LED-Wiz USB LED and Output Control Device now available. *Blinky lights*

[MikeQ]

What is a game that reports more buttons that it uses?  I'll debug this tonight and see what I can find.  Somewhere there must be a connection between the input port being there and what the ROM does with a signal on the input port.

Also, I edited an earlier post.  How do you make that post current message on that thread?  Or can that not be done?

I posted a rant to a question that I think people on this thread (and software forum in general) should read.

[KillerArcades]

Now, there's something I'd be interested in as well. Getting this working with some of the other  popular emulators like the at2600, and NES, etc......

[mahuti]

The little app I wrote can work with any other emulator.

For example; nintendo (which always uses the same buttons)

1. create a LWA for nintendo
2. Add nintendo=nintendo.lwa to the ini file.
3. launch the nes emulator with a batch file that calls my app like so; bloodywiz.exe nintendo

[SirPoonga]

I'll look into this some more.  I'm sure there is a way to tell that the button doesn't have an event associated with it.  I've never bothered because it hasn't been a problem.  Once nice feature of having the lighting code in MAME is that when I hit delete, the LED goes off and I don't worry about it anymore.  It has only happened on a couple games.  I think most games that don't use the extra buttons must already have them set to n/a because I've not seen this issue much.

Ahhh, so you don't get the info form mame, you just delete them yourself. 
That bit of code I posted earlier is how mame defines a button.  That's it, nothing more.  That basically says what pin (the 0x80) of whatever chip the definition is in and what button in mame to map it to.  It doesn't say anything about if the game uses it.  It's just mapping the hardware, the hardware specs say a button is at that location.
It isn't that big of an issue in mame as it was 2 or 3 years ago when controls.dat started.  We've been submitting fixes to mame where it makes sense a fix is needed.  Some macros do not need changing, like neogeo.  Being that it is a cart based system makes it more of a special case.  A game may have only used 1 button but the cabinet had 4 buttons on the control panel.  The ones we did change are ones where the conversion kit or cabinet didn't have those extra buttons.
 
You can delete a led but can you add it?   Wait, are you lighting everything that mame has mapped?  So if you don't delete anything discs of tron will light 4 buttons,  8way joystick, spinner, and trackball?

Also what if you have a spinner and a 360 steering wheel on a control panel?  I'm just thinking about the folks that have monster control panels or rotating panels.

I will be writing something that uses controls.dat so people can light correct controls.  I wonder if I should just make a program that outputs to the cfg files of your mame build...  It would be nice to have the delete on the fly type feature.

So what you are saying is that MAME has buttons defined for games that are never used.

It took a while, but I get it now.  So at worst case, you might end up with controls that are lit, because they were part pf the original hardware, but not actually used.  Would this be a big issue for anything other than the "multi-game" style units like the Neo, or is MAME a lot less reliable?

Read above.  Like I said it isn't big of an issue now as when we (controls.dat) find an error and it is a legit error we will submit it to mametesters.  For example,
http://www.mametesters.org/currentbugs.html
Check out bug yiear0103u1gra
Yie Ar Kung Fu's docs, schematics, operators manual, everything says it only has 2 buttons but the current driver has defined three. 
Now, I didn't submit this one to mametesters, someone else did that.  I posted a comment on the mameworld forum and someone submitted it under my name.  And I didn't find it, someone else at controls.dat did.

But, as you see, the issue still comes up.

Then there is another issue.  Even if controls.dat correctly identifies the control, what if that control doesn't actually exist on the panel?  I would think there would need to be a substitution file someplace to account for this.

Yep, Johnny5 does this.  You would have to have a way to map the controls defined in controls.dat to your control panel.
If you didn't have controls.dat you'd still need some substitution file for specific games.  If your control panel did have a spinner and a 360 steering wheel how would you know which to light up when mame just says dial for those?

That is the reason I started controls.dat.  I wanted to find out which games where spinners vs steering wheels.  The rest of the problems it fixes (as read in the FAQ) I realized after I started the project.

What is a game that reports more buttons that it uses?  I'll debug this tonight and see what I can find.  Somewhere there must be a connection between the input port being there and what the ROM does with a signal on the input port.

Yeah, the rom.  It's the software coding in the rom that will determine what it actually uses.  It's like having a modem built into your computer but the software not using it. 
If you want an example see the yiear example above.

[SirPoonga]

I posted a rant to a question that I think people on this thread (and software forum in general) should read.

what rant is that?

[KillerArcades]

The little app I wrote can work with any other emulator.

For example; nintendo (which always uses the same buttons)

1. create a LWA for nintendo
2. Add nintendo=nintendo.lwa to the ini file.
3. launch the nes emulator with a batch file that calls my app like so; bloodywiz.exe nintendo

perfect! I'll be ordering buttons and LED's soon, but I have to admit, I'm waiting on ordering a LEDWIZ until I hear whether or not RandyT may add the ability to have multiple LEDWIZ boards running simultaneously on a single system....

[MikeQ]

The little app I wrote can work with any other emulator.

For example; nintendo (which always uses the same buttons)

1. create a LWA for nintendo
2. Add nintendo=nintendo.lwa to the ini file.
3. launch the nes emulator with a batch file that calls my app like so; bloodywiz.exe nintendo

perfect! I'll be ordering buttons and LED's soon, but I have to admit, I'm waiting on ordering a LEDWIZ until I hear whether or not RandyT may add the ability to have multiple LEDWIZ boards running simultaneously on a single system....

I would really like this too.  I will have multiple CP's and each CP will have an LEDWiz in it.  I'd also like to have cabinet lighting separate from the CP's.  I'll write the driver if Randy will build the hardware.  I'm think it could be done without special hardware if a kernel driver were written but that would be a ton of work or at least a bunch of "learnin stuff."

[RandyT]

perfect! I'll be ordering buttons and LED's soon, but I have to admit, I'm waiting on ordering a LEDWIZ until I hear whether or not RandyT may add the ability to have multiple LEDWIZ boards running simultaneously on a single system....

I would really like this too.  I will have multiple CP's and each CP will have an LEDWiz in it.  I'd also like to have cabinet lighting separate from the CP's.  I'll write the driver if Randy will build the hardware.  I'm think it could be done without special hardware if a kernel driver were written but that would be a ton of work or at least a bunch of "learnin stuff."

Mike, if you want to do this, then I'll send you an LED-Wiz device #2 to keep.  You've already earned it anyway 

I'd rather not go the route of special drivers, and I think that can be avoided if we stick to separate device numbers.  seems like the simplest approach to keeping the lights where you want them if you are able to assign stuff to the units by "name".

RandyT

[MikeQ]

perfect! I'll be ordering buttons and LED's soon, but I have to admit, I'm waiting on ordering a LEDWIZ until I hear whether or not RandyT may add the ability to have multiple LEDWIZ boards running simultaneously on a single system....

I would really like this too.  I will have multiple CP's and each CP will have an LEDWiz in it.  I'd also like to have cabinet lighting separate from the CP's.  I'll write the driver if Randy will build the hardware.  I'm think it could be done without special hardware if a kernel driver were written but that would be a ton of work or at least a bunch of "learnin stuff."

Mike, if you want to do this, then I'll send you an LED-Wiz device #2 to keep.  You've already earned it anyway 

I'd rather not go the route of special drivers, and I think that can be avoided if we stick to separate device numbers.  seems like the simplest approach to keeping the lights where you want them if you are able to assign stuff to the units by "name".

RandyT

Works for me.  Do you still have my info or do I need to PM you?

No I was suggesting a special driver only in the event that you didn't want to provide a secondary device id.  It would be an educational excercise.  Writing Kernel drivers is a bit of a pain so that would not be my first choice solution either.  My experience with Kernel drivers has been with 2D/3D graphics cards.  They are especially ugly because a bug in those drivers makes your computer unbootable.  I guess a USB device wouldn't be that bad.

[MikeQ]

Randy,

would it be possible to put a dip switch on the LEDWiz so that the productID could be set to many different values and thereby allowing more than just 2?

Later,

Mike

[RandyT]

Randy,

would it be possible to put a dip switch on the LEDWiz so that the productID could be set to many different values and thereby allowing more than just 2?

Dipswitch=lost outputs

I'll plan on 4 different ID's.  If anyone thinks that 128 outputs (up to 42 RGB buttons) isn't enough, speak now.

I can do as many different devices as the software will allow for.  Maybe a good idea to give the software the ability to index up to (pick a number!) units to allow for future expandibility?  8? 10? 16? You tell me

The current device should be considered the first one though.

RandyT

[MikeQ]

I'll give you a whole byte and allow for 256.  You'll have to put a disclaimer that 600w power supply is necessary, 1200w power supply with an ATI X1900 plugged in.

[mahuti]

Randy, if somebody want's to buy 40 led-wiz units for their machine who are you to stop them

[dmsuchy]

I have a dream.....that there will be one joystick and 6 buttons, and the joy will configure automaticly to whatever game I am playing and the buttons will lite indicating what buttons are to be used in that particular game. Because of Randy, Mike and many other people of this great forum, this dream is quickly becoming a reality. Thanks

[SirPoonga]

Ahhhh, about the rant.  There are so many different things that can be done that will be extremely hard to do.   How many people here who don't use NoNameMame knows it exists?  He tried to do that, include all the modifications possible.  It's a huge task, along with getting the word out.  also keeping up to date is difficult.  That's why I no longer work on my hacks.  Mame changed so much in the areas of controls and artwork that the hacks on my site no longer work.

I'd be happy with a site that just had a bunch of diffs and you could add in what you want into your own build.  There is a site out there like that but it doesn't have much.

[MikeQ]

The LEDWiz stuff is very localized so it isn't a problem for doing diffs.  The vidhrdw stuff is god awful ugly and would be more work to diff.

[SirPoonga]

Dipswitch=lost outputs

Just curious, how many outputs are lost due to software programming DRM in gpwiz49?

[MikeQ]

Ahhhh, about the rant.  There are so many different things that can be done that will be extremely hard to do.   How many people here who don't use NoNameMame knows it exists?  He tried to do that, include all the modifications possible.  It's a huge task, along with getting the word out.  also keeping up to date is difficult.  That's why I no longer work on my hacks.  Mame changed so much in the areas of controls and artwork that the hacks on my site no longer work.

I'd be happy with a site that just had a bunch of diffs and you could add in what you want into your own build.  There is a site out there like that but it doesn't have much.

I've heard of it and heard that it was dead.  Was this one person trying to put all the features in one version of MAME or was this everyone contributing to one version of MAME?  If it is one person trying to do this, I can see how it would die.

[mahuti]

If anybody's really interested, I could put up a PHP-collab system... there'd be an online system for sharing, documentation, bug tracking, etc.

I can't program anything in MAME, though, so my role would be strictly administrative.

[MikeQ]

If we want to start a real dialog on this we should move to the software forum.

[RandyT]

Dipswitch=lost outputs

Just curious, how many outputs are lost due to software programming DRM in gpwiz49?

I think you mean DRS

[MikeQ]

sweet!! does this mean I can illegal rip DVD's with the gpwiz49?

[JoyMonkey]

sweet!! does this mean I can illegal rip DVD's with the gpwiz49?

Can you add that as a feature in your version of Mame? And also get it to wake me up in the morning with a cup of coffee?

[Buddabing]

<Mike's rant>

I would not mention "why don't MAMEdev add 3d acceleration to MAME?" on the MAME forums. They will flame you.

Also, why go about reinventing the wheel? SirPoonga and Howard put a lot of work into the controls.dat project, why not use it? Gl.tter put a lot of work into his LSE, why not use that?

[KillerArcades]

I'm with MikeQ, I'd say go 256 just to be safe.

[MikeQ]

<Mike's rant>

I would not mention "why don't MAMEdev add 3d acceleration to MAME?" on the MAME forums. They will flame you.

I don't care, and you might go back and read my post.  I didn't say "why don't MAMEdev add 3d acceleration to MAME?".  I said, I'm doing it.  I've already done part of it. 

Also, why go about reinventing the wheel? SirPoonga and Howard put a lot of work into the controls.dat project, why not use it? Gl.tter put a lot of work into his LSE, why not use that?

Because I didn't know they existed when I started working.  Another reason to have a core development effort.

[RandyT]

Also, why go about reinventing the wheel? SirPoonga and Howard put a lot of work into the controls.dat project, why not use it? Gl.tter put a lot of work into his LSE, why not use that?

Pehaps an equally valid question would be "Why use it if you don't need it to get the job done?"

I'm not saying that this is the case.  The controls.dat project is a great piece of work, but it may not be necessary to call on it if the software can be made to analyze each game to see which controls are actually used.  But if not, it's darn nice that it is available.

Just because someone did something, doesn't necessarily mean that it is the best approach to a problem, or that any future similar endeavors need to make use of it....

RandyT

[SirPoonga]

But I'm not sure I follow you.  If you mean a "soft" device number, this could only be done if there were EEPROM on the board (which there isn't and would also use outputs if there were.)

Or are you inferring something else?

Right, answer a question with a question... 

You sorta have it right.  I was wondering about about programming an id.  I know it would take up pins (hence my question) and eeprom.  You know I know this much from past discussions (and I have been making some of my own custom hardware).

I was looking to see if you would answer with 1 or 2.

Though I can only see up to 4 ledwizes ever being needed for arcade use.  Outside of the arcade world....
RGB leds take up 2 outputs?  So 10 per board leaving 2 extra (hence why I say 2 above?  On a 4 player or rotating control panel that will easily take up 4 ledwiz worth of rgbs or more.

I think people want rbg leds to color code the buttons.  I get at least 1-3 requests a month to add button color information to controls.dat.  As I have replied many times probably only 15% of the games in controls.dat used specific color buttons, so it would be better as a side project.  Anyway, I know people are interested in it and I could see someone using only rgb lights for everything.

So if there are two extra pins when using all rgb could they be used for programming in an id instead?  And if it only costs the end user $5 for that feature...

But if you can order, say, up to 8 different ids then the arcade community would be covered.  Though I can see a product like this being used outside of the arcade community.  In fact I have a friend that bought a keywiz eco for a project that was not arcade related.

I guess I am just looking at the big picture.  Compared to other output devices this is very cheap.  We all know it can (and will) be used for more than LEDs.  (I think I found my power source for the qbert knocker, or possibly a dragon's lair scoreboard instead of the parallel interface).

I think you mean DRS

[MikeQ]

The 3rd button on Yie-Ar Kung Fu does do something.  It is a jumping maneuver.

Do you another example?

[SirPoonga]

The 3rd button on Yie-Ar Kung Fu does do something.  It is a jumping maneuver.

Ahh yes, I remember I was told that now.  But it isn't documented anywhere.  Well, it had to be documented somewhere if it was defined in mame originally or the dev tried all pins...  because up is jump as documented.  I remember that chat on that, wondering if the yiear in mame was original or a really good bootleg with a jump button.

One would have compare listxml to controls.dat to see where button numbers aren't the same to get other examples.  Right now I am not going to write up the app to compare the two xml files.  If I can find some time I will try and find one.

The point is there are drivers which use the same macro to define buttons for all the games in the driver.  Basically the manufacturer used the same hardware, just changed the software.  For those games we have the correct number of buttons the game used.

[MikeQ]

The point is there are drivers which use the same macro to define buttons for all the games in the driver.  Basically the manufacturer used the same hardware, just changed the software.  For those games we have the correct number of buttons the game used.

I know this.  I'm asking for an example so I can look into the issue.  I ran into 1 game I think that had this issue but I don't recall what it was.  This issue doesn't seem to be that prevalent.  I sat down and went through a huge # of games one night and only found the 1 (maybe 2) that had this issue.  The problem wasn't big enough to consider a problem but if this is a big deal then I'll look into it.

[MikeQ]

You can delete a led but can you add it?   
Sure, you go to the input menu and program a key for the delete one and the LED comes on.

Wait, are you lighting everything that mame has mapped?  So if you don't delete anything discs of tron will light 4 buttons,  8way joystick, spinner, and trackball?

No, by default the controller mappings for Disc of Tron are all keyboard keys.  You would have to map the mouse to whatever (spinner).  On my panel, the joystick already matched the defaults as did the buttons so I didn't need to do anything there. 

I'm not sure what the trackball Y axis is supposed to do on this game but it was also mapped to keys.

[RandyT]

Right, answer a question with a question... 

....I was looking to see if you would answer with 1 or 2.

Your question was:

Just curious, how many outputs are lost due to software programming DRM in gpwiz49?

The answer to that is neither 1 or 2, rather 0.  In my mind, this was like asking "how much carrot juice does it take to get to the store."  So I didn't think I understood the question and I "gave it a shot".

You sorta have it right.  I was wondering about about programming an id.  I know it would take up pins (hence my question) and eeprom.  You know I know this much from past discussions (and I have been making some of my own custom hardware).

Well it would depend on the EEPROM used.  There are single wire interfaces, but the most common are 2 wire, which would mean 2 I/O pins.

But the problem is that you have a catch-22 of sorts.  You can't upload an ID to the unit unless it has an ID.  So this would mean a clumsy method of having them all needing to be one ID, programming the unit, unplugging it and re-plugging, possibly going back through the "New Hardware" stuff (Win98) and then being ready to go.

If it were just a matter of 4 devices and you were going to give up 2 outputs per, jumpers would get you there more simply.  On the other hand, It hasn't been a big deal to just give the customer the device number they ask for.  That way it just works as they expect it to.

RGB leds take up 2 outputs?  So 10 per board leaving 2 extra (hence why I say 2 above?  On a 4 player or rotating control panel that will easily take up 4 ledwiz worth of rgbs or more.

The math is right, but the number is wrong (3 not 2) so I'm assuming a typo

There is no reason an RGB LED can't span across multiple devices if each color is being independently addressed, and some things like spinner chasers and joystick directional indicators don't necessarily need RGB, so there are really no such thing as "extras".  One of those could run your "knocker."

So if there are two extra pins when using all rgb could they be used for programming in an id instead?  And if it only costs the end user $5 for that feature...

As written above, there aren't and it's not a good solution because of the dance the end-user would need to go through.  Of course, if you are volunteering to take over my customer support duties for no pay, then I will consider it

BTW, when faced with paying an extra $5 per unit for a feature they probably won't need, my customers tell me they would "rather not."

But if you can order, say, up to 8 different ids then the arcade community would be covered.

Here's how I view it:  Everybody wants a #1.  A quarter of everybody will want a #2.  A quarter of them will want a #3 and maybe a 5% of them will want a #4.  But if someone asks for a #10 after ordering a #1 through #9, then I will happily accommodate them.   If they haven't ordered #1 - #9 they will just be trying to make extra work for me, but I will probably accommodate them anyway .

Though I can see a product like this being used outside of the arcade community.  In fact I have a friend that bought a keywiz eco for a project that was not arcade related.

Happens more often than you might think.

Which with this conversation has proved you still can't find out exactly what a games uses unless you use trial and error or controls.dat

This is true in the sense of  spinner versus trackball versus steering wheel versus analog paddle.  However, an individual has to end up tweaking their set-up manually to handle these exceptions anyway.  Or am I missing something obvious?

RandyT

[SirPoonga]

No, by default the controller mappings for Disc of Tron are all keyboard keys.  You would have to map the mouse to whatever (spinner).  On my panel, the joystick already matched the defaults as did the buttons so I didn't need to do anything there. 

I'm not sure what the trackball Y axis is supposed to do on this game but it was also mapped to keys.

Well, this is sorta right.  First, the trackball in dotron is a hack to simulat the up/down spinner.  FYI buttons 3 and 4 are the up and down on the spinner.

   PORT_START_TAG("FAKE")   /* fake port to make aiming up & down easier */
   PORT_BIT( 0xff, 0x00, IPT_TRACKBALL_Y ) PORT_SENSITIVITY(100) PORT_KEYDELTA(10)

"No, by default the controller mappings for Disc of Tron are all keyboard keys. "
I am trying to understand this comment.
The controls aren't mapped to the keys, the keys are mapped to the controls.  As you see above the control is mapped to the trackball.  But mame also allows keyboard to be used for those inputs. 
So I wonder what you are looking at to determine what's a spinner vs trackball versus left and right on a joystick.  All can be simulated with a keyboard and for most games are defaulted to the same keystrokes..

So on your control panel do you have a trackball, did you disable highlighting the trackball in dotron?  The game only has an 8 way triggerstick (with two buttons) and an up/down spinner.

[MikeQ]

Though I can see a product like this being used outside of the arcade community.  In fact I have a friend that bought a keywiz eco for a project that was not arcade related.

Happens more often than you might think.

If we get 4 unique id LEDwizs, I can create a christmas lighting setup that will be a grid 64x64.  Rows will represent + and columns will represent -.  If I can switch both positive and negative, I will be able to address 4096 circuits.  4096 strands of lights will allow me to do something far more impressive than this:

[SirPoonga]

Though I can see a product like this being used outside of the arcade community.  In fact I have a friend that bought a keywiz eco for a project that was not arcade related.

Happens more often than you might think.

Heh, I doubt it, I think it happens alot

I've been thinking of using a couple of ledwiz's to control some 7 segment counter leds for something.  But that would require several ledwiz's and I have to think it all through.

[MikeQ]

Ok, just fired up dotron default everything.  I get a joystick, 4 buttons a 2 coin acceptors lit. 

The buttons that get lit are aim up, aim down, p1 button 1 and p1 button 2.  No spinner and no trackball.  This is because by default track Y analog is set to NA and dial analog is set to NA and in MAME32 they contoller mapping for these is set to NONE.

So by default the game is unplayable.  I'm sure this is the case even with controls.dat. 

Now, I go into MAME32 and I map my mouse to "dial" devices.

When I fire up dotron, I get a joystick, 4 buttons, 2 coin acceptors, a spinner and trackball lit.

"No, by default the controller mappings for Disc of Tron are all keyboard keys. "
I am trying to understand this comment.

<snip>
not really worth arguing.  I'm speaking in MAME32 menu terms. 

So on your control panel do you have a trackball, did you disable highlighting the trackball in dotron?  The game only has an 8 way triggerstick (with two buttons) and an up/down spinner.

No, why would I disable the trackball.   The spinner could be pulled up and pushed down to control aiming.  Isn't that what the trackball would be used for?  I also have keys for it but I'd like both the be available if the game supports it.


If the trackball doesn't emulate the push/pull spinner,  then at the same time I enable the spinner, I could disable the trackball.  I have to set this stuff up anyway.

[SirPoonga]

No, why would I disable the trackball.   The spinner could be pulled up and pushed down to control aiming.  Isn't that what the trackball would be used for?  I also have keys for it but I'd like both the be available if the game supports it.

I forgot you are using mame32.  That makes things a little different.
YES, all games that use dial or trackball won't work unless you enable mouse in the mame.ini file.    However, if you have the hardware you are going to enable it.
If you have a spinner why would you want joystick highlighted for tempest?

If the trackball doesn't emulate the push/pull spinner,  then at the same time I enable the spinner, I could disable the trackball.  I have to set this stuff up anyway.

My original point is if you incorporated controls.dat then that stuff could be setup automatically.
What if you had an oscarcontrols up/down spinner?  Why would you want the trackball highlights as it is a hack when you have the actual hardware?

Like I said, the integration of controls.dat would mean the correct controls would be highlighted if the user has them.  There's no configuration.  So if you have a friend come across one of these oddball controlled games it will be correct without having to figure it out ahead of time.  And I think that's the point of highlighting controls, so you don't have to figure out what the game really used.

I guess I was hoping you'd see it that way.  Maybe save myself the need to write something as I didn't want to reinvent the wheel   But remembering you are using mame32 also negates that.  Good news is I found the source code for set49way.  My utility will use alot of the same code for parsing listxml and controls.dat to determine the correct hardware to light

[MikeQ]

I don't think MAME32 works differently.  I've built a .102 MAME from my source and the LED stuff works the same.  I should probably double check that with a weird game.

How do you tell normal MAME to a spinner to the mouse vs keyboard?

My original point is if you incorporated controls.dat then that stuff could be setup automatically.
What if you had an oscarcontrols up/down spinner?  Why would you want the trackball highlights as it is a hack when you have the actual hardware?

So how does controls.dat modify the control settings?  Does it replace the .cfg files or does it require a specail build of mame?  I thought controls.dat was used to create an image of a CP with the buttons that a game uses.  I didn't realize it reprograms all the input mappings.

I guess I was hoping you'd see it that way.  Maybe save myself the need to write something as I didn't want to reinvent the wheel   But remembering you are using mame32 also negates that.  Good news is I found the source code for set49way.  My utility will use alot of the same code for parsing listxml and controls.dat to determine the correct hardware to light

Really, I'd rather not make my stuff public.  I like this hobby more when I just do what I want.  I really want to work on my 3D stuff and changing what I have to make the rest of the world happy isn't helping me any.  I don't mind fiddling with the occasional game that has weird inputs.  It really hasn't been a problem so far.  You can walk into any BestBuy in the country and pick up a box with my software I've worked on, so I don't get a kick out of a bunch of people using my stuff.  Also, with people now adding RGB, LEDs to the mix, I'd have to go make a way to specify button colors.  I don't have or plan to do this on my setup so again, I'd be doing this for everyone else. 

I haven't had a chance to work on my cabinet in a month because I've been working on the lighting stuff.  I've been testing the code out the wazoo and making the LEDWiz hot swappable so that it all behaves like a nice product.  I wasn't doing this for me.  I'd really like to spend some time finishing or at least playing with my cabinet and working on the 3D acceleration.  Look at today.  I'm going to get about 5 hours sleep because I've been looking for a stupid game with more inputs than controls.

 BTW, unused buttons on NEO-GEO games aren't going to be detectable with my scheme.  The machine still has memory addresses for the unused buttons.  Luckily, a big picture in the game shows me what controls aren't used.  Also, I don't play an NEO-GEO games so it isn't a problem for me.

I would suggest not waiting on me.  I'd like to see another solution arrive so I don't feel like I should make my project public.   I think the simple config file for each game is a good solution for now.  It lets people use RGB's and is fairly simple. 

If you plan on using my LEDWiz.dll for communication, you may want to wait on the DLL that can support multiple LEDWiz's though.  If you use the current DLL you will probably suffer through a minor API change.   I should have it done this week.

[mccoy178]

Thanks for what you have done.  I say if it's burning you out, let it go.  Do your thing.