MAME Cabinet in 4 key steps

Step 4 Software set up

Now that most of the hardware steps have been reviewed, let's talk about the software. Well actually let's talk first on the computer I'm using, from salvaged parts here and there. Rough specs:

• AMD K6 II
• 64 SDRAM
• ArcadeVGA AGP Videocard
• Sound Blaster PCI 128
• 10 Gb Harddrive

It may appear completely outdated, and it is, but it's actually enough to run most games emulated by MAME. (however don't try to play digitize games such as Mortal Kombat or NBA Jam!). Please note I did not include a floppy drive or a CD/DVD drive since it will be irrelevant for the use here: I just temporary plugged a CD drive just to do the initial install and setup.

Besides the games that are in fact single computer files called ROM which contains a copy of the data from a read-only memory chip from an arcade game's main board, I'm using three different softwares:

• First, the Operating System: I'm using Freedos which is a free and open source Operating system belonging to the DOS family. Just download Freedos from their website, burn the ISO file to a CD, launch the CD at the boot and follow the installation steps in order to install it on your harddrive. I'm also using a DOS sound card driver for the Sound Blaster PCI 128 that you can download from here. After downloading it, unzip it in the root of your harddrive (i.e. C:\). Then, go to the SBPCI folder and run install.bat. You can then delete the install folder SBPCI. At the next boot, the sound driver will be loaded with the execution of the autoexec.bat.
• On top of this I'm using Mame for Dos. There are many different versions, I let you Google it (or Bing it) or you can use this version here. After downloading it, unzip it in a folder called MAME in the harddrive's root (i.e. C:\). Then copy all your game ROMs in the MAME subfolder called ROMS. Freedos and MAME for Dos make up the back-end.
• Since Freedos and MAME for Dos are command-line only software, I'm using a frontend which is called Game Launcher. You can download it here (choose the DOS Binary zip file). After the download is completed just unzip the file in the harddrive's root. Game Launcher will be located in C:\GLAUNCH. You'll have to edit mainly two batch files (MAME.CFG and MAMESCAN.CFG) in order to let Game Launcher where MAME and the ROMS are located in your harddrive, see bellow. Also you'll have to manually launch MAMESCAN.EXE under the GLAUNCH folder to let it create an available game menu list for Game Launcher.

After all of the above is done, your filing structure should look like this in your C: drive (also see attached image):

DOS (the FreeDOS folder)
DOSDRV (the Sound Blaster driver folder)
GLAUNCH (the Game Launcher folder)
MAME (the MAME folder)
TEMP (a temp file folder)
autoexec.bat (file)
config.sys (file)

The above is just a general guideline, you're going to need some basic DOS knowledge, and read each software documentation if you really want to do it this way, but here is the content of the final autoexec.bat and config.sys (of course you can configure / customize it to better suit your needs):

AUTOEXEC.BAT
@ECHO OFF
SET BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H7 P330 T6
SET SBPCI=C:\DOSDRV
C:\DOSDRV\SBLOAD.EXE
C:\DOSDRV\SBINIT.COM
C:\DOS\SMARTDRV.EXE
PATH C:\;C:\DOS;C:\MAME;C:\GLAUNCH
CD GLAUNCH
GLAUNCH.EXE

CONFIG.SYS
DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS
DEVICE=C:\DOS\EMM386.EXE NOEMS NOVCPI
DOS=HIGH, UMB

Also the two files MAME.CFG (under the C:\GLAUNCH\CONFIG folder), and the MAMESCAN.CFG (under the C:\GLAUNCH\ folder):

MAME.CFG
[Emulator]
# Emulator name, i.e. MAME
name = MAME

# Short description of emulator, i.e. Arcade Machines
description = Arcade Machines

# Location of emulator, i.e. c:\mame
directory = c:\mame

# Name of emulator executable, i.e. mame.exe
executable = dmame.exe

# Global options passed to emulator, i.e. -sound 1
global_options = -soundcard 1

MAMESCAN.CFG
[Main]
# The path to the MAME executable
mame_executable = c:\mame\dmame.exe

# The path to the MAME ROM directory
mame_rom_directory = c:\mame\roms

# This is a base path to use for the Game Launcher files to be
# created. Two files will be created by appending ".rom" and ".map"
# to this base path.
base_configuration_path = config\mame

Finally, to customize the control for Game Launcher you'll have to edit the section # Key mappings of the file GLAUNCH.CFG (under C:\GLAUNCH\).

Now that Freedos and the sound driver are properly installed, MAME is installed with it's ROM in the subfolder and Game Launcher is installed and configured, here is what happen when I turn on my cabinet:

• Initial power up - BIOS screen is displayed
• FreeDOS boots
• AUTOEXEC.BAT & CONFIG.SYS starts to load
• Sound card driver loads
• GLaunch loads

From here I can select the game I wanna play from a list, using the sticks and the push buttons. I select a game, which is then launched with MAME for Dos and can then play with it. I have attached an animated picture that simulates what happens when I boot my machine.

Comments

[alexmoi]

was thinking of fallowing your tutorial to build my own little arcde for the kids. Got all the parts. Got a intel celeron 733 mhz pc with a 32 mb graphic card. Everythign goes good. I install Freedos, but after installation, freedos won't boot on it's own. Am i doing something wrong?