fit these buttons on a sidewinder

[Ghoul]

I have a couple of spare sidewinders and would like to use them as interfaces for a cocktail (no ghosting like a keyboard, and easier than a keyboard hack), but I'm just barely over on the number of inputs. I believe there are 14 inputs on a sidewinder, and I am planning on the following buttons:

Escape
Coin
Pause
1 button per player (so 2)
2 start buttons
2 joysticks take up 4 inputs each

total: 15 - which is 1 more than what I have.

I also am going to have a power button but that connects to the motherboard so it doesn't need to be plugged into the interface. Basically, can anyone think of a way to wire these 15 buttons up to these 14 inputs without having a problem?

[Spaced Invader]

Plug an old mouse in and steal one of it's inputs. That's what I'd do anyway.  

[eightbit]

2 players on 1 sidewinder is pretty agressive.

The mouse button idea is a good one. You  could use all 3 mouse buttons and give each player 2 buttons, that would open up a lot more games.

Gamport sidewinders are daisy chainable so use 2 for your cocktail. That would give you more inputs than you could use.

Do you really need dedicated pause or escape buttons? You could get both of those from shifted keys.

[Ghoul]

You could get both of those from shifted keys.

Does the USB sidewinder have shifted keys? I hadn't heard that.

[eightbit]

You could get both of those from shifted keys.

Does the USB sidewinder have shifted keys? I hadn't heard that.

Not in the driver that I am aware of. When I was talking about shifted inputs I meant in mame you can make shifted inputs or key combinations. Works with encoders or joysticks.

[Ghoul]

Not in the driver that I am aware of. When I was talking about shifted inputs I meant in mame you can make shifted inputs or key combinations. Works with encoders or joysticks.

Oh just tried that with a keyboard, excellent! I had forgotten about mame being able to use dual key presses, I wish every other emulator was as configurable as mame is (and very conveniently at that). I'm only running mame so that will work perfectly.

[eightbit]

Have you researched hacking a usb sidewinder? It seems like their were issues. Maybe it was just becuase they were over $20 which didn't make them a good cheap alternative interface candidate.

[Spaced Invader]

If you can find an old AXIS Pad they are easy to hack and BUTTONS...I got 25 inputs from one.

Oh, and you might consider using Joytokey. It converts pad/stick inputs into keyboard presses and mouse movements. It also supports multiple shift functions--that will work with all your emulators. Using Joytokey with the AXIS Pad I was able to have 24 buttons avalible for direct input and 24 more for coin inserts, player starts, and other admin functions. All for the price of one button. 48 inputs ain't bad for a $14.00 pad!  

Just my $0.02.