Encoder Comparison Pages Updated

[Tiger-Heli]

http://www.mameworld.net/tigerheli/encoder/index.htm

The page has now "blossomed" into Arcade Interfaces and includes optical, gamepad, rotary, and 49-way interfaces, as well as keyboard encoders.

Comments welcome.

[Adeptus]

Check out http://www.codemercs.com/E_index.html
They make a range of USB encoder chips for keyboard, joystick, mouse, and general I/O. And they now offer joystick encoder 'modules' (the chip with all associated components mounted on a PCB, just add cables & controls)

I have a couple of the joystick encoder chips, which I still haven't gotten around to doing anything with...
(need some ceramic resonators & particular resistor values which seem to be hard to come by round here... plus I haven't had time...)

[Tiger-Heli]

Check out http://www.codemercs.com/E_index.html

Interesting - Not sure whether I'll add anything about them or not.

First off, while this is BYOAC, they seem more geared toward manufacturers than end users.  I.e. they would be a good source for Hagstrom or GGG or Ultimarc, if they wanted to outsource some of their production.  Not sure that the end user would be able to buy and incorporate these chips cost effectively.

Secondly, there is no pricing on their website, for North America, they refer to a distributor, but ask you to E-mail him for pricing, and he only seems to carry the I/O Warrior line of chips.

[Adeptus]

Yeah, their distribution kinda sucks... 

I was looking at getting mine from Germany but the postage was going to be more than the chips were worth... but they were looking for leads on companies in Australia who could act as distributors for them, & agreed to swap me a couple of chips for some suggestions on who to try. 

So, you may be able to get some for review purposes. 
Can't hurt to ask.

As far as cost effectiveness... I think the chips I have (digital directions + 8 buttons) were going to cost about the same as a gamepad, once you add the other required components. The more advanced chips were not much more costly I believe, which may make them cheaper than the gamepad (or keyboard?) equivalent.

Also, some people may prefer having a chip with circuit diagrams so they can build their own interface, making a PCB as small as they like (within limits of the circuitry), rather than hacking a pad. That's certainly what got me looking at them in the first place.

(Like I said, I still haven't put mine to use, so can't comment on the end result.)

[Tiger-Heli]

My general feeling is that it is probably more involved than most users on the board will want.  I'm also not sure it will ever be cost effective with the GGG Eco line when you figure adding on the PCB and pin header, KB connectors, and soldering everything together.

That said, I probably should mention somewhere in the review that if you were going the ButtonBox route, lots of chip manufacturers will send you FREE evaluation samples if you say you are only interested in one or two (especially if you say you are building an electronics component with it and sound like you might be a company interested in 1,000's more down the line, but that's somewhat of an ethics issue.)