This document provides instructions for building your own arcade cabinet from scratch or using a kit. It discusses options for the cabinet, necessary electronics including controls, interface cards and software. Building your own cabinet requires basic woodworking skills but provides instructions and allows customizing the design. Necessary electronics include a computer, speakers, controls and interface cards to connect the controls to the computer. Software includes an arcade emulator like MAME to run games and a front-end interface to select games.

1. BUILDING YOUR OWN
ARCADE CABINET
Phil Denoncourt III
www.philknows.net

2. MAJOR SECTIONS
 Cabinet
 Electronics
 Software

3. CABINET
 Either find an old one (~ $300- $900)
 Ebay
 Craigslist
 Purchase a kit (~ $500 - $2700)
 Rec Room Masters
 MameRoom
 Monster Arcades
 Build your own ( ~$200 + 20 hours)
 ArcadeCab.com

4. BUILD YOUR OWN
 ArcadeCab is nearly idiot proof
 Cut by Cut instructions, lots of warnings
 Need to adjust some dimensions depending on size of monitor,
speakers
 Basic woodworking skills
 Jigsaw
 Table saw
 Miter Saw
 Router
 Most materials (wood, acrylic) can be gotten from Lowes
 Bought T-Molding online (www.t-molding.com)
 Designed own Marquee, but you can order them online

5. ELECTRONICS
 Computer
 10 year old computers work fine
 Speakers
 Subwoofer really adds to depth
 Arcade controls
 Buttons
 Joysticks
 Trackballs
 Spinners
 Light Guns
 Driving Pedals, Shifters
 Interface cards
 Coin Door / Bill Door
 Ticket Dispenser
 LEDs

6. COMPUTER / SPEAKERS
 You’re emulating games that ran at a
megahertz
 Old computers work fine
 Mine is 10 year old student level All-in-
one
 OS can be Windows, Mac, or Linux
 Best to use All in one so you don’t have
to secure both a monitor and CPU
 Bought car speakers
 Used an old Logitech subwoofer
 Sounds fantastic due to wooden
cabinet

7. INTERFACE CARDS
 Need to present devices to
computer
 Usually keyboard emulators, or
game device emulators
 I liked Ultimarc I-PAC Ultimate I/O
 Support nearly any control
 Supports outputs, such as lights
 Plan your layout to make sure you
have enough interface cards
 2 Player – generally one card
 4 Player – generally two cards

8. CONTROLS
 Purchase online from
 Amazon.com
 Xgaming.com
 MikesArcade.com
 Ultimarc.com
 GroovyGameGear.com
 Plan out your layout ahead of time
 Quite a variety online
 Buttons – $1-2 per button
 Joysticks - $10-50 per joystick
 Trackballs - $50-$100 per trackball
 Spinners - $60-$100 per spinner
 Lightguns - $95 per gun
 Pedals, Shift sticks - $100-$200

9. COIN DOOR / BILL DOOR
 Adds more reality
 Cost $40-$140
 Xgaming.com
 TwistedQuarter.com
 Bill Door cost $120-$200
 Triggers a momentary switch when
quarter is placed.
 Wire switch to interface board

10. SOFTWARE
 Arcade Emulator - Use MAME
(mame.net).
 Well supported, constantly being
improved.
 Emulates arcade system, older
consoles (Atari, Nintendo, Sega).
 Front-end to choose game
 I wrote my own
 Tons to choose from
 ROMs
 Download from variety of sites.
 Torrents that provide a pretty big set
 Legality is unclear. It seems that you
should own the ROM