24 replies to this topic

[IceCold]

Well, there's a guy that lives close to me, and I asked a question on an arcade message board if anybody has gutted cabinets in Northeast Ohio. He responded, said he'd let go of his Astron Belt cabinet, and after talking, said he'd sell it for $25. He took some pictures, and I will post them here. Is it a good deal? Would it be a good deal if all I wish to do is make a MAME cabinet out of it? Another thing, he says that he'd include the control panel for like $15 more. He said it has a Zaxxon style trigger stick. I wasn't planning on getting the control panel, but should I? Is it also a good deal?

I personally think $25 is a fairly tiny sum of money, so if I get a bad deal it's not a big deal.

Here's the pictures:

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[Nukey Shay]

Wow...too bad that it's not complete. Astron Belt was probably the earliest laserdisk game made. The game itself was kinda crap, though.

Anyway, I'd buy it. Beats having to cut everything out yourself for the Mame cab. And the panel might be worth it if it's in good shape...but I think that you are better off building your own custom panel (to include spinners, extra buttons, etc.).

[IceCold]

Nukey Shay said:

Wow...too bad that it's not complete.  Astron Belt was probably the earliest laserdisk game made.  The game itself was kinda crap, though.

Anyway, I'd buy it.  Beats having to cut everything out yourself for the Mame cab.  And the panel might be worth it if it's in good shape...but I think that you are better off building your own custom panel (to include spinners, extra buttons, etc.).

Yeah, I don't have very great wood working skills or tools, so I thought this would be better than building it myself.

I was still going to do my own custom panel, but thought about possibly using some of the parts off of the existing panel. Although the guys seems to want to keep it, and I don't really want it, so I'll probably just let him keep it.

I had no idea that it was even a laserdisc game! I think I'll read up on it on KLOV.

[Nukey Shay]

My guess is that is probably the reason it was gutted. Laserdisk players for arcade games are pretty saught-after. Perhaps used to restore a Dragon's Lair game?
I've only played the game on one occasion. It mixed gfx against a laserdisk background (which consisted of The Wrath Of Kahn's "genesis" footage and some bizzare-looking tunnel run footage).

Regardless, the cab panels look to be in good shape. Well worth $25. Good luck on the project!

[Witchfynde]

Nukey Shay said:

I've only played the game on one occasion.  It mixed gfx against a laserdisk background (which consisted of The Wrath Of Kahn's "genesis" footage and some bizzare-looking tunnel run footage).

Yeah, I think the latter was some new footage that was filmed for the game, but I might be thinking of another laserdisc game instead.

Those laserdiscs are usually fragile, so that's probably why it's up for grabs.

[IceCold]

I've used M.A.M.E. and various other emulators, but is there like a laserdisc emulator? I think I've heard of one, but I don't know if it only plays Dragon's lair, or if it'd also play this game. That would be cool to play this game on this cabinet . And is it true that laserdisc games are like 1GB? That wouldn't work too well on my dialup connection...

[IceCold]

I've used M.A.M.E. and various other emulators, but is there like a laserdisc emulator? I think I've heard of one, but I don't know if it only plays Dragon's lair, or if it'd also play this game. That would be cool to play this game on this cabinet . And is it true that laserdisc games are like 1GB? That wouldn't work too well on my dialup connection...

[Witchfynde]

IceCold said:

I've used M.A.M.E. and various other emulators, but is there like a laserdisc emulator?  And is it true that laserdisc games are like 1GB?  

Laserdisc games are, indeed, hard to emulate. Maybe emulating them themselves take 1 GB of space, but I doubt the games originally took up that much, as a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure they didn't: a version of Dragon's Lair for the Colecovision was made without a laserdisc add-on (Coleco said they'd create one--for only $150, yeah right!--but they didn't, and just offered a pixelated version instead, which I heard was good), as well as versions of that and Space Ace for the Sega CD, which had less than 700 megs of space on those CDs (I forget what the limit is on CDs...650?). So maybe trying to get those games emulated runs you a gig.

[Nukey Shay]

There is an emulator of sorts called Daphne, but I believe that you need to have the actual lasterdisks (and hence, an actual compatable laserdisk player). Dunno if it works with this game at all, though. Dragons Lair and Space Ace for sure.

[Witchfynde]

I also forgot to mention that a friend of mine once saw a guy working on Dragon's Lair in an arcade when it had broken down, and there were only a few chips positioned around the laserdisc, so, yeah, the game itself didn't take up much memory, as it was always the same when you played it, as far as memory/making moves went, since it had no Random Event Generator.

[Nukey Shay]

Witchfynde said:

IceCold said:

I've used M.A.M.E. and various other emulators, but is there like a laserdisc emulator?  And is it true that laserdisc games are like 1GB?  

Laserdisc games are, indeed, hard to emulate. Maybe emulating them themselves take 1 GB of space, but I doubt the games originally took up that much, as a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure they didn't: a version of Dragon's Lair for the Colecovision was made without a laserdisc add-on (Coleco said they'd create one--for only $150, yeah right!--but they didn't, and just offered a pixelated version instead, which I heard was good), as well as versions of that and Space Ace for the Sega CD, which had less than 700 megs of space on those CDs (I forget what the limit is on CDs...650?). So maybe trying to get those games emulated runs you a gig.

I think that he's referring to the amound of data that a laserdisk contains...not the romsize of the chips. Anybody know the capacity of the Pioneer laserdisks? It must be at least the capacity of a DVD (since many movies were released on laserdisks). AFAIK there have never been any plans to release the video in another format (like .mpg) for true 100% cloned emulation.

[IceCold]

I picked it up, the sideart looks pretty good! BTW - if anybody needs an untested power supply for an Astron Belt(not sure if it works on other laserdisc games too), I can sell one. It was the first time I've ever seen a full size M.A.M.E. cabinet up close in person too, he had one.

My Dad thinks I'm crazy for buying it and that I just paid $25 for a piece of garbage with no uses, but he'll change his mind when he's playing Asteroids, Pac-man, NBA Jam, etc.

[oesii]

Nukey Shay said:

There is an emulator of sorts called Daphne, but I believe that you need to have the actual lasterdisks (and hence, an actual compatable laserdisk player).  Dunno if it works with this game at all, though.  Dragons Lair and Space Ace for sure.

Daphne is actually a very cool emulator for laserdisc games. You don't have to have the orignals at all to play but you can wire your PC up to a compatible LD player if you want to do it that way. If you have the DVD or Laserdisc versions of Dragon's Lair you can convert them to mpegs which will run on the Daphne emultor after downloading the game roms. It works on over a dozen laserdisc games, I enjoy playing Super Don Quixote and Cliffhanger because these and other mpgs have been released on IRC and Usenet over the last few years. If you ever want to get into some of these games you need a large hard drive, most of the games are around 2 Gigs each to hold all the video data.

@Icecold, cool pick up on the cabinet, can't wait till you get some guts in there and get Mame up and running.

[IceCold]

oesii said:

Daphne is actually a very cool emulator for laserdisc games.  You don't have to have the orignals at all to play but you can wire your PC up to a compatible LD player if you want to do it that way.  If you have the DVD or Laserdisc versions of Dragon's Lair you can convert them to mpegs which will run on the Daphne emultor after downloading the game roms. It works on over a dozen laserdisc games, I enjoy playing Super Don Quixote and Cliffhanger because these and other mpgs have been released on IRC and Usenet over the last few years.  If you ever want to get into some of these games you need a large hard drive, most of the games are around 2 Gigs each to hold all the video data.

@Icecold, cool pick up on the cabinet, can't wait till you get some guts in there and get Mame up and running.

Thank you for all the information oesii! I can't wait until I get some guts in there either, Happs super joysticks are on sale for like $7.99, so I'll definitely be picking some of those up. I'll either add a MAME cabinet section to my website, or start a new website for MAME, but I'll definitely try to get a place to show what I've done. My digital camera will definitely be coming in handy now.

Do you know if you can run the laserdisc video data off of a dvd-r? Then it wouldn't take all your hard drive space.

and do you know if the emulator supports Astron Belt? It'd be kewl to play it on this machine.

[oesii]

Yes it definetely plays Astron Belt so you'll run it on there one of these days I'm pretty sure it will run off a DVD-R because many people use the original LDs and DVD's with the emulator and never have to dump anything to their harddrive.

[Witchfynde]

IceCold said:

My Dad thinks I'm crazy for buying it and that I just paid $25 for a piece of garbage with no uses, but he'll change his mind when he's playing Asteroids, Pac-man, NBA Jam, etc.  

Ha ha, yeah, that'll shut him up real quick

[IceCold]

oesii said:

Yes it definetely plays Astron Belt so you'll run it on there one of these days  I'm pretty sure it will run off a DVD-R because many people use the original LDs and DVD's with the emulator and never have to dump anything to their harddrive.

Can a 850mhz run laserdisc games okay? That's probably what I'll be putting in it.

Now I just need to find somebody with a DVD-RW drive

[Nukey Shay]

Sorry, I'm a little behind the times regarding emulation. Wasn't aware of how well Daphne works these days. Anyway, the old version of it that I was referring to ran on P2 computers...so I don't think that a P3-class computer would have a problem.

[moycon]

IceCold, Did you ever finish this MAME project? I'm interested in doing something similar. Now if only I can find a decent cabinet for $25.

[Cassidy Nolen]

Before you go any further.....PLEASE do the following....


Go to www.videotopia.com and email Jeff Anderson. He is the "curator" (for lack of a better word). I do not know if they have a cabinet that clean. If he does, fine.

If you have the time.......

Consider this:

Very few of these cabs were ever made. I would argue production runs are in the thousands, if not maybe 2 or 3 thousand total. The guts are available (I keep a working LD player around just in case....). MAME cabs usually look best with 25 inch monitors (something that cabinet could not accept without serious hacking), and the control panel on that cabinet will be cluttered very quickly with buttons, etc. If you posted that game to a newsgroup like "rec.games.video.arcade.collecting" and posted "For Trade: Astron Belt Cabinet for good MAME project cab", someone would jump all over that. Fighting game cabinets with monitors can sell for mega cheap at auctions, too. Might be able to get a converted game already pretty far along (controllers, buttons, power supply, etc) in trade for just what you have.

MAME's can be built very easily, and many collectors/operators have spare cabinets. Finding one that nice that could be restored is tricky. I just had to mention this stuff. I would not be able to sleep tonight otherwise... Just my .25 cents, you have to decide what is good for you...

Cassidy

[IceCold]

Cassidy Nolen said:

Before you go any further.....PLEASE do the following....


Go to www.videotopia.com and email Jeff Anderson.  He is the "curator" (for lack of a better word).  I do not know if they have a cabinet that clean.  If he does, fine.  

If you have the time.......

Consider this:

Very few of these cabs were ever made.  I would argue production runs are in the thousands, if not maybe 2 or 3 thousand total.  The guts are available (I keep a working LD player around just in case....).  MAME cabs usually look best with 25 inch monitors (something that cabinet could not accept without serious hacking), and the control panel on that cabinet will be cluttered very quickly with buttons, etc.  If you posted that game to a newsgroup like  "rec.games.video.arcade.collecting" and posted "For Trade: Astron Belt Cabinet for good MAME project cab", someone would jump all over that.  Fighting game cabinets with monitors can sell for mega cheap at auctions, too.  Might be able to get a converted game already pretty far along (controllers, buttons, power supply, etc) in trade for just what you have.

MAME's can be built very easily, and many collectors/operators have spare cabinets.  Finding one that nice that could be restored is tricky.  I just had to mention this stuff. I would not be able to sleep tonight otherwise...  Just my .25 cents, you have to decide what is good for you...

Cassidy

Well, you're saying this a little late, but I haven't hacked anything up too bad yet. All I've really done is drilled some small holes and put screws through them to hold the monitor shelf up better. I would actually much rather have a nice fighter cabinet that would be better for MAME, but this was all I could find. I did already buy a 21" PC monitor for it, but if I can get a good enough deal, I'd be willing to trade this cabinet. Although the cabinet isn't in THAT great of shape. The sideart looks fairly good, but tha'ts pretty much it. It still has the power supply too. And I can get the control panel if needed, the guy I bought it from still has it I think. So you don't think I should make it into a MAME cab?

Moycon - I'm not done, but I am still working on it. I can post a picture of my progress if you want. It should be ready to play within a week or so(unless I trade it and get a different cab to MAME ) If you do decide to do this, it would be invaluable to check out www.arcadecontrols.com they have TONS of information, and a pretty good message board too.

[IceCold]

Just a little update for Moycon and the other people interested. It has been playable for a few weeks now, it's really fun. It's definitely not done yet though. Here are some pics.

It's fully playable, and the coin slot for player 1 works. I mounted a switch so that when you press the coin return button, it gives you a coin in the game. The coin door lights use white superbright led's that I wired to the PC power supply(had to use resistors so that they won't burn out).

The pc is 1.1ghz AMD Athlon with a total of 60gb of hard drive space. 192 mb of ram and a 16mb nvidia tnt2 video card. It uses Happ Super joysticks and Happ pushbuttons. I hacked 2 gravis gamepad pro's(gameport version) for the controls. The monitor is a 21" pc monitor that I got off of eBay(got it for around $130 after shipping).

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[oesii]

Looks great, now get some Karate Champ or Robotron going with those dual joysticks

[chromizone]

any update on this project?? I'm looking at buying a machine and making it a mame is looking more and more like the way to go for my intrests

SO. I was wondering how far alone u are now and if we can see some more pics please...

[IceCold]

chromizone said:

any update on this project?? I'm looking at buying a machine and making it a mame is looking more and more like the way to go for my intrests  

SO. I was wondering how far alone u are now and if we can see some more pics please...

Not much has changed since the last update.