Author Topic: LPT Switch (Read 50147 times)

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #40 on:** January 17, 2005, 01:33:13 pm »

any idea onhow to test this without wiring up 60 individual buttons and figuring out a way to press them all at once?

brained · « **Reply #41 on:** January 17, 2005, 01:34:10 pm »

sup Lord Hyriu, I've sent the link to playjodete!!

...

Well did you get the diodes?? Did it work???

I've got all the materials, but time is running so fast right now 'cause I'm moving. I think I'll be able to put the darn thing together tonight. I'll let you know what happens...

brained · « **Reply #42 on:** January 17, 2005, 01:35:59 pm »

Quote from: Hoagie_one on January 17, 2005, 01:33:13 pm

any idea onhow to test this without wiring up 60 individual buttons and figuring out a way to press them all at once?

Well you can wire them all closed, closing the circuit, but i dunno what'll happen... it's a lot easier than wiring a hole bunch o buttons...

oldsage · « **Reply #43 on:** January 17, 2005, 01:48:17 pm »

Quote from: brained on January 17, 2005, 01:35:59 pm

Quote from: Hoagie_one on January 17, 2005, 01:33:13 pm
any idea onhow to test this without wiring up 60 individual buttons and figuring out a way to press them all at once?

Well you can wire them all closed, closing the circuit, but i dunno what'll happen... it's a lot easier than wiring a hole bunch o buttons...

Say he wire one button to inputs 1->29, another to 30, another to 31->59, and another to 60...
Would they all burn and make a big exsplosion when he'll push them?!?!

Sorry... I'm a bit tired...
But won't it damage something if he wires one button to a few inputs??

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #44 on:** January 17, 2005, 02:14:25 pm »

i can see it breaking anything....but it just may not work, dunno.

LordDamo · « **Reply #45 on:** January 17, 2005, 10:41:29 pm »

This looks cool - really cool.

So, has anyone got this working or not?

Has the ghosting issue been worked out?

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #46 on:** January 17, 2005, 10:55:38 pm »

I'll have the circuit built by teh weekend, But i dont have any switches handy right now. I'll have to buy some to test it.

LordDamo · « **Reply #47 on:** January 18, 2005, 01:53:31 am »

Cool bananna's Hoagie, hope it works for you. Looks like a cheap way to connect controls to the pc. I tried to download the PPJoy program, but couldnt get to the download page, I tried to register at the site but it looked like the page kept refreshing.

Would anyone mind emailing it to me?

Lord Hiryu · « **Reply #48 on:** January 18, 2005, 06:24:06 am »

Hi guys!
I finished my interface and tested it a few minutes ago.
And as Dr.Frankstein says "It works...it's alive!!"
Now, I'm working on the office, so only I tested one game (Ghouls'n Ghost with Mame32plus), and all the buttons works OK.
The response of the buttons is fine and quickly as the I-pac.
I've not find any ghost issue, pressing 7 buttons at once, but at dinner time, will test it with StreetFighter Zero 3 and KOF97 (to see how works with fast fighting games)
At the moment, only say one word, OUTSTANDING!!
Cheers.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #49 on:** January 18, 2005, 07:28:42 am »

Quote from: LordDamo on January 18, 2005, 01:53:31 am

Cool bananna's Hoagie, hope it works for you. Looks like a cheap way to connect controls to the pc. I tried to download the PPJoy program, but couldnt get to the download page, I tried to register at the site but it looked like the page kept refreshing.

Would anyone mind emailing it to me?

got an email address?

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #50 on:** January 18, 2005, 07:31:46 am »

Quote from: Lord Hiryu on January 18, 2005, 06:24:06 am

Hi guys!
I finished my interface and tested it a few minutes ago.
And as Dr.Frankstein says "It works...it's alive!!"
Now, I'm working on the office, so only I tested one game (Ghouls'n Ghost with Mame32plus), and all the buttons works OK.
The response of the buttons is fine and quickly as the I-pac.
I've not find any ghost issue, pressing 7 buttons at once, but at dinner time, will test it with StreetFighter Zero 3 and KOF97 (to see how works with fast fighting games)
At the moment, only say one word, OUTSTANDING!!
Cheers.

awesome, how did the fighting games work out?

Lord Hiryu · « **Reply #51 on:** January 18, 2005, 09:16:37 am »

Hi Hoagie_one.
I finally tested the SF3 and KOF97 in my house, and....I only have to say one thing......Go quickly and do it one for yourself NOW!!!
It works fantastic!!!.
Take a look at these screenshots:
http://www.forumcommunity.net/?t=1104461&st=105#lastpost
The forum is in Spanish..

..sorry.
I don't find any conflict with the buttons, pressing all at once.
Is the easiest and cheapest way to do a interface for ours CPOs.
Cheers.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #52 on:** January 18, 2005, 09:25:37 am »

to cool

brained · « **Reply #53 on:** January 18, 2005, 11:41:14 am »

WOW!!! Outstanding!!!

I'm almost done with mine, last night I assembled everything in a nice way. Now I just need to solder the diodes!!

Today I'll give it a Try I Hope...

brained · « **Reply #54 on:** January 18, 2005, 11:50:16 am »

Quote from: Lord Hiryu on January 18, 2005, 09:16:37 am

Hi Hoagie_one.
I finally tested the SF3 and KOF97 in my house, and....I only have to say one thing......Go quickly and do it one for yourself NOW!!!
It works fantastic!!!.
Take a look at these screenshots:
http://www.forumcommunity.net/?t=1104461&st=105#lastpost
The forum is in Spanish....sorry.
I don't find any conflict with the buttons, pressing all at once.
Is the easiest and cheapest way to do a interface for ours CPOs.
Cheers.

Hey did you use some driver to map de joybuttons to Keystrokes, I've noticed that in the picture in of the interface @ marcianitos.com .... can you clear this up please...

Lord Hiryu · « **Reply #55 on:** January 18, 2005, 12:50:41 pm »

Hi brained.....como estamos!!!XD
Well, I use the PPjoy program to drive the interface.
BTW, I think that you can also use the SnesKey driver.
I supose that you talk about this:

Sorry....spanish again, guys!!

You can list more buttons, but for now, I only need a few.
Cheers.

brained · « **Reply #56 on:** January 18, 2005, 01:18:09 pm »

No te averg

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #57 on:** January 18, 2005, 01:29:35 pm »

Yo hablo espanol un poco

well not really. I had 3 years of spanish in high school. 11 years ago. I remember very little.

BTW, i got my diodes today, So I'm going to build the switch. Gonna build it so it can use all 60 buttons, eventhough the project im working on only requires 45. If your gonna do it, do it right....right?

Side question, to be sure. Teh flow of the diode current follows the arrow correct?

brained · « **Reply #58 on:** January 18, 2005, 01:49:26 pm »

Quote from: Hoagie_one on January 18, 2005, 01:29:35 pm

Yo hablo espanol un poco

well not really. I had 3 years of spanish in high school. 11 years ago. I remember very little.

BTW, i got my diodes today, So I'm going to build the switch. Gonna build it so it can use all 60 buttons, eventhough the project im working on only requires 45. If your gonna do it, do it right....right?

Side question, to be sure. Teh flow of the diode current follows the arrow correct?

Espa

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #59 on:** January 18, 2005, 04:05:56 pm »

I'll see how much i can get done tonight with it.

mnm1200 · « **Reply #60 on:** January 18, 2005, 05:32:21 pm »

This looks interesting. I took a look at the link (the translated one is dead) and I found this: http://users.skynet.be/plipke/PF50HC/LPTswitch/index2.html

Something written about it in English. Gomen if someone posted this and I missed it.

If this works, it'll solve a lot of problems =D

oldsage · « **Reply #61 on:** January 19, 2005, 03:06:57 am »

Quote from: mnm1200 on January 18, 2005, 05:32:21 pm

This looks interesting. I took a look at the link (the translated one is dead) and I found this: http://users.skynet.be/plipke/PF50HC/LPTswitch/index2.html

Something written about it in English. Gomen if someone posted this and I missed it.

If this works, it'll solve a lot of problems =D

I was about to post it last night (+2 GMT - i live in israel [but i'm moving to the US in 7 days]), but i was tired so i went to bed...
Me-sa-so-laaazy....

Anybody knows something about it? It seems like a "development" of the first one...

oldsage · « **Reply #62 on:** January 19, 2005, 03:51:13 am »

BTW, this might be helpful too...
(if someone wants to design their own circuit, this might come in handy...

)

Samstag · « **Reply #63 on:** January 19, 2005, 06:11:17 am »

I just finally noticed this thread.

The circuit in the original post looks pretty much like what we use in flight simulation to take inputs from massive numbers of aircraft circuit breakers (several hundred is not uncommon). Any ghosting or blocking in an FAA-certified sim would be unacceptable and we don't have any issues. The important factor is that you have one diode per switch.

Putting a resistor on each row and column would be a good idea to protect your parallel port hardware. I don't know what they can handle for current.

That said, if I needed another encoder I would probably buy another IPAC.

brained · « **Reply #64 on:** January 19, 2005, 01:16:14 pm »

Hey I've finished my interface last night, but I didn't have the chance to try it out, I might post pics and my results tonight.

cheers

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #65 on:** January 19, 2005, 02:00:43 pm »

awesome. I had the parts out to get started, but teh wife and child had different plans, lol

Trimoor · « **Reply #66 on:** January 19, 2005, 05:08:18 pm »

Sorry I missed a few days. I was being held in the Ministry of Love....

I got my interface working properly, but I'm having a couple of problems with the PPJoy driver.
I wired up the buttons randomly, and for the most part the driver allows me to assign them in any way I choose, but it forces a distinction between joy1 and joy2 at inputs 1-30 and 31-60. It will not allow me to assign input 43 to joy1 or input 15 to joy2. This is not a problem for MAME, but it can be for other games.

I have no ghosting/blocking problems, but then again I only have one column wired up.

PPJoy does not translate the buttons into keyboard presses. It translates them into a windows game controller.
The LPTswitch program and SNESkey translate the buttons into keyboard strokes, but these programs crash on me.

I think the best approach is for someone to make the mapping files for SNESkey. It supports both DOS and windoze, and it's very lightweight. PPJoy is great, but it's windoze only, and the developer is no longer working on it.

I'll try more configs and let you know how it works out.
It's impressive that two of my ideas have actually caught on. Now I can reap the glory.....

brained · « **Reply #67 on:** January 19, 2005, 11:01:46 pm »

I did it and It works!!

. I just tested a 1 player 6 button config and it worked great.... when a get my new hole saw (again) I can drill them holes in my metal panel and get going. I hope this darn hole saw gets here quick, so I can try the interface with 2 player sf-neogeo layout!!

GREAT FIND TRIMOOR!!!

Lord Hiryu · « **Reply #68 on:** January 20, 2005, 05:49:40 am »

Nice to see that works, Brained!!
I spected to see how works with your 2 player layout.

Trimoor, don't worry about the "little" issue of the 2 players, rewired the conections are easy to do.
Pins 2-3-4-5-6-7 are the ground for palyer 1.
Pins 8-9-1-14-16-17 are the ground for player 2.
Btw, I hope that you find a program to manage the interface on Ms-dos as Ppjoy do on Win.
Good luck on your search!
Cheers.!

Trimoor · « **Reply #69 on:** January 20, 2005, 06:21:49 am »

I made a nice write-up of the LPT Switch on my web site if anyone wants to look.
http://www.trimoor.com/lpt_switch/index.htm
I sent a news item to saint, so it should appear on the homepage soon.

Lord Hiryu, the problem is a little more difficult than that. I have the player 1 controls wired to a single column, not row, so it is rather difficult to change them. I'm hoping someone can make a SNESKey config file for the LPT Switch, so can be made into a keyboard for DOS and windows, eliminating my problem.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #70 on:** January 23, 2005, 08:55:12 am »

Here's some pics of teh switch I built.

Trimoor · « **Reply #71 on:** January 23, 2005, 09:39:00 am »

Uh, Hoagie_one, I don't quite know how to tell you this, but if that little diagram of a diode you drew on the printout is what you used, then you wired it up wrong.

From the looks of your pictures, you have the diodes in backwards.

Also, you might want to put a strain relief on the cable. Having it pull on a bunch of little wires is not good.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #72 on:** January 23, 2005, 09:43:57 am »

Quote from: Trimoor on January 23, 2005, 09:39:00 am

Uh, Hoagie_one, I don't quite know how to tell you this, but if that little diagram of a diode you drew on the printout is what you used, then you wired it up wrong.

From the looks of your pictures, you have the diodes in backwards.

Also, you might want to put a strain relief on the cable.

Trimoor · « **Reply #73 on:** January 23, 2005, 10:08:04 am »

You can get a pack of 50 from radio shack cheaply enough. Asking them to find diodes for you would still be faster than shipping. (but not by much)

You said you tested a few connections and they worked? I wonder how that could be.

SirPeale · « **Reply #74 on:** January 23, 2005, 10:08:58 am »

I was gonna say, hey if it's working, then maybe he did something right.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #75 on:** January 23, 2005, 10:15:07 am »

It probably worked for individual presses, but i bet as soon as i hit more than one on the same line...it'll crap itself.

I'm depressed about it now....maybe next weekend

Trimoor · « **Reply #76 on:** January 23, 2005, 01:24:23 pm »

Hoagie_one, I remember when I was testing that the interface wouldn't register anything when the diodes were connected backwards. Try it a bit more. Maybe it really does work.

Has anyone gotten the interface working with anything but windows?
Can anyone tell me how this could be configured using SNESKey?

I want to know before I start trying to make linux drivers.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #77 on:** January 23, 2005, 01:53:40 pm »

I get button presses, but it registers several presses as the same button...dammit

Some buttons dont register at all.

3 hours of work.....very irritating.

brained · « **Reply #78 on:** January 26, 2005, 08:49:46 am »

Hoagie, Diodes only let flow current one way. So if it works it's ok... the problem with the button pressing various simultaneous inputs must be wiring... double check the wiring. It can be very confusing!!

Ohh, just in case, The black stripe in the diode must go towards the wire terminal connector..

Btw, just unsolder your diodes, flip the ones that are backward and solder them again,... you don't have to throw them away....

edit: added another suggestion.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #79 on:** January 26, 2005, 09:02:52 am »

Quote from: brained on January 26, 2005, 08:49:46 am

Btw, just unsolder your diodes, flip the ones that are backward and solder them again,... you don't have to throw them away....

Too much work for $1.50 in parts

On top of that, I also believe i mislabeled my lpt wires.


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