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GAF, help me buy a candy cabinet!

giggas

Member
People of GAF,

My 30th birthday is coming up and my wife has given me two options; I can either have a big party or I can finally buy myself an Arcade cabinet. I of course have leaned towards the cab. I know a lot of you guys on here have your own cabinets, so I hope someone can spare some advice.

I'd really like to get a candy cabinet, especially since this will be going in my basement where we have a low ceiling and sitting is prefered. I don't really know much of anything about these cabs since I've always put off the notion of actually owning one. I assume the best way to go about obtaining one of these is to look locally? I've read that shipping prices from online stores can double the cost of the actual cab. I decided to check Craigslist and I came across a Crowin Candy Cabinet for $350 (with no game). It appears to be in really nice shape. I sent the guy an email to see if he's still trying to get rid of it (the listing is from around Thanksgiving), but does that sound like a good deal for that type of cab? What sort of price range should I be looking for in general with these?

Also I noticed the Crowin has a four button setup, where as I'd ideally like to have a six button. Is it possible/easy/not too pricey to swap it out for a six button? Also, is it semi easy to hook up different boards or even consoles like a Dreamcast to these cabinets? Since I'll probably only have room for one of these things, I'd really like to try and get a lot of mileage out of it with lots of shit hooked up to it.

Anyway, any sort of advice would help. Thanks in advance!
 

Yes Boss!

Member
Get to know some of the forums like Arcade Otaku, NeoGeo forums, or even Shmups. They come up quite often. If you live on the coasts (preferably west) it will be easier to buy locally, and in better condition. If you want as much mileage as can be had then try to find a tri-sync candy, something like a Blast City. Don't import unless you feel like going through the laborious process of shipping and container customs and all that...you go through the same process and costs ordering a $500 cab from Japan/HK as you would if it was a $20,000 Lacanche range imported from france. Most/all legacy systems can be hooked up with little cost.

If you are in Europe then there are a bunch that come up regularly.
 

shuri

Banned
Always check the monitor, its the most important part of an arcade cabinet; replacement monitors are getting harder and more expensive to come by. Buy a cab with a game you like inside; you dont want to buy a project cab as your first cab, as there is a learning curbe when dealing with arcade hardware if you are a notive.

Buy a cabinet with 6 buttons already wired-in, its going to be less trouble in the long run. Also please consider that this is an expensive hobby, and buying and taking care of arcade boards takes time and SPACE.
 

Jockel

Member
Ugh. Tough question. What do you want to play on it? Fighting games or shooters? Low resolution stuff, or high resolution Naomi / Type X etc games?
If you intend to switch the orientation of the monitor often, I'd recommend getting an Egret 2, Egret 3 or Atomiswave sitdown cab, since these have a rotation mechanism.
So if you plan on switching between vertical and horizontal games, that should make your life a lot easier.

It's also possible to setup MAME to run in a cab, but it's really a pain to get it working in the correct resolutions, with minimized input lag etc.

FYI, JAMMA standard only supports 4 buttons per player, so if you plan on playing Street Fighter II / III / IV, you'd need a kick harness.
 

giggas

Member
Thanks guys.

Yeah I was reading about the Blast City cabs, they seem really nice. Perhaps that'll be the one I really keep an eye out for. Also read about how it's kind of a pain in the neck to go from a four button to a six, so it's good to see you guys agree with that.

As for what I'd like to play on it, ideally older late 80s to mid 90s games. I don't have anything too particular in mind, I've just been going through eBay looking at different boards to see what's out there. The only fighting game that I would really want to play would be Third Strike, but that's where I was thinking the Dreamcast could come into play.

shuri, yeah I figured that buying a cab with a game I'd like to play already in there would be a good bet, but I don't mind spending time with the cab and slowly figuring things out with it over time. I'm ready for it to turn into a small hobby once/if I actually get one. But yeah, the cost of this stuff will keep me from going too crazy.

Also, Boss, I'm located on the east coast. Didn't realize it would be so much easier on the west but I guess that makes sense.

Well thanks for getting me started guys, hopefully I'll have some luck and at least now I have a few ideas on what to look out for.
 

Jockel

Member
Personally, I'm rocking an Astro City, which is really damn nice and has a great picture. The sound is a bit flat, though. A Blast City is a great choice if you want to play Dreamcast / Atomiswave / Naomi and newer systems, but high res monitors supposedly give a worse low res picture. Don't quote me on that, though. It won't be terrible or anything, just worse than, say, an Egret II.
 

robot

Member
I'd consider going the CPS2 (capcom) or MVS (snk) route at first. Games are easier to come by, sometimes cheaper, and encased in plastic so they're more durable. But obviously if you don't like the library of games either offers, it may not be worth it. You also have to know what the battery status is in your CPS2 games, as they can suicide, or you can get Phoenixed versions which bypass the need for a battery at all.

I had an MVS in my New Astro City for 4 years before finally doing a bit of rewiring for CPS2/standard JAMMA. I wound up getting over 30 games in the past 12 months. It's a great hobby, but VERY expensive if you get hooked on hunting for boards. It's a great community of people and ere are so many unknown arcade games out there.. I just got the arcade version of Battletoads for Xmas. I had no idea they even made an arcade version. But they did. And it's awesome!

Decide what type of games you want to play - shooters, fighters, beat em ups, etc. and go from there. You may find that a majority of the games that interest you are CPS2 or MVS, or that you need the monitor horizontal instead of vertical. And I wouldn't wire a console to it, getting new boards is half the fun!
 

giggas

Member
Personally, I'm rocking an Astro City, which is really damn nice and has a great picture. The sound is a bit flat, though. A Blast City is a great choice if you want to play Dreamcast / Atomiswave / Naomi and newer systems, but high res monitors supposedly give a worse low res picture. Don't quote me on that, though. It won't be terrible or anything, just worse than, say, an Egret II.

I'm honestly going to be more inclined to look for older games, so maybe you're right in that an Astro City or Egret 2 would be the way to go.

and robot, it's funny, Battletoads is one of the games I actually thought of wanting to get! But yeah, there's a bunch of CPS2 stuff I'd love to get my hands on, especially one of the D&D games. How would I go about that? Is there just a CPS2 board that would be wired into the cab and then the CPS2 game boards are purchased separate? Ha sorry if that's a stupid question, but like I said, I'm totally new to this.
 

Jockel

Member
You've got the right idea. There's a CPS2 mainboard that's wired to your cab through a standard JAMMA connector, and on top of the mainboard there's the actual game.
It looks like this:
cps2_board.jpg

One thing to keep in mind while hunting for those boards - there are lots of bootlegs and conversions. Luckily they don't differ in function from original boards, since all the hardware is on the mainboard.
Another small heads-up: CPS2 boards "die", when the on-board battery runs out.
The SRAM has some values which get checked on boot-up. If the battery runs out, the SRAM clears and the check fails, rendering your board unplayable.

However there's the possiblity to "revive" the board by removing the check in the game program. So you might want to look for so called "phoenixed" boards.
 
Edit: beat like a mofo!

there's a bunch of CPS2 stuff I'd love to get my hands on, especially one of the D&D games. How would I go about that? Is there just a CPS2 board that would be wired into the cab and then the CPS2 game boards are purchased separate? Ha sorry if that's a stupid question, but like I said, I'm totally new to this.
CPS2 boards are basically in two parts - the base unit (A Board) and the game (B Board). Here they are together:

And here's the base board without the game:

One thing to keep in mind about CPS2 boards, though, is they are designed to eventually die. They have encryption which is dependent on a battery - as long as the board is plugged in it's fine, but when the system is unplugged, the battery slowly dies, and once it's dead, the board is dead. The battery can be (carefully) replaced, though it's not as simple as you would think (the battery is soldered in there). The only way to revive a dead game is to reflash the EEPROMS on the board with hacked versions, called "Phoenix Roms".
 

Cousteau

Member
Want to be a real Boss? Don't do either and buy your wife something nice/go out to a really nice restaurant. She will never expect it. Those are the best times man.
 

robot

Member
CPS2 games consist of 2 pieces - a motherboard (A Board) and the games themselves (B Board). B boards are region specific (color coded), thus some of them require specific region A boards. I'd suggest getting a USA or JPN A board and stick with USA and JPN games (blue and green). A boards usually run about $30.

Once you have your A board, you can start buying the games. The game boards basically snap into the motherboard, almost like a game console - but the games are much bigger. The tricky thing with these games is that once the battery dies, it essentially kills the game - making it unplayable and almost worthless. What I've been doing and seems to be pretty popular, is buying Phoenixed games. Phoenixes B boards have a few modified chips in there that bypass the need for a battery. No battery, no suicide!

Aside from the standard 3 buttons required for JAMMA games, most CPS2 games require an additional 3 buttons. Thats where a "kick harness" comes in, which is a wire that runs from the A board to your other 3 buttons. Kick Harnesses are around $20, and are really simple to hook up. When not in use you can just unplug the Kick Harness from the A Board and leave it wired to the buttons.

CPS2 Shock is a great resource for CPS2. It even has the full catalog of games out there. Aliens VS Predator and the D&D games are some of the best beat em ups around, there are a handful of great shooters that do not require a vertical monitor, and the fighters speak for themselves.

EDIT: Too sloooooow
EDIT 2: While you do have to watch out for boots, it's mostly for either Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo/X, and Progear. The originals are so expensive and hard to come by so boots started popping up. I personally own boots of both because of the price & rarity. Originals are $350 and up for these two titles, while the boots are around $170. They are fantastic games too, Progear is one of my all-time favorite games (hey look at my avatar!).
 

giggas

Member
Wow, had no idea about the CPS2 games killing themselves, that's pretty crazy. I looked on ebay and there seems to be a lot of CPS2 stuff that is bundled with both the CPS board and a game, so that's cool. They seem easy to obtain and a few of them are priced surprisingly lower than I thought.

Also, never heard of Progear but I checked it out and it looks really cool.

I'm glad I have plenty to go by now and have a bit more of an understanding thanks to everyone's help. I get the feeling finding the right cab is going to take some time, which is fine, I'm in no rush.
 
What about a supergun instead and then go custom with the cabinet or do you specifically want the candy cab?

I have a supergun and a sony wega TV TATE'd - eventually i will go custom with it and the happ sticks i have.
 

giggas

Member
What about a supergun instead and then go custom with the cabinet or do you specifically want the candy cab?

I have a supergun and a sony wega TV TATE'd - eventually i will go custom with it and the happ sticks i have.


Yeah I'm looking for a candy cab specifically.

Also I came across this on eBay. Just to get an idea of pricing, does the price for this sound about right, or is this too high? Is this a good deal?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Candy-cab-A...ultDomain_0&hash=item1e699d42e9#ht_483wt_1334
 
i've an ok baby cabinet, i like it a lot!
ok_baby_side-450x600.jpg

bought it via a german videogame forum, it cost me around 300$ which is cheap i think.

i own raiden and 2 other jamma boards and i bought a xbox converter which is quite cool cause I use it to emulate snes, neo geo, genesis.. etc on it.
 

robot

Member

giggas

Member
OP is after authenticity, dude. There are some cases where MAME just won't cut it.

Exactly. I want the real deal. I actually did originally want to just do a MAME machine years ago, but f it, I want real boards. There is just something about things being run the way they should be. It's the reason I don't settle for emus and still love collecting old games and hardware.
 

Mik2121

Member
The real deal is definitely better, but if I ever get a cabinet it will be the outside of one of those white taito cabines (LOVE THEM!) with a nice screen and a PC inside. I'll probably also invite someone who knows a lot about cabinets and invite him to lunch and probably dinner too so he can help me setting up some nice buttons and custom stuff around :p

Also I don't like the wooden black cabinets but rather the white plastic ones (as the OP said, the candy cabinets).
 

giggas

Member
Also I don't like the wooden black cabinets but rather the white plastic ones (as the OP said, the candy cabinets).

I really like the classic style wood cabinets as well. They're just generally a lot larger than the candy cabs and I don't have much room to work with. And there is just something really awesome about the candy cabs too that I can't quite put my finger on. I spent a week in Japan during our honeymoon about five years ago and just can't shake that feeling of playing D&D Tower of Doom on one of those things. There was just nothing else really like it. But really, there is just nothing like the real arcade experience in general, I love it all.
 

giggas

Member
I'd say waaaaay too high. A real New Astro City will run anywhere between $450-$700 depending on condition. I think Blast Citys are in the $1k range but not 100% sure.

So the guy that had this auction didn't end up selling the unit. He relisted it with SFA1 for 1k, 200 less than he originally started it at. I decided to send him an email to see if I could talk him down. He said he'd sell me the cab for 800 with no game. So would 800 for this one be a decent price?

xiongba.jpg


Here is description from the eBay listing

For sale here is a japanese style arcade candy cab made by Xiongba with a 29" tri-sync monitor. it is very similar to a sega versus city and was made in china. it is structurally sound and has a brand new monitor which looks great and should last a very long time. it is wired for a jamma type arcade game with a capcom CPS2 kick harness. this cab is ideal for any street fighter game. i installed a proper sega astro city reproduction control panel with sanwa buttons and sanwa JLF sticks just like what is found in current console tournament arcade fightsticks. the controls are in perfect working condition. currently, i have street fighter alpha 1 installed which is included but i have other street fighter games if you prefer a different one. prices vary based on what game you are looking for but current price includes alpha 1. i will not ship the cab. it is for local pickup only in central NJ. i will deliver for up to 60 miles for an additional $50. any questions, feel free to ask.

What do you guys think? Should I bite or take my time and look for something better?
 
If you intend to switch the orientation of the monitor often, I'd recommend getting an Egret 2, Egret 3 or Atomiswave sitdown cab, since these have a rotation mechanism.

Of those 3 only the Egret 2 has a rotating mechanism !
Atomiswave/Egret 3 have a tri sync monitor , Egret 2 is 15/24 and gives a better picture for 15 K games .

I would never pay $ 800,00 for a cheap Chinese Blast City knock off .
Go to :http://www.neo-geo.com/forums or http://shmups.system11.org/index.php and maybe http://forum.arcadeotaku.com/ , but the last one is mainly Euro .
On Neo-geo and shmups cabs are offered weekly in the US area and they have adresses for buying from US importers .
 

giggas

Member
Of those 3 only the Egret 2 has a rotating mechanism !
Atomiswave/Egret 3 have a tri sync monitor , Egret 2 is 15/24 and gives a better picture for 15 K games .

I would never pay $ 800,00 for a cheap Chinese Blast City knock off .
Go to :http://www.neo-geo.com/forums or http://shmups.system11.org/index.php and maybe http://forum.arcadeotaku.com/ , but the last one is mainly Euro .
On Neo-geo and shmups cabs are offered weekly in the US area and they have adresses for buying from US importers .

Yeah I wasn't sure how cheap the Chinese/Korean ones are compared to the real deal.
 

giggas

Member
Wanted to bump this thread to give an update on my search for a candy cab.

So I bought one a few weeks ago. I was able to find a Blast City in the area, so I picked it up. Of course there was some hesitation, but I really wanted a Blast. Also, I found it on the Neo-Geo forums, which you guys had suggested, so thank you!

526153_3886018516194_1363433245_n.jpg


I just fired it up for the first time last night. I was able to score a Tiger Road PCB for really cheap (about 50 bucks), so I went for it. The cab itself cost me $700, which I'm still not sure if that was too much or not. I've looked on eBay since grabbing it and they usually seem to go within that price range (or more) plus crazy shipping costs. Since I got this locally, there was obviously no shipping costs.

The Blast is a converted Bass Fishing, which from what I understand were the only domestically released candy cabs in the US. It looked like it had been through the ringer when I picked it up, and honestly, I was kind of put off by it when I finally saw it in person. There was some nasty burn in on the monitor (large Sega logo in the bottom right, plus some text in the center of the screen), not to mention there were light scratches on the screen from the fishing rod. The cab itself looked like it had been through hell and back. Tons of paint chipped off, the speakers are slightly bent inwards, etc. Oh, and the cab smelled like shit. I wanted one of these so bad though that I just went ahead and took the cab anyway. Plus, the control panel was all new, and it was wired with a kick harness, so it did have some key things I wanted it to have.

Once I got it home I stashed it in my garage to air out and to clean the next day. At that point I was still feeling kind of bad about the whole thing.

0513121728.jpg


462871_3789350779561_1450831154_3235900_552829698_o.jpg


It's hard to tell in the pictures, but the side of the machine was scuffed up really badly. Also, I had already done some scrubbing when I took these shots. I spent about 7 hours that day cleaning this thing up just to give it some life and to get rid of the smell. There were a bunch of pealed off stickers I removed with Goof Off. The Mr. Clean Magic Eraser was my best friend for this, I was amazed at how well it cleaned up the scuff marks. Where the paint was just chipped off, I started to fill in some of the more rough spots with white rustoleum. The white doesn't exactly match the white of the Blast, but for now it'll do. Maybe one day I'll be able to repaint the entire machine, but that's way down the line. I also took off the entire control panel and cleaned each button off. I think I screwed up the wiring when I put the control panel back together, but I'll worry about that when the time comes. I'm not too concerned there.

Anyway, after that I still let it air out before even trying to wheel this beast into my basement... which ended up being a three man job and a lot of work. We had to remove the monitor just to lighten the load, and remove the control panel. I also took off the front door which is probably like 5 pounds. Wasn't much, but all that weight adds up. It also started stinking up the basement once it got down there, so I bought a bunch of air fresheners and threw them into various areas. Now there is a different smell, but at least it's not awful.

So here it was in my basement after the move.

546727_3802486587948_1450831154_3242563_1537561468_n.jpg


Yes my basement is very yellow. Trust me, it is nowhere near as eye piercing in person, it's the flash blowing out the color. The yellow brightens it up down there because it's generally rather dark. ANYWAY...

So it sat there for a few weeks. I'm trying not to spent too much money on this thing at the moment since it cost so much already, so I found the cheapest board I could (Tiger Road, which I also found on the Neo-Geo website). Also, since I already have a modded Xbox 1 with Mame on there, I decided that will go in my cab for now. I bought a bunch of parts for it to get that to work but I'm still waiting on an Xbox Jamma Timer board. Though apparently the company in China that sells these things lie, because the Timer board isn't Jamma compatible, so I had to buy some additional shit to get that together. That's gonna be a tricky project because I need to solder wires, something I've never done before.

So I played Tiger Road last night since I just got it in the mail yesterday.

I'll tell you what, I instantly felt better about the whole thing. The screen burn in is really only visible in the sun light. I can't even see it in my basement and you don't see it when the game is running. Same with the light scratches on the monitor. The color looks good (as far as I can tell) and I was really happy with it seeing it in action again (I saw it briefly in action when I picked it up). Everything seemed to be working great aside from some minor hissing from the speakers. I did a search and it could be the game and the Jamma connection, or it could be the speakers themselves, I'll find out when I get the Xbox hooked up, but it's not a deal breaker.

So yeah, I'm pretty excited about it now. I'm the kind of person that always feels sick after a big purchase, so I was feeling that way about this, especially with the shape it was in. However a good cleaning and actually playing a PCB on this thing made it all better.

I still want to do work on the machine, but that'll be way down the line. The side art was also damaged badly, so I'd love to do some repro prints of that. There are a few other odds and ends as well, and I'd eventually like to make a custom marquee, instruction space, and control panel art, along with some brand new buttons. Also really want to fix the pushed in speaker grills.

Anyway, thanks for all of the help that I got when I started this thread. You guys pushed me in the right direction and after all these years I finally have a arcade cab in my house.
 
I'd say you overpaid if it's in such bad condition. You might regret not getting a pristine monitor later on.

However, it's an awesome feeling to have your own arcade cabinet. I bought a VF3 cabinet last year. I figured four buttons would be enough, as I didn't want to bother with CPS2 games because of the suicide battery. I didn't expect that it would be so hard to convert to JAMMA, but when I eventually decided to throw out the existing game it wasn't that bad.

I bought loads of MVS carts as those are really easy to use, but I've also got Soul Calibur and Sunset Riders on PCB. Using the original hardware is the main point with a cabinet, so I would advise against MAME or some emulation solution.

Currently I need to find a kick harness for System 11/12 and then save up for an original Bubble Bobble. After that I think I'm happy with my purchase.

You'll love having access to the games from the front. On my cab, I need to pull the entire thing away from the wall to replace games from the back hatch.
 

giggas

Member
I'd say you overpaid if it's in such bad condition. You might regret not getting a pristine monitor later on.

Yeah, it's possible I overpaid. You're probably right. The seller claimed to have put 900 dollars worth of work into it, and I was able to talk his price down a bit. He was originally selling it for closer to 800, but we settled on 700. It looked great in the photos, so when I saw just how beat up it was in person I was a bit taken back.

I get the feeling if I were to have found a Blast with a pristine monitor the cab would have run for a much greater price, which I certainly wouldn't have been able to do. Like I said though, the burn in and scratches are really only visible in the sun light, other than that the monitor looks good. I mean, yeah I guess it certainly has a chance of really failing on me sooner, but I'll cross that bridge when the time comes.

From what I've been able to piece together, most of these cabs are usually just in poor shape generally with lots of scuffs. I knew 700 was steep, but I didn't really think the chances of getting a Blast over in the Philly area for much less would happen so that's why I took it.

But yeah, it's great having a cab to call my own. I'm with you in that I'd love to go full on pcb boards, but at the same time I want to save some money for now and get a little more out of the machine so it's not just sitting there, which is where the Xbox with MAME will come in.
 
If you just want to stock up on cheap games, a Neo-Geo MVS setup is very affordable. While it's a bit more messy to switch games all the time, I recommend a 1-slot system (for 1 cartridge) because it follows the JAMMA standard so it's easier to switch for another PCB game altogether.

You could probably also find all sorts of classics for rather cheap. It's mostly the major titles like Cave shooters and Bubble Bobble which are expensive.
 

giggas

Member
If you just want to stock up on cheap games, a Neo-Geo MVS setup is very affordable. While it's a bit more messy to switch games all the time, I recommend a 1-slot system (for 1 cartridge) because it follows the JAMMA standard so it's easier to switch for another PCB game altogether.

You could probably also find all sorts of classics for rather cheap. It's mostly the major titles like Cave shooters and Bubble Bobble which are expensive.

Yeah the MVS stuff seems affordable, like regular game prices. I'll probably look more into that a few months from now. I think if I bring anything else into the house my wife will kill me.

I just checked eBay for a 1 slot board but didn't see much. Any idea how much they usually run for?
 
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