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Games Entertainment Hardware

The Ultimate MAME Box 145

Posted by michael from the one-credit-to-continue dept.
Strudelkugel writes "Aaron Mahler, director of network services at Sweetbriar College, has built the ultimate MAME box. His site describes his efforts in detail. Lot of cool pics, too."
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The Ultimate MAME Box More

The Ultimate MAME Box

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  • Here's the background page... (Score:5, Informative)

    by OrangeHairMan ( 560161 ) on Sunday October 19, 2003 @09:59PM (#7257428)
    ...in case it gets slashdotted...

    ----cut here----

    A few years ago I had this sudden desire to start collecting the arcade games I remember from my childhood in the 80's. I'm not completely certain why this notion suddenly took hold of me seemingly out of the blue. Maybe it was the nearly mint Pac-Man machine I kept walking by at the Bistro at Sweet Briar College where I work. It wasn't getting a lot of play there in the late nineties where it had lived a fairly sheltered existance for nearly 20 years.

    To some extent I'm certain I had the sudden realization that it might be possible to actually own an arcade game now. I was older and had an income higher than I did when I was ten years old and had to think twice about spending a whole quarter in such a fleeting manner. As a child in the 80's the thought of owning an actual arcade game was somewhat akin to the likelihood that I could take a ride on the space shuttle just by asking nicely. This was a time when the height of excitement was a gradeschool friend having a birthday party that included a set number of FREE tokens for the gameroom at the local Chuck E. Cheese knockoff. The choices and spending power in that couple of hours was overwhelming.

    Maybe it was the fact that I grew up immersed in computers and did play a lot games on the Atari 2600, my Commodore 64 or a friend's ColecoVision. This was the era when finding a console version that came close to the real game was a challenge that made the genuine arcades a luxury for their graphical prowess if not the big screen and the neat lighted marquees. There was a certain ambience to an 80's gameroom filled with noisy arcades that added a lot to the experience.

    Right about the time I started eyeing the Pac-Man machine I had discovered MAME and was having a nostalgic blast not only with the games I remembered (or knew about and never got to play) but with the very concept of emulation. Those involved in the "emulation scene" will know what I'm talking about here. It becomes addictive in a very strange way. At the time, though, this fascination with emulation simply fueled my desire to own the real thing and fulfill a childhood dream.

    In very short order I was absorbing everything I could find online about arcade collecting and was avidly pursuing my first classic machine. I expressed my desire to purchase the lonely Pac-Man machine in the Bistro which likely led to it being added to the next silent auction the college periodically uses to divest itself of various items. In the few months it took before I was able to get the Pac-Man I managed to score a Q*Bert machine from a guy outside of Raleigh, North Carolina. A little while later I located a BurgerTime machine in Richmond, Virginia, then a Gauntlet and a Space Duel cocktail somewhere out in the sticks southwest of here. I was calling various arcade operators all over the place and seeing what they had sitting around from the arcade heyday. Some were being thrown out and others I bought for a song. Unfortunately, I lost count of the number of operators I spoke with that had literally taken dumptruck loads of machines to the landfill in the days or weeks before I got a bug in my butt to obtain them. Afterall, one man's garbage is another geek's nostalgic obsession. It didn't please either of us that they had to pay to dispose of them and I would have paid to obtain them had my wild goose chase begun sooner.

    To make a very long story shorter, I owned just over 30 machines by the time that Pac-Man that started it all came into my posession. In the meantime I had bought, repaired, sold and brokered tons of machines.

    Now where does one put 30 arcade games? Well, a few of your prized ones you put in your house and try to find a tasteful way to fit them into the decor. They are most definitely not furniture and are hardly compact. Your project machines you stash in your parents' large cinderblock shed/workshop rendering it virtually unusable since the average woodworking endeavor requires more than five square
  • ...but I can play mine from the sofa!

  • mine is cool (Score:2, Interesting)

    by LinuxCumShot ( 582742 )
    http://rabien.com/mame/journal.html

  • I know how he feels (Score:4, Interesting)

    by downix ( 84795 ) on Sunday October 19, 2003 @10:02PM (#7257450) Homepage
    I've seen many folk doing similar projects... and to run into one I just have to look into the mirror in the morning. I purchased a beat-up old Double Dragon box and began turning it into my own personal MAME box. I also began buying up boards in order to run the games I wanted legally, many times boards that were too damaged to actually run. I just sank $500 into a brand-new 19" monitor for my box, so I am thrilled seeing a similar project get the recognition. My hat goes off to you.
    • I've been trying to work on a similar thing myself, have a killer instinct box(No game:() and I've put a PC in it with a flat panel. The only place I'm stuck is the controls(It didn't come with them, box was empty) and with my zero knowledge of electronics I'm having problems. It's really cool seeing peoples faces when they see an arcade in my living room though. "Holy shit, is that the first Mortal Kombat?" Although kind of lame with gamepads.
      • www.ultimarc.com is your friend. they make controls that plug into the keyboard.
      • $500 for a 19" monitor? PLEASE tell me that you therefore built this machine in like 1999 or something!

        a) For my machine, I put a "wanted" ad in craigslist and got a fine 19" CRT for $50.

        b) If it's a flat-panel monitor, why do that? MAME/Arcade games are SUPPOSED to have poor-quality screens. In fact, that's why many people prefer to use actual arcade monitors instead of PC monitors - monitors look TOO good!

        In fact, there are even emulators to "simulate" the lines that go across old games for you
    • $500 for a 19" monitor? Please tell me it was an LCD. You could get three 19" CRTs for that price.
      • $500 for a good arcade monitor.

        VGA monitors do not have the same color-quality of a true arcade monitor, nor do they take the abuse. (heck, the old monitor was still running even tho it had a mega-crack in the front)

        I was making a true arcade that just happened to have a PC, not a PC in a funny case.
    • Yeah, MAME boxes are a proud tradition, and there's a lot of interesting ones out there.

      Too bad, really. Since this is apparently the "ultimate" MAME cabinet, there won't be any more.
    • I just sank $500 into a brand-new 19" monitor for my box, so I am thrilled seeing a similar project get the recognition.

      Jesus dude. Get a new one from Victor Geneao [8liners.com] for $100.
      I got a 25" from him [havokmon.com] for $230 shipped. And WHY did he use a Millipede cab?

  • Cocktail Table MAME box (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 19, 2003 @10:05PM (#7257459)
    At the risk of slashdotting a friend, check this out [loungespot.com]. A hand-built MAME box crafted to look like a pac-man cocktail table. Has some real class, and a place to set your drinks. Made by the same guy who created the gameman [loungespot.com] of previous slashdot fame.
  • A box that constantly plays Auntie Mame [imdb.com]? I am SO psyched!
  • Here [sciam.com] is an article from about a month ago on it.
  • ...I am too (Aaron's been a big help, thanks buddy!), and so is Cmdr Taco (what do you call it when Slashdot gets Slashdotted?), and so are a bunch of other folks. Plenty of examples found here:

    http://www.arcadecontrols.com [arcadecontrols.com]

  • Jubei (Score:2, Informative)

    by rmohr02 ( 208447 )
    Not as cool as this one [cmdrtaco.net].
  • Someone get some mirrors up or something. I wanna see the site but the server is dying fast. If someone has the site and wants to send it to me I can run a 500kb/sec mirror...

    traid at pr0n.biz in tar or zip or bz2 or gz is fine :)

  • It's great to see someone get recognition for thier work on Slashdot, but this has happening for years. It seems as soon as someone whacks linux in something it becomes new again. If you want to check out what people have been doing the best place to start is arcadecontrols.com. My cabinet is on there too, the Arcade-Inferno mark 1.x. Check it out.
  • You can buy an entire cabinet with control dashboard if you've got deep enough pockets.

    Slikstik [slikstik.com] sells both cabinets [slikstik.com] and controls [slikstik.com] making the creation of a top-quality custom cabinet a fairly simple chore.

    Just add your own monitor and system of choice and you've got a professional looking cab with true arcade controls. You can even get a working coin-door.

    The resources are now so easily available, there's no excuse for someone to make a Mame cabinet that doesn't look professionally built unless they just

  • Nothing New (Score:5, Informative)

    by Techiegeeks ( 643964 ) <geekboy@techiegeeks.com> on Sunday October 19, 2003 @11:24PM (#7257804) Homepage Journal
    This is nothing new. Check out Arcadecontrols.com [arcadecontrols.com] . Folks have been building there own arcades for awhile now.

    If you want to check out an utlimate Mame box, take a look here:
    1UP's Arcade [1uparcade.com]
    This dude has a spinning control panel.
    • Wow. This is certainly nothing new. I have three of the damn things in the working (website coming eventually).

      There are two schools: convert an old retro cabinet, or build one yourself. Building one yourself entails quite a bit more; for starters, better already have invested in thousands of dollars in carpentry equipment. Jigsaws are just the beginning, friends.

      The other school can have you going in little time: get an old original cabinet cheaply somehwere (from a local arcade, or collector, check R

    • to maintain the original cabinet while converting it for MAME. In particular, he's done something really awesome with the control panel. If he wanted to, he could take the MAME out and put the original control panel back on and I doubt a collector would be able to tell it had been MAMEd at one time.

      I really wish he had gone into more detail about the control panel. I'd have appreciated more pictures showing what hardware was original and what hardware was added. This is exactly how I want to do my MAME cab
      • My point was that people do this all the time. Check out Build Your Own Arcade Controls [arcadecontrols.com]. There are plenty of projects using an existing Arcade cabinet. If you are interested in building a control panel, that is "THE" source of info.
        • What is mostly unique about this project is that:

          A. He used linux (not totally unique but fairly rare in the MAME cabinet scene)

          B. He MAME'd a classic cabinet but did not mutilate it. He took great care to make sure all his modifications reversible and not alter the original classic cabinet/game (upon penalty of death from his s.o.)

          III. I dunno... but felt a third point was needed.

          4. It was featured in Sci amercia... only cabinet to be featured there IIRC =P

          It's not necessarily the best/ultimate MAME
        • Just hate to inform you, but none of that is unique.
          People do use Linux for their MAME box.
          People do use cabinets and do not mutilate them.
          Just look at the examples page of Arcadecontrols.com and see.
          • Go ahead and point out to me how many people have used Linux in their documented MAME cabinet project. I've visited nearly all the 800 or so cabinets submitted to BYOAC (even seen the ones that are gone/404'd now) I'd wager that I can count on one hand the number that were linux based (less than 5 out of 800, fairly uncommon I'd say). When people used underpowered machines in MAME cabinet they tended to use DOS, (which is what I did) because they were more familiar with DOS than linux. This guy's cabine
    • This is nothing new. Check out Arcadecontrols.com . Folks have been building there own arcades for awhile now.

      While we're at it, our very own CmdrTaco has one of the nicest styled MAME cabinets out there... cmdrtaco.net/jubei

  • MIRRORED till 10/21/03 (Score:3, Informative)

    by emptybody ( 12341 ) on Sunday October 19, 2003 @11:25PM (#7257810) Homepage Journal
    I have mirrored it - Here [blasterpiece.com]

    This won't be around for long - maybe a day or two tops. someone else wnat to mirror from me?
  • I'm sorry but this is a So So MAM arcade cab. I have been building my own for about a month now. (Yes it's a slow process but I'm making constant progress.) Before I started I wanted to get an idea of a good looking mame arcade.

    THIS [robboweb.com] is what I found. Personally I think it's the best looking mame arcade done yet. It's covered in Laminate (not painted black) and decorated tastefully.
  • this [gbax.com] and oh my God do I want one! Next pay cheque please!
  • Shameless plug for my own MAME cab:

    http://www.clatfelter.com/arcade.html [clatfelter.com]

    Actually, though ... I was inspired by CmdrTaco's MAME cab Jubei ... so the science of creating MAME cabinets is nothing quite new.

  • This guy has not only a MAME in a classic millipede arcade box, he's got a TiBook too!

    Some people got it all...=P
  • This is nothing... goto www.arcadecontrols.com and browse through the 800 examples.
  • We built it all from scratch. It was tons of fun.
    The SquirrelCade (or Joygasm... we haven't decided yet) [rabidsquirrel.net]

    We've nearly completed it and I have many pictures up if anyone is interested. I dont have any descriptions or instructions yet but I'm in the process.

    If anyone is building their own and have questions or concerns, feel free to ask me. I had a blast just laying out how this entire thing was gonna work. I'd love to give some people a helping hand. My email is on my site... you can leave comments als
  • Future Cab [attcanada.ca] and it's possible today. If only I had the money for that size of flat screen. Still I'm building a bartop out of an old laptop :-) The screen has got to be vertical god damn it.
  • if he were serving his Millipede Site from the Millipede machine?
  • Am I the only person that noticed that the second player joystick has the buttons on the wrong side? So if you want to play with another player, the second player must be left-handed.

    Is that why this is the "Ultimate" MAME Box?

  • This has been done before (Score:3, Informative)

    by subreality ( 157447 ) on Monday October 20, 2003 @03:01AM (#7258564)
    So many times it'll make your head spin. [arcadecontrols.com]
  • Built in winter 1999-2000 and since parted out:

    Video Invasion caberet [vg-network.com]

    Yeah, it's pretty ugly, but I got to test the incredible I-Pac control panel interface [ultimarc.com]. The I-Pac in my cab is the prototype for the 6-input model.

    Since (sort of) getting out of the coin-op amusements business, I've been giving away free cabinets for MAME projects as I get them in, in the hopes that old, dead, "undesirable" machines get a second life as a living, breathing MAME machine.
    • I also used the I-Pac in my mame box, it works great, I highly reccomend it. It's available from Ultimarc. I also bought two j-stiks from them and they work great, high quality stuff.

  • On an Dutch tech forum [tweakers.net] some guy has posted his Mama Cabinet.

    Wich is also pretty awsome. This guy added 6 joysticks and 7 buttons per joystick.
    For more pictures look here [lycos.nl].
  • A step by step Mame Arcade building website can be found @ Mame-Arcade [mame-arcade.com]
  • Do you know what is the difference between a computer and a coin-op ? the coin-op literally invites you to play...with its playful appearance, it's like going to the kindergarden all over again. Whereas a computer is non-inspiring cold beige machine.

    Today I read an old copy of EDGE Retro, featuring Archer Maclean (Dropzone, IK+) having his basement converted to an arcade room.

    I really envy these guys. I live in a country that coin-ops are prohibited (guess what coutry - it has the next Olympic Games) beca

  • Ultimate MAME box? (Score:2, Informative)

    by NipsMG ( 656301 )
    Ultimate MAME box? That's a bold statement. Granted, it's nice.. but nothing really revolutionary. There are some much better examples of cabinets with original artwork or insane designs such as: 1-up's Pac-Mamea [1uparcade.com], Mamestation II [leafstation.com].. It's a very nice box tho. I'd prefer swappable control panels to a one panel jammed with controls, but eh.. to each his own. For tons of examples, go to Build Your Own Arcade Controls [arcadecontrols.com].
  • Oooooooooohhhhhhhh!!!!!! B U T T O N S !!!
    And to circumvent the lameness filter for Yelling: News at 11
  • UberCade [randomdrivel.com]

    It doesn't run Linux, but I do have a removable star wars yoke, so that should count for something, right?

    E.
  • Frostillicus Rotating Control Panel Mame Cabinet [tomvanhorn.com]

    1up's original rotating cabinet PacMamea [1uparcade.com]

    None of these projects would be possible without ArcadeControls.com [arcadecontrols.com] and it's excellent Message Board/Community [arcadecontrols.org]

    Discussion of Top 20 most inspirational mame cabinets [arcadecontrols.org]

    *shrug*

    E.

  • No where near as cool, yet my arcade controller plugs into a standard game port and uses the same classic joystick and buttons (from Happ Controls, see my site [rod.info] for links, pics and schematics).

    Enjoy!

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