Future Pinball Table

Devospeed

The Beast from the East
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Anybody started or completed a table to run Future Pinball? I've seen a couple videos (you tube) and websites, but really no step by step stuff. I'm just curious because I started one. Here is an image of what I'm starting with. I should be getting a bunch of parts I ordered this week!
 

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I have built one, I'm just waiting for my pc to come for inside. I have it hooked to my desktop right now. Any questions, I'd be happy to answer. There is also a homebrew cabinet section over at fp forums where a bunch of people have. Built cabinets, that's where I went for all my information. My cab is under the ultra cheap mini pin topic over there. I had like no real budget to work with and it ended up only costing about 300, so far including the lcds, but not the pc. Good luck with your project. It looks good so far
 
I'm also playing Future Pinball on my desktop waiting for my custom computer to be built. I think I have about $300 invested also into my table so far. What kind of keyboard encoder are you using for the buttons? I just bought an I-Pac 2 encoder for all of the buttons. As for the Future Pinball forum I never received an email to get into the forum and I've registered twice.
 
I had an old x arcade dual stick that I dismanteled for the encoder and the buttons. The problem I had was, I didn't take into consideration the fromtend I would be using, so I had to add a few extra buttons after I was finished. I post a few pictures of my cab in this thread when I get he from work, just take into consideration that I'm no craftsman, Ive never built anything that didn't come from ikea.
 
sorry my digital camera's battery is dead so i had to take these with my iphone. but here is the ultra cheap cabinet i built.
 

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Wow! That is a nice looking cabinet! Are a lot of people surprised when they see it? Have you got a theme in mind for the graphics?
 
most of them are surprised that i was able to build it. i'm fairly good with electronics, but wood working is a whole different story. the real shock comes when i tell them what i built it from: it's basically an old stereo cabinet i had in my basement from the mid eighties, that i took apart and cut up to build the cabinet. i noticed you had a bottom to your cabinet, i didn't put a bottom panel in in hope that it would reduce heat build up, i'm going to just put a small tray big enough to hold the motherboard and power supply in the back. where i notice heat build up is the playfield monitor, which i covered with the glass door from the stereo cabinet. i'm hoping this doesn't become a problem, i am going to install fans which will blow air between the glass and the monitor. i can't wait to see how yours turns out.
 
oops.... i forgot about the theme. i don't know if i'm going to add any art to it. i'm pretty happy with the shiny black. maybe just some striping outlining the panels. i might also label the buttons.
 
The cabinet I'm using is a back to a Pachislo slot machine. I plan on installing at least 4 fans in it to keep temperatures down. I just purchased a duel cabinet fan that made for home theater cabinets and I also purchased 4 green LED fans. I have a couple names for the table, so far I've narrowed it down to Pin Fusion, Pin Vision and Pin Station. The colors will be black and green. What size monitors did you use in your table? I have a 22" for the play field and a 17" for the head, but I might be getting a 19" for the head.
 
I'm using a 19 for the head. I was going to use a 22 for the pf, but I found a deal on a 24. I wasn't trying to go to large as I didn't want it to take up too much space, but it ended up kinda big. It's 35 inches front to back, 19 wide, 32 from floor to pf, and about 51 from floor to top of head. It's funny, I kinda got a bug to build a mame cab now. If only I were rich
 
Do you plan to make it nudgable? I'm sticking with button controled nudging for now. I'm kinda worried about hard drive damage with banging the table around.
 
I'll probably go with the 19" for the head and use the 17" on a Bartop arcade kit I bought recently. I think if we were all rich it would not be as fun finding all the parts at the best bargins for our projects. I'm constantly scouring Ebay and the rest of the web looking for the best price. I'm also going to try and use Band-it Iron on Melamine for the sides of the cab.
 
Do you plan to make it nudgable? I'm sticking with button controled nudging for now. I'm kinda worried about hard drive damage with banging the table around.

I'll probably stick with the button nudging also. I can see some people playing it and getting crazy with it, then I would have to lay the smack down on them!:boxing:
 
Bartop arcade. I never thought about that. Will a pc go inside of it? Boy it would be nice if I could run the pin and an arcade cab off the same pc simultaniously, now that would be a money saver.
 
i just got a front end configured for my cabinet, it's called Maximus Arcade. It works real well with pretty much any emulator. I figured you might be looking for one for your pin cab and the bartop. It's nice cause i can use it to select pins, and because MAME allows you to choose which display it plays on i can play MAME on my backbox screen. I've been working on a skin for the pinball selection and thought i'd show you a few screen shots. Let us know how you're progressing on your cab.:D
 

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I think I saw a youtube video on the Maximus Arcade front end about the pinball selection. I'll probably end up using it, it looks good on your table. I got my black Melamine in today from Parts Express. I figured I would try it out as an alternative to painting. It doesn't seem that hard to apply. I was figuring out last night if I should put the nudging buttons next to the flipper buttons. They will be very close together if I do, about an inch apart. What do you think? Also should I put the flipper buttons first or vise versa?
 
that skin i made today, the normal one is an arcade cab. As far as the buttons go.... here is a screen. The white button is the flipper... closest to the front of the cabinet... the black button level with the white button is the nudge(about an inch and a half in between), the other black button is for FP special keys(some pins have an extra key for say a magna save or something). I don't think anyone has used the special keys in a table yet but i'm sure someone will eventually. i also put a button on the front of the cab directly in the middle for the up nudge that i can press with my leg or hip as if i were really nudging the table.
 
I got my computer today and I'm now configuring the camera for arcade mode. One problem I'm having is what keystroke is the save button? It says save it before exiting after I configured both screens.
 
after you load the game and get the screens how you want them, exit the table and save it in the editor. I usually do save as and over write the table so I get a conformation screen so I know it saved. I haven't ordered the of for In my cab yet... Not till next month. If you don't mind me asking, what did you get, and from where? I think I'm going to get a cyberpower customized.
 
Here are the specs (pentium 4 3.0 ghz 2 g ram 80 g hard drive dvd dual layer with lightscribe the video card is Radeon X1650 Pro Engine Clock: 600MHz Memory: 512MB DDR2 800MHz 128-bit PCI Express x16 RAMDAC: 400MHz Pixel Pipelines: 12 Dual DVI-I (Support Dual VGA) TV-out (HDTV ready) CrossFire DirectX 9.0 OpenGL 2.0 Vista Shader Model 3.0) I traded my UltramanST Pachislo Slot machine for this custom computer. I put an ad on Craigslist for a trade, thats how I got my 22" monitor also. The computer runs everything perfectly and fast! Here are some testing pics
 

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Your cabinet is looking really sweet. Keep us updated. I can't wait to see the completed project.
 
I finally got all of my parts today and I'm now going to get down to figuring out the buttons. Here is a list of buttons I thought I would need. Any input would be greatly appreciated! I want to be able to have easy access for going into a game and out of a game.
(2) Flipper buttons
(2) Nudge Buttons
(1) Ball Launch Button
(1) Exit Game Button
(1) Start Game Button
 
3 nudge buttons- one for center nudge
2 special keys by flippers- some of the em's have a ball lifter programed to these and dead hunters uses them for power ups

You might also need a couple for front end use. I have 4 extras at the bottom on the side for shutting the computer down and setting up a favorites list and other stuff
 
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