Die Hard cab conversion (pics) (2024)

Quote from: FiZiX on January 27, 2015, 11:49:05 am

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I'm sorry to revive an old thread. Just wondering if you could post some pics of the final result? I have a Die Hard Arcade cabinet I'm working on converting.

I love me a good necrobump! Unfortunately, tykenfitz hasn't been on this forum in almost two years.

JimmyU, make that four years, but I'm back baby!

The PC in the cabinet bit the dust, I'm replacing the whole thing with a Raspberry pi 3 running Retropie. Adding the buttons and 4 way joystick for realz this time haha.

OK so first a few updates. The cabinet served me well for a couple of years, but was never really "complete." The PC, the VCR, and the CD player I used as an amplifier were always just placed outside the cabinet with wires running in and out every which way and I never quite got around to installing more buttons, a four-way joystick, or a trackball. It was always ugly as sin, but always worked for me, especially for PS2/PS1 light gun games, since it is the only CRT TV left in the house (and probably on of very few left on the face of the planet )

After I went away to college and have since returned like the prodigal son, I have found that things are not exactly as I left them. First, the PS2 and all of my light gun games have been boxed up and shoved away in some deep dark unknown corner of the basem*nt. Second, the POS PC that I had been using refuses to acknowledge the existence of my controls. I believe this is a problem with computer itself, rather than an issue with the I-PAC I used to interface with it. Finally, the stereo I had used as an amplifier for the speakers is missing, it's probably blasting EDM jams in my brother's dorm room as we speak.

After spending a couple hours trying to get this freakin' dell to accept my I-PAC, I decided that I would instead take it to the back yard and stick an M-80 inside, prompting the search for a new powerhouse for the cabinet.

The one reason I went with that Dell to begin with was it had S-Video out, so I could easily (i.e. cheaply) go S-Video -> Composite Video -> VCR/RF Modulator -> TV. After looking at ridiculously expensive HDMI to composite adapters and all sorts of other work-arounds, I had almost given up hope. That was, until I read up on the miracle-in-a-box they call the Raspberry Pi. This little thing is a beast, with hardware specs that blow the Dell out of the water, accepts almost any USB HID, is the size of a credit card, and the best part, it can output analog audio and composite video out of the box!

Oh yeah, it also has wifi, bluetooth, a huge community that supports the RetroPie operating system, and it only costs 35 bucks!

Anyway, I have been playing with this thing non-stop since I've gotten it. So far I've been able to hook up a wireless PS4 controller and get all my NEO-GEO ROMS working (which are my favorite) as well as some NES and SNES ROMS which are cool, but will probably be removed before I put it in the cabinet.

My objectives for this overall project are:

• Get all my favorite NEO-GEO and MAME ROMS to work on the RetroPie (Neo-Geo works easily, MAME takes a ton of tweaking)
• Set up controls so that you can turn everything, play a game, exit it, play another with a different emulator, and turn it all off without opening the CP
• Get every component (Pie, I-Pac, Amplifier) mounted within the cabinet, only a power cord sticking out the back
• Install more buttons, total of 6 per player
• 4-way joystick, either on its own or replace existing one with a switchable joystick
• Add a dedicated "1 credit" button to the CP in addition to the working coin acceptor

Tasks/Roadblocks

• Turning on the TV from outside the cabinet

I will have to drill a hole and mount a button somewhere on the cab or CP and wire/solder it up to existing power button on the TV's circuit board. Luckily, the TV defaults to channel 3 whenever it's turned on, so I wont have to mess with any other buttons.

• Installing additional buttons

I will attach photos of two layouts I'm thinking about, the four colored buttons represent the layout for Neo Geo games, with an extra two buttons each for six-button fighting games.
Note: I did not take the original photo, it is from someone else who was doing a Die Hard conversion with an Xbox. Someone, obviously, with much more "Git-r-Done" than myself
In the spirit of giving due credit, you can check out his/her/their build here: Die Hard Arcade Cabinet Conversion - CoinOPS XBox Project

• Coverting composite video to RF

Right now, in order to get the PC or PS2 to show up on screen you have to turn on the VCR and use the Channel buttons on the VCR to select AV input one or two. My plan here to switch out the vcr for a stand-alone
RF modulator that will be mounted inside the cabinet and always powered. I haven't seen any RF modulators that support switch inputs, so I will either have to build or buy an RCA input switch, which will be mounted to the cabinet or inside the CP.

• Re-wiring the controls

My current cable management is a living nightmare, I'm pretty sure there's a loose wire somewhere in my ground daisy chain, and I'll have to do a good bit of wiring for the new controls anyway. So once everything's mounted the way I want it, I'm gonna rewire the whole thing to make it not look like a robin's nest.

• Audio

Seeing as my CD player disappeared, I will need someway of amplifying the audio from the Pi to the speakers in the monitor bezel. I've used these little guys before, they're cheap and will mount easily inside the cabinet:
Lepy Stereo Class-D Hi-Fi Digital Audio Amplifier with Power Supply Black US - Amazon

Stay tuned for progress, man it feels good to be back!