Xion Ba Jamma Cabinet project

[JayC]

Ok, so I posted a question if I should get a used Xion Ba cabinet to rebuild it to a Hyperspin cabinet.

I got the cab for 150€, not bad i suppose. The cabinet is in pretty good shape and i actually like the size and model of it. I can sit in front of it on normal chairs and the screen is pretty big.

So I'm starting a project thread on this mostly because I have really no idea about what I'm supposed to do with this. I'm no arcade guy to start with. My wife is actually more of the gamer in our house. I guess it's a good combination, I like working on stuff like consoles, computers and she likes to use them, its a win win situation

I picked up the cabinet earlier today and didn't have too much time to examine it, but I did have time to take some pictures and will post a couple of them here so you guys can tell me what the hell I'm looking at

What I'm trying to do is turning the cab in to a Hyperspin cab. So running MAME and other arcades as well as some pinball games. I have a small Dell "Pizzabox" itx pc with a i5 processor I'm not using at the moment and I'm thinking about using that for this cab, is this a good idea? The biggest problem I see is the video card as it's intergrated...I saw the Ultimarc arcade VGA card, should I get one of those?

I am open for the possibility to get a whole new computer hardware for this build, if you think this would be better...what should I get? Like I said...MAME and other arcade games mostly. As this has an arcade monitor It probably suits older games best? I'm thinking about building myself another cab from scratch for newer games.

Oh...and to start with...I may need help with getting this thing to run at all. I haven't had time to fire it up yet. But the company I bought it from did say that there where some problems with it. They said it ran perfectly when they got it...but then they tried to install (i guess) some games on it and when they tried to boot it it ran for a while and then just stopped working. But when they restarted it it worked again for a while...to me this sounds more like a game hardware problem than a monitor problem?

The other thing I will try to do is make a new CP. The one on this machine is very simple...a joystick + 6 buttons and a start button / Player. I'm thinking of changing the ashtray to a second control panel and putting the basic buttons needed for hyperspin there. I'm also thinking about adding a trackball where the start buttons are now. Is this a good idea? Do I need a trackball? Like I said, I'm know nothing about arcade games.

So here goes for the pictures...oh...and don't worry I will have a lot of more questions for all of you

This is a picture of the cab (without the top part), behind it you can see the NES controller framed posters my wife made:

This is how the original CP looks. I think I will go for the Joystick + 6 button layout like it is but add some buttons to where the ashtray is and maybe a trackball in the middle:

Backside of the cab. Its all plastic and has some scratches...but I don't mind, and I can probably polish some of them out:

So first thing I noticed when opening the front door is that the PCB had come loose totally...I lifted it upright before taking the pictures:

A closeup of the gameboard connector:

The second thing I saw was what I assume is a audio amplifier with a volume control:

Then I see two micro-switches lying on the bottom of the cab, what are those supposed to be? Player coin buttons?:

This is what looks like the modded backside of a power input panel with a fuse:

Ok...so on to the back of the cabinet. This is what I see when opening the back door:

And a closeup of the board attached to the monitor:

This sticker is on the monitor tube (a Samsung sticker obviously) so how do I know what monitor this is?:

This is what I see when looking at the bottom of the cab from the back door. A loose VGA cable, the game board and what I suppose is the amplifier:

The left speaker:

The right speaker obviously has a loose wire (Is this a mono or stereo cab btw?):

And lastly the outside of the power input panel...not the best looking one for sure...I may change it completely:

So What is all this and what can I use and what needs to be replaced?

Thanks a million for any input you might have!

[JayC]

Wow...those Images got really big...should I make them smaller? Or how do I get them to be smaller in the post and bigger when clicked on?

[gigapig]

I prefer the pictures like that, clear and no need to click anything.

This looks like an interesting project. Is the plan to try an run it, to see what the is or just gut it? Will you be putting an LCD in there?

[JayC]

Ok...I think i'll leave it like this then.

The plan was initially to just run Hyperspin on the cab, but save as much of the parts as could be used with a computer running Hyperspin.

Now I'm not sure. I don't even know if the game board has a game on it. The company I bought it from said it stopped running when they tried to install a game, so I assume it doesn't work.

So at the moment I will probably go with my first plan...leave everything that can be used in there and adding/modifying what I need to run Hyperspin.

If the arcade monitor is in order I will use it. I will probably build another cab from scratch with a LCD in it for newer games.

I saw someone else doing a similar project and he changed out all the controls because they where crap. I'm not even sure what controls to get or if the old ones are crap Total newb on the arcade scene...still...I want one and I'm willing to learn.

[brolly]

Gut the whole thing! Leave the monitor only maybe if it's working and you intend to play MAME only I guess.

Too bad you didn't get one of those chinese pinball machines they looked like fun lol

[HazzardActual]

Looks awesome dude! First off that thing that looks like the audio amp is not. thats the power supply to the cabinet. that knob should be the voltage fine tune (dont touch it). You should disconnect that board and take a few pics of it. If theres damage we'll be able to see it and also we might be able to ID it. The monitor might be just fine. Check out the bottom of the neck board to see if theres a model number. if that vga is running to the monitor, hook up your pc to it and see if you can see anything on it. You'll have to mess with the resolution settings in windows, but that will be a good way to see if it all works. this is definitely a stereo cab, just re solder that speaker connection and it should work again. those 2 micros laying in the bottom are probably hooked up to TEST and SERVICE according to JAMMA standard wiring.

Im jelly as helly, that cab is slick. I want one!

[JayC]

Gut the whole thing! Leave the monitor only maybe if it's working and you intend to play MAME only I guess.

Too bad you didn't get one of those chinese pinball machines they looked like fun lol

Lol...yeah the pinball game looked ridiculous but they actually wanted more for those and I think one project except the hyperspin project is enough at the moment

So what you are saying is that only mame would work on that monitor? Is the resolution that bad? I was wanting to run model2, naomi and neo geo at least as well. Should I just go for a lcd then?

Looks awesome dude! First off that thing that looks like the audio amp is not. thats the power supply to the cabinet. that knob should be the voltage fine tune (dont touch it). You should disconnect that board and take a few pics of it. If theres damage we'll be able to see it and also we might be able to ID it. The monitor might be just fine. Check out the bottom of the neck board to see if theres a model number. if that vga is running to the monitor, hook up your pc to it and see if you can see anything on it. You'll have to mess with the resolution settings in windows, but that will be a good way to see if it all works. this is definitely a stereo cab, just re solder that speaker connection and it should work again. those 2 micros laying in the bottom are probably hooked up to TEST and SERVICE according to JAMMA standard wiring.

Im jelly as helly, that cab is slick. I want one!

Thanks man! I like it! Even better if I get it to run.

Oh of course... A PSU...I see that now looking at the cables. The "volume" knob threw me off. I'll leave it as is.

I will take out the board and take some more pictures later today.

Could this be the monitor model? HH-3978-2

So what does the service and test buttons do? Just curious.

[HazzardActual]

I googled samsung HH-3978-2 and got nothing. maybe take a few more pics of any stickers you see on the tube. test and service buttons are for setting how many quarters equal a credit, screen calibrations etc. stuff only a tech would need to use, thats why the buttons are usually hidden. MAME has test and service buttons too, just look up the defaults and click away

[JayC]

Yeah...I tried google first as well. As far as I could tell Samsung didn't ever make arcade monitors so the Samsung sticker is only for the tube. I'll dig for some more model numbers later when I'm at the cab.

So any thoughts on my control panel idea?

[brolly]

I doubt something named Xion Ba will use an actual Samsung monitor, but I can be proven wrong.

Since that's a VGA monitor you should be fine for those systems as well, I meant if you want to run something more recent you might want to go with a LCD instead.

I'd redo the whole cp (that color selection hurts my eyes) even though there's not much room to play around with and I agree that making use of the ashtray for some extra buttons would be a good idea. Not sure if a trackball would fit there without getting the whole thing too jammed, I'm guessing you wanted to move both start buttons to the top and put the trackball at the center, you need to see if you have enough room for it without keeping bumping against it when playing. Also if you are actually going to make use of a trackball.

[JayC]

That's exactly what I meant...but the tube itself could be Samsung.

Like I said...I will probably build one from scratch for newer systems and use this one for older since it has a arcade monitor.

I'm planning a total makeover of the CP yes. As I have never even played a game with a trackball I'm not sure I'm going to need one...I read that 95% of mame games use joysticks anyway. What about a spinner? That should be smaller...but do I need one of those? Soo many questions.

And I was planning to move the start buttons to the ashtray and adding exit, start, pause and what else I need, not sure yet. But I think that 6 buttons per player will be enough?

I would like to have some pinball games on it as well...but maybe the monitor can't handle those...no easy way to add buttons for those on the side as the cab is all plastic, but I assume I can use a couple of the player buttons for double duty.

[JayC]

Ok...so I had some time to check out the cab in some more detail today.

I even tried to fire it up with a computer connected to the VGA cable. The screen worked perfectly...or should I say...it worked...well...kind of

The monitor clearly works, the problem I assume is that I wasn't able to use the right resolution. I tried two different computers and none of them let me set the resolution even close to what I need. Should I get a VGA card from ultimarc or try another computer and see if I can manage to get it right? There was picture, and it didn't black out or anything but it was very weird looking, kind of stretched, just like when the resolution isn't right. Do you have any suggestions on what resolutions to try? What refresh rates and so on.

Well at least there is some life in the cabinet.

So here are some more pictures for you pros to tell me what to do next

Here's the board, it says Data East DE-0333-3, Made in Japan, I checked it out and it says that it should be a "Two Crude (Crude Buster)" board:

Closeups of numbers and stickers on the board:

The board from the side:

These are the numbers I could find on the monitor and the boards connected to it, GXN 6253:

SP054U 70609?:

SCD-29411VX2V MIR-J 070613 DIF2920V2VB (this is the only number I could find anything on google on):

Found out that the CP was on hinges and I could open it with the key:

This control board was under the CP panel cover...I suppose it's a control panel for the monitor??

The CP from the backside:

Did I at least get something right?

[HazzardActual]

after looking at the pictures again I noticed that the monitor might be VGA only, hence the game board not working. look for one of these cables in coming off of the jamma harness. if its actually running into the neck board then there might be a switch some where to go to cga to vga.

[JayC]

Ok...I'm not sure what you mean by that, could you explain in a little more detail? What's CGA?

From looking at the pictures I took yesterday, it looks like there is one of those cables running from besides the VGA input to the neck board of the monitor...is the colors of the wires always the same or can they vary? But there also seem to be one of those cables coming from the gameboard in to an input beside the VGA input as well.

Here's a couple more pictures of it.

First the VGA input on the board below the monitor, there's a input like you described on there, but there's also an output beside it that goes to the neck board:

Then a picture of the input on the neck board (I noticed that the grey quick connector that is to the left and not entirely visible isn't connected at all, should it possibly be connected somewhere):

[HazzardActual]

in the first picture directly behind the VGA port is your CGA cable. so there is either a manual switch somewhere to go from VGA to CGA or its supposed to auto detect and its just not seeing the cga signal from the jamma board. But like you said, it seems like the monitor works with VGA so who cares about running jamma boards

[JayC]

Ok...well at least it worked with the vga cable. I just couldn't get the right resolution for some reason. Maybe I should get a new computer for this cab and maybe a ArcadeVGA card? What specs should I look for?

So...where do I go from here?

Do I need to get a I-pac or J-pac to get the controls working? Where do I add the extra buttons? And how do I get sound out of this?

Obviously I'm going to have to replace all the controls.

[HazzardActual]

You might have to talk to some other guys about what to do with the the video card. I seem to remember that theres a way to use newer amd gfx cards to produce 31 khz video signals. I would recommend an ipac, but thats only because i have a few. Ive never used a jpac but im sure its the same thing for the most part. And if the controls are still clicky and functional then leave them there. Of course if you want to get different colors go for it but im sure they're fine.

[brolly]

If you are getting rid of the Jamma board I'd say get an i-Pac.

The ArcadeVGA card should make the process much simpler, but isn't required. Read this:

http://www.instructables.com/id/MAME-Cabinet-in-4-key-steps/step2/VGA-to-the-Arcade-Monitor-hookup/

http://www.ultimarc.com/monfaq.html

There should be others around other that have actual experience with these which is something I don't, so I'd wait for them to chime in.

[Anpanman]

Ok, so I posted a question if I should get a used Xion Ba cabinet to rebuild it to a Hyperspin cabinet.

I got the cab for 150€, not bad i suppose. The cabinet is in pretty good shape and i actually like the size and model of it. I can sit in front of it on normal chairs and the screen is pretty big.

So I'm starting a project thread on this mostly because I have really no idea about what I'm supposed to do with this. I'm no arcade guy to start with. My wife is actually more of the gamer in our house. I guess it's a good combination, I like working on stuff like consoles, computers and she likes to use them, its a win win situation

I picked up the cabinet earlier today and didn't have too much time to examine it, but I did have time to take some pictures and will post a couple of them here so you guys can tell me what the hell I'm looking at

What I'm trying to do is turning the cab in to a Hyperspin cab. So running MAME and other arcades as well as some pinball games. I have a small Dell "Pizzabox" itx pc with a i5 processor I'm not using at the moment and I'm thinking about using that for this cab, is this a good idea? The biggest problem I see is the video card as it's intergrated...I saw the Ultimarc arcade VGA card, should I get one of those?

I am open for the possibility to get a whole new computer hardware for this build, if you think this would be better...what should I get? Like I said...MAME and other arcade games mostly. As this has an arcade monitor It probably suits older games best? I'm thinking about building myself another cab from scratch for newer games.

Oh...and to start with...I may need help with getting this thing to run at all. I haven't had time to fire it up yet. But the company I bought it from did say that there where some problems with it. They said it ran perfectly when they got it...but then they tried to install (i guess) some games on it and when they tried to boot it it ran for a while and then just stopped working. But when they restarted it it worked again for a while...to me this sounds more like a game hardware problem than a monitor problem?

The other thing I will try to do is make a new CP. The one on this machine is very simple...a joystick + 6 buttons and a start button / Player. I'm thinking of changing the ashtray to a second control panel and putting the basic buttons needed for hyperspin there. I'm also thinking about adding a trackball where the start buttons are now. Is this a good idea? Do I need a trackball? Like I said, I'm know nothing about arcade games.

So here goes for the pictures...oh...and don't worry I will have a lot of more questions for all of you

Thanks a million for any input you might have!

- 150€ for a chinese candy cab imo is still a steal.

- double and triple check your setup and at least try to fire up the cab. sheesh

- The i5 is fine. Your mileage is obviously going to vary from that based on what else you attempt to run besides mame.

- the VGA cable suggest the monitor likely has tri-sync capabilities. Try to find the exact model numbers on the chassis. Setting up mame to run exact CGA resolutions is possible but it can be difficult and very tedious. If this chassis can run at least 640x480 in VGA mode, you won't need an arcade VGA card to drive a basic image into it but you won't have pixel perfect resolutions. Most of the later tri-sync monitors can do up to 800x600 resolution. Don't be a ladyboy and remove the monitor if its working and throw an LCD in there.

- I'd be weary about putting a trackball on a control panel that thin. Maybe you can find a suitable mini trackball to mount there. A full sized happ trackball will likely not fit in there both in depth and width clearance.

- The power supply appears to just be a PC power supply with screw terminals and the adjustment on the side is the voltage adjustment. Somewhat common during the later arcade era.

- the two switches laying on the ground are likely test and service switches for the game. They allow you to access options in the game such as screen and color adjustments, how many coins are needed to play, difficulty etc.

- the game has Data East markings on it. If you have no interest in testing it, just attempt to identify the game based on markings and sell it as is. Still think you aren't doing the setup any justice by not attempting to turn this on.

[JayC]

Yes I plan on trying the original board. I wouldn't leave it before trying it out. And maybe I could sell if I won't use it.

I will leave the monitor in for sure, at least as long as it works. I'm gonna build another cab from scratch with a LCD, and then maybe...just maybe a pinball cab after that.

I may get some new computer parts and using them in this cab instead. The Dell has the problem that I can't add much to it...the integrated video card isn't working so well and there is no possibility to add another card to it. Same goes for hard drives, yes I could add external drives but I don't want to. And there's only one 2,5" drive.

I checked that I can get a MSI Z97 PC Mate and G3258 for about 150€, then maybe add a ArcadeVGA to it, the rest I have lying around. That should do fine for this cab.

I think of skipping the trackball...had no idea they where that big! Not sure what to put in the middle...maybe make it 8 buttons per player instead of 6. Or maybe I just leave it as is and change the controls and make a new CP overlay.

The controls are clicking so they should work...I just read about another guy who got another of these and he said that the controls where crap, so I just thought that I should change them for new ones.

So the I-pac would be a better alternative than the J-pac...is there any particular reason for this? I just assumed since there already are controls connected somehow, it would be just to connect the J-pac to the board connector and be halfway there, and I think there are some additional ports for additional controls on it so I could connect the buttons I plan to add to the ashtray.

[Anpanman]

^^ what resolution did you try on the pc before connecting the monitor? Most of these units will only support 640x480 and 800x600 TOPS. Try forcing 800x600 and shut down the pc, then attach it to the cab's monitor to see if you get a picture. If that doesn't work, try 640

[JayC]

That's the problem...I couldn't get the integrated gpu lower than 800x600 or 848xsomething. There was clearly a picture and I could almost read the text, but not good enough to use. I will try another computer before ordering new stuff, I have some old core 2 duo computers lying in a closet, I suppose that should work for mame at least.

Well...I tried hooking back up the game board...and...it's ALIVE...it works perfectly. Too bad I don't really like the game though. I even might try to get another board for it, just for fun. I tried the two microswitches hidden inside the cabinet, one of them did nothing...the other one added credit.

The picture was slightly misaligned and warped a little. I tried the controls under the CP and got it almost right...there's a sligthly warped line in the near top of the picture, but I almost don't see it, so I think it's all good.

So if I leave a board in the cab and add a computer for hyperspin...how can I switch between them and how can I get the controls to work for both...is there any point in doing that at all?

The controls worked fine...I just hate the colors of the buttons. So I might change them at least. Don't know about the joystick...it felt like a joystick...and since I have no preferences for joysticks I think they are good enough for the moment. Yay...another buck saved.

Here are a couple of pictures of it running:

Before picture tweaking:

And after:

[HazzardActual]

DUDE! thats awesome! nothing like benefiting from someone elses stupidity. you my friend got a sweet ass deal on that cab.

[JayC]

Yes...nice indeed! I think they would have asked for closer to 1000€ for a working one.

[JayC]

So I'm leaning towards getting a J-pac to minimize the work...and maybe even a 2-1 jamma switcher at some point so I can switch between pc and jamma board. I will leave the controls as is for now and just add the ones I need to the ashtray. I will eventually change out the ones in the cab to match whatever layout I come up with.

Not sure about the ArcadeVGA though. And why is there no sound from the board?