swapable usb control panels?

[jkm]

I've been brainstorming the concept of a roughly pacman-sized cocktail table with swapable control panels.  The cabinet would be a simple glass-topped box, with usb ports around the sides and some kind of brackets to attach panels on any side. The cabinet would probably have at least 2 USB ports on the wide sides and at least one on the narrow sides. If you want one joystick on each of the narrow vertical ends, plug their panels in via usb and secure the panel in place (with some kind of bracket mechanism). If you want both joysticks on one of the wider horizontal sides, move them and plug them in there instead. If you want 4 joysticks, build 2 more panels and plug them in.

The upside is that you'd have unlimited flexibility. Build 1 or 2 joystick panels at first. Add new panels as you have time/money. Swap them in and out for whatever config you want. Now the main downside of this, as I see it, is the complexity of the panels. Ipac won't be cost effective, because you'd need one inside each control panel. So, each panel would probably require it's own hacked usb keyboard and/or mouse. Or hacked USB gamepads.

What I'm not clear on is Windows/MAME support for USB devices. Is there some technical reason that this wouldn't be feasible? If I unplug a USB joystick and plug it into a different USB port, will MAME get confused? Will I have to go into MAME and reconfig key mapping/controllers everytime I move panels around? Is this concept more trouble than it's worth?

[SirPoonga]

Well, it depends on the order windows sees the ports.
plug in a bunch of game pads once, then unplug one and plug it back in.  make sure in the game control panel they stay in the same order.

My cabinet uses USB (check out link)  I hav ea hub just below the control panel.  the spinner and trackball plug into that.  the other two ports of the hub are extended to the shelf on my cabinet.

[MrArcade]

From what I have read....usb keyboards are a bad candidate to hack...something about the speed they see keypresses or something.

I think usb joysticks/pads would be ok though...

[brandon]

yeah I have similar questions about USB because  I was thinking of doing something with gamepad hacks.  It does seem to me like the USB gamepads are assigned the number based on the order they're plugged in and not depending on what port they are in.  If you unplug everything and then plug in a gamepad in the 4th port windows has to recognize it as control 1 as far as I can tell.  Then it would seem that if you had to reconfigure your panels you would have to do them in the correct order...  anybody else tried this??

[Lilwolf]

USB keyboards are bad because in the spec, it says it only needs to handle 3 keys pressed that the same moment... Bad for gaming... real bad.  You might find one that doesn't happen like that, but good luck..

Joypads are great for hacking.  But you might have to hack 2 pads per control panel... this will get EXPENSIVE quick!

I would still go keyboard encoder for hotswapping.  They will all handle it fine (ipac, mk64, hagstrom).  put the encoder in the cabinet... and hack some cable between them.  

[Grasshopper]

The cocktail table with swappable panels sounds like a really cool idea.

I have a similar problem. I'm planning to build a number of control panels. Some will be one player and some two player. I've been searching for a suitable interface that will enable me to mix and match them. I've ruled out USB as I want to use MAME in dos.

I considered the possibility of daisychaining some Sidewinders. However there is a question mark over whether the (unofficial) DOS driver will allow this. Also Sidewinders aren't that cheap where I live.

Another possibility I considered was fitting an I-Pac in its own box. There would be two D connectors coming out of the box - one for player one, and one for player two. I would connect my one player panels to either of the D connectors, and my two player panels would have two leads to connect to both of the connectors.

There are a few problems with this. First the leads would be very thick. The standard I-Pac has 28 inputs so that would be 15 wires per lead (14 inputs plus ground). Also you could only have a maximum of two players unless you want to severely restrict the number of buttons per player.

Another possibility is to build a buttonbox (http://surf.to/buttonbox). The advantage of this over the I-Pac is that it can operate in matrix mode which gives you up to 128 inputs! If you assume you need 16 inputs per player then the leads only have to have 8 wires each (for a 4*4 matrix).

The downside is that you have to build it yourself. It's also hassle having to connect a  diode in series with each switch. However I'm tempted. It all depends upon how cheaply I can source the components.

[SirPoonga]

Joypads are great for hacking.  But you might have to hack 2 pads per control panel... this will get EXPENSIVE quick!

Expensive?
USB controller, $2 x 2 = $4 + S&H (justdeals.com)
A couple of rolls of wire from radio shack, $5
soldering iron form radio shack, $10
solder and other soldering equipment, $5.
we are talking about $30

[SirPoonga]

There are a few problems with this. First the leads would be very thick. The standard I-Pac has 28 inputs so that would be 15 wires per lead (14 inputs plus ground). Also you could only have a maximum of two players unless you want to severely restrict the number of buttons per player.

The leads aren't that thick,  no different than a printer cable.
You could get eh IPAC4.

[Lilwolf]

I'm used to spending about 5 bucks for the last controller I hacked...

but 2 per control panel (since I got 10 or so contacts on each)... so 10 bucks each.  Plus one that always stays on the cabinet for the 'nonchanging' buttons.

I have 5 control panels right now..  

55 not including shipping.  and you could almost get a ipac4 for that.

I just think they are good for cheap hacks... but with swappable control panels, the fun is adding new panels when the parts show up...

[u_rebelscum]

yeah I have similar questions about USB because  I was thinking of doing something with gamepad hacks.  It does seem to me like the USB gamepads are assigned the number based on the order they're plugged in and not depending on what port they are in.  If you unplug everything and then plug in a gamepad in the 4th port windows has to recognize it as control 1 as far as I can tell.  Then it would seem that if you had to reconfigure your panels you would have to do them in the correct order...  anybody else tried this??

The USB port # should not matter (will come back to this, though) what # the USB joystick gets.  Usually the devices are numbered by:  the order they are installed, which ones are installed at mame start up, and then the order they were replugged in (before mame start up) if they use the same driver and the driver does not look at the devices' ID#s (can't tell the difference between the devices).

The first device is given the lowest number, the second installed gets the next, ect.
Only devices plugged in (ei, the driver thinks it's plugged in) get numbered by mame.  Any unplugged devices are not counted, and devices that would have gotten a higher number get that number instead. (note on this later)
Sometimes, if two of the same brand & model device are unplugged, the order they are replugged determines which gets placed first and second between these devices.

Example: Gamepad A installed, then analog joystick, then gamepad B (but is same model a gamepad A).
1 gamepad A
2 Joystick
3 gamepad B

Joystick unplugged:
1 gamepad A
2 gamepad B
3 --

joystick replugged:
1 gamepad A
2 Joystick
3 gamepad B

both gamepads unplugged:
1 Joystick
2 --
3 --

gamepad B, then gamepad A installed:
1 gamepad B
2 joystick
3 gamepad A

Now, if the driver looks at the device's serial number or something, the gamepads would not switch in the last step of example.  Depends on the drivers.

First note: Some drivers have a little problem (on my winME box, at least) have problems if I plug the same device in a different USB port; it installs a new device at the end of the line, but mame finds the device twice: both the original number and the new installed number place.  And the original number does not get inputs, the new number does.  This is only on one device (my gravis Xterminator digital gamepad); the others don't have this problem.

Second note:  Some drivers (IIRC a ps four-port adapter) claim all ports as full even if only a few are.  So if the adapter is install first and plugged in, it says 4 devices are plugged in, each getting a number, even if only one, two, or three gamepads are plugged into the adapter.  The next device get number 5.  Don't know if this was fixed, and I heard it second hand.

[jkm]

Thanks, u_rebelscum. That helped my understanding a lot. Thanks everyone.

[SirPoonga]

what about if all the devices are plugged in before you start up the computer?  Then what's the order?

[u_rebelscum]

what about if all the devices are plugged in before you start up the computer?  Then what's the order?

Depends.  Want me to "go long" again?

What should happen (is spec'ed to happen): Every device holds its possition relative to each other, just like if unplugged/replugged while computer on.


What really happens:

If devices already installed: acts the same as if computer was on except:

If you have the problem with switching ports like I do, you'll have pretty more the same problem I discribed before, except it sometimes will also happen if multiple devices numbered below it are replugged or unplugged at bootup, even if the buggy device is left in.  Can't nail exact cause down.

If you switch the same model devices' ports, the device number (player) may or may not switch depending if the driver looks for each device's ID# or not, sort of like when on.

USB hubs might add a twist if before shutdown the joy was installed without a hub, & before the hub (thus earlier in the USB lookup list), but on startup the joy plugged into the hub.  Depends on the hub driver, as hubs should be found before other device, but I've had numbering change from moving a device like discribed.

For my sanity, I try to install, unplug, and replug USB devices only while the computer is on, unless the install manual says do it while the computer is off (never, AFAIK).  And if I have a problem with USB: unplug, watch for hourglass mouse pointer, replug is one of the basic tests I do now.  Not that I never unplug while off, but I try not to.


If the device model/driver is not installed yet:
It gets placed last, like if computer on.  

If multiple devices not installed at startup:
<sound="thhhhhpp">  Don't do this if you want control of how they are numbered.


If the device was installed and then unplugged before shutdown, and then plugged in before startup:

Well, I'm not sure.  I try not to do this, as I've had renumbering from doing this, before, but now that I think about it, I'm not sure if it was because of my buggy driver.