://efo.buy-lowest.com/keyboard-mouse-touchpad-c-77/efo-multi-touch-wireless-keyboard-mouse-touchpad-laser-pointer-p-254
And another:
http://www.dhgate.com/wireless-mini-pc-keyboard-with-laser-pointer/p-ff8080812c3058d5012c5370246a2a11.html
And here's a pretty good chinese clone of the keypad, cheap as chips
http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/366333963/Rii_Mini_2_4G_Wireless_Keyboard_Touch_Pad_Laser_pointer.html

Thejackson · 18-02-2011 7:29pm

sweet cheers

check out my cab

Optimus Prime · 18-02-2011 8:20pm

I bought that keyboard off ebay after i seen it online, it was 30 or something i think. well worth it, very sturdy and does the exact job i needed it for.

weeder · 18-02-2011 10:44pm

is that the mortal kombat cab plans your working from?

Optimus Prime · 19-02-2011 12:49am

To be honest, havent a clue, i found the side panel plans online and drew up the rest myself.. could well be though.

nacimroc · 19-02-2011 2:59am

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

I have seen that touch/keypad online, expensive enough!
Saw a dodgy version online though, some chinese version without the laser pointer but with a torch (!!) instead.
No idea if it works as well as the original but hey!
Here's another dodgy version:
http://efo.buy-lowest.com/keyboard-mouse-touchpad-c-77/efo-multi-touch-wireless-keyboard-mouse-touchpad-laser-pointer-p-254
And another:
http://www.dhgate.com/wireless-mini-pc-keyboard-with-laser-pointer/p-ff8080812c3058d5012c5370246a2a11.html
And here's a pretty good chinese clone of the keypad, cheap as chips
http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/366333963/Rii_Mini_2_4G_Wireless_Keyboard_Touch_Pad_Laser_pointer.html

I have loads of these things and all work perfect. I had one for the last 2 years using it for my HTPC and I havent charged it since the first day! Works perfect. Would def recommend it!

Optimus Prime · 19-02-2011 11:31am

I havent charged my one yet either and its still flying!

Optimus Prime · 02-03-2011 5:10pm

Ive been messing around in Photoshop recently, I think im going to go with a space invaders theme for it. Ive been trying to come up with a decent control panel design. so far this is what i have. i used images i found on the net of a side panel of a space invaders cab. ive reduced the size here big time, the original is 30inches wide, it looks a bit blurry as a result but the main one isnt at all.

what do you do think of this, be honest now, i dont want to pay to get something printed if it doesnt look right! im a bit unsure of it myself at the minute. it needs a bit of tweaking to fit on the shape the control panel is going to be, but you get the idea.

Keep in mind it will be going on this, so the 1,2 player buttons will be in the black bit on the top.

EDIT: Its the space invaders ships up the middle that i think have to go.. not sure.

Andrew76 · 02-03-2011 5:28pm

I suppose the design will always be down to personal taste but I'm wondering how the 1 & 2 player buttons will look. They'll sit somewhere across the big monster dude and the blue section? Will they stand out against that background?
My personal preference is to keep the control panel design simple so the joysticks/buttons stand out and leave the nice artwork for marquees or side panels.

One other thing, are the player one controls a bit too close to the player two ones? I mean P1 button 3 & 6 look quiet close to P2 joystick? Or maybe that's a standard distance.

Optimus Prime · 02-03-2011 5:37pm

The one and two player buttons will be in the dark space in the middle, just in there where it curves with the spaceinvader ships going up between them. They are illuminated buttons two, one and two player are white and the other 12 are blue.

I know what you mean about the controllers im not sure if the distance is right or not myself, it seems ok when i put my hands down on both of them. the joystiq will just be there coming from the hole in the middle i think the fact i drew on the square of the whole joystick throws it off when you are looking at it, but it seems ok when you are sitting in front of that template. Its 30inches wide in total, so thats 15 inches per player. its seems ok to me though, although i dunno if there is a recomended distance.

Andrew76 · 02-03-2011 5:46pm

Maybe just get your misses to sit down beside you and pretend you're playing away - see if there's too much shoulder rubbing going on? If it's mainly going to be just you playing on your own then it isn't a big deal either.
On my candy cab the P1 & P2 start buttons sit in between the P1 & P2 controls so there's a fair gap there, but I guess different styles of cab have different setups. Whatever setup is comfortable for you within the space you have to work with is all that matters.

Optimus Prime · 02-03-2011 5:55pm

yeh i had her try that already it seems fine, like you say it will mostly be myself anyways, i might just get her to try it again with me to make sure.

What i would love to do is build the cab using parts to make it look "steampunk" with cogs and pipes and stuff on it. maybe down the road ill try that!

nacimroc · 02-03-2011 5:58pm

Positions look fine. You were right in saying the mounting plate makes it look too close but even right beside each other makes no difference when playing as you are shoulder to shoulder anyway. If you move it any further apart you will be too close to the side piece of MDF under the panel on either side. You will need that space to mount holding brackets when complete.

I do think that your controls will sit right over him in the artwork and it may turn out that it doesn't make sense if you can't see him clear enough? As far as I can see the joystick on the left will sit right on his manhood giving him a massive wand with a big ball on the end

:D

Word of advice, If you are printing that onto adhesive backed vinyl, seal the MDF first and sand it smooth as this could affect the adhesive and every tiny little detail can show up when you place acrylic over it.

Also, leave as long as possible between laying your artwork and putting the acrylic over it to let it air out and properly dry. I made the mistake of doing it immediately after it and the adhesive never got time to breath, which left what looked like damp patches under it.

Optimus Prime · 02-03-2011 6:02pm

haha i was thinking that myself about the joystick position!! Ill have to make sure its not in the wrong place.

I think ill print it out myself on paper and just see where it goes, i seen an app before that takes large images and prints them out evenly on sheets of a4 and you can join them all up once printed, i cant remember the name of it but i think its worth doing.

Optimus Prime · 10-03-2011 12:00pm

Hey Dudes, Need some advice on a Coin Door. Im in two minds about getting one of these or not and im kind of at the point where i need to make up my mind.

I dont want a big huge thing on it, just a door with one slot maybe two that can be hooked up properly to work when a coin is inserted.

Im running mame with an ipac2 and i think there is a connection on there for coin inserts? what would your advise be on where to get one, how much to spend etc?

Myrddin · 10-03-2011 12:37pm

keithgeo wrote: »

Hey Dudes, Need some advice on a Coin Door. Im in two minds about getting one of these or not and im kind of at the point where i need to make up my mind.

I dont want a big huge thing on it, just a door with one slot maybe two that can be hooked up properly to work when a coin is inserted.

Im running mame with an ipac2 and i think there is a connection on there for coin inserts? what would your advise be on where to get one, how much to spend etc?

I'd def get one, even a single slot one. It will wire to your jamma connector instead of the ipac, as the jamma harness caters for coin inputs. You may never use it, but having a working coin mech is well cool.

Optimus Prime · 10-03-2011 1:00pm

Jamma connector? I dont have one of those.. hmm.. have i forgot something i need? I though it was buttons\Joysticks to ipac then ipac to pc via usb?

Myrddin · 10-03-2011 1:02pm

keithgeo wrote: »

Jamma connector? I dont have one of those.. hmm.. have i forgot something i need? I though it was buttons\Joysticks to ipac then ipac to pc via usb?

Ugh I'm mixing up who has mame cabs & who has pc cabs. Ok yep, the ipac should in that case have an input to accomodate a coin mech.

Optimus Prime · 10-03-2011 1:04pm

You had me worried there for a minute! Any recomended sites to buy off?

I was looking at arcademachines.ie there and they have one for 40 but am i right in thinking that you can get two types, one that just are doors basically that give the look of it and then ones that have coin mechs on the back that work?

Myrddin · 10-03-2011 1:04pm

Or does it :eek:

Ultimarc wrote:

Important Legal Note.
For legal reasons we must state here that the I-PAC is not designed to be used in revenue-earning applications where a credit mechanism is used. The I-PAC contains no specific interface functionality for any credit device. Although it has inputs labelled "COIN", these are labelled as such because 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.

Ok, from my understanding the workaround is to wire the signal from a coin mech & a ground to these COIN parts.

Optimus Prime · 10-03-2011 1:11pm

Ok thats cool, but, take a look at this

http://www.arcademachines.ie/shopping/product_info.php?cPath=3_30&products_id=92

Now i cant see the back of this but im guessing there is nothing on the back? that this is basically just a door and you need to buy other parts for the back? like if i stick a coin in there im assuming it just ends up on the floor in the back of my cab?

Building My Arcade Machine log

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