Ghosting/Lag with IPAC Controls

[DashRendar]

Hey guys, I need some help troubleshooting an issue with my system.  Help!

First, here's the specs:

• IPAC4 (connected via USB port)
• Player1 + Player2 = Ultimarc 360s (analog)
• Player3 + Player4 = Sanwa JLWs (keyboard emulated connected to IPAC4)
• Admin buttons (connected to IPAC4)

The symptoms:

• Player1 + Player2 play all games perfectly in MAME.
• Player3 + Player4 have odd ghosting and/or unresponsive behavior in 4-player games.  For instance in Gauntlet II; Players 3 and 4 try to move, and sometimes the character moves, sometimes the character keeps repeating their shots, and usually the character doesn't do anything at all.  It's like there's huge delays and repeating keystrokes.
• When I play a 4-player game (like Gauntlet II), the admin buttons also get unresponsive.  They seem to work fine in 2-player games though.

Troubleshooting I've done:

• Disabled sticky keys.
• Checked for USB Legacy Support setting in BIOS.  It is not part of my BIOS.
• Replaced the "Q" and "S" keys, mapping them to other keys.  Also replaced the "Alt" and "Shift" keys with other keys.  Still no improvement.
• Checked the key strokes in the WinIPAC software.  All keys register correctly with the button presses/joystick movements.  There are no delays here.
• Checked the key strokes in the Keyboard properties part of the WinXP control panel.  Make sure it allows the fastest repeat keypress.  No change.
• Checked Notepad to make sure key presses are working.  The correct letters/numbers appear in Notepad without any delays.
• Disabled out all the non-essential settings in MAME (like Service1 button mappings, etc), just to avoid any conflicts.  There should be no button conflicts in MAME now.
• Enabled Multikeyboard setting (set from 0 to 1) in MAME.ini.  Still having the problem.

I do have a lot of gatherings at my house, including my bachelor party this Saturday!  So it's pretty important for me to get all 4 players working correctly.

Any help that people can provide is appreciated!  

[DashRendar]

I've read in old posts that keyboard hacks can cause this, but not IPACs.

I wonder if this is a MAME configuration issue (since it seems to happen only in MAME), or a wiring problem with those joysticks.

Just to be sure, I'll ask this- for 8 way mapping, would MAME be configured something like this?

P3 Up:    Key I
P3 Down:  Key K
P3 Left:  Key J
P3 Right: Key L

P3 Up/Left:  Key I and Key J
P3 Up/Right: Key I and Key L
P3 Down/Left: Key K and Key J
P3 Down/Right: Key K and Key L

P3 Left/Left: Key J and Key J
P3 Right/Right: Key L and Key L
P3 Left/Right: Key J and Key L
P3 Right/Left: Key L and Key J

Or could the Left/Left etc be confusing the IPAC?

[BobA]

I don't think the combos of I and J for up left etc are needed just up down left and right for the ipac.

[HaRuMaN]

I don't think the combos of I and J for up left etc are needed just up down left and right for the ipac.

Yeah, what he said.  All you need is:

P3 Up:    Key I
P3 Down:  Key K
P3 Left:  Key J
P3 Right: Key

[BobA]

P3 right: key L

[DashRendar]

Cool- I'll try setting that way when I get home. 

I know there's a limit of consecutive keypresses going through USB, so maybe with the way I have it mapped it's exceeding that.

[DashRendar]

No luck using only the Up/Down/Left/Right settings in MAME.

I have a USB to PS/2 adapter, going to try connecting it that way.  I doubt USB would be the issue, but you never know.

[AndyWarne]

This does not sound like an I-PAC issue, although that doesnt help much... you can make sure there are no key issues by running the keyboard test program from www.passmark.com

There are no simultaneously-pressed key issues with USB on the I-PAC so its not that.

The mapping you suggested is completely wacky, and will confuse Mame. Even though you mention you have backed these out, I would try deleting (or renaming) default.cfg just in case.

Andy

[DashRendar]

Renamed default.cfg, and reloaded MAME.

That did make a bit of an improvement, but it's still a problem.

I'm using Gauntlet II to test it.  After redoing the default.cfg file, I could control Player 4 a little longer.  There was a slight delay with my movement/button presses and what was showing on the screen, but it was better.

But after about 30 seconds, my character started moving around by himself and firing nonstop.  Controls went haywire again. 

Has anyone else run into a problem like this?  I have seen posts that describe these symptoms on the Ultimarc forums, but there were never any fixes posted.

[Epyx]

Are any of your mapped keys windows keys? IE Alt, tab, ctrl etc?  Those can cause issues like you describe.

[Turnarcades]

The best way is to hook them up to another PC, and go through everything from the start to see if you get the same results. If everything then works fine, you've messed up in some combination of ipac flashed inputs/ipac flashed key maps/mame default keymaps/mame game specific keymaps/windows settings.

It's a ---smurfette--- but with so many points to check it's easy to overlook any single one of these; I've done it before and the whole setup went tits-up. Go back to the drawing board and start from scratch - it's very doubtfully a hardware fault.

[DashRendar]

One thing I wondered about is the WinIPAC software.  Not saying it's a problem necessarily, but I wonder if it could be contributing to the problem.

I remapped a few buttons with WinIPAC.  Not sure if this is confusing Windows (especially since I have Multikeyboard set to 1 since I still have a regular keyboard hooked up).

What I might try is to have the buttons mapped to the keys that correlate to them on the IPAC, rather than forcing keystrokes to be other keys.

Regarding the Alt, Tab, Ctrl, Shift keys, those are the ones that I changed with WinIPAC.  I read that those keys can be confusing for Windows (as well as Q and S in MAME), so I changed those keys to other keys.

[DashRendar]

I think I might have stumbled on the cause for this glitch with the IPAC.  Putting it up here in case anyone in the future runs into the same problem.

Using the WinIPAC software, I created a custom key mapping that was programmed into the IPAC4.  No big deal, the programming worked, the joystick moves/button presses were putting the right keystrokes into a Wordpad document.

But I'd get that bizarre lag and ghost movements in games when using controls that go through the IPAC.

So I decided to reset the programming to default in WinIPAC.  No problem yet.

Now when I went to program the IPAC with the changes, I saw a message about "Installing driver" from WinIPAC.  During this, my external (UBS-connected) hard drive would disconnect from Windows and reconnect.  The programming would fail.

It seems I have some sort of conflict between my external hard drive (which is where MAME and my ROMs are located) and the IPAC.

The Device Manager doesn't show any conflicts though.  Not quite sure how to work around this, other than ordering a PS/2 cable for the IPAC.

[northerngames]

ipacs and mini-pacs are all I have ever used and to be honost the usb gave me trouble's on each and all on all my pc's so I went ps2 and never had any trouble with any of them on any pc.

first thing I would suggest drop the usb and go ps2 and see if it helps becuase its like night and day for me between the ps2 and usb connections.

I use a usb to ps2 converter adapter there cheaper plus if you want to go back to usb you can change it at the pc's side and just unplug it instead of the actual ipac unit itself and have both usb or ps2 option on the same cord.

[crisalan44]

I had the same problem only it was with player 1 controls, (very frustrating when you are in the middle of a game and the controls go on their own) I was wondering are you running the games through a front end or straight out of mame?? and if you are running through a front end, does this occur when you run straight from mame?

[eds1275]

Maybe you are having power issues with your USB when you use multiple things going at once. I know that my computer has trouble keeping everything powered so if it disconnects whatever was happening before [for example moving a joystick and pushing a button] would get "stuck" until I restart the game. The solution for me was to use an externally powered USB hub.

[DashRendar]

I'm using Hyperspin for my front end, but it happens even running regular MAME.

Power shouldn't be a problem- I have my USB hookups going through a powered USB hub.

I suspect switching to a PS/2 connection will solve my problem, but I haven't tested it yet.

[kagaden]

I actually had a similar issue with the J-pac bout a year ago via USB before I installed the U360's. Every once in awhile the controls would go nuts. They'd either stick in one direction or go rapid fire if it was a button. I never figured out the cause but exiting out of the game and re-entering it seemed to clear it up every time. Front-End was Mala with no other programs running other than the emulator (final burn alpha).

I never figured out the cause, but never used PS2 connection instead either. I'm planning on installing an ipac now, so I'll make sure to use PS2.

[AndyWarne]

I think I might have stumbled on the cause for this glitch with the IPAC.  Putting it up here in case anyone in the future runs into the same problem.

Using the WinIPAC software, I created a custom key mapping that was programmed into the IPAC4.  No big deal, the programming worked, the joystick moves/button presses were putting the right keystrokes into a Wordpad document.

But I'd get that bizarre lag and ghost movements in games when using controls that go through the IPAC.

So I decided to reset the programming to default in WinIPAC.  No problem yet.

Now when I went to program the IPAC with the changes, I saw a message about "Installing driver" from WinIPAC.  During this, my external (UBS-connected) hard drive would disconnect from Windows and reconnect.  The programming would fail.

It seems I have some sort of conflict between my external hard drive (which is where MAME and my ROMs are located) and the IPAC.

The Device Manager doesn't show any conflicts though.  Not quite sure how to work around this, other than ordering a PS/2 cable for the IPAC.

The driver install only happens once, the first time you run WinIPAC, and this is only used for downloading configurations, not during use. But its worth looking into why this is not installing.
The usual reason for the driver not installing is lack of permission on the PC. In Windows 7 the first time the program is run it needs to be run as administrator. But, if the WinIPAC installer is run with a board connected, this will also install the driver.
I would suspect something is wrong with the USB subsystem on the PC. Not sure what, possibly a power problem? Is the USB external drive the type which has two USB connections, one for data and one for power? These can upset the USB controller.
Maybe try copying all the data from the USB drive to internal.
Is the USB drive showing activity when a game is in progress? This would of cause cause delays in the game owing to the relatively slow nature of these drives compared to internal.
If everything is OK until you run Mame and the external drive is used for this, then this has to be a suspect.

[DashRendar]

The usual reason for the driver not installing is lack of permission on the PC. In Windows 7 the first time the program is run it needs to be run as administrator. But, if the WinIPAC installer is run with a board connected, this will also install the driver.

Running this on a Win XP machine.  The account I'm using has local admin rights.

I would suspect something is wrong with the USB subsystem on the PC. Not sure what, possibly a power problem? Is the USB external drive the type which has two USB connections, one for data and one for power? These can upset the USB controller.
Maybe try copying all the data from the USB drive to internal.

Yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking too, but it's odd.  I am running through a powered 7-port USB hub, but I have also tried running some of the USB connections direct to the back of the PC.  I haven't noticed any difference.

The external USB drive has a dedicated power cord (not a second USB input for power).

The external drive is a 1 TB drive (about 1/3 of that is emulators/roms/CHDs).  Unfortunately the internal drive is much smaller.  But...for testing, I could probably copy Hyperspin, MAME, and just the Gauntlet 2 rom that I've been testing to see if there's a difference.

Is the USB drive showing activity when a game is in progress? This would of cause cause delays in the game owing to the relatively slow nature of these drives compared to internal.
If everything is OK until you run Mame and the external drive is used for this, then this has to be a suspect.

I can hear the USB drive hum a little when it is in use.  This drive does have an eSATA port as well.  I could attempt using this, but I'll need to buy an eSATA riser card for it to connect to (although it'd cost the same as buying a 750 GB internal drive, so I would probably go that route).

But everything seems to run fine reading off that drive normally.  I have 60 GB of MP3s on that drive, and I can play those constantly without any hiccups.

It still seems to be some conflict with the IPAC4 and the external drive.  The external drive only disconnects from Windows when I try to program the IPAC.

[stevodevo]

Sorry to resurrect this.  I haven't been on this forum for years since my Astrocade has been working with no problems up til this weekend.  Had some family in and was playing the cade when I noticed the same issues that have been mentioned in this thread.

Did you ever confirm that PS/2 helped resolve your issue with the lag?

I have the WinIPAC2 which is awesome btw and it's been flawless even recently up til now.  Running MAME through MAMEWAH frontend player 1 and 2 controls were both lagging really really badly.  I tried running through winMAME directly and noticed little to no improvement.  Ran neoMAME and it was much better but still seemed like keypresses were buffering up and being processed very slowly after a few minutes of gaming.

Running the test from winIPAC control panel shows all keys mapping fine and no lag (although I did notice that every once in a while I could get the L-CTL key to show as R-CTL in the key test???)

Again sorry for Frankensteining this thread but it came up first in my google search for the issue...

[AndyWarne]

The first thing to do is test the controls outside of Mame so you can narrow down the problem. The keyboard test from www.passmark.com is very good for this.

If you find its a problem in this test (unlikely) then drop me an email and we can try to troubleshoot. If the test is OK, then I can still help but by all means seek help here also for a generic Mame/PC issue.

You could also try running the keyboard test with everything else running (eg Mame) in case something is causing the PC to be too busy to poll the input devices at the correct rate. Then quit tasks to find out what is causing this.

[stevodevo]

Thanks Andy,  I've downloaded that keyboard test and will certainly give it a try.  I also noticed there was newer IPAC software on your website so I'll install that too as well as trying the PS/2 route that's been mentioned.

IIRC this has happened before but usually it 'went away' if I rebooted.  Hopefully with a little more diagnosis I can nail this down.

Thanks again.

[stevodevo]

  Again I'm coming back to this old thread since Andy responded last time...

First I installed the latest Ipac software and reflashed the Ipac with it.  I had hooked up the Ipac (usb) with a PS/2 adapter.  Playing with the Ipac attached I noticed the same problem with inputs.  Then I tried playing the same game using just the standard PS/2 keyboard and it played fine.

I installed the keytest program and of course there were no (major) issues recognizing keypresses from the Ipac.  I did notice 2 keys seemed to give multiple presses and one key only registered on the 'up' but that's probably my wiring or a microswitch imo.

I hadn't come back to this thread before I did these tests so I will try running Mame in the background and *then* running the keytest program with the Ipac.  So far though it seems that it's not Mame since it performs correctly with just the PS/2 keyboard.

Updates to follow...

[AndyWarne]

  I had hooked up the Ipac (usb) with a PS/2 adapter. 

Need to clarify this, as I am not sure how you have it hooked up. It will be much easier if you could drop me an email, andy@ultimarc.com

Andy

[stevodevo]

Hi Andy,

Sorry I meant to come back to this last week... I actually figured out my issue.

First off, to answer your question, I have the IPAC w/USB cable but had purchased a USB/PS2 adapter and that's how I had it hooked up - IPAC to PS2 (via adapter).  I had to reflash using the PS2 option but it seemed to work just fine.  I did this since some suggestions indicated it could be usb related.

Now to the issue at hand... I did as you suggested and ran Keytest as well as MAME in the background (difficult to do btw since MAMEWAH was taking away my mouse pointer, etc!).  Once I did this I noticed that keytest was showing several keys 'locked' down.  In other words, it showed a key pressed that never was released.

To test better, I closed MAMEWAH and just started MAME32 (story behind that coming up next for reference) and noticed that the same keys were showing continuously pressed.  Then I tried this test again with the IPAC disconnected and using my PS2 keyboard as the controls.  Same problem!  Now I knew I was on to something.

BACKGROUND story:  Before this whole incident started I had always had the dos version of MAME as my exe in MAMEWAH.  However, after not having played in quite some time I fired it up and noticed that several roms were no longer loading using dos MAME.  As a quick fix I changed the exe to MAME32 which allowed all my roms to work but apparently this was what caused my keypresses to 'stick'.

So, I've since changed the exe that MAMEWAH is using back to the dos version of MAME.  No more lagging, ghosting, keypress issues!  Of course it still means some roms won't load but I'm hoping to research and resolve that separately.

I can't thank you enough for your responses and attention to my issue.  I'm a fan of your product and have a buddy that started this project at the same time I did but has left his unfinished cab as a shell.  He'll be another IPAC fan soon (once I can convince him to reboot this hobby!)...

Thanks again!