GunCon2 + ArcadeVGA

[Minwah]

I got a bit confused trying to find the answers to these questions, so if anyone knows...

Is the circuit here ( http://intruderalert.myarcade.org/GUNCON2.htm ) required for ArcadeVGA card?  I presume so but just wanted to check, since I'm not sure if the circuit is for a normal VGA card or not.

Also, from the WinGun site ( http://www.acornscity.com/guncon/index.php?language=english ), I read:

'Note: If you are shopping for a video card to use with WinGun, get a Geforce 4200 or newer Nvidia! Some Radeons have trouble with screen brightening - including the ArcadeVGA card.'

Just wondering if anyone actually has a GunCon2 working with an ArcadeVGA card?  If so, how well does it work?

[Acorn]

The circuit is required for any VGA out - the input for the gun is a composite (RCA), so you must have the video stream in this format at some point in time. You can send whatever you want the the monitor (assuming it is a 15Khz monitor).

ArcadeVGA's work fine normally, to my reports. Since they use a Radeon 9200 for a base, and ATI's drivers hadn't caught up to speed by that time - you'll be missing a few features here and there, in various programs. For the guncon2 drivers this means no gamma flashing. Recently one person reported gamma flashing as working with an arcadevga, so it is possible the most recent drivers support downloadable gamma ramps (or perhaps hes using the omega hacked drivers, I don't know yet).

[Minwah]

Thanks for your reply, very helpful

ArcadeVGA's work fine normally, to my reports. Since they use a Radeon 9200 for a base, and ATI's drivers hadn't caught up to speed by that time - you'll be missing a few features here and there, in various programs. For the guncon2 drivers this means no gamma flashing. Recently one person reported gamma flashing as working with an arcadevga, so it is possible the most recent drivers support downloadable gamma ramps (or perhaps hes using the omega hacked drivers, I don't know yet).

What is 'gamma flashing'?

Also, do you happen to know about the old ArcadeVGA version (based on Radeon 7000 series)?  I guess it would give similar results as you describe.

[Acorn]

Gamma flashing is the screen flashing that is quoted above. Since lightguns obtain a position by reading the timing of the scanlines, and since when an area is dark/black the scanlines become invisible, lightguns cannot read a position when pointed at a dark/black area. Therefore making the entire screen bright is very helpful, since you have a chance at hitting your target *grin*. Gamma flashing is the way I came up with to brighten the screen. It does not work on older ATI cards.

The results should be similar. You can also expect some lag in HOTD2 and VirtuaCop if (and only if) you use troubleshooter with that card.

[Minwah]

Gamma flashing is the screen flashing that is quoted above. Since lightguns obtain a position by reading the timing of the scanlines, and since when an area is dark/black the scanlines become invisible, lightguns cannot read a position when pointed at a dark/black area. Therefore making the entire screen bright is very helpful, since you have a chance at hitting your target *grin*. Gamma flashing is the way I came up with to brighten the screen. It does not work on older ATI cards.

OK thanks, I knew the theory but never heard of the 'gamma' part.

So I suppose I would just have to try it and see how it goes.  I also have tinted glass which is against me...but hopefully raising the brightness should cancel that out.

The results should be similar. You can also expect some lag in HOTD2 and VirtuaCop if (and only if) you use troubleshooter with that card.

I have Virtua Cop somewhere...I didn't think it ran on XP tho.  HOTD2 I'm more likely to play on Xbox (unlocked with HOTD3).  Primarily I want to use a GunCon2 gun for MAME.

Thanks again

[Alcohol]

hi minwah,

iam currently using a guncon and arcadvga card on my cab, the set up is basically a vga to scart cable connected to a 21" tv,all i did was solder a phono lead to the scart connector to get the sync for the gun (after making a new cable).

the gun is connected to the pc's usb port and to a psx to usb adapter, it also required a power supply to be connected to the psx to usb adapter or windows would not see the gun.

so far results with accuracy have been very good and most games are very very playable, unfortunately it isnt 100% right as you do get the odd dead spot and strange quirk while playing, so far i would say its 85% to being perfect.

so yes it does work  and no you dont need a circuit to make it work, i had to join h-sync and v-sync though in the cable to get the composite sync required to get a solid picture


As a side note while iam here, ive been playing hotd2 using the gun and it plays great, but for some reason if i launch hotd2 using mamewah, as soon as i press the trigger or any button hotd crashes .. but if i just play hotd without mamewah it works fine, any help is apreciated


Alc..

[Acorn]

Tinted glass results will vary - but be warned, at the very worst, the glass will cause the gun to believe it is pointed offscreen 50%+ of the time, making all games nearly unplayable.

Virtua cop runs fine for me on XP. HOTD2/3 will be much better on the X-Box probably

Alchol - for some reason mamewah doesn't seem to like lightguns But then, most other launchers don't either. For example, if you launch virtuacop 2 indirectly (as most people do, through a batch file) then it will run in a window, and minimise/crash every time you click the top-left corner. Yours could be something similar.

[Minwah]

iam currently using a guncon and arcadvga card on my cab, the set up is basically a vga to scart cable connected to a 21" tv,all i did was solder a phono lead to the scart connector to get the sync for the gun (after making a new cable).

What pins on the Scart?  Just Gnd & Sync?

the gun is connected to the pc's usb port and to a psx to usb adapter, it also required a power supply to be connected to the psx to usb adapter or windows would not see the gun.

OK, I didn't think the PS2 connector was usually required...probably varies on gun type (?)

so far results with accuracy have been very good and most games are very very playable, unfortunately it isnt 100% right as you do get the odd dead spot and strange quirk while playing, so far i would say its 85% to being perfect.

That's pretty good, considering the battle involded!

so yes it does work  and no you dont need a circuit to make it work, i had to join h-sync and v-sync though in the cable to get the composite sync required to get a solid picture

Cool, I suppose as the AVGA can be connected straight to a TV it already has the correct sync (?)

As a side note while iam here, ive been playing hotd2 using the gun and it plays great, but for some reason if i launch hotd2 using mamewah, as soon as i press the trigger or any button hotd crashes .. but if i just play hotd without mamewah it works fine, any help is apreciated

With new (beta) versions of Mamewah you could try game-specific commandline settings, so you can use {safelaunch} and {dosbox} which *may* solve the problem.

[Minwah]

Tinted glass results will vary - but be warned, at the very worst, the glass will cause the gun to believe it is pointed offscreen 50%+ of the time, making all games nearly unplayable.

OK, I'll be prepared for the worst then.  Was I right in thinking upping the brightness might help?

Virtua cop runs fine for me on XP. HOTD2/3 will be much better on the X-Box probably

I'll have to dig out my old V-Cop, used to love that game.  HOTD3 on Xbox is great, the HOTD2 port is a bit jerky at times tho, for some reason.

Alchol - for some reason mamewah doesn't seem to like lightguns But then, most other launchers don't either. For example, if you launch virtuacop 2 indirectly (as most people do, through a batch file) then it will run in a window, and minimise/crash every time you click the top-left corner. Yours could be something similar.

Take a look at this thread from Biff...I have not gone through it in-depth but he has really gone to town on documenting his gun experiences (inc. with Mamewah):

http://www.mameworld.info/ubbthreads/showthreaded.php?Cat=&Number=45128&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1&vc=1&new=1125954798

[JoeB]

I haven't tried the guncon2 yet with my ArcadeVGA card, but I should also add that if you are using a JPAC with your arcadeVGA, then a lot of your problems will go away.

- the JPAC has a video amp in it
- the JPAC video output is composite, which is what the gun needs, so no need to build any circuit.  It's a direct tap!

[Minwah]

- the JPAC video output is composite, which is what the gun needs, so no need to build any circuit.  It's a direct tap!

Doesn't joining the h & v syncs from the AVGA make a suitable composite sync?  I know it is sufficient for Scart TV's which require a composite sync...

[Alcohol]

What pins on the Scart?  Just Gnd & Sync?

pins 20 and 17

OK, I didn't think the PS2 connector was usually required...probably varies on gun type (?)

some guns need 9v through a pin on the psx connector, iused my adapter because it had a 9v input on it, thats all

Cool, I suppose as the AVGA can be connected straight to a TV it already has the correct sync (?)

 i used the old mamescart diagrams to make my original cable and it worked first time, but to try and improve accuracy i made a new cable using these diagrams

http://www.idiots.org.uk/vga_rgb_scart/index.html

using that cable gave me a messed up picture at first so iam "guessing" the arcade vga does not give out composite sync, so i joined h and v-sync together on the vga connector and connected pin 20 and 16 together on the scart connector.. this fixed the picture and the cable did give a good improvement on accuracy compared to the old mamescart diagram i made my first cable from....

With new (beta) versions of Mamewah you could try game-specific commandline settings, so you can use {safelaunch} and {dosbox} which *may* solve the problem.

its a little wierd but ill keep working on it.. mame/lightgun and mamewah works great, but when i launch hotd2 from mamewha as soon as i press a button on the gun it locks up

Alc..

[Silver]

Doesn't joining the h & v syncs from the AVGA make a suitable composite sync?  I know it is sufficient for Scart TV's which require a composite sync...

In theory no, in practice - probably. It actually depends on the kit. A lot of people have success creating a composite sync by joining the wires - the results are not perfect, but a lot of kit can deal with it.

Note (to anyone else): that this only works with the ArcadeVGA because its already outputing a 15Khz signal. You can not do the above with a regular VGA card (or at least you can, but it would be useless as its a 31Khz+ signal)

Next Note: All modern radeon drivers I have seen (I've never seen ArcadeVGA drivers, so they may not) can be set to ouput composite sync in the display options. Almost all radeons can be made to ouput 15Khz signals via powerstrip. Add the two together and in theory the radeons can output a composite 15Khz signal directly, with no circuits whatsoever. I plan to test if this works sometime but it may well not....?

[Alcohol]

A lot of people have success creating a composite sync by joining the wires - the results are not perfect,

This was something i was thinking about, ive joined the wires on mine and it works well, bu t i was thinking of buying a j-pac to get composite sync and tapping off the edge connector to my scart connector.

what iam getting at is, would the composite signal from a j-pac give me better results than h-sync and v-sync connected together?, or is composite sync the same all the time and cant be improved or done poorly?


Alc..

[Silver]

I honestly don't really know.

However, I suspect if the gun seems to work - then its picking up the syncs and changing to a system with cleaner syncs is not really going to improve things. Syncs are basically just a 'pulse' of voltage at regular intervals. Monitors and such have 'clamping' circuits that rebuild a clock frequencey based on the timing of these pulses - essentially allowing it to work out where and when to place each bit of the picture. Theres no grey area - it either works (your picture is stable) or not (your picture rolls). This is simplified, but basically if it works then it thres not much to improve...

[Alcohol]

good man.. thanks for the info, i may end up trying it anyway just for the hell of it.. itl give me something to do

Alc