Warning to all Trackball hackers!!!

[CthulhuLuke]

Hello all,
   Well I was talking to a lot of people including SirPoonga, HowardC, and Oscar, and they all seemed to agree it would be totally fine to grab the +5v and ground for a trackball from a USB mouse's usb cord input instead of hacking out to another source such as the computer's power supply.
   I finally did this, double checked my wiring, and plugged it in to try it.  The computer says it's searching for an Unknown USB device, then nothing.  Absolute nothingness from the trackball, the mouse buttons don't even work.  So I unplug it, thinking it's a failure, and I try to plug in another USB device into the port, and nothing again.
   So in conclusion, by trying to grab the power from the USB cable on the mouse, somehow it shorted out my USB port, and I would not suggest anyone to try this themselves.  Maybe there was a reason no one else had tried this before me...
    -CthulhuLuke
ps: although its a shame I'm down one USB port, the plus side is I might be able to convince my parents to upgrade this computer to a 1.4ghz AMD, cause I'll just swap out the motherboard, and leave everything else in place.

[Dave_K.]

So where was the ground going from the trackball?  And this is an arcade trackball?

[grafixmonkey]

USB ports can only supply a small amount of current.  Not sure what happens if you overdraw current from a port, I thougt it was supposed to have a safety (cuz you can have port-powered usb hubs and plug 4 current drawing things in for 4x max port spec)

I dunno what arcade trackballs draw relative to the 500mA I see most USB hubs rated to provide, but if your trackball manufacturer designed it to not care how much power it drew, it might be well above what USB handles.

Try it with a self-powered USB hub tho, it might work.

[OSCAR]

Hello all,
   Well I was talking to a lot of people including SirPoonga, HowardC, and Oscar, and they all seemed to agree it would be totally fine to grab the +5v and ground for a trackball from a USB mouse's usb cord input instead of hacking out to another source such as the computer's power supply.
   I finally did this, double checked my wiring, and plugged it in to try it.  The computer says it's searching for an Unknown USB device, then nothing.  Absolute nothingness from the trackball, the mouse buttons don't even work.  So I unplug it, thinking it's a failure, and I try to plug in another USB device into the port, and nothing again.
   So in conclusion, by trying to grab the power from the USB cable on the mouse, somehow it shorted out my USB port, and I would not suggest anyone to try this themselves.  Maybe there was a reason no one else had tried this before me...
    -CthulhuLuke
ps: although its a shame I'm down one USB port, the plus side is I might be able to convince my parents to upgrade this computer to a 1.4ghz AMD, cause I'll just swap out the motherboard, and leave everything else in place.

There was evidently a short somewhere, either in your hack or in the trackball wire harness.  I've powered trackballs many times for over a year now from a USB mouse without any trouble.  I have a Happ 3" sitting on my desk right now powered by a USB mouse.

[Mike]

I agree with oscar. It works, that is how mine has been wired up for several months now. You must have wired something wrong or had some kind of short in the trackball.

[RandyT]

The other thing to keep in mind is that the circuitry for a trackball is really not very different than that of a mouse, maybe simpler depending on the type.  Therefore, it should use pretty much the same amount of power.

I'm with those that think something was shorted or hooked up wrong.  Did you test it with a multi-meter?  A $10 investment in one of those can save a lot of headaches.

RandyT

[rampy]

The other thing to keep in mind is that the circuitry for a trackball is really not very different than that of a mouse, maybe simpler depending on the type.  Therefore, it should use pretty much the same amount of power.

I'm with those that think something was shorted or hooked up wrong.  Did you test it with a multi-meter?  A $10 investment in one of those can save a lot of headaches.

RandyT

Just to be contrary...  buy the 15 dolalr multimeter... the 10 dollar multimeter has crappy leads.  I actually toasted the trace on an optic by trying to measure voltage across two pins next to eachother with the cheap arse probes and one slipped creating a short that sparked, and vaporized part of the trace....

I was able to bridge the gap in the trace with a little solder.

Rampy

[RandyT]

Just to be contrary...

May I call you "Mary" ?  

BTW, you can file down the tips if you run into this problem.  Just make sure they are clean before you use them.

*EDIT*
Or do you mean the handles?

RandyT

[rampy]

Just to be contrary...

May I call you "Mary" ?  

BTW, you can file down the tips if you run into this problem.  Just make sure they are clean before you use them.

*EDIT*
Or do you mean the handles?

RandyT

You're about to break into an Andrew Dice Clay rhyme aren;'t you? =P

Nah.. I meant the probe tips... I just prefer the type like you have on an oscillascope I guess... (they kinda grab/hook on to a post)

*shrug*  But i digress...

Rampy

[SirPoonga]

Hello all,
   Well I was talking to a lot of people including SirPoonga, HowardC, and Oscar, and they all seemed to agree it would be totally fine to grab the +5v and ground for a trackball from a USB mouse's usb cord input instead of hacking out to another source such as the computer's power supply.
   I finally did this, double checked my wiring, and plugged it in to try it.  The computer says it's searching for an Unknown USB device, then nothing.  Absolute nothingness from the trackball, the mouse buttons don't even work.  So I unplug it, thinking it's a failure, and I try to plug in another USB device into the port, and nothing again.
   So in conclusion, by trying to grab the power from the USB cable on the mouse, somehow it shorted out my USB port, and I would not suggest anyone to try this themselves.  Maybe there was a reason no one else had tried this before me...
    -CthulhuLuke
ps: although its a shame I'm down one USB port, the plus side is I might be able to convince my parents to upgrade this computer to a 1.4ghz AMD, cause I'll just swap out the motherboard, and leave everything else in place.

There was evidently a short somewhere, either in your hack or in the trackball wire harness.  I've powered trackballs many times for over a year now from a USB mouse without any trouble.  I have a Happ 3" sitting on my desk right now powered by a USB mouse.

Yeah Luke, I'd have to agree here.  Something you did must be weird.  I get my power just fine from the mouse.  How did you scome to the conclusion it was the power from the mouse, did you try another power supply and it worked???

[CthulhuLuke]

Crap, I wonder what da hell happened, cause I know I didn't burn out the chip, but I'll do some more tests with the multimeter with my father and see what exactly happened.  One interesting thing about my USB port, is that the port still gives off power, we tested that with a multimeter, and I had the wires correct going to the mouse, but I think it's definitely something in the trackball PCBs.  maybe one of em's bad or something stupid like that.
   Well its been concluded I have to use a HUB next time I wanna test out a USB hack, which is perfectly fair.  I was looking all over the internet to see if anyone has blown out their USB port before, but everyone says "Reinstall your OS, upgrade your BIOS" nothing about whether a USB has a safety to prevent blow outs or not.
    -Thanks for the advice guys, well if other people have done this, I must have done something wrong.
       -Luke

[SirPoonga]

No, USB does not have safety.  My friend burnt his usb 2.0 ports.  The chip was red!

Your trackball IRs could have issues too.


How are you testing this?

[StephenH]

Try installing the driver for the USB Device.   SOmetimes if it says "Unknown", then it is missing the driver.   This is especially true in earlier versions of windows (such as 98 and ME).

[StLouisRod]

Why do so many people go through so much pain to find a 5 volt power for their hacked trackballs?

Since most people are using an IPAC, like me, as their keyboard encoder, just solder a wire to the correct pin sticking out of the IPAC.  Those pins are meant to be plugged into the lighted keyboard leds, but most people don't use them for that anyway.

Andy has a schematic on his site www.ultimarc.com so you know which pin to use.  Voila, perfect 5 volts for whatever you need.