Jukebox simulator software for your MAME™ cabinet or for dedicated home jukebox projects
Latest version: Version 3.1.4 Updated 4 September 07
Page updated 12 October 07
NEWS UPDATE (12 October 07): DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox moving to DWJukebox.com
DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox is an MP3 and OGG Vorbis player, designed for use in
DOS or Windows based MAME cabinets or as a standalone home jukebox.
It is designed to operate as a true jukebox, and
not a media player. It is a complete jukebox construction set which
can be completely re-skinned and controlled via keyboard, keyboard encoder,
gamepad, mouse, or touchscreen.
Why another jukebox?
I wanted a jukebox function for my own MAME (Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator) cabinet (in fact, having it available as a jukebox was one of the conditions for bringing it into the house!). Thus, I went searching for a jukebox program. I wanted it to look and play like an actual classic jukebox. Since my cabinet didn't have a usable pointing device (well, it had a trackball, but none of the buttons were mapped to a trackball button and the axes were reversed), it had to be usable from the keyboard, and that had to be configurable. And, of course, it had to support DOS, because that's what my cabinet was based on at the time.
I didn't find one suited to my needs that would run on a DOS cabinet, so I wrote one. Other MAME cabinet builders saw it and asked for a copy, and thus DOSCab Jukebox has taken on life as a project of its own. It wasn't long before the cabinet was converted to use Windows; thus, WinCab Jukebox was born.
There certainly are many other jukebox programs which are excellent; each has its own strengths and weaknesses. If DOSCab or WinCab are not right for you, please take a look at one of these other fine programs.
Why continue to support DOS?
One of the last useful uses of DOS is as an operating system for embedded applications such as a MAME cabinet or a dedicated jukebox. DOS loads quickly, is stable, and is supported by MAME. It does not multitask, which is a benefit in an emulation environment where every machine cycle counts. It also will run on much less hardware.
However, DOS was long out of fashion by the time the MP3 format rose to prominence. Thus, there are few DOS-based MP3 players, and those that do exist are either command-lne based or try to act as media players, not jukeboxes.
Click here for DOSCab Sound Card Compatibility Information
Features
- True jukebox-style operation via buttons or a GUI
- Can look like an old-fashioned jukebox or a modern CD jukebox
- Supports both DOS and Windows
- Runs in any resolution supported by your video card
- Can be rotated in either direction for vertical monitors
- Flexible input system can adapt to almost any control panel
- Fully skinnable
- Skins support icons that react to keystrokes or status messages from the jukebox
- Can be configured to accept coins from up to four slots, with the number of selections per credit adjustable individually for each slot
- Fully remappable controls
- Supports a greater or fewer number of selections onscreen just by changing the skin
- Supports CTRL, ALT, and SHIFT keys as inputs
- Supports input from gamepads, joysticks, mice and touchscreens (touchscreens supported on DOS or Windows XP only)
- Supports an optional Radio and Play Stimulator mode, where a random song is played whenever the queue is empty
- Free for non-commercial use
News
Update (12 October 07): DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox moving to DWJukebox.com
!Yes, after almost 6 years DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox gets its own domain, and a new name! The name DOSCab made sense when the program was released, as it only worked on DOS and I wanted the name to scream that out so the DOS users could find it. With the addition of WinCab, however, the name is an ugly mess as DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox, so I will generally refer to the whole package now as DWJukebox.
The new site is WordPress-based, which means that you'll be able to comment on news items or the development blog, or even individual skins. The new site isn't completely ready; in particular I don't have the skin gallery up yet, and the look of the site is still being tweaked. But in the meantime, you're welcome to go take a peek.
Update (29 August 07): DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox 3.1.4 Released (Download)
Changes for this version are:
- Added MSG_QUEUEFULL.
- Added MSG_SELECTNG.
- Added MSG_SELECTIONREADY.
- Added BTN_TOPTUNE.
- Added automatic timed page flips.
- Added settings FirstAutoFlipTimer and AutoFlipTimer to support timed page flips.
- Added CMD_NEXTPG and CMD_PREVPG to support timed page flips.
- Added SkipLetterA, SkipLetterB, SkipNumber1, SkipNumber2, etc. to [Selection] section in skins.
- Added LetterASymbol, LetterBSymbol, Number1Symbol, Number2Symbol, etc. to [Selection] section in skins.
- Added KEY_10 through KEY_25.
- Added Steelfish and Steelfish Bold fonts.
- Added larger, more detailed icons for Windows Vista.
- Increased maximum titlestrip width and height by 1000 in each direction.
- Increased maximum number of songs per titlestrip to 120.
- Fixed OGG files, which were locking up when played.
- Fixed bug where rotated icons were being smeared if there was an On image with no Off image.
- Converted documentation to HTML and Windows Help formats in addition to plain text.
Update (29 August 07): DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox 3.1.4 Coming Soon
Yes, DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox is still alive!
I'm nearing a release point for 3.1.4 but I haven't had a lot of opportunity to test it yet; also I need to do a lot of work on the docs and clean up the skin files and such. But for the adventurous, I have a beta release available that just contains the WinCab executable and new docs, including a Windows help file (jukedocs.chm).
Changes so far for this version are listed in the revision history.
If you have needed any of these changes, please give it a shot and let me know if there are any big issues. The whole selector system had to be rewritten to accomodate the ability to skip letters/numbers, so it will benefit from anyone who has a chance to look at it. I'm also interersted in feedback on the CHM docs, although they're still two-thirds empty.
For those who don't want to download but do want to browse the new docs, you can take a look at them online. Again, there are big gaping holes in them, mostly long lists of settings with no actual explanation, but hey, it's a start. (Yes, plain text docs are still available for DOSCab users.)
Again, this beta release only includes a new executable and docs, so you'll need to unZip it over the top of a 3.1.3 installation.
Thank you for any feedback, bug reports, comments, or suggestions you may have on this beta release!
Update (9 January 07): DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox 3.1.3 Released
This release fixes a number of newer features that had some small bugs in them: CTRL, ALT, and SHIFT keys can once again be mapped as controls, and problems with UseTrackZero were fixed for classic style skins. Track handling for large albums has also been improved; no longer will a small chunk of an album appear as being by a different artist, and if only one or two tracks would remain on a split album, the tracks will now be divided more evenly.
An additional command button, BTN_PLAYSTIMULATOR, has also been added to toggle the play stimulator function on and off, and MSG_PLAYSTIMULATOR was added to indicate the status of the play stimulator. Cursor movements for rotated orientations now move in the proper direction; before they always moved relative to the physical screen and not the virtual one (mouse movements are still relative to the physical screen, though). Play counts no longer increment for songs selected by the radio mode or play stimulator. Finally, a new classic-style skin has been added that uses a numeric keypad rather than a letter/number input style; you can find this as numeric.skn.
Here is the full change list for this release:
- Added RadioMode option to [Settings] section of jukebox.ini.
- Added BTN_PLAYSTIMULATOR to toggle the state of the play stimulator.
- Added MSG_PLAYSTIMULATOR to indicate the status of the play stimulator.
- Added cursor movement normalization for flipped and rotated modes.
- Added orphan track control: if part of a split album has 1/4 or less of an album worth of tracks, some tracks will be moved from the previous portion to even them out.
- Added numeric.skn, a version of the default skin set up for a 10-key keypad.
- Changed play counts to not increment for songs played by radio mode or play stimulator.
- Moved message proccessing logs to debug level 3 from level 4.
- Fixed radio mode adding songs when enabled even if a song is playing.
- Fixed SHIFT, ALT, CTRL, WIN, and LOCK keys.
- Fixed arrow mouse pointer orientation for rotations 2 and 3.
- Fixed shutdown crash in screen saver cleanup.
- Fixed skin loader not reporting missing icon files.
- Fixed bug causing database to be erased on a fatal error.
- Fixed multi-part albums showing incorrect artists. Multi-part albums now look at all parts when deciding who the main artist is.
- Fixed UseTrackZero for classic-style interfaces.
- Fixed bug allowing selections from the next page to be selected if an out-of-range selection address is entered.
Update (6 October 06): Older versions available for download
Did something break on you after the last update? Selected older versions are now available for download. A big thank you to Saint from Build Your Own Arcade Controls for providing the webspace for these older versions.
Update (15 September 06): Bad DOSCab 3.1.1 build
Somehow the build of DOSCab 3.1.1 was bad, causing the sound cache to become corrupted. WinCab 3.1.1 was not affected.
I have uploaded a replacement DOSCab 3.1.1; if your copy of DOSCab.exe has a build date of September 13, please download the latest DOSCab.exe. I apologize for the inconvenience.
In addition, the download prior to September 15th has the DebugLevel in jukebox.ini set to 4; this will create a very large debug file. You may want to edit jukebox.ini and set DebugLevel to Disabled.
Obviously I shouldn't do releases late at night...
Update (13 September 06): DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox 3.1.1 Released
This is mostly a bugfix release, however there are a couple of small new features.
Changes in this release include:
- Added BTN_SKIPLAST to delete the last song in the queue. Note that you cannot skip the currently playing song this way.
- Added SkipLastTimeLimit setting to [Settings] section of jukebox.ini to control BTN_SKIPLAST.
- Added MSG_SKIPLASTOK to indicate when it's OK to skip the last song in the queue.
- Added IncrementalCreditDelay to [Timers] section in skin; when non-zero, credits are added one at a time with the specified number of hundredths of a second between them.
- Added MSG_ADDINGCREDITS to indicate that credits are being added; this message is not sent when IncrementalCreditDelay is disabled.
- Added MQ_MSG_ADDEDCREDIT to indicate that a credit has been added. It will fire once for all credits on a coin if IncrementalCreditDelay is disabled, otherwise it will fire once as each credit is added and unset a short time later.
- Added CMD-ADDCREDIT message to tell the jukebox to add a credit. CMD_ messages do not come in pairs like BTN_ and MSG_ messages; there is no "unset" for a CMD message.
- Added a deferred credit counter; if another coin is inserted before all credits are added, the additional credits are deferred until the first credits are all loaded.
- Added case support for Title, Artist and Album font contexts.
- Fixed backward compatibility for font settings. If the Font setting in the [Titlestrips] section of a skin is present, the [Fonts] section will be ignored.
- Fixed BTN_PAUSE.
- Fixed AllowSelectFullCD=False.
- Cleaned up coin sound effect.
- Changed Unicode character sorting to use ASCII equivalents.
- Changed random song selector to not select songs that are duplicates of those in the queue if duplicates are disabled.
Please read the installation information in the announcement for version 3.1 below regarding DLL changes. I hope you enjoy this release; please feel free to send me any bug reports, feedback, or excess sums of money that you have lying around.
Update (12 September 06): Bugs in DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox 3.1
Some huge bugs are showing up early... things that I know were tested and working somehow got broken before release. The biggest and most obvious is that BTN_PAUSE no longer works. You may want to hold off on downloading this until I can get fix these bugs later tonight.
Update (12 September 06): DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox 3.1 Released
This release brings the largest number of changes in any one release. Note that the DLLs have changed in this version, so simply installing the updated EXE is not enough to get a working installation.
The default installation is set up for DOS and Windows XP. If you are using Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows ME, or Windows 2000 and you want to use a mouse, you will need to replace alleg42.dll with the included alleg42-98.dll. Simply delete or rename the alleg42.dll and rename alleg42-98.dll to alleg42.dll.
Changes in this release include:
- Added AllowSelectFullCD setting to enable or disable selecting all tracks when Track 0 is selected.
- Added BTN_FREEPLAY and MSG_FREEPLAY to toggle and indicate the state of the credit requirement.
- Added BTN_CLEARALL which clears both the queue and the currently playing song.
- Added automatic addition of .skn extension if not specified
- Added automatic search for skin files in a folder with the same name as the skin
- Added transparent backgrounds for displays. Use TRANSPARENT as the background color.
- Added MSG_IDLE message to indicate no songs are playing or queued.
- Added time index to debug file.
- Added logging of processed messages to debug level 4.
- Added delays before and after songs, indicated by MSG_PRESONG and MSG_POSTSONG.
- Added message to delay between songs, MSG_INTERSONG.
- Added MSG_IDLE to indicate when no songs are playing or queued.
- Added MSG_QUEUE to indicate that songs are present in the queue.
- Added ability to specify different fonts, colors, quote status, and quote symbols for various font contexts.
- Changed color parameters to accept either "Color" or "Colour" spellings.
- Changed clock to count seconds based on globalclock rather than asking the music engine for the time; this fixes the clock for MIDI files and makes it more consistent for MP3's.
- Changed BTN_CLEARQUEUE to not clear the currently playing song.
- Updated Allegro library to 4.2; this seems to have fixed the DOS MIDI crash.
- Fixed getting song lengths for MIDI files.
- Fixed bug that sent MSG_CREDITS even if 0 credits were added.
- Fixed bug where -MSG_SONGSTART was not being sent if song was skipped.
- Fixed bug where song would be skipped if paused within the first second.
- Fixed bug where extraneous button unsets were being sent when processing the delayed turn queue.
- Fixed taskbar icon and window title.
Here's a sneak peek at the features I'm planning on working on next:
- TrueType fonts as an option for displays
- Orphan control, dividing up split CD's in a more reasonable fashion rather than stranding one or two tracks on a CD
- More customizable displays; you'll be able to set up any arbitrary number of displays showing pretty much anything related to the status of the jukebox
- More customizable titlestrips, such as being able to add track numbers to singles strips, specifying different fonts for different display elemets, etc.
- Animated icons
- More flexibility over icons, i.e being able to send one message and respond to a different message
- A Slider object type for volume control or navigation
- An LED object type, allowing you to control the ScrollLock, CapsLock and NumLock LED's in response to jukebox status messages.
- Adding MouseOver events to icons to allow for more customization
- Queue/Credits optionally saved on shutdown
- Multi-page navigation options
- More page-change animations
- Support for alternate titlestrip graphics for different genres
- Filter support to filter on an artist, genre, decade, or perhaps custom-definable filters
- Touchscreen support for Windows 98
- Changing skins/sorts on the fly (switch from random singles to sorted albums with the touch of a button, or from horizontal to vertical, or to flip sides on a cocktail, etc.)
- Faster indexing
- More screensaver options, including the much-requested slide show.
Options I'm considering but haven't committed to:
- A Search function. (I'd have to create a customizable on-screen keyboard first.)
- Loading/Saving Queues. Same problem as above.
- Support for 4x40 external LCD displays
- Support for one of the hardware light controller options.
- WMA support through Media Player
Update (17 August 06): DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox 3.0 Beta 11 Released
Finally, the first official release in over a year! Changes since the last release are:
- Added control over screen saver song info display; the size, color, and number of lines displayed can now be set,
- Added control over color ranges used by screensaver.
- Fixed bug where credits display wasn't updating after a random song was selected.
- Added FileSystemEncoding setting to control which encoding is used to read filenames. This will almost certainly never be necessary to set, but it's there if some weird filesystem encoding doesn't work.
- Added ability to specify a different INI file on the command line. For example, typing "wincab alt.ini" will start WinCab with alt.ini instead of jukebox.ini.
- Added UseTrackZero setting to skins to allow track numbers to start at 00 instead of 01. This is mostly for people emulating specific mechanical jukeboxes, such as a three-column Seeburg layout. If this option is used, you lose the ability to select track 00 to select an entire CD. This option is only active when UseZero is set to True.
- Fixed bug that caused BTN_CLEARQUEUE to crash for queue sizes below 1000.
- Fixed Unicode handling for ID3 tags.
- Fixed database entries not getting a last updated date on first run. This always caused the second indexing run to take as long as the first.
- Fixed bug that caused queue to fill with one song when queue was completely filled.
- Fixed bugs preventing songs with international characters in the filename from being loaded.
- Fixed bug that caused split CD's to be sorted in the wrong order.
- Changed MaxQueueSize range to 1-500, with 250 as the new default.
- Changed default on AllowDuplicatesInQueue to FALSE
- Changed maximum songs per strip to 100. Again, this is to support physical emulations for people converting real jukeboxes.
Click here for older news items
Download DOSCab and WinCab Jukebox
Download the current version or selected older versions. See the full revision history for full details on the differences between versions.
| Download | Version | Size | Release Date | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Current version: | ||||
| Download | Version 3.1.4 | 4.6 MB | 4 Sep 07 | Current Version |
| Older versions: | ||||
| Download | Version 3.0 Beta 11 | 3.8 MB | 17 Aug 06 | Unicode fixes |
| Download | Version 3.0 Beta 8 | 3.3 MB | 30 Jul 05 | First version with sound effects and adjustable queue sizes |
| Download | Version 3.0 Beta 7 | 3.3 MB | 31 May 05 | First version with MIDI support |
| Download | Version 3.0 Beta 6 | 2.9 MB | 7 Mar 05 | First version with screensaver and strip grids |
| Download | Version 3.0 Beta 5 | 2.3 MB | 1 Dec 04 | First version with volume control |
| Download | Version 3.0 Beta 2 | 2.3 MB | 26 Aug 04 | CD skins, ID3, skinning, rotation, TrueType, OGG, lots more |
| Download | Version 2.41 | 2 MB | 1 Apr 03 | Required separate indexing program, no ID3 or skinning |
Make a Donation
Many people have asked why DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox is free, and have asked about making a donation. Although
I did briefly consider asking for a $15 registration fee at one time, I have used a great deal
of free software to put together my MAME cabinet, and
it was time for me to give back to the community. However, as I have painfully become aware, MAME cabinets are an expensive hobby, and work on
DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox and providing technical support for it has extended into hundreds of hours. If you feel that
the jukebox has been of value to you and would like to make a donation to encourage future deveopment and new features, I certainly
won't turn it down. You can make a donation in any amount via PayPal using the button below. If everyone who used the jukebox donated a dollar,
I could probably buy a new joystick... or at least a button. 
Other Jukeboxes
If DOSCab Jukebox or WinCab Jukebox don't seem to be the right fit for your cabinet, try one of these other jukeboxes (list last updated on 3 Jan 05):
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A bar-style album jukebox. Very professional looking, with animated page changes. Possibly the most popular jukebox among the MAME community. Freeware with a donation link available.
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By Mark J. Schwartz. Requires Windows; if it didn't, I would have probably never started this project! This is a singles-style jukebox as opposed to an album oriented one. No license mentioned; it appears to be freeware.
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A bar-style CD album jukebox. Looks very nice, and if you don't like the looks, it's skinnable. It gets lots of positive comments. Commercial software; price was $34.95 USD at the time of this writing. A demo download is available; at this writing, the demo was limited to 15 days of operation. Requires Windows.
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Designed for MAME cabinets running MAMEWah. Supports vertical monitor orientations. Has a sort of HTPC look to the interface. Will run in low resolutions with appropriate skins. Freeware.
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Kind of a cross between a media player and an album-oriented jukebox. Many party-oriented features, including video support. Requires Windows Media Player 9 or higher and a minimum resolution of 1024x768. No specific license mentioned; appears to be freeware.
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By Barry Barcrest. A skinnable album-style touchscreen jukebox. Includes search abilities via an on-screen keyboard. Requires Windows. Freeware.
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Yet another bar-style CD album jukebox. Looks fantastic, and is free for non-commercial use.
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By Howard Casto, author of the Lazarus front end. Dragonator Jukebox is a Winamp frontend, not a skin or stand-alone app. Source code is available. No license is mentioned; appears to be freeware.
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By Ed Husar, author of the ArcadeFX front end. More like a media player than a jukebox, but looks sharp! No license mentioned, appears to be freeware. Requires Windows.
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Commercial software. Registration was $15.95 USD at the time of this writing, with a 15 day free trial download. Requires Windows.
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MAMEP3 is a free mp3 jukebox program designed primarily for arcade cabinets using an I-PAC control interface or a hacked joypad. Looks more like a media player than a jukebox. Freeware. Requires Windows.
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Another media-player style jukebox. Sports a Web-based interface option for those of you with networked cabs. Commercial software with a 30 day trial download.
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By Bjoern Petersen. Emulates a kiosk-style jukebox. Available for Windows, with a Linux and Macintosh version in development. Includes support for VST or WinAmp modules and a number of playlist formats, crossfading, an interesting looking "smart shuffle" feature, and more. Fully skinnable. Commercial software; currently €28 for a single user license or €38 for a family license, with commercial licenses available.
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For you Linux types, here's a Linux-only jukebox (although it's Open Source, so it could theoretically be ported). Multi-user with a Web interface. Skinnable; themes include a text-only mode for hardcore Linux users, a media player-ish interface, and old-fashioned wood look, and a CD jukebox interface. Includes an integrated CD ripper.
Links
Build Your Own Arcade Controls
A motherload of information regarding the construction of arcade cabinets and controls. You probably came here from there.
Allegro: A Game Programming Library
Allegro is the basis for DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox; it is a cross-platform C library providing functions for graphics, sound, input handling, and more.
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My own MAME cabinet, which was the genesis for this project.
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Wonderful free fonts designed by Ray Larabie. Two of the fonts in DOSCab/WinCab Jukebox, Blue Highway and Blue Highway Condensed, came from Larabie Fonts.
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United Kingdom based online shop for all your video arcade needs, offering a wide range of parts from Happ buttons to full flat-packed cabinets to jumpstart your jukebox project.
Comments? Mail celamantia@charter.net