Console Controls

[Mike]

I decided I don't like the Atari, Coleco, Intellivision, Nintendo and so on, console emu's on my arcade cabinet. So i want to build a small box to accept the controllers from each of these systems and hook it up to my TV. I figure I'll have to find a male and female connector to put on the joysticks and the "new console" which will probably contain an ipac. I think I also might have to alter some of the circuitry in the controls. Basically I was wondering if anyone has seen where someone has done this before so I can use it as a reference or maybe find an easier way to do it. Thanks for any help.

[Mike]

One more thing I have looked at everything on this site. I'd much rather use an ipac rather than have software run to connect the controllers on a parallel port. It will allow me to connect really any controller I want with out needing software. It will also allow me to create a frontend for the consoles that are controlled through a very basic button set. Thanks again.

[rampy]

I'm having trouble following you... you don't like those games/systems?

How's your cab currently configed? is the TV in the cab or external?  What exactly is your end goal here?  Adding console gamepad control ports to your existing cab or ?

ramnpy

[Dink]

rampy interpretation:  He took the Atari, etc. emu's off his MAME cabinet.  He is building a new cabinet for the Atari, etc. emu's.  He wants to know if he can use an IPAC to interface from his Atari 2600 joystick, through the IPAC to his PC.  (At least that's what I think, he said. )

I don't know the answer, but I will interpret where I can.  

[J_K_M_A_N]

Well, you will have a problem with the Intellivision because it used a 16 position disc. It can't be hooked directly to an I-Pac because it doesn't have seperate wires for each direction and button. It puts out a signal like most joysticks/controllers. The machine decodes the signal to tell which direction/button is being pressed. You could MAYBE hack all of them by hooking wires to each connection but it would be a real pain in the a**. Good luck.

J_K_M_A_N

[Mike]

Ok, I'll try to better explain my plan. I have an old compaq desktop case that I stuffed a celeron overclocked to like 450mhz in. I'm gonna make a new front for the case that has 2 ports(looking like I'm gonna have to use db25 connector) and 2 buttons. One button is going to back out of the game and the other button is gonna turn the computer off. Then I'm gonna hook this box up to my TV and reciever. I want to adapt a bunch of different joysticks so thier connector on the end is female db25 connector. I want to do this so I can swap out the joysticks to the same port depending on what emu I'm playing. And I want to use an ipac so the front end that i use can accept the same keystroke from each joystick. So basically The up button for the nintendo joystick and the atari joystick will be the same key. It sounds like the intellivision pad will be the hardest to adapt to this idea. But if that is the only one that won't kill me. Basically, I like to play arcade games like they were meant to be played on my cabinet. But I'd like to play console games the way they were originally meant to be played. Hope that clarifies the plan.

[Darkstalker]

That might be possible, but it depends on the power requirements of the joystick itself.  Which consoles are you going to attempt this with?  And since you have to open the cab to change the game anyways, wouldn't it be easier to just grab an already plugged in controller for that system?  Not to acid rain on your parade, but it seems like a lot of work for not a whole lot of benefit, unless you wanted ONE controller to interface to ALL of the consoles.

[Skeleton]

Mike,

Check out my site http://www.geocities.com/emu_skeleton  I have done something similar to what you want to do (a console-like system hooked to a TV). My site is in dire need of an update, but you may get some ideas from it. My "console box" has a DB25 on it connected to the PC parallel port. There is joystick driver for windows called DirectPadPro that allows you to connect the original console controller to the PC via the parallel port.

I think PacFan has also done something like this where he made a box that contained a laptop MB and had DB9's on it for ATARI 2600 joysticks.

[Mike]

I didn't want to use the parellel port because it would be too difficult to make the signal for up, down, left, right and fire button the same for all the controllers. Also I want the controllers to be swappable while the system is running. But I have been doing more research on how to do this and did some tests with an nes controller and my idea is possible even with the intellivision controller with some minor changes to the original idea. First I will have to use a keyboard hack instead of the ipac so that I can have a matrix and only need 9 wires and I'm able to get 20 keys per controller. Also so the cable isn't super thick going to each controller. The biggest question is on the intellivision controller is how do I want to handle the 16 way disc. I can wire the controller so that corners send both the signals that it sits between. But how do I want to send the signals between the corners and the sides is the question do I want to send them as just the sides or the corners. I will have to do some testing to find out which one works better. If I get all this worked out I will put something up but so far after looking at the circuit diagrams it looks like this should work with an atari, nes, snes, sega master system, sega genesis, intellivision, and colecovision controller. It might also work with playstation and n64 but those will be the last controllers I work with so it will be a little while before I check those out.

[romid]

Has anyone else thought of doing something like this?  I am personally very interested in it.  Although playing NES games using arcade controls works, I would much rather have an actual nintendo controller sticking out of my cabinet that I could use instead.

Anyone done this before or is familiar with a project that did this?

[eightbit]

Wiring the consoles with digital controls to an ipac should be doable. The tough ones are going to be the ones with analog controls. For the newer controllers you should look into adapters to convert them to USB. I know PS, PS2, DreamCast, and xbox controller adapters are out there. Then have the db25 plug for the older controllers and USB plugs for your newer controllers.

[MinerAl]

I've hooked up an Atari 2600 joystick to my iPAC.  Here's the thread about that:
http://www.arcadecontrols.org/yabbse/index.php?board=1;action=display;threadid=4392;start=0

It works because the 2600's joysticks had no processors in them, they sent nice raw ground pulses, just like arcade buttons do.  You'll run into dificulty when you get to things like NES controller pads, because they DID have processors that sent signals, like a mouse or keyboard does.

You'll have to tear up some controls, and wire directly to the switches under the pads to get, for instance, a NES controller to send ground pulses to the iPAC.

I'd suggest that since just about everything but Atari used the thumbpad-next-to-buttons model that Intellivision started and NES refined, you get a nice USB or gameport thumbpad controller, and only wire up your Atari Joys to the iPAC.

Good luck!