Have some newbie questions.

[dimebolt]

Im pretty new to everything but very excited to start building my 1st mame cab/machine.

It started with me pre ordering mk6 for xbox and wanting to play live, then eager to get the midway arcade treasures 2 with mk2, and not like the xbox controller.

My friend has an x-arcade I borrowed and got into mame.

My biggest problem is when I play on the x-stick and someonen tries to 2player with the keyboard i start moving in wierd directions without being able to stop.

Is that a problem with mame or just 1 sticking and keyboarding it?

My goal is to build a machinne that can/will play anything with 4p but be "focus"ed on fighters (younger haydays comin out)

I plan on buying a keyboard decorder,  Which one will work the best for 2 people mashinig out combos and joystick moves through mame for titles like mk2/U3 / Tekken 2/3 Marvel Vs Capcom ect.?

I wonder if my probleme is the ps2 input not being able to handle the request? would a usb be better for fightting and lots of button mashing?

How many buttons do I need?

I plan on the Neo/Cap set up for the main 2 (3 top 3 botton with the one a lil offset)

but how many will other games need? 3 buttons 4 buttons 5? for player 3/4 (not incl coin/start ect Just joystick and game functions)

What does the term ghosting refer to? is that the problem im getting with the x-stick and p2 on keyboard?

For the machine Im probably going to use my desktop computer on a fresh format and rebuild a n ew desktop for myself its a

Athlon XP 2500
512 Dual Channel DDR
80GB 8mb cache wd HDD
ATI Radeon 9600 XT with video out
CDBurner / Nic card other misc.

With that and a good keyboard decoder will the main fighters play "arcade like"

Im worried about the funky movement when I get mashin into combos vs a p2 or a game of gauntlet and everyonne is mashing.

While im "testing" on mym desktop when I get mashing and someone is using the keyboard the computer starts beeping all mad and weboth start walking out of control.

For Joysticks/buttons are these good?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=13718&item=3294291684&rd=1

esp for the fighting?

I was thinking on getting 2 sets for all 4 players and just having spare buttons.

TIA
and good maming to yall.

[dimebolt]

Ok, I really just want some f eedback  on the keyboard decoder/ghosting questions and my choice on the ebay buttons/sticks

[cdbrown]

I have a 4-player cab and use the IPAC 4 from ultimarc.  No ghosting issues at all.  I believe that most of the encoders available don't have any ghosting problems but could be wrong based on the x-arcade problem you described.  In saying that some people have suggested that the controls are sometimes not setup correctly when you first receive the x-arcade so you may find that some P2 buttons are mapped to the same P1 movement controls - then again this may be very incorrect.

But as you are going to build your own controls then check out www.ultimarc.com for great encoders.

The number of buttons and layout comes up all the time.  I originally planned for all players to have 8 buttons (2 rows of 4) and was due to future compatibility with hooking up a PS1 or similar.  Moved away from this and decided on P1 and P2 - 7 buttons (3 top, 4 bottom) and P3, P4 - 6 (3 top, 3 bottom).  Most people with 4 players choose 4 buttons for P3 and P4.  The reason for 7 buttons - I get a neo geo layout on the bottom row, but also have a Street Fighter layout when including the top row.

That looks like a very powerful machine and will play 99% of the games no worries - but that can change as the mame dev team rewrites drivers and the mame core.

The beeping by pressing too many buttons is because the keyboard buffer is being exceeded and can't process all the signals you are sending.  Encoders can get around this problem and allow many more signals to be sent at the same time.

Cheers
-cdbrown

[paigeoliver]

Umm, uh, wow. Just have to say that I don't see a lot of posts like this.

[dimebolt]

ty cdbrown

I like the idea of the neo/sf combo the 7 bottons

[neuromancer]

Ok, I really just want some f eedback  on the keyboard decoder/ghosting questions and my choice on the ebay buttons/sticks

As for ebay, check the prices on happcontrols.com -- I think you can buy the stuff for less than his "buy it now" price.

"Ghosting" means that when you press several buttons at once, the keyboard encoder thinks you are pressing another key that you are really not pressing. Around 20 years ago, the keyboard standard was changed to eliminate ghosting.

Instead, you get blocking. As you press more and more keys, a lot of the others are "deactivated". You can try that out by just pressing more and more keys on your keyboard. After a certain number, it will stop responding.

If you buy a keyboard encoder that is designed for video games, you don't need to worry about any of that, just follow the instructions it comes with and you'll be fine. If you intend to "hack" a keyboard, then you can successfully control 2 sticks with 6 buttons each, but no more. It is a little tedious to do it, and you need to find and read the instructions on mameworld.net before starting. You end up mapping all sorts of odd keys like insert, f7, num pad - and who knows what, but it works.

Bob

[dimebolt]

TY again, Im going to deffo get a keyboard incoder proolly the ipac.

[Mameotron]

Ok, I really just want some f eedback  on the keyboard decoder/ghosting questions and my choice on the ebay buttons/sticks

If you intend to "hack" a keyboard, then you can successfully control 2 sticks with 6 buttons each, but no more.

There are lots of threads all over here debating the keyboard hack.  I haven't read through them, I just went to the Interfaces link on the BYOAC site and carefully read the articles there.  Then I built my keyboard hack.

You can get more than 2 joysticks with 6 buttons each.

I have 4 joysticks, 2 with 6 buttons and 2 with 2 buttons.  Gauntlet plays with four players with no problems at all.  This may be attributed to the keyboard I used (an old Dell), but I have no problems with 16 simultaneous inputs.

I think the only issues with a keyboard hack is how comfortable you are with soldering and how much time you want to spend on it.  It does require lots of work.