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The Ultimate MAME Box
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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Be good to get this running on an xbox or something. fp.
...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!
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
http://rabien.com/mame/journal.html
-- OMFG = Oh My Floatse Goatse
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.
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
he did your mom.
Why would someone do this.
There are lots of great reasons to do this. For fun, for nostalgia, or to learn new skills. Who knows -- perhaps this will lead to some fabulous job refurbishing cocktail tables for the guy : )
Vino, gyno, and techno -Bruce Sterling
At the risk of slashdotting a friend, check this out. 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 of previous slashdot fame.
Aren't ROMs illegal?
quick before he gets mad
A box that constantly plays Auntie Mame? I am SO psyched!
The Words of Doom:
Lot of cool pics
When you see that in a slashdot blurb, you KNOW that the link is not going to load by the time you see it...
Here is an article from about a month ago on it.
While I don't think it will be slashdotted since it is on a university server something tells me that some sort of throttling script should kick in soon.
Either that or the Admin is going to wonder what the hell is going on when he looks at the statistics for the server.
...or better yet, for himself! He could make a lot of money at this.
If it's not one thing it's your mother.
Do you think that cruising floof bars and having anonymous sex with other men makes me, I mean him, a little gay, or is this perfectly normal heterosexual activity?
It makes you gay. But not in a good way.
It's a hobby. You don't need a reason to have a hobby.
Some? All!
how many "ultimate MAME box" stories are we gonna
.. BOX .. and imma put some .. .. and then imma .. SUBMIT TO SLASHDOT
have to choke through?
"HI! imma buy a
PAINT on it
my WEBSITEX0R! FUQYAH!"
fuqu
...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
Not as cool as this one.
traid at pr0n.biz in tar or zip or bz2 or gz is fine :)
None of us are as dumb as all of us.
with his Pee-Niss
Why aren't geeks more popular with women?
You are now being trolled. How does it feel? Suffer under the weight of my troll.
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.
EGG, the Electronic Gamers Guild
I will troll you additionally. I will troll the forums of your soul. Suckaz.
It can?! Holy Leaping Mario's man!!! I want one.
Can you imagine a beowulf cluster of those? A beowulf cluster of Donkey Kongs?
Here's the mirror.
Notes:
Not all of it is downloaded.
In the images gallery, the thumbnails aren't there yet. Most(?) of the full images are, so click on them anyway.
Enjoy.
2) In MAME32, at least, go to Options -> Interface Options and check Skip disclaimer and Skip game info. This should take care of the "OK" problem.
Hope this helps.
There's no place I can be, since I found Serenity.
You can buy an entire cabinet with control dashboard if you've got deep enough pockets.
Slikstik sells both cabinets and controls 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 don't take their time to do it right.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Aaron Mahler's MAME setup was featured as The Infinite Arcade Machine: Building the world's largest video arcade--in your family room (page 2) in the October 2003 issue of Scientific American. Printer-friendly version.
This is nothing new. Check out 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
This dude has a spinning control panel.
I have mirrored it - Here
This won't be around for long - maybe a day or two tops. someone else wnat to mirror from me?
comment directly in my journal
Stupidity + Globalization = Mass Destruction
Stupidity + Globalization = "we think Iraq has weapons of Mass Destruction"
my isp's server is a little slow atm so if some one could put this up on a phat pipe http://www.cyberonic.com/~creamme/mame.tar.bz2
http://freshmeat.net/projects/knoppixmame/
*cough* karma whore *cough*
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 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.
"the stoneage look, feel and functionality of it has no place in gaming these days"
You do know that this is "retro" gaming, right?
Oh, and move the joystick left, then right... MAME accepts that as an "OK"
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
Yet Another Sick Post. *cough* karma whore *cough* I have some CowboyNeal-brand syrup that can clear-up that dreadful disease you have.
this and oh my God do I want one! Next pay cheque please!
The problem with slashdot is that most of its users were bullied and stuffed into lockers as kids!
http://www.clatfelter.com/arcade.html
Actually, though ... I was inspired by CmdrTaco's
MAME cab Jubei ... so the science of creating MAME
cabinets is nothing quite new.
Share data. Share code. Share ideas. Share the wealth.
http://stockfilter.org
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
in girum imus nocte et consumimur igni
He is going to get a lot of pussy because of his mame box.
Stupidity + Globalization = "we thought Iraq had weapons of Mass Destruction"
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)
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 also if you have questions.
I appreciate the info point #2 provided. Cripes, I'm sick of "OK".
Be that as it may, portability is a sorry excuse these days not to include a GUI, especially when the average ROM library is far from portable, when the media of choice is CD and when harddrives regularly come in multi-gigabyte flavors. We're not exactly dealing with 1.44mb floppies here anymore. My Rom Library takes up at least 5 CDs. I don't think another meg or two on MAME for a spiffy user interface and enhanced ROM management is going make a difference on way or the other.
But hey, it's free, right? You get what you pay for and I guess it really is too much to ask.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
All I'm asking for is something nice to handle those retro games, but point taken :p
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Future Cab 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.
The only exception I can currently think of to the storage rule is for the GP32 (noted by somebody else a few posts down) where space can be a premium. Otherwise it's a non-issue.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
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?
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
And with xmame, the Linux/Unix Mame version, you can use
-[no]skip_disclaimerSkip displaying the disclaimer screen
-[no]skip_gameinfo Skip displaying the game info screen
on the commandline, or specify these options in your xmamerc file.
If you're a zombie and you know it, bite your friend!
Take a look at gxmame for a really cool and very pretty Linux frontend for xmame.
If you're a zombie and you know it, bite your friend!
As we're adding links to slashdotters cabs - if you like, take a gander at my Pac-Cab. It's what was left of a jamma cabinet, but with none of the fancy extended control panels so it looks like it would have done in a real arcade. Runs MAME, Gamebase64, WinUAE, Visual Pinball, and so on.
So many times it'll make your head spin.
Built in winter 1999-2000 and since parted out:
Video Invasion caberet
Yeah, it's pretty ugly, but I got to test the incredible I-Pac control panel interface. 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.
"You're getting brutal, Sark. Brutal and needlessly sadistic."
"Thank you, Master Control"
-Sark and the MCP
On an Dutch tech forum 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.
A step by step Mame Arcade building website can be found @ Mame-Arcade
30% off web hosting. Coupon code "SLASHDOT".
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) because operators turned them to gamble machines. I am considering myself building a MAME box. I hope I am not an outlaw!!!
By the way, arcade graphics are so nicer on a coin-op screen than on my 17" TFT monitor!!!
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, Mamestation II.. 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.
Never deploy on your work machine! Heh heh...
Blar.
http://amdpower.com/sections.php4?op=viewarticle&a rtid=1
This one was done about 3 years ago by a friend that uns www.amdpower.com
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 cabinet.
Oooooooooohhhhhhhh!!!!!! B U T T O N S !!!
And to circumvent the lameness filter for Yelling: News at 11
Free ?! Does that mean I can't get a Discount ?!
This message was
I want to build a MAME machine but don't have the cashflow to do so properly. If you have a spare in any kind of condition to be presentable, it would be a great donation.
Drizzt(REMOVESPAM)@(REMOVESPAM)adelphia.net
Jesus dude. Get a new one from Victor Geneao for $100.
I got a 25" from him for $230 shipped. And WHY did he use a Millipede cab?
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
UberCade
It doesn't run Linux, but I do have a removable star wars yoke, so that should count for something, right?
E.
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &
Frostillicus Rotating Control Panel Mame Cabinet
1up's original rotating cabinet PacMamea
None of these projects would be possible without ArcadeControls.com and it's excellent Message Board/Community
Discussion of Top 20 most inspirational mame cabinets
*shrug*
E.
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &
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 for links, pics and schematics).
Enjoy!
"Be that as it may, portability is a sorry excuse these days not to include a GUI,"
The source is available, if you feel up to that task =P But if you are just figuring out the "OK" answer, I doubt you're up to it.
*shrug*
e.
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &
I'm sick and tired of actually typing out "OK" 500 times everytime MAME finds something to prompt
Just move the joystick left then right. That's what I do on my arcade cab and it works great...
I am disrespectful to dirt! Can you see that I am serious?!
Please document what you can when you get a chance. There're too many good photos on your site to let it fall by the wayside. My project begins in the Spring.
So long, michael. Don't let the door hit you...
Yeah sorry I'm getting to it. I've been more interested in getting the thing to work. I really do need to put up some documentation when I get a chance. We took all of those pictures just for that purpose.
Oh, you mean the OK solution as part of somebody else's utility and not really MAME itself? Dude, my entire point (which you obviously missed) is native GUI support, NOT writing your own/3rd party front end.
"shrug"
You need a FREE iPod Nano
no, you are wrong...
MAME natively has had the ability itself to skipdisclaimer, etc. via the ini files or command line parameters for some time now. All the win32/mame32 gui does is enable those options via checkboxes for people who don't read the doc's/play with config files. =P What exactly do you think a GUI "front end" does?!
Next thing we'll hear about this neat trick where you can bypass the "OK" screens by pressing left then right on your joystick!
E.
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &
Let me clarify -> If it is so easy, you do it. No where in MAME's creed/mission statement does it say, "Make a cross platform GUI so ungrateful slobs can play games" it's supposedly (paraphrase), "document/preserve games/hardware"
I doubt you are up to doing it, if you don't understand very basic MAME config options.
*shrug*
e.
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &