GT, Trackballs, and Life

[FoX]

Well...maybe minus the life part....

A few questions here.

I've hit as many of the GT threads I could find and regarding trackballs.  I apologize if this has been asked or referenced but I haven't found it through the search yet......

GT Question:
The PC game looks to come with 3 courses but someone referenced a course package addition:

Didnt the mame Dev. get something from IE telling them to take GT off the games list?  I thought I read something about it awhile ago.  But Just buy the PC version with the extra courses  Thats what I got on my cab and it plays great.

I've scoured ebay and other sources but havent found anything.  Anyone know about this?  Does it play differently then the late 90s versions of GT?  Anything I need to plan for to make this part of my cab?

Second Question is dealing with the trackball itself.  I saw happs sale on the GT 3" ball and was wondering if this was considered one of the better trackballs.  What else do I need (other than the trackball) to get this going?  Someone had mentioned:

For instance, this month the Golden Tee 3" high lip trackball is $60. The difference in price would almost pay for the Opti-pac needed to interface it to a MAME cab.

Thanks for any help

[mahuti]

You need a trackball, a trackball mounting plate (if you don't have a metal control panel you don't need it) and some kind of interface connection (optipac, mouse-hac, etc)

[nipsmg]

Well...maybe minus the life part....

A few questions here.

I've hit as many of the GT threads I could find and regarding trackballs.  I apologize if this has been asked or referenced but I haven't found it through the search yet......

GT Question:
The PC game looks to come with 3 courses but someone referenced a course package addition:

Didnt the mame Dev. get something from IE telling them to take GT off the games list?  I thought I read something about it awhile ago.  But Just buy the PC version with the extra courses  Thats what I got on my cab and it plays great.

I've scoured ebay and other sources but havent found anything.  Anyone know about this?  Does it play differently then the late 90s versions of GT?  Anything I need to plan for to make this part of my cab?

Second Question is dealing with the trackball itself.  I saw happs sale on the GT 3" ball and was wondering if this was considered one of the better trackballs.  What else do I need (other than the trackball) to get this going?  Someone had mentioned:

For instance, this month the Golden Tee 3" high lip trackball is $60. The difference in price would almost pay for the Opti-pac needed to interface it to a MAME cab.

Thanks for any help

The PC version plays just like the GT3d through GT2k.  There was an expansion for GT PC, I had a version with 6 courses.  I wish I still had them.  The only difference is you HAVE to use the keyboard to enter names and stuff (I believe) which kind of sucks on a cabinet.. But oh well. -- at least you can play a relatively recent version of GT golf at home, legally.

--NipsMG

[Tailgunner]

You need a trackball, a trackball mounting plate (if you don't have a metal control panel you don't need it) and some kind of interface connection (optipac, mouse-hac, etc)

Actually that's backwards, the mounting plate is for use in a wooden control panel. The trackball wil mount directly to a metal panel without the plate.

[FoX]

Ok...I'll take a look at the optipac and mouseball hacks.  Any consensus and the easier/better approach?  I would assume the optipac but....

I'll have to keep my eye out for the course expansion.  Anyone ever seen it up anywhere?  I've been keeping my eye on ebay to no avail.

[Tiger-Heli]

Ok...I'll take a look at the optipac and mouseball hacks.  Any consensus and the easier/better approach?  I would assume the optipac but....

Opti-pac is simpler to hook up, can support up to two trackballs and 4 spinners and automatically disables one spinner/trackball (for five seconds) when the other one is in use.

For a MouseHack - www.oscarcontrols.com's $9 pre-hacked USB mouse is very simple, but you either need two of them (and both would be active always) or one of them and a switch to select between spinner and t-ball (http://www.oscarcontrols.com/DPDTswitch.shtml)

Hacking a mouse on your own is the cheapest option but requires fairly good soldering skills and some level of trial-and-error as well.

[FoX]

Thanks again!

Any pluses or minuses going with a usb hookup for the optipac?  I would assume more simplicity again but was wondering if anyone has run into any issues with going that route.

[Tiger-Heli]

Thanks again!

Any pluses or minuses going with a usb hookup for the optipac?  I would assume more simplicity again but was wondering if anyone has run into any issues with going that route.

USB has a plus for using two trackballs or spinners with MAME Analog plus.

I don't know of any Opti-pac USB drawbacks other than lack of support in DOS or Win 95 or NT, but that's pretty obvious.

[mahuti]

Actually that's backwards, the mounting plate is for use in a wooden control panel. The trackball wil mount directly to a metal panel without the plate.

OOOPS! That's what I meant, My bad. Sorry for the misinformation...

[FoX]

OOOPS! That's what I meant, My bad. Sorry for the misinformation...

Heh.....thats the beauty of redundancy

Thanks for all the info and help guys.  I'm definately going to get the GT trackball from happs before that sale runs out at the end of the month.  Sounds like its a good ball.

Now I just have to get my copy of GT (oh...and build a cab)