PC Spec

Hardware:
Gigabyte main board model number ???
1ghz Athlon processor
128mb pc100 ram
20gb HD
TNT2 32MB AGP
ATI 3D Rage 2 PCI
SoundBlaster PCI128
SoundBlaster AWE64 ISA
56K modem
2 X PCI 10mbs network cards

Software:

Windows XP
System Commander 2000
Partition Magic 7

DOS (win98SE version)
ArcadeOS
Mame .37
Sound Blaster Utilities

This was the family PC, but I modified it so that it could run my arcade cab as well.

I plugged the J-Pac into the PS2 port of the PC and then plugged the keyboard into the J-Pac using a PS2 extension lead.

I made it so that it would boot up using the PCI graphics card but windows XP would use the AGP as its main display card. As such, I could not see anything on my monitor until it booted into XP.
I had the PCI card plugged into the J-Pac all the times, except when I needed to access the bios or edit some config files in DOS, in which case I would have to plug the PC monitor into it.

I used Partition Magic to set up the FAT32 partition for DOS. Use FAT32, if you are using the win98SE version of DOS. I used this version because it has better memory management than the older ones, and FAT16 wastes too much hard disk space anyway. When you have about 5 gigs of ROMs it is not economic to use FAT16.

I then copied a win98SE boot disk onto the new partition, and changed the Autoexec.bat and config.sys files accordingly. If you are dual booting you can remove the CD-ROM drivers for DOS as they use up valuable memory that could otherwise be used by mame.

Then I installed cdmpi, which you can find by searching google. You need it for mame.

Then I set up the Sound Blaster using the supplied CD. The file you need to have running is CTCM which is like a dos plug and play thing for SoundBlaster.

Then I installed Mame .37. Self-explanatory really.

Then came ArcadeOS. I set it up to use the resolution 320 X 240 (I think) and to only use 8-bit colour and 22khz sound as defaults. I left all of the other settings on auto or as they were. I have no idea what they do. If anyone has a really thorough write up of ArcadeOS and all its various functions can they send me a link? The site where it is hosted is somewhat lacking in that department. After I made sure it was working with mame, I set the "arcadeos.cfg" file so that it was "in cabinet" and sending out the 15khz signal for my arcade monitor.

Then I installed system commander. I set it up so that it would make a sound from the PC speaker before booting to windows XP after 10 seconds. If I wanted to boot into ArcadeOS I had to hit down then Enter and wait a couple of minutes for it to boot up. Why it took so long I have no idea. After I got another sound from the PC speaker indicating that ArcadeOS had dropped to the horizontal resolution to 15khz, I turned on the arcade monitor, speakers and marquee light.

Now, finally I was ready to play.