Flack

Where did you guys end up getting a room? My whole family and I are staying at the Sheridan, which is about 3 miles away (near the Galleria).

1541's went out of alignment relatively frequently even back when they were new. Sometimes it was from use, sometimes it was from nasty copy protections that would knock the head, and sometimes it was just 'cuz. There are guide out on Google to help you align and adjust the speed of your drive, but after a while I'd just say screw it and buy another one. I find them for $5 and under all the time. I used to buy them just to put them in my garage to have a spare or two. I had to quit when I reached an even dozen.

Jack Flack disagrees. (Yes, that's where the nick came from.)

I'm a senior network engineer, working for the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) and employeed by Lockheed Martin. I work in AVS (Aviation Safety) which is the second largest line of business in the FAA next to ATC (Air Traffic). I have two major job functions, the first of which is running the AVS WAN. We have 300+ servers in 130 locations across the country that I constantly monitor for hardware, software, and network failure. I handle all the hardware replacement and upgrades for those servers, make sure they have all the current Microsoft patches, etc. I work along side a couple of other people. One guy is in charge of security and vulnerability scanning, and the other guy is in charge of all our switches and routers. We also work with a helpdesk upstairs which does all of our end user support (unlocking users, etc). We get a lot of things referred to us up the chain (so to speak) from them. My other hat is the manager of the AVS antivirus program. I currently handle the antivirus duties for 500+ servers and over 8,000+ end users. Fortunately things go pretty smooth in this area, but when there's a large virus outbreak on our network, you can bet I'll be busy (and cranky) for a couple of days. So yay, chalk up another vote for overpaid IT person.

Just extract the first WinRAR file. The others will automagically fall in line.

That may be one of the single most interesting posts I've ever read on a forum. Thank you for sharing that info!

Good looking cabinet! I can't believe you got all those buttons to fit on a Nintendo cabinet -- I may try drilling some more holes in mine someday!

Does SuperAuctions make it to that area of the country? The last half hour of their last auction here was empty cabs, all going for less than $20 depending on the amount of parts left in them. A few that were totally stripped and in not great shape went for a dollar.

Yup, that's the one! I think on things like this, I'm not a very good reviewer because I'm not nearly critical enough. That other review talks about the wave third of the sound chip not being 100% accurate or something ... I don't know about all that, all I know is I plugged in Super Mario Brothers 3 and played it for a couple of hours and it worked great. I'm sure that other review is probably correct, some of the colors may not be 100% accurate but then again if you are that worried about 100% accuracy then I agree, don't buy a cheap clone and spend your time and money refurbishng a toaster. I guess if you're blessed with crappy eyes and ears like I am, you'll enjoy the Yobo. It's very compact and cheap, but it also doesn't blink and has A/V outs.

I am right in the middle of writing a review of this thing, but I can tell you so far that it's played every game I've tried. Original NES controllers work great with it as well (I have the US Yobo Fami). Seeing as though it's a NOAC (Nintendo on a Chip) and not a real chipset, the colors and sound may be slightly different which may upset you greatly or if you're like me, doesn't matter in the slightest. Personally I think they're a great alternative to blinking toasters and RF-only top-loaders, although I'm quite sure loyalists will disagree.

What do you have, a 12 car garage? 886332[/snapback] I'm pretty sure it's just a 2 car garage (I've stood in it).

I think the only difference might be monitor sizes (or depths). I assume the board sets and whatnot would be the same. When you say $100 for a cheap/dead cab, do you mean for a Frogger one or a generic one? I'm guessing you mean a Frogger cab? I can get working games for $100 here. Dead, gutted cabs (generics) go for $5-$10 at auctions all the time.

Nice find! I love stories when people find awesome deals on holy grails and still manage to talk the sellers down in price!

Didn't I already win this label contest over a year ago? http://www.atariage.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=46661

There are always a few on eBay. If soldering's not your game, it's a nice alternative. I've got an old 486 that I kept around for gaming and for using with my xe1541 cable. Most of my retro pc gaming is done through DosBox now, but I keep the old machine around for the XE1541 still (since you have to boot into DOS, it's just easier). Of course, I still have a real '64 hooked up as well.

Last weekend I found 30 Atari 2600 games in a container with 40 manuals, a couple of joysticks, a Star Raiders controller, and a 7800 joystick ... all for $4. Life's good here.

The joystick "OK" thing is built into MAME. No need for special roms or mame versions for that. You can try it on your own computer with a joystick hooked up! The front end I'm working on completing is in VB and launches games with DOS commands which it builds based on the switches and things you list in the INI files. That makes it extremely configurable. In the end I doubt anyone in the world will ever run it beside myself, but that's okay.

Looks great! There are things you can learn about building a MAME cabinet that can only be learned by building a MAME cabinet, if that makes sense. I'm sure many of the lessons learned will apply to MMF's! If you ever want to personalize that cabinet, you can put your own marquee in there pretty inexpensively. I had a piece of plexiglass cut for a couple of bucks at the local plastic shop. Then I printed out a marquee for free at work on our printer plotter. I'm sure it wouldn't cost more than a couple of bucks to print one out at Kinko's or something. Marquee printed out: http://www.robohara.com/albums/mame/P1010001.JPG Marquee installed: http://www.robohara.com/albums/mame/P1010010.JPG Again, we learn from our mistakes. If I had it to do over again (and I'll probably correct it someday), I wouldn't have used tinted plexiglass. (Note: The arcade near my house that I grew up hanging out in is named Cactus Jack's. "Cactus Flack's" seemed only fitting.)

Sometimes I feel awkward at garage sales, but every time I spend a weekend morning at them I always find something good so that's why I keep going. I try to look for garage sales where there are other shoppers so I can walk up, scan the piles and get out without doing too much talking. Today I found a pile of about 30 Atari carts with another pile of manuals for $4 total. Those types of finds are the ones that keep me going.

I own the SNES Messiah controllers. I really like them, but the d-pad is a bit different than the original but I like it just fine. The RF works great, I've tried them from 20-30 feet away and they work great. If you are the type of person who only likes original controllers and not 3rd party ones then I would try them out first. Like I said, I like them as much as I like the originals. They use 2 AA batteries and seem to last for a pretty long time. The NEX console looks interesting. It has both a 60 pin and a 72 pin slot for both Famicom and US NES games, and accepts US controllers as well as Messiah's own wireless controllers. That being said, I think they may have a tough time competing with those Yobo units. I got one of those (won it at OVGE) and it's pretty sweet. It is unbelievably small and light. Looking top down it is only slightly wider than an NES cart, and it's shorter than 3 carts stacked on top of each other. The controllers feel light and cheap but since you can use real NES controllers on it that's not really an issue. The A/V out works well. I can't tell if the sound is 100% accurate or not, to be honest I've spent so much time playing different emulators and whatnot that SMB sounded off to me tonight but maybe it's how it always sounded.

Wow, what a score! I am especially jealous because Double dragon, Excitebike, Yie-ar-kung fu, and Track & Field are all on my "to own" list. If you decide to part with any of those, let me know. I'm in Oklahoma and would gladly come pick some or all of them up.

No need to feel shy -- you're among fellow nerds! You know, I always expect the regulars like Phosphor Dot Fossils and MegaManFans to come out to the shows, but I love it when the "long time lurkers" make it out. It's so cool to put a face to a fellow collector's alias, whether they have 2 posts or 2000. When I originally saw that Luigi doll I had to have it ... it made me laugh so hard and I used to have them sitting side by side on my shelf. I would always make Mario say (in his normal, Italian voice) "It'sa me, Marrrrrio!" and then I'd make Luigi say (in a thick Hispanic accent) "Hey vato como esta pass the mush-roomy-rooms esse!". I decided to sell them when I had done the joke for everybody I knew at least three times and everyone had quit laughing. Do you live here in Oklahoma? If so, the next time we have another gaming night at my place or a city-wide thrift store adventure, I'll send you a PM!

That stuff all came from my table! You're lucky you got the Mario/Luigi dolls, Icbrkr's wife wanted them and if they didn't sell I was going to donate it to their cause.

Great pix MMF! It's always awesome to see the same event through someone else's eyes. Usually it shows me how much I missed!

I was just disappointed that I didn't get a chance to meet you in person. I just picked up the BBS Documentary DVD's and really liked your interview parts! Maybe we can hook up in Dallas in August for a few minutes.