Am close to buying a unit from Dream Authentics, anyone have info on them?...also how hard is it to actually find & download games for MAME?

Greetings,

I purchased the DreamAuthentics' "Excalibur" cab last July. It wasn't cheap
(about $4k) but well worth it in IMO. Lots of replay value and the games look
great and play very well. I went with the stainless steel joysticks (see pic).

Do you have any specific questions? What are some of your favorite games?
I also have the light gun and am using a Pentium 3 Ghz setup w/ 1gig RAM.

I will also send you a PM regarding the MAME roms.



http://s144.photobucket.com/albums/r187/MythTrip/?action=view&current=MAMEStarWarsCabs.jpg

I'm also interested in getting a unit from DA. I want the Quad unit.

Greetings,

I purchased the DreamAuthentics' "Excalibur" cab last July. It wasn't cheap
(about $4k) but well worth it in IMO. Lots of replay value and the games look
great and play very well. I went with the stainless steel joysticks (see pic).

Do you have any specific questions? What are some of your favorite games?
I also have the light gun and am using a Pentium 3 Ghz setup w/ 1gig RAM.

I will also send you a PM regarding the MAME roms.
Thanks..thats the one I'm thinking of getting..I'm looking for games like crossbow, sub hunter, zaxxon, etc...i got your PM (thanks!)..I heard horror stories of 3 day downloads...so is it just a matter of loading into cab's PC?

The 48-in-one multicades are pretty nice. They have a board rather then being a computer in the cab. Downside is it is only the 48 games.

Thanks..thats the one I'm thinking of getting..I'm looking for games like crossbow, sub hunter, zaxxon, etc...i got your PM (thanks!)..I heard horror stories of 3 day downloads...so is it just a matter of loading into cab's PC?


Trust me, you do not want to download all those games. Some games such as Area 51, Maximum Force, (recent gams) are over 1 gig in size. If you are just after the classics - Pac Man, Donkey Kong, etc. - they are very small files, less than 100k. I would definitely recommend a burner (see my PM). Yes, it's just a matter of loading the DVD's onto the hard drive. I have a 250 gig HD and am using about 130 gig for games.

I have not played crossbow or sub hunter on my cab. Did you mean spy hunter?
Zaxxon plays pretty well - it's one of my favorites - but I would prefer to use a flight stick. I don't have a flight stick on my cab, but I'm thinking of purchasing another DreamAuthentics one with a flightstick.

Games that play great on my cab include Robotron, Tempest, Area 51, Hogan's Alley, Ms Pac Man, Galaga, Dig Dug, Mortal Kombat, Pole Position, etc. Track ball games - Centipede, Marble Madness, Golden Tee, Missile Command, etc. - also play great.

Some games that don't play that great due to limited controllers, include Spy Hunter (arcade game used a bunch of buttons/steering wheel, etc.), Cruisi'n USA
(arcade game used a centering steering wheel), Food Fight (arcade used a 49-point joystick), Tron (would work better with a flight stick), Front Line/Ikari Warriors (used rotary joysticks).

Some of the overall negatives are the power button is on the side of the cab and not underneath the control panel, the control panel can leave fingerprints, but they do wipe off and you can get an overlay design for the control panel. Also,
the cab weighs over 350lbs so if you are moving down a stairs, you need a strong dolley and two friends.

Overall I'm very happy with my purchase and see myself enjoying it ten years from now. I would like though to eventually buy a sit down driving MAME cab and another cab with just a flight stick.

Jim

Trust me, you do not want to download all those games. Some games such as Area 51, Maximum Force, (recent gams) are over 1 gig in size. If you are just after the classics - Pac Man, Donkey Kong, etc. - they are very small files, less than 100k. I would definitely recommend a burner (see my PM). Yes, it's just a matter of loading the DVD's onto the hard drive. I have a 250 gig HD and am using about 130 gig for games.

I have not played crossbow or sub hunter on my cab. Did you mean spy hunter?
Zaxxon plays pretty well - it's one of my favorites - but I would prefer to use a flight stick. I don't have a flight stick on my cab, but I'm thinking of purchasing another DreamAuthentics one with a flightstick.

Games that play great on my cab include Robotron, Tempest, Area 51, Hogan's Alley, Ms Pac Man, Galaga, Dig Dug, Mortal Kombat, Pole Position, etc. Track ball games - Centipede, Marble Madness, Golden Tee, Missile Command, etc. - also play great.

Some games that don't play that great due to limited controllers, include Spy Hunter (arcade game used a bunch of buttons/steering wheel, etc.), Cruisi'n USA
(arcade game used a centering steering wheel), Food Fight (arcade used a 49-point joystick), Tron (would work better with a flight stick), Front Line/Ikari Warriors (used rotary joysticks).

Some of the overall negatives are the power button is on the side of the cab and not underneath the control panel, the control panel can leave fingerprints, but they do wipe off and you can get an overlay design for the control panel. Also,
the cab weighs over 350lbs so if you are moving down a stairs, you need a strong dolley and two friends.

Overall I'm very happy with my purchase and see myself enjoying it ten years from now. I would like though to eventually buy a sit down driving MAME cab and another cab with just a flight stick.

Jim


basically just the classics...newer games I would just run on reg. PC...sub hunter is one of those torpedo games ( there were a few kinds )..spy hunter is cool, I would think with all the buttons on the cab it should configure better on its own...as far as burners do you specify the games or is it a set package

Jerry

Check out the site I had sent in my PM. If for some reason I didn't include a link, please advise. You would purchase the entire library plus, flyers, game cab pics, etc. It would be too much of a hassle to send a burner a list of games, unless there are only a handful you wanted.

Don't discount some newer games. Some of my favorites are Mr. Driller, Virtua Fighter, Area 51, etc. It's great having the variety of several hundred games.

Check out the site I had sent in my PM. If for some reason I didn't include a link, please advise. You would purchase the entire library plus, flyers, game cab pics, etc. It would be too much of a hassle to send a burner a list of games, unless there are only a handful you wanted.

Don't discount some newer games. Some of my favorites are Mr. Driller, Virtua Fighter, Area 51, etc. It's great having the variety of several hundred games

I clicked on 1 of the links...the guy has tons of games including nintendo...too good to be true?...main question is how much will the cab's PC hold (about 16 discs worth according to site) is the 250 gig standard on the excalibur?..sorry if questions seem dumb, not much of a computer guy!

Check out the site I had sent in my PM. If for some reason I didn't include a link, please advise. You would purchase the entire library plus, flyers, game cab pics, etc. It would be too much of a hassle to send a burner a list of games, unless there are only a handful you wanted.

Don't discount some newer games. Some of my favorites are Mr. Driller, Virtua Fighter, Area 51, etc. It's great having the variety of several hundred games.


I second the Area 51. I must say that I am like the OP and like the older games. I don't have time to get involved in the deep, elaborate and addicting games like Everquest. I like to de-stress with some classics that are more mindless - I am a roadtech for IT and do more than enough mind work.


Enjoy!

Dennis

I clicked on 1 of the links...the guy has tons of games including nintendo...too good to be true?...main question is how much will the cab's PC hold (about 16 discs worth according to site) is the 250 gig standard on the excalibur?..sorry if questions seem dumb, not much of a computer guy!


No problem with the questions. I was in the same boat as you about a year ago.

I would email Dream Authentics (Rick) and ask him the specs of the model you are looking to purchase. They have different "engines" and some have more CPU speed and memory than others. One of the reasons my cab cost more than usual is because I asked for the highest CPU speed, RAM, harddrive they had. In all honesty, you probably can get away with a 200 gig harddrive, but I would get the fastest CPU unless you absolutely don't care about more modern games (Area 51, Tekken). You can always upgrade later by putting in a new computer box.

Yes, in addition to arcade games, consoles such as the SNES, Nintendo 64 are available also. However, I mainly play the arcade games on my cab as I'm used to playing console games on my couch.

I second the Area 51. I must say that I am like the OP and like the older games. I don't have time to get involved in the deep, elaborate and addicting games like Everquest. I like to de-stress with some classics that are more mindless - I am a roadtech for IT and do more than enough mind work.


Enjoy!

Dennis


I'm 39 years old and mainly enjoy the older classics also. However, every now and then newer games like Mr. Driller, Area 51, Crazy Taxi (PC game) etc. are great to play. I would say 90% of the games I play are from pre 1984.

I have a custom built arcade cab as well and I just love it! I have had it for over 3 years. A pic of my cab can be seen here:

http://www.custom-arcade.com/barracudagallery.htm

It is the one with the caption '2-player Barracuda with all the fixin's'.

I agree with Myth, don't seek out and download the roms, just find a place that burns them for you and grab the whole set on DVDs. You'll find 100s of cool games you never even heard of before.

I have a custom built arcade cab as well and I just love it! I have had it for over 3 years. A pic of my cab can be seen here:



It is the one with the caption '2-player Barracuda with all the fixin's'.

I agree with Myth, don't seek out and download the roms, just find a place that burns them for you and grab the whole set on DVDs. You'll find 100s of cool games you never even heard of before.
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yeah...looked into burners, that's the way to go..ordered the excalibur with the 200G mem., the games will use up about 130 or so..decided against nes games, the ones I like need to be saved, not sure if rom can do that.

Build your own definetely, I sell arcades for a living and I always recommend for private use build you own mame from a old cabinet, add a pc or even a modded xbox, find some roms and go to town, save a ton and its like a museum of classics in your home as well. I think these companies charging $4000 for a mame machine are nuts, I have built many excellent machines for under a grand, just do some research online, learn the way its done, head to ebay or better yet an arcade auction. Gather the cabinet and parts nad voilaaa your all set.

Build your own definetely, I sell arcades for a living and I always recommend for private use build you own mame from a old cabinet, add a pc or even a modded xbox, find some roms and go to town, save a ton and its like a museum of classics in your home as well. I think these companies charging $4000 for a mame machine are nuts, I have built many excellent machines for under a grand, just do some research online, learn the way its done, head to ebay or better yet an arcade auction. Gather the cabinet and parts nad voilaaa your all set.

I couldn't agree more. It's not all that hard to do. I built my MAME cab from a converted arcade machine about 4 or 5 years ago. I've upgraded the PC motherboard inside once since then, and the hard disk a couple of times, but my total cost (using hand-me-down PC components from other systems in my house) is still less than $1K in all that time - and most of that was in the $200 monitor (19" monitor in about 2002) and the $250 I spent for the used arcade machine.

I spent about $200 - $250 with Happ Controls to get the real arcade joysticks and a USB/PC interface for the real arcade trackball that came in the used arcade cabinet I bought and about $30 (if I remember correctly) for a USB keyboard encoder to which the joysticks and buttons are connected. I've got the MAME machine up on my home network so I can remote into in and update it as necessary. For a time, before I started beta testing Windows Home Server, I was also running Windows Media Connect to serve my music collection throughout the house.

I have a 160GB drive in the cabinet. Currently about 80GB are the MAME ROMS and another 30GB are roms and video files for Daphne (Dragon's Lair and other old Laserdisc Arcade games).

It's not quite as polished as some of the pre-packaged machines, but it was a whole lot less and a LOT of fun to do myself: laying out the control panel I wanted, drilling the holes, assembling the PC and controls and wiring it all up. It was an evening hobby for a lot of planning time and about 2 weeks of construction. But I recognize it is not everybody's cup of tea.

As for the MAME ROMs themselves, I used to maintain a high-speed Usenet account just for MAME, but I've finally given up on keeping up with the additions to MAME. They just take up too much space and I NEVER play them. I have a fairly (99+%) complete set of ROMs through about 18 months ago and I find that 80% of my MAME time is spent playing games from 1984 or earlier. The most recent game I ever got into playing a lot on the MAME machine was probably Metal Slug (SNK from the mid to late 90s, if I remember correctly).

Nowadays, I have taken a lot of the more graphically violent and/or suggestive games off of the MAME cab because my 5 year old daughter has started to play with the MAME machine and I'd rather not have her stumbling on those games accidentally. I like to play Ms. Pac Man with her and we've spent a lot of time together at the MAME machine in recent months.

I had the most bizarre "proud papa" moment on new years eve this year, when for the first time, my daughter cleared the first screen of Ms. Pac Man all by herself - I was across the room in a conversation at our new years party but was watching her out of the corner of my eye, becuase she had been getting better and better, and sure enough, she managed to make it through. Now I'm waiting for her to get good enough to reach the first intermission by herself - but she has a way to go yet.

You surely can play these games on PCs or modern gaming consoles, but for my money, nothing comes close to playing them standing upright with real arcade controls.

Ted

I purchased my MAME cab since I work alot of 60-hour weeks and don't have alot of spare time and I don't have carpentry/electrical skills. I just wanted a plug-n-play option in a nice cab with an authentic arcade monitor and controls.

Plus, if I did attempt to build my own cab it would probably end up on this
guy's website being ridiculed. Scroll through some of the pics to get an idea
of how not to design a MAME cab.

http://www.wickedretarded.com/~crapmame/4.html

Plus, if I did attempt to build my own cab it would probably end up on this guy's website being ridiculed. Scroll through some of the pics to get an idea
of how not to design a MAME cab.

http://www.wickedretarded.com/~crapmame/4.html
That's some of the funniest stuff I have ever seen/read! And I'm with you there, the exact reason I didn't build my own cab.

Remember, you don't need to build a cabinet. I was able to buy one (with monitor and game...world class bowling deluxe) for $400 shipped to my door and brought in my basement.

Yes, I had to refurb it myself, but since I don't have woodworking skills (and didn't want to buy a kit), this was the cheapest option. Since I had the computer, all I needed was a way to plug it in and get the controls going.

Of course, I upgraded the monitor due to not being able to get convergence done properly, as well as a somewhat badly burned in tube. However, I was able to recap that chassis, so you might get lucky with a decent tube and chassis in the one you might buy.

That's some of the funniest stuff I have ever seen/read! And I'm with you there, the exact reason I didn't build my own cab.

that guy is great!...he needs to branch out into other products...even though I went with the commercial machine, the funny part is I do carpentry ( furniture, cabinets, bars, etc.) it's just something I couldn't get into building

I purchased my quad cab from Dream Authentics. I had some shipping issues with them, but once it was all sorted out, I had a great cab that did everything I could ever want in an aracde machine.

They are pricey, but I did not have the time to build one or refurb one myself.

I would recommend them to you.

PS I would also recommend the burner route.

I have a slikstik. I love it, fantastic build quality. My trackball started getting wonky, not broken but just wonky and they sent a replacement for free even after warranty. I just got the control panel though. I moved it randomly through my apartment whereever I have space.

If you have the time, it is definitely worth the effort and options to build your own. I will start a thread with my cabinet and details.

Those arcade units look good. I may think about adding one to my rec area in my basement. :)