Imperial Trackball From Ebay Problems

[foosguy27]

I finally finished my Mame cabinet a few days ago.  It only took like 6 months, but seemed like forever.  Anyway, I bought one of the NEW 3" Imperial Trackballs from E-bay with the PS2 connector and 3 buttons, all wired up.  I plugged the unit in and it seems to work OK.  
The problem I am having is that when I play trackball games like Capcom Bowling, or Mini Golf if I move the trackball real hard, it doesn't seem to want to register.  Let me give you an example.  If I push forward real hard in Capcom bowling, the ball will almost seem to go backwards at first, and then slowly roll down the lane.  Same in Mini Golf, if I slide the trackball real hard to the left, the ball will go to the right a bit, and then just move a real little bit.  I did read a post a while ago from someone else, saying they were having a similar problem.  They thought it may have something to do with the encoders or something?  These trackballs are apparently what comes in the Golden Tee games and you can hit them as hard as you want in any direction and they seem to be rather precise.  I have no idea what is causing this problem.  If anyone has any ideas or suggestions, it would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks for your time.

Brian

[rampy]

sounds like backspin... (I assume the effect of spinning it "hard" is that it spins "fast")

hmm... one small trick that might help for the bowling game (for me it did anyways - I have an imperial betson but not ps/2 version) was to adjust the dipswitch setting in capcom bowling.  There's a setting for trackball size, aparentely if someone converted a game with a smaller trackball you could compensate via dipswitch (in the real deal)...

I dunno what else to tell ya... is mouse accelleration off ?  

rampy

[Chris]

You may have the sensitivity set too high in the analog controls, so the emulated trackball is backspinning, not the real trackball.  Try reducing your sensitivity and see if that helps...

--Chris

[MameFan]

What you're witnessing is the same as a bike tire with spokes that is going forward, and as speed increases, suddenly appears to be going backwards as an optical illusion occurs with the spokes moving in just the right time to appear to be going backwards.

By spinning fast, you may be overloading either the original circuitry, or as others said, the psuedo circuity in that the pulses in forward motion exceed the sampling rate, and therefore actually set up a condition for it to look like it's going backwards when in reality it's not.

Since you say these same balls don't do this in a real machine, then I assume the problem is not with their encoders. It probably is in the converter that converts the encoding to the keyboard PS/2 emulator.  I know other sites have talked about how slow the keyboard is polled (read by the computer) and that sometimes causes problems with keyboard hacks pressing too many buttons in rapid succession, some not registering.  Perhaps the same issue is here in the mouse port.

Mice were never meant to travel fast over long distances.. slow over short distances only. So you are probably stressing out (figuratively speaking) the actual PS/2 hardware, and not even the software sensitivity in Mame.

Perhaps look for a model with USB conversion, perhaps they can handle a faster input rate?

[Chris]

USB mice poll at, I believe, at least twice the rate of PS/2 mice.

[foosguy27]

Geez I should have used this forum a LONG time ago.  Thanks for all of the wondeful ideas.  Ummm, BTW, I am using MAME32 the version .59.  I am still using this version, because it plays NBA jams and all other games at a higher speed than the newer MAME32 versions do.  Anyway, onto the trackball again.  I have a little device that converts a PS2 plug to a USB plug.  Would you suggest plugging in the converter and putting it in the USB port?  I am willing to try anything.  Also, how would I go about adjusting the Sensistivity?  Do I do this in MAME32 or somewhere in my computers Control Panel?  I have a feeling that you are exactly right, that the mouse port cannot handle, what a trackball is intended to do.  I will wait to try the USB thing after hearing some replies on here (hopefully).  Also, is anyone else out there using one of these E-bay PS2 Imperial trackballs?  How are they working for you?  And what did you do to help make them work better?  Again, any help is greatly appreciated.

Brian

[Chris]

The trackball sensitivity is under the Analog Controls menu.  Start the game, press Tab, and go to Analog Controls.

--Chris

[Ted_Striker]

I got an Imperial trackball and I like it.  It wasn't from ebay (I bought it from Imperial) but it is the same unit.  I have the ps2 type and had similiar problems as you.  However all were cured by fiddling with the analog control setup.  Runs like a champ when you get it tweaked in.

[gtjoe]

Try replacing the encoder wheels from 24 teeth to 36 teeth

Check out
"Replacing Imperial PS/2 trackball encoder wheels"
bu Oscar on December 06, 2002

http://www.arcadecontrols.org/yabbse/index.php?board=1;action=display;threadid=3760;start=0

There are pictures of the new encoders installed.

[rampy]

What settings did you settle upon, if you don't mind sharing...

I just had a maddening experience with shuuz because the sensitivity was all out of wack...

thanks!
rampy

I got an Imperial trackball and I like it.  It wasn't from ebay (I bought it from Imperial) but it is the same unit.  I have the ps2 type and had similiar problems as you.  However all were cured by fiddling with the analog control setup.  Runs like a champ when you get it tweaked in.

[jerryjanis]

Ha Ha... Shuuz!  I've had a few recent all-nighters playing that and enjoying the beer breaks...  I could care less about the game, but the friends love it!