Build Log (Part 3)

I wanted today to be the last day I work on the cabinet for a while - my goal was to get the darn thing playable. That meant decasing the PC and stuffing the guts in the bottom, wiring up the remaining things, and turning it all on to make sure it worked.

Here I have cut the back door into two sections and attached the top half permanently to the beam. The hope is that this gives the extra support to the TV I was wanting. I think it will hold nicely. I then carefully pulled the parts out of the PC and stuffed them at the bottom of the cabinet, powering it on and off every so often just to make sure it was working. This part scared me because it is how I broke the last PC, and I didn't want to lose another one due to some static or mishandling. Then I plugged it all in, turned it on and... woo! I got a boot screen, then a menu, and then I started a game of Galaga so I could map all the controls properly. (Nothing at the bottom of the cab is secured in place at this point - the HD actually sits on top of a cut up pair of pants to reduce noise, and everything else is free to slide around. This is basically going to be a permanent fixture in the garage, so I don't see it as a big problem, but if we ever move or want to take it inside it's going to be a huge hassle.) Speakers are currently located outside the cabinet on the floor : ) 

One annoying thing about TVs is that some of them don't degauss when you turn them on, and if you mount them horizontally, the Earth's magnetic field screws with the colors. Whenever I get this situated in its proper home I'll be able to fix it with a magnet - until then, everything is all rainbow-colored. Only one problem: remember yesterday, when I mentioned that I dropped a hammer on my keyboard encoder? I had hoped at the time that I just dented the pins on the chip a bit. Looks like I was not that lucky...

That is a crack cutting across several traces on the board. Though the lights flick when I plug it in, the computer does not recognize a connected keyboard any more, and none of the controls respond. DAMN. This is a huge disappointment, because the way I built the control panels means there is no easy way to fix it. My options are to somehow attempt a fix in-place, cut the wires and put them back later, or take apart most of the cabinet so I can remove the encoder and repair it outside. None of these are at all appealing, all are time-consuming, and this coupled with leaving town in a couple days has pretty much taken the wind out of my sails. Anyway, control problems aside, I decided to fire up Galaga anyway and take some photos just to prove it's (sort of) working. It can be played with the keyboard but that isn't any fun.

Until next time...