Keyboard hacking...

[EndTwist]

Yeah, I know what you're all going to say right off the bat, "Buy an encoder!". Well, guess what?! I'm not going to if this hack works.

I just need some quick help. I was reading a tutorial on it, and got confused. The two black things that are being pointed to by the arrows. Do I remove those to solder wires or leave 'em on?

[jerryjanis]

Yeah, you probably gotta remove it with a "desoldering braid" (radio shack has it).

Then you will stick a slightly stripped wire into each hole and solder it.


It would be awesome to find some kind of a male "plug" that would stick into those things and have wires coming out the other end, but I'm guessing that it's pretty unlikely that you'll have something like lying around.

[grafixmonkey]

you will when you realize player 2 can't go diagonally to the right and fire at the same time in the default mame config...   but in answer to your question, I believe you leave those in place, using the existing circuit that powers them and everything in place, and using the traces that leave them for other places on the board for soldering your switches.  Otherwise you'd have to look up datasheets on those chips and figure out how to work them yourself, as well as have to provide your own PS/2 or USB port attachment.  But, if you were referring to removing the chips, soldering wires to them, and then reinserting them, you don't do that either...  I don't think you'd be able to get them back into their chip sockets afterwards.

I'd say you just have to solder your switches to the contacts that your keyboard keys normally push down onto, but then I've heard of Hall effect keyboards that don't even connect contacts just use magnetism, and I don't know if that's what they use today or not.

[tmasman]

The keyboards I hacked had these on there as well. You do not need to remove. You can solder your wires either into these connectors or to the solder points on the other side of the PCB.

I've done it both ways, but it's much easier to solder the wires to the solder points on the PCB.

If you want to, you can remove them, but if this is one fo your first times soldering, I wouldn't mess with removing them.

Good luck.

[EndTwist]

Alright.

Oh, and in response to grafixmonkey: I don't need to go diagonal, as I'm making a cocktail cab with a 4-way stick [you b owned.  ]

[grafixmonkey]

ok, but hope it only has one button then

[Tiger-Heli]

ok, but hope it only has one button then

GrafixMonkey, those aren't chips, they're some sort of clip that holds the Mylar sheets to the Keyboard PCB.

And, as long as you map out the matrix and choose inputs carefully, you should get at least 6 and maybe as many as 16 inputs from a keyboard hack.

[tmasman]

hm...
4-way...
Probably only 3 or 4 buttons...
Start/Select/Quit buttons rarely get pressed at the same time as player buttons...
You'd only need 8 inputs.

You could easily have up/down in the same column & right/left in the same column...
in a 8X18 matrix or even a 7X13 he'd have more than enough non-ghosting inputs.

Granted he's gonna have to remap his Mame inputs, but that's not a big deal.

What's with all the KB hacking bashing? Sure there are other ways to get many more inputs, but if you only want a simple panel (1 player 6 buttons, or 2 player 3 buttons) what's the problem?

I guess I'm just lucky (or pay enough attention to what I'm doing) to have hacked multiple keyboards (4) and not had a single problem (I'm doing 4 more in the next week). I get KBs for free! (Broken, discarded, maybe $1 if I get it @ a discount store). I have more than enough time to do the hacking. And the first soldering that I ever did was a KB hack!

Just take your time and make sure you don't cross any connections. Map your matrix. Study it for the best keys to use. Half the time you can even get away with Player1 Up/Down/Left/Right being those keys.

Have fun!

If you have money to burn, or don't like the idea of doing something like this, then by all means buy yourself an encoder with a terminal strip (IPAC). I'm not against encoders, I just think that doing things like this can help broaden people's horizons a little.

Eh... I'm not trying to fight.  If I offended you, I'm sorry. Just putting in my 2

[Tiger-Heli]

>You could easily have up/down in the same column & right/left in the >same column...
>in a 8X18 matrix or even a 7X13 he'd have more than enough >non-ghosting inputs.

True, assuming at least a 16xsomething matrix, you can support a 2-player 6-button, 3-player 3-button and 4-player 2-button layout with a keyboard hack (assuming the kb isn't limited to only 6 simultaneous inputs, some are, some aren't), actually, a gamepad hack would work well for what he's doing as well.

>Granted he's gonna have to remap his Mame inputs, but that's not a >big deal.
>What's with all the KB hacking bashing? Sure there are other ways >to get many more inputs, but if you only want a simple panel (1 >player 6 buttons, or 2 player 3 buttons) what's the problem?

Comes down to what you want to do!  If you ONLY want to play MAME on your cabinet, then a KB hack might be acceptable.  If you want to play other emulators, than the KeyWiz Eco is only around $32 with shipping.  For most people, if I'm spending $500-$1000 or more on an arcade cabinet, I don't want to be limited to only one emulator and have a lot of limitations to what it will do, just b/c I tried to save $30 on a true encoder.  I think the bashing comes b/c a lot of people come into the scene and think "$30 for an encoder, $FREE for a keyboard hack", the Keyboard hack is my answer."  I used to be one of them.  When you figure the time and effort, incidental costs (wire, solder, terminal blocks), chance of mistakes, and the limitations, the encoder is often a smarter choice, and some people are a little over-zealous in pointing that out.

>Half the time you can even get away with Player1 >Up/Down/Left/Right being those keys.

You can probably get away with Up, Down, Left, Right, being those keys IF you don't want a full SF layout.  You can probably have the first three keys be L Ctrl, L Alt, and Space.  You probably can't have both, although, since MAME will allow you to remap any key to any input, it doesn't really matter.

>If you have money to burn, or don't like the idea of doing something >like this, then by all means buy yourself an encoder with a terminal >strip (IPAC). I'm not against encoders, I just think that doing things >like this can help broaden people's horizons a little.

or KeyWiz or MK64 or . . .

[grafixmonkey]

GrafixMonkey, those aren't chips, they're some sort of clip that holds the Mylar sheets to the Keyboard PCB.

huh?   *blink* *blink*   (puts on glasses)
holy damn you're right...   those looked for all the world like chips in chip sockets until I looked at them twice.

ok, then if it were me, I'd twist the stripped end of the wire tight, apply solder to the bare end to make it stiffer, then insert and heat it up again to fix it in place.

And, as long as you map out the matrix and choose inputs carefully, you should get at least 6 and maybe as many as 16 inputs from a keyboard hack.

ok, it seems like a lot of work to save $20-$30, but I won't argue about it.

[EndTwist]

I started on it today, and got all the wires in. I did the the VERY unethical way, by putting wires in each slot, then hot gluing it in. It seems to hold up well. I made a vague attempt at mapping the matrix and got about 15 inputs. I know some other ones gave me some keys I didn't see, so I think I have 16!!  

Well...I'm going to redo my matrix later/tomarrow so I can get ALL 16 keys. Now I just gotta figure out how to hook it up to different buttons  

[tmasman]

I made a vague attempt at mapping the matrix and got about 15 inputs.

Just making sure...
You tried all 128 combinations, right? (I noticed from the pics you should have a 8X16 matrix...)

You should be able to find a row with at least 2 of your 4 directions. I'd suggest using that row so you can map your joystick with up,down,left, & right keys.

Let us know what you end up with. Heck post your matrix if you want any help. (Or just so we can see what is available with that particular KB).

[EndTwist]

One thing that I found weird though when doing this was that some connections would produce 2 characters at once, like "r4" again and again. WTF is up with that?  

[jerryjanis]

One thing that I found weird though when doing this was that some connections would produce 2 characters at once, like "r4" again and again. WTF is up with that?  

Either you crossed some wires, or you made a connection that isn't on the actual keyboard...  The way the matrix is set up, you can generate a lot more connection/combos than there are keys on the keyboard, so you probly hit an unused one.

[TrickyFishy]

I just need some quick help. I was reading a tutorial on it, and got confused. The two black things that are being pointed to by the arrows. Do I remove those to solder wires or leave 'em on?

I did a KB hack and it works great.  Only cost me $4.95 for a used Kb too so I'm pretty happy.  I don't have many controls though so I thought it was worth a shot.

My keyboard PCB looks pretty much like yours (takes ribbon cables) and I soldered CAT-5 wire directly to the leads on the underside of the board.

Works real nice but you have to have a steady hand!

[grafixmonkey]

I'm curious, when you're done, to know how long it took

[Tiger-Heli]

You should be able to find a row with at least 2 of your 4 directions. I'd suggest using that row so you can map your joystick with up,down,left, & right keys.

Here's the deal on Up, Down, Left, and Right:

If you are only using 16 inputs, you can probably get away with this (unless UP and RIGHT are in the same row, etc. :-(  )

If you are trying to let the Up and Down inputs be in the same row and ghost (so you really have 20 inputs), you probably can't do this.  (It's unlikely that Up Arrow and Down Arrow are on one row and Left Arrow and Right Arrow are on the same row but different from Up and Down.)

Even if you did, it's NOT a good idea.  The Direction Arrows, R Ctrl, Insert, Home, Page Up, Delete, End, Page Down, Keypad Slash, and Keypad Enter all send extra codes to the keyboard buffer and take longer to process.  Another case where it's not that big a deal with a keyboard encoder, but it's definitely noticeable with a keyboard hack.

A better option is to try to map to KP8, KP2, KP6, and KP4.  Then you can tell your Frontend you have a HotRod or X-arcade and use it's defaults.

BTW, I verified the above, b/c I am using a KEYBOARD (not a hack).  I originally mapped J2 to Home, End, Page Down, and Delete (because they were right above the arrows and easy to remember).  I saw dramatic improvement when I remapped them to KP2, KP5, KP3, and KP1.

Then again, this was on a Pentium 233 that was struggling with MAME, so a faster machine might be less burdened.

[Tiger-Heli]

One thing that I found weird though when doing this was that some connections would produce 2 characters at once, like "r4" again and again. WTF is up with that?  

Either you crossed some wires, or you made a connection that isn't on the actual keyboard...  The way the matrix is set up, you can generate a lot more connection/combos than there are keys on the keyboard, so you probly hit an unused one.

Agreed, and another reason I recommend mapping the matrix BEFORE you remove the Mylar sheets, but that's water under the bridge now.

See http://www.mameworld.net/emuadvice/keyhack2.html for info on choosing keys from the matrix, or better yet, read it in a week or two after I revise it.

[JeSo]

Just a quick keyboard hack related question.. Just got around to disassembling the keyboard, and the pcb (which happens to be about the smallest thing I have ever seen, way smaller than I expected) has these little.. umm.. goldish line things (technical term) where it connects to the mylar(?) sheets. Is that an alright place to solder? It seems to have the biggest area to solder to, just checking if it'll work fine there.
Thanks.

[Tiger-Heli]

Just a quick keyboard hack related question.. Just got around to disassembling the keyboard, and the pcb (which happens to be about the smallest thing I have ever seen, way smaller than I expected) has these little.. umm.. goldish line things (technical term) where it connects to the mylar(?) sheets. Is that an alright place to solder? It seems to have the biggest area to solder to, just checking if it'll work fine there.
Thanks.

goldish line things = traces.

I think they're okay to solder to.  Funny thing is I know as much as most anyone on the logistics end of hacking (mapping the matrix, assigning keys), but have never had any luck with soldering.

[SirPeale]

Just a quick keyboard hack related question.. Just got around to disassembling the keyboard, and the pcb (which happens to be about the smallest thing I have ever seen, way smaller than I expected) has these little.. umm.. goldish line things (technical term) where it connects to the mylar(?) sheets. Is that an alright place to solder? It seems to have the biggest area to solder to, just checking if it'll work fine there.

That's where you're supposed to solder to.  I don't think you can solder to Mylar.

[EndTwist]

Ok, I ripped apart the whole thing as it looked like major crap and the wires were too short. I need to do some soldering and NEED a lot of help and suggestions. I'm either soldering to the little metal pieces in the black terminal thing (I can't get that black thing off!!!) or to the solder points on the bottom. But the points are very small and I'm afraid of screwing up, which I REALLY don't want to do.

Here's a photo of the bottom (the red circled areas are where I need to solder to):

[EndTwist]

And this is my soldering "kit" (I know, not much, but whatever). Please help, as I really want to get this done! If there is any other way than soldering please tell me! edit: Also, would it be easier to use an IDE cable and plug it in to the connector (shown in first post)? Heres an example: http://www.rpgx.emusanet.com/kbhack.htm

[SirPeale]

Unsolder the connector, and push your wire thru.  Then, solder the wire into the hole.

Question: do you know how to solder?  If not, practice on something you don't care about/is broken first.  Better to get some practice in and do it right, then have all your traces pull up because you used too much heat.

Hint: unlike most liquids, solder flows up.

[EndTwist]

I can unsolder with just a soldering iron? Hmm... I'm sure I have something I practice on first, so I might do that. But can I unsolder with a soldering iron (I know I repeated myself, just want to get that across)  

[SirPeale]

Do you have a solder sucker or solder wick?  If so, yes.  If not...not easily.

[EndTwist]

No, I don't have either a solder sucker or a wick. Can I still do it?

[SirPeale]

With great difficulty.  Best to get a sucker or wick.

[tmasman]

Also, The guy that hacked that KB (That you linked to) unsoldered the black connectors and soldered in a new pin connector. (Allowing him to plug an IDE cable into it).

To "unsolder" buy some copper braid... It's in the same area as soldering stuff... I haven't used it before, but if I remember correctly, you place it on top of the soldered point, then put your iron on that. When the solder melts, it shoudl flow up (like Peale said) into the braid & you sould be able to pull it up. You'd have to do that with each solder point.

I'm not soldering guru, but I was able to get away with pushing my wires into the black blocks (I believe like you were saying you did...) And then I placed my soldering iron against the wire & metal connector until it heated them up, then I carefully touched the solder to the wire. Since both the wire & metal were hot enough, the solder flowed right on to them & when I moved everything away it stayed secure & After I got all of them in place (& tested w/ a multimeter) I gobbed some hot glue over it all to help keep any of it from getting wiggled lose or anything.

I'm still learning to solder to PCBs, so what I mentioned above seemed to work pretty easily for me.  Although on the next KB I hacked I used an IDE cable and just heated the existing solder points enough to grab onto the wire. That seemed to work pretty good to, you just have to be careful, small wire + small area to work with... And you truely do need about 4 hands to do it easily.

[EndTwist]

I'm not soldering guru, but I was able to get away with pushing my wires into the black blocks (I believe like you were saying you did...) And then I placed my soldering iron against the wire & metal connector until it heated them up, then I carefully touched the solder to the wire. Since both the wire & metal were hot enough, the solder flowed right on to them & when I moved everything away it stayed secure & After I got all of them in place (& tested w/ a multimeter) I gobbed some hot glue over it all to help keep any of it from getting wiggled lose or anything.

Won't this melt the black blocks?


edit: ahh crap! I just called my local radioshack and they don't have desoldering braid in stock   Now what?

[tmasman]

Won't this melt the black blocks?

Yeah... A little... But heck... I'm soldering wires into them. I didn't really care about the shape the blocks were in.

[EndTwist]

Are my blocks like yours? Because I can't do much if the solder runs over onto the next prong. Also, what do I do about the no-desoldering-braid problem?

[SirPeale]

Get a solder sucker.  Little thing with a plunger, sucks up liquid solder.

[tmasman]

yeah... get yourself a sucker if you want/need to go that route.

If you do decide to di what I did, just don't slop too much solder in there & be careful.
If you do mess it up, you'll have to just remove the black connectors and poke your wires through the holes (or get a different connector that you can use like in the page you linked).

[Chris]

Suggestion: Use barrier blocks rather than soldering wires directly from the harness to the circuit board.  I've had to repair my keyboard hack a couple of times because I went the direct route...

Of course, barrier blocks add to the cost... I've always been a big believer in keyboard hacks, and I still use one today because I have time and money invested in it, but if I was starting over today I'd use an encoder... and if I ever sell the cabinet, I'll pull out the hack and put in an encoder.

--Chris

[jerryjanis]

I use desoldering braid from radio shack to remove solder...  It works great!  I haven't tried a solder sucker, but you gotta get one of these two items, for sure!

[EndTwist]

All I have to say is: the people that work at radio shack are COMPLETE idiots!

I called earlier to ask if they had "desoldering braid" and the guy says "No we don't have any of that item." I go there later, and guess what I find? A solder sucker and desoldering braid! I got the sucker, it looks easy to use. I'm going to desolder the little terminals later and put the wires in. Finally!

[Chris]

That's because Radio Shack is trying to turn itself into a mini-Circuit City/Sprint Store.  Their electronic parts area is shrinking by the day, and none of the sales staff knows anything about electronics anymore.  When I go in there for something, almost all the other customers are there looking for cell phones or cell phone batteries.

Unfortunately, there are no other nationwide mass-market electronic parts retailers.  I wish they would open a Fry's Electronics out here...

[Zeitgeist]

That's because Radio Shack is trying to turn itself into a mini-Circuit City/Sprint Store.  Their electronic parts area is shrinking by the day, and none of the sales staff knows anything about electronics anymore.  When I go in there for something, almost all the other customers are there looking for cell phones or cell phone batteries.

Unfortunately, there are no other nationwide mass-market electronic parts retailers.  I wish they would open a Fry's Electronics out here...

So True...
My wife was getting tired of me complaining about the inept help & lack of what used to be common electrical components every time I'd return from a local Radio Sh** visit.
Luckilly I have found an old Radio Shack Associate Dealer located about 20 miles away, who still keeps tons of electronic components in stock.
In fact he still has a bunch of RS discontinued stuff for sale.
Many of his items are NOS & he knows what I'm talking about when I ask for something.
Not a single Compaq computer for sale in the place.
No offers for discounted internet either.
I only use the local RS for last minute items now & I always call ahead with part numbers.
 

[EndTwist]

Well...gues what? I screwed it up and its dead! I got it unsoldered, but the new solder wouldn't stick to the PCB!

PITY ME!