MAMEWorld Forums - EmuChat - UPDATING MAME COCKTAIL CABINET , BEST MAME VERSION

hi all
im thinking of updating my mame cocktail table which is quite old
it only has a what looks like a 4gb hdd and a very old version of mame via a pc mother board which is screwed to the base of the cabinet
so thought id have aplay atound with a spare laptop i got to see if i can get it all up and running and booting into mame from boot up on the laptop
so if i do anything wrong i can just do full re-install with recovery discs
the mame table has a 19" crt monitor which i prefer for that total retro look scanlines wise
the monitor is rotated 90 degrees so its portrait not landscape
so in theriory the side of the monitor is the bottom
and the bottom and top are the sides (hope that makes sense)
anyway as i said im looking at updating to a newer version of mame in a new pc housing
and was wondering whats the best version of mame to use on a cocktail cabinet, as mine only seems to have the games on it that are i portrait view , and id like both the portarit and landscape games on there..
any help will be greatly appreciated
thanks in advance
scott