This page was designed with the intent of proving that the average schmuck could build a relatively cool Mame cabinet with limited experiences and resources. Obviously as you read on you will see that it has grown a bit from that, but I suppose the underlying theme is still there. It was never my intent to build the "Ultimate" cabinet, at least not at this time. Merely I was attempting to put together something that I would be happy to display and play. And I think I'm getting there.

If this is something you're interested in, the only advice I can give is Dive right in, but know what your limitations are. If you do not have the skills to construct a cabinet yourself, there are almost always people giving away freebies. For those who feel that an arcade cabinet should only be used to "restore" the original game, I say,{TANGENT} Wood lasts often far longer than electronics. I do not support stripping an old game cabinet of all it's parts and disposing of them just so you can throw a PC in there. In fact, if that is your intent, give the parts away, so someone else can find a use for them. Even if something doesn't work, does not mean it is not repairable. Ideally, one who does not want to construct a whole cabinet from scratch should do what I did, find a shell. Usually people are more than happy to give them away, rather than destroy them. If you plan on Mame'ing something, try to find a cabinet that has been converted so many times that noone even knows what it was originally. But don't go out and destroy a perfectly good Tron cab or some other super rare game (or highly collectible) to throw a Mame cab together.{/TANGENT}

I was one of the lucky ones who intended to build a single Mame cabinet, but ended up with 2 cabs. The Cabinet that became my Mame project was an old Kick or Kickman that someone had (and God only knows how and why) converted to a Mortal Kombat. And I use the word Converted quite loosely. By the time I obtained it, the only thing that was left was the wood, and a really bad spray paint job to cover up the original (albeit loud) Kick(man) sideart, and a few really bad repro MK Stickers, and severely peeling (and severely bad) sideart repros. Of course the bright oranges and yellows of the Kick(man) bled through the paint quite extensively. Although I believe it's a lost cause, I may at some point try to uncover the original artwork.

The second cab was a pretty good Pleiades. Chuck (www.chux0r.org) who gave me both cabinets had no idea what was left in it, but I discovered a working (at least I think it's working) PS and a severely hacked wiring harness. Since I found Phoenix stuff first, and am a little partial to the game, and since they're virtually interchangeable, I decided to restore the cab.

Well thats the whole backstory, at least for now...