this part took a while. of course i chose to start the
project in the winter, so it took some time to get some good
days to go out in the garage and work on it. i did not take
any pics (of course, stupid me). but i can tell you i used
all of my wood working tools and borrowed one just to finish
it. i used mainly a circular saw (with new blade, yes!). jig
saw for small cuts and speaker cut outs. barrel sander for
speaker holes and plexi glass. band saw for plexi, table
saw for long wood cuts, and belt sander for finish work. and
one key tool you will need for the t-molding, a slot cutter.
a 1/16 in slot cutter to be exact, it goes in a router. i
got mine a few years ago at a woodworking place online, cost
$25. kinda steep, if you ask me, but worth it. t-molding makes
it look authentic.
base
2x6' frame, 1/2 mdf top, 135 lbs rated swivel casters. that's
a total 540 lbs. rated weight and this thing probably weighs
about 320 lbs!
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| casters, wow |
sides
material 3/4 mdf. slot cut on the perimeter for t-molding.
the bracing/supports were screwed to these pieces and then
the holes filled before painting.
coin door
got this on ebay, total $35. that's pretty good, new ones
are $75-100. i had to refinish it, but i didn't mind. its
mounted into a 3/4 mdf door, with a piano hinge, and all the
locks are keyed alike. got em from happcontrols.com.
the lights are powered from and old defunct 12v power supply
that is plugged into the switch board.
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| coin door front |
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coin mech's |
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closeup |
monitor bezel
this is what houses the 27" tv. i cut it from .093 plexi
and cut out the screen size from the middle. i the masked
off a couple of rectangles and a circle for the tv eye on
the back of the plexi. i then painted the back black. looking
at the front, it makes it look real glossy and professional.
the rectangle are see thru for the controls images i created.
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| bezel |
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detail of arcade instructions |
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awesome! |
speakers
i got some shielded speaker from partsexpress.com for like
1.50 apiece. they are 3" i think and had nearly the exact
specs of the 3" arcade speaker from happcontrols. i have
them controlled by an altec lansing powered $9.99 3 pc. speaker
set from office max. sounds pretty good too. i mounted the
control for the speaker set in the speaker panel, easily in
reach.
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| speakers |
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speaker control |
marquee
the marquee image is sandwiched between 2 sheets of .093 plexi
and held on there with happcontrols marquee retainer trim.
cool stuff. it is backlit with a 24" 20 watt fluorescent
light. looks really cool at night.
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| light |
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marquee |
electrical
i wired in my own 4 outlet box inside the cab for powering
everything. a computer switch board is plugged into that for
turning on and off the lights and for surge protection for
the rest of the outfit. and there is an rf modulator for turning
the video out from the computer into a coax signal. as for
the computer...
computer
i had some requests for more detailed info on the pc specs,
so here they are:
via epia C3 800MHz, itx form factor silent/low heat
 w/ built
in s-video or component video out, usb, and lan!
512M PC133 (2x 256 sticks)
Western Digital 40G 7200 rpm drive
Toshiba 52x DVD drive
windoz 2000 pro (slimmed install)
roll-up keyboard (flexible), run of the mill mouse
ati remote wonder, and of course the ipac for inputs
i have power dvd for movies, sonique2 102 for music (and
sweet visuals). and of course winkawaks (version 1.48) with
no frontend. i like the way winkawaks runs, smooth and with
low resources unlike mame. i used msconfig and tweakui for
the small but helpful slimming of windows 2k, and i turned
off most of the warm fuzzy features.
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| outlet |
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the hole dizzle |
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epia c3 |
the ati remote wonder is used so i don't have to open the
door and move the mouse for some complex controls or setup.
it is a usb controlled uhf wireless remote. it can control
the mouse with an 8 way d-pad, launch custom apps (dvd player,
winkawaks), full screen and shut down the computer. pretty
sweet. i recommend it for all computer users.
i also made some skin.bmp's for winkawaks, a little higher
res than the standard, and look good at 640x480 maximized,
which is what my monitor runs at for the cab. one is for fighting
games and the other is metal slug themed. they both say neogeo
and are red themed as well, cause of my cab (of course). email
me if you want to check em out.
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