Archives for 07 / 2004
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Cha Ching
Saturday, 31st July 2004 at 5:47PM (3215 days ago)
Spent most of the day out the back today cutting up a little box for my coin mechanism as well as re-wiring my demo control unit.
I wired up the coin mechanism after building the box and gave it a nice test. All works perfectly! Next step I need to replace my 17" LG screen with the 19" version. Once i've done that I need to get around to ordering my laser cut stencil, then i'll have everything pretty much ready to go before I venture up to Nelson Bay!
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Spare change please?
Friday, 30th July 2004 at 9:28AM (3216 days ago)
My coin mechanism arrived this morning! It looks way better than I thought, and it's the same coin mech that was used in the classic Australian arcade machines. Nice and simple it is with a polished stainless steel face.
I'm going to rig up a basic frame for it this weekend and wire it up to the iPac. Internally you can adjust the coin mech to accept different sized coins. You simply adjust a screw to suit your needs. The coin mech itself is very simple, it's a mechanical one rather than an electronic one which means no additional power is required. The coin drops when inserted and hits the microswitch which will trigger the coin insert on the iPac and hence in MacMAME.
I'm getting closer to finally putting something together with this thing. On another note Renae is now on her way to Scottland for about a week, then she'll head back to London to spend time with her cousins. What's everyone up to for the weekend?
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Arcade Madness
Sunday, 25th July 2004 at 4:17PM (3221 days ago)
Was playing around with a few ideas for features for the cabinet. I'm weighing up whether or not I put a trackball in it. I'm a bit opposed at doing that as I mainly want the machine to be for fighter type games. I'm thinking i'll get a copy of QuickKeys X on the iMac so I can easily shutdown the machine and return to the main menu of MacMAME.
I ordered myself a coin mech this morning to play around with. They're quite reasonably priced $40 AUD, and are very simple to hook up. They come with a microswitch that you can connect to the iPac so coin inserts will be triggered within MAME. I need to get a hold of the 19" screen so I can work out the final specs and sizes. I'm still surprised at how well MAME plays on the iMac.
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Bonvoyage
Saturday, 24th July 2004 at 2:10PM (3222 days ago)
Renae left on her exciting adventure this morning. Five and a half weeks of travelling around europe visiting her cousins. I love watching the planes at the airport, it's amazing how they work.
She's flying on a 747-400, the biggest of planes. First stop is Singapore. After that she'll fly to London and then travel around with her cousins (they all live really close to each other in england).
I got a few snaps of the plane taking off, quite cool actually, I took a whole sequence of the plane going through it's motion of taking off. If only I had a bigger lens I could get way more detail.
Work continues to be busy, which is a good thing. Working on some exciting projects at present which should keep us busy for quite a while. I'm going to be doing some more work on my arcade machine over the coming weeks and get it ready to start putting together once Renae returns.
The weather is really crap today, raining and dark sky with a bit of fog. That's my two cents.
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Funky see funky do
Tuesday, 20th July 2004 at 6:10PM (3226 days ago)
It seems like forever since I posted last! You'll notice that the comments can now remember you via a nice cookie.
Renae is heading off to to Europe for 6 weeks come this Saturday. We've been really busy these last few weeks with a few nice projects. I've still got the arcade machine on my mind, but am having time issues with working on it (as per usual). More to come soon!
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My spider sense is tingling!
Monday, 5th July 2004 at 1:15PM (3241 days ago)
Had a nice and relaxing weekend which was good. Went and saw Spiderman 2 last night! Wow that's a cool movie. I'm liking it more than the first. Although the first was cool in it's own right.
Work is still commencing on my arcade machine! Getting really into it. I've found a place that is going to cut up the stencil for me, really well priced too.. $137 AUD all up including materials and delivery. This is for laser cutting our logo on 6mm arcylic, 800mm wide. Will send off the artwork this week or next when I get around to it. I just need to finalise the dimensions of the cabinet first.
I'm going to replace my 17" LG screen with a 19" LG screen, as I really do want a bigger screen for this thing. I think 19" is a good size, not too big, not too small, just right. I've got the sound system sorted too, i'm going to get an Altec Lansing 2100 speaker system. This should fit really nicely in the cabinet.
As you can see i've got the logo on the side and the space for the monitor cut out in the model. The full size view is here.
