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| Yet Another: "Does this sound right?" Control Panel Thread |
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| StarChild:
--- Quote from: danny_galaga on September 30, 2004, 01:42:24 am ---perhaps a quick sketch to illustrate the layout of your control panel? some of us are a little slow and need a purdy pikcha to help --- End quote --- <* StarChild grab a stone and begins drawing on the cave wall> Something like that? Cab is going to be about 30-32" wide (still drafting it) and I'd expect the control panel to easily be able to extrude 4-6" on each side without looking "cheesy". That should give me an awful lot of real estate to play with...although the mock up will tell all. :) -* |
| cdbrown:
Things to think about - 1. what buttons will be used when you are using the spinner or analog stick? 2. Ipac has the SHIFT function which means you don't need the admin buttons - you just need to remember what the combination is to cause ESC, PAUSE etc 3. Are you having player 1-4 start and credit buttons (ie 8 buttons total) as they are supported by the ipac4? Check my cab out - 4-player with a 27" TV. It's a monster and I only have sticks and buttons on the panel. However I do have 2 more panels planned for the future - a dual trackball panel and a dual spinner/dual t-stick panel. Cheers -cdbrown |
| StarChild:
--- Quote from: cdbrown on September 30, 2004, 02:57:20 am ---Things to think about - 1. what buttons will be used when you are using the spinner or analog stick? 2. Ipac has the SHIFT function which means you don't need the admin buttons - you just need to remember what the combination is to cause ESC, PAUSE etc 3. Are you having player 1-4 start and credit buttons (ie 8 buttons total) as they are supported by the ipac4? Check my cab out - 4-player with a 27" TV. It's a monster and I only have sticks and buttons on the panel. However I do have 2 more panels planned for the future - a dual trackball panel and a dual spinner/dual t-stick panel. Cheers -cdbrown --- End quote --- 1) ahhh...I forgot the 3 mouse buttons from the trackball are going to be above the trackball in my crude sketch. Those should suffice as buttons for the rotary and the analog stick (I would think anyways) 2) Yeah...the IPAC shift keys should come in handy. I'm also kicking around the idea of not placing buttons on the control panel unless necessary. I don't need the "esc" key on the panel, for instance. In fact, adding that to the panel seems to be taking an unnecessary risk for those "wild moments". I'm still in my early planning stages though, so I haven't decided on which keys I'll need and whatnot. I'm thinking at least ESC, Enter...sheesh, do I need anything else I'd be using often enough to map to a button? I'd prob pull out the keyboard for Tab and whatnot. <shrug> 3) So far my plan is to use the 1-4 player buttons on the main panel. Maybe I should do them on the front of the control panel face (perpendicular to the ground)? That would save more surface area for real controls, and put them in easy reach of each player without any annoying reaches... Coin reject is going to my credit buttons along with the "real" coin mechanism. I'll prob just play with the idea of adding a switch to cut out the "free" credits so the coin mechanism actually works as it's supposed to (just for grins) hehe Your cab looks great! :) I can't wait until I get it to that stage, but at the same time I'm going to really enjoy doing it. I'm going to do my best to make my cabinet good at multiple things, so I'm really curious to see how it turns out. Using the TV allows for a nice console connection and there's no reason I can't have 5.1 sound and a wireless lan while I'm at it. :D -* |
| DougHillman:
A few comments. Along with Druin's interface, my Happ's 12 position Rotary sticks work great. And they only take up 2 slots each on the I-Pac, not 12. (Well, 6 total actually. 4 directions and 2 rotate.) They just send a clockwise/counterclockwise command, not a specific position. I'm an advocate of administration buttons. Much easier, quicker, and user friendly than using the shift button capabilities of the I-Pac. I've got Enter, Esc, and Pause on my cabinets. You can turn off some of the "OK" screens in the mame.ini file, and the P1 joystick left/right to pass the ones that are mandatory. Make sure you check the size of any doors you may need to move your cabinet through now or in the future. 32" may be too much. Alot of standard doors are only 30" wide. Check out the last cabinet I built in this thread http://www.arcadecontrols.org/yabbse/index.php?board=10;action=display;threadid=23028 It's about the size that you're thinking of for yours. 30" wide with about a 6" CP overhang on each side. I think you can find a link to the Adobe Illustrator template I used in laying out the CP in that thread as well. May find it useful in deciding if you have room to place your Player Start, coin, and admin buttons on the CP face as well. (IMO, you'll have plenty of room.) |
| StarChild:
Hi Doug :) Thanks for the tips. For some reason, exploring the mame.ini hadn't even occured me yet. lol <slaps himself> I'll explore in there and see what I can find to tune things even better <grin> One of my concerns which was tilting me around on the optical vs. rotary was the way Druin's Interface works as far as sending signals to the ipac. I know in the config for the games which actually use the rotary...it's simply a matter of a keypress for each rotation. If I spin the spin or twist it a few positions in a smooth motion, will it "keep up" with my movements? If it were laggy at all, I'd probably be frustrated with it. I really would like to use the rotary sticks just because I like the "click click click" as it twists into each position, but I'd rather go with the optical if it will work smoothly. I measured a few doorways in my place and came up with a number for my doorways, but if the standard doorway is 30, I should probably keep it around there. I'd REALLY hate to move and discover my cab has to live in the garage or something like that. hehe I'm sure I'll reconsider and make it as narrow as is feasible. :) I've been using a few cabs and control panels as inspiration in my design and your thread there was one of them. :) I really like your setup you have going there. <grin> I think I have everything down for the most part...I'm just curious on the "latency" between the inputs on the rotary/druin and the response on the screen. Thanks again for the input, everyone...it's much appreciated! It's a semi-big investment getting all these controls and I don't want to mess it up :) -* |
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