Modding an X-Arcade

[Marc]

Hey all, sorry if this has been covered before but I did search and turned nothing up. I've got the bog-standard X-Arcade, which I believe plays a lot better if modified with some Happ parts, or so I'm told. However, habing just checked the website, there's millions of options and I haven't a clue where to start, so any advice would be appreciated.

I've also heard they're supposed to be prett laggy but I honestly can't say I've encountered this as of yet, thoughts?

[PC Engine Fan X!]

Happ Competition arcade parts ain't laggy whatsoever. I've got one of those Deluxe Atari Jaguar Jamma LX joysticks personally made by Dan Loosen from Goatstore.com site and it is endowed with all Happ arcade parts. Really durable parts indeed. It's been said that you could take a sledge hammer and bash a Happ arcade stick and it'd still work. Dunno about them Japanese Sanwa or Seimitsu arcade parts if they durable enough to take that kind of insane punishment though. Perhaps not. ^_~

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[Damocles]

Happ Comps are probably what you want. No actuators to screw with. Happ sticks aren't laggy, but the throw is relatively long and they are quite heavy compared to J-style sticks. It's preference. If you want to mount a Sanwa or the like you'll need to (in all likelyhood) heavily mod the joystick base.

If you want to mod the buttons the stick will accept either concave or convex screw-in buttons.

[brokenhalo]

happ comp's are just chinese knock offs at this point. your best bet are the Il sticks at lizardlick.com. they are the true happ competition sticks that everyone loves. if you want to stick sanwa or seimitsu in there, you'll need to break out the router and remove some wood off the bottom of the top panel so that the joystick sits at the correct height. not really that difficult assuming you have a router..

[Jeneki]

I still have an old X-Arcade 2-player stick that I use for convention gamerooms, where I don't know who's going to be using it. I went with HAPP super joysticks, which are pretty heavy-duty. Kids beat on it quite a bit and it hasn't had any issues yet.

X-Arcade parts use Zippy microswitches, while HAPP parts come with Cherry. These use different sized quick-disconnects, so it's a little more work if you want to replace the microswitches as well. Not a big deal though.

I believe when people talk about lag on an X-Arcade they are talking about the board inside it or the converters. It's been a while since I used for a home gaming session, but I can hook it up later tonight and see if I notice any. Although to be honest, any time I go out of my way to think about lag I find it whether it's there or not.

Does X-Arcade still use concave-top buttons? That was probably my biggest complaint with their stock parts. I hate the feel of concave buttons.