So i see the jamma boards on ebay all the time, and what i think i have to do, is just hook the jamma board up to the tv and bam its good?
Setting up an arcade from scratch is not a project... it is a hobby. You got superguns, encoders, upscalers, etc. etc.
I'm not exactly sure what you want here...do you want an arcade machine...or do you want to play it on your TV. On your TV requires a Supergun...but well...MK Requires...what is it...an extra -5v Line to power the sound board...which can be hard to find in a supergun...Long story short...you just can't hook an arcade board to a TV...(though you can get pretty close if you live in Europe...Grumble...) For a cabinet...I'd just recommend finding a dedicated MK Cabinet...(though I'd recommend MK2 or some other better fighting game)...otherwise you'd have to find another Jamma Cabinet and convert it...and well...I don't know how good you are with electronics.
Get yourself a supergun and you're good to go. Dont get raped and buy a $200+ one though. Essentially its just a powersupply and a bunch of cables. (and for you americans i suppose a video encoder circuit)
No, it's far more complicated than that really. First do you want the game or an actual full machine? If you want a full machine first you should hunt down any decent Jamma cabinet you like. After that, converting it isn't very hard. If you want to just hook it up to a regular TV, you'll need a "SuperGun" or Jamma Test Rig, as well as a compatible TV set. If you are in USA you may find it difficult to find a TV with SCART RGB which means you'll need a video encoder, and even then you may have trouble finding a TV that can sync to the refresh rate of Mortal Kombat. I own both MK and MKII but can't play them due to my TV being unable to sync to the 53hz or 56hz refresh rate (MAME claims 53hz, JROK claims 56hz.) I have found though that a Toshiba HDTV set worked quite well. From what I've heard newer TVs with better tuning/digital tuning capabilities are more likely to work. The best solution though, is an arcade cabinet. If you like arcade games then there is no reason not to get a JAMMA arcade cabinet, unless you don't have the space or money right now which is my situation. First decide wether or not you want the arcade cabinet or the home console like setup. http://www.chadsarcade.co.uk/oldsite/Supergun/supergunIndex.htm Visit that site to get an idea of what a Supergun is like. I'm sure you are familar with what an arcade cabinet is like. The SuperGun will cost a varying amount to build depending on just what you decide to build. Some people with SCART RGB can throw one together with spare parts for next to nothing. If you're like me without SCART, you'll spend about 70$ on an RGB encoder, in addition to a JAMMA Harness, Wood, Paint, Arcade Joysticks and Push Buttons, Power Supply, audio jacks. It's a fun project but I would insist you find another game to get besides MK because of the video issue. I'd recommend a NeoGeo motherboard and cartridge or a Capcom CPS game. I have both those on my MK-intolerant TV and they work great. All this reminds me I still need to finish my JAMMA console. I still need to wire the second controller, rewrite the first controller, rewrite controller port 1, wire controller port 2, oh yes and put the whole thing in a wooden casing. Right now it is consealed in an old SNES game caddy box that the tray is out of. Oh ya and as others have mentioned, be very careful about buying a Supergun, you will more than likely be ripped off. You're better off building it yourself because that way the quality is under your control, the cost is under your control, you don't have to pay for worksmanship, etc. Also if it breaks, you can fix it! That reminds me I still need to connect -5v for my JAMMA Supergun.
Put it this way, I bought this for 150 bucks: A supergun setup of a decent quality will easily run you 250 plus for US support
Yes that is exactly what i want. Your good Hay, 1/2 the price of a 360 and 1/6 the price of a PS3, i think its a bargin
The catch is you gotta be able to find a cabinet close to you that cheap. During the christmas holiday season my local arcade often puts price tags on some of their arcade machines, and if I had the space, I'd definitely put aside the money to pick one up. Ofcourse part of the problem is finding one you like enough and can be converted to suit your needs. I'd think it's really unlikely to find the actual game you want in a good cabinet. I'd have loved a MK2 cab for 150$. mr wiggl3s, you should find the MK boards you want. If it's the original Mortal Kombat or Mortal Kombat II (i'm unsure about mk3 and umk3) they also have a seperate sound board that you should be certain is included in the auction/item because without the sound board, you have no sound. ;p Also be sure it is actually tested and working. Also it is common on Mortal Kombat boards to have to replace the "sound pot" from what I've heard. Anyway, after you get your MK PCB board, if you see any other more standard JAMMA games you like, I'd grab one for testing purposes. Generally go for a game that is JAMMA, not "JAMMA+" and runs at 60hz (or 59.99hz, same thing really). Mortal Kombat like I said, runs at 53hz and has extra buttons that need wiring. Ideally find some 3 button or less horizontally oriented JAMMA game that runs at 60hz. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles forinstance, Final Fight, etc. NeoGeo would work (even though it's not quite JAMMA). I just want to stress it's not a bad idea to have more than one board to test your JAMMA rig with. And actually it might not be a bad idea to find really cheap retarded game for your real test board, thus if you fry it you won't feel so bad. I didn't do this as I knew what I was doing, sorta. Once you have some nice shiney PCBs of games you love, you'll be ready to start building a Supergun. The arcade and supergun section of the forum would be a great place to read and post for help. I made some posts back when I want building mine. I still haven't put the finishing touches on my SuperGun, but it's playable. Be prepared to spend alot of time and a good bit of money on this hobby. If you're building your own SuperGun, buying all the parts required make sure to have atleast 200$(USD) set aside for that. The first thing I did was buy a JAMMA harness. It's the JAMMA connector with all the required pins wired (although mine didn't have -5v wired!!!! grrr! I think another one like test wasn't wired either). I also around then ordered a RGB to NTSC encoder from JROK ( www.jrok.com ). At this point I had the Video and the heart of the wiring purchased. The next thing I did was I bought a set of 2 Joysticks with 6 (Green) Push Buttons for each, in addition to several other White Push buttons, 2 of white had a 1 Player and the other 2 Player Start icon on them. So at that point I had a video encoder, jamma harness, and a bunch of buttons sitting around. I needed a power supply so I went for the easiest and closest one, a brand new PC Power Supply that came with my new PC's case. =) Now I was ready to do some damage. I jumped right in and connected the Power supply to the jamma harness, as well as connected the Power Supply to the Video Encoder board, and the Video Encoder board to the Jamma harness. That took maybe 20 minutes. After that I had my very first PCB I ever bought (Street Fighter II' Champion Edition) running on my ghetto Supergun. It was very satisfying seeing the graphics appear on my TV. So I went and wired up the audio to RCA jacks and plugged it into some speakers and had sound to go with it. So in less than an hour I had a working SG despite never building anything like this before. The next day I bought some pieces of wood and cut it up, put together some arcade style controller boxes to mount the joysticks and buttons on. That took much longer, esspecially because I painted them black. Getting the game running is easy, the controllers and polishing your system are the harder more time consuming parts. I still have to rewire my one arcade stick when I get the chance, as well as wire the second one as I never did that. Then I have to work on boxing all the internal guts such as the PSU and Video Encoder. Once all that is done, I plan to make some protective custom PCB enclosures. Forinstance a Black wooden box with the Mortal Kombat dragon logo on the top to keep MK inside even while in use as I could add vents and even a fan.
