If you’ve got a netbook and don’t know quite how to make it useful, perhaps this idea may be of help. If you’re into arcade gaming and wish you had your own arcade system, you can take your netbook and give it a fairly decent upgrade with the Nanocade to convert it into a laptop arcade.
Designed by Rasmus Sorensen, it’s a pretty simple system, and all it really requires apart from the case is a donor machine (which can be a netbook or a mini-ITX motherboard and 10.1inch display) and a little adhesive to put together this sweet wee MAME cabinet. It’s obviously a system that is so much more affordable and so much more portable than an actual arcade cabinet, and can be just as fun, if not more.
In terms of the games available, you can customize it to run with all of your favourite arcade games, just by installing them to the emulator. It’s a perfect way to take gaming back to the retro days, and since it’s only $349 plus shipping, it’s also pretty inexpensive.
In terms of the full system specs, it is fairly decent. The kit comes with an Ultimarc Ultrastik 360 with built in encoder, 3 Sanwa 24mm OSBN-24 Orange pushbuttons, 3 Seimitsu 24mm PS-14-DN Black pushbuttons, Ultimarc harness for Ultrastik 360 and sheets of acrylic. The cabinet can weigh between 3.7kg and 4.5kg, depending on what is being used on the inside. The monitor’s maximum size can go up to 10.4” and will fit any screen of this size or smaller.
The system comes with two USB ports and a built in sound system, and for software works on Windows 7 Starter (x86), MALA FE with custom Nanocade Layout and MAME 0.139. In terms of size, this cabinet is 28cm x 23cm x 29cm approximately. If you’re interested in picking one up, they ship out in March.
You can check out other stuff, in the meanwhile, like the iPad arcade cabinet or the original Pac Man arcade.
Via Engadget
