need harness for mini-pac

[roberts123]

Hello i am looking for a wiring harness for a mini-pac that i want to use for the control panel on my arcade machine so if anyone knows where or how to get one it thank you

[surface tension]

Go straight to the source and order one from ultimarc.

That's the old board, so you'll probably need to contact Andy to make sure get the right one.

[Turnarcades]

That's the old board

.... and much better board, in my opinion.

[protokatie]

Just out of curiosity, what are the major diffs between the old board (the one I have but recently died on me) and the new one? I will be ordering a new minipac sometime soon, and would like to know what experience is different with it (I know I could go to andy's page for info, but I am more curious about people's experience with the new mp vs the old one.

[Turnarcades]

Just out of curiosity, what are the major diffs between the old board (the one I have but recently died on me) and the new one? I will be ordering a new minipac sometime soon, and would like to know what experience is different with it (I know I could go to andy's page for info, but I am more curious about people's experience with the new mp vs the old one.

The big issue for me is that the new board is not really a unique purpose-built board as the original mini-pac was, it is just a variation of the U-HID board. Also, the PS/2 version of this board is now more expensive than the USB version and I don't think the PS/2 adapter for the new one supports pass-through like the original board did. For example, for wiring simplicity we used 2 mini-pacs in PS/2 mode for a 4-player panel - one board could be mounted at either end of the panel to cover two players each, with the PS/2 cable running in serial from 1 mini-pac to the next, requiring just 1 input on the PC itself and still allowing a PS/2 keyboard to be connected to the first mini-pac. I've calculated many combinations and all methods of creating a 4-player panel now work out more expensive and will take longer to wire up.

Even from just a 2-player perspective I'm not over-enthused as if going with the now 'default' USB version, I've experienced a lot of problems with running the old mini-pac in USB mode in the past. It is supposedly to do with unplugging and switching USB ports with the mini-pac (which I'm not even doing, I've done enough panels to know better) and the supposed registry fix does not always work. If the same happens with this new version, I'm going to encounter problems every time I program a panel/PC, instead of just occasionaly when a USB mini-pac is essential (ie. when a trackball+spinner is required), which is also my final point...

The way the pre-wired harness is now supplied is only ready-made for the regular 2 joysticks/buttons arrangement. You now have to push the connectors from the trackball/spinner harness into the black connector block yourself and program them in using the U-HID programming utility. Whilst I'm sure it's not complex, it is yet another process that will take longer to complete and is more complex than the old arrangement.

Andy has said that he is willing to discuss creating a simpler viable 4-player harness/board program using this new board, but I will have to experiment with a few different arrangements of the existing board first to see what will be best. Not easy to find time to do when you are busy building as many cabinets/panels as we do.

Some of these points will not be relevant as they are issues that affect us only as a building outfit, but at least it gives some food for thought. I may need to post a full review and hopefully will not end up having to seek a new interface solution and supplier based on my findings, as until this point most aspects of their products and service have been perfect for our needs.

[surface tension]

When I met Andy, we spoke about the old/new minipac. The IC has gone obsolete, so tying it in with the u-hid design was the best way to go. I will soon be using the new version when I've used existing stock and on first impressions, the wiring method looks a little more structured. So, yes you may need to change your loom a little, but you can wire the 10-ways individually. Plus the trackball/spinner connections are isolated.

I've only ever used them in USB configuration and have never had any problems... apart from the XP bug where you simply had to delete the entry in the device manager.

As far as the trackball/spinner is concerned on on the new minipac, from what I gathered from Andy is that it is business as usual. Connect the trackball/spinner as before, no programming necessary... certainly not with u-hid software, but with the latest winipac.

It's just one of those things, products have to move on if something goes obsolete. As far as I'm concerned, nothing has really changed on the minipac apart from the USB connections.

Craig, if you're making so many control panels, you must be buying a lot of encoders. So there must be leverage on getting the u-hid (or custom-programmed version) on your panel at the same price?

[Turnarcades]

Craig, if you're making so many control panels, you must be buying a lot of encoders. So there must be leverage on getting the u-hid (or custom-programmed version) on your panel at the same price?

Well yeah, but like I said in my last post though I need to get in both a U-HID and the new Mini-Pac-UHID first with various cable configurations to identify what exactly will work best for our applications. Obviously the new configuration meets the needs of your cabinets owing to a fairly fixed layout for your control panels and PC hardware, whereas making a range of custom panels means we need to identify something suitable to cater for our 'usual' layouts (2-player, 2-player with analogs, 4-player, 4-player with analogs) but without extending the cost and the setup time too much, as it is mainly the construction time which reflects the cost of any custom work we do.

The details are too much to list here, but I have looked at various ways to do what we do without extra work and cost. The problem arises in that because of the custom nature of our builds, we do not order parts in bulk - instead ordering on a 'per cabinet' basis depending on what the customer wants. I will have to see.

I understand things have to move on, but if it ain't broke don't fix it. The big problem is the USB thing - many tmes I've not been able to resolve it - not sure if it's to do with the OS or the line of PC's we frequently use, but they are a good range so it shouldn't be the case. Besides that I'd rather not use up a USB port when there are only usually a couple available. On 4-player panels this now means two sockets as well as the USB problem. I don't know why this problem even exists as it's never happened with any other USB device or PC I've ever used.

[AndyWarne]

The way the pre-wired harness is now supplied is only ready-made for the regular 2 joysticks/buttons arrangement. You now have to push the connectors from the trackball/spinner harness into the black connector block yourself and program them in using the U-HID programming utility. Whilst I'm sure it's not complex, it is yet another process that will take longer to complete and is more complex than the old arrangement.

There are so many inaccuracies in this post I dont know where to start. I have no idea why you have this strange objection to our updating the board. Just to single out one part of your post, above, this is totally and utterly incorrect. There is one pre-made harness for switches and another for optical controls. No configuration is required for the optical controls.
Many people have commented to me that the new harness arrangement with goupings of 8 wires and the fact the optical harness is now separate, is an improvement.
The new board has 4 extra switch inputs for no extra cost.
Configuring it is the same task as the old board using exactly the same software, or it can be left in default mode.
Its true the board no longer has PS/2 connectors although it can be used in PS/2 mode, which we maintained largely for use with the console adaptors.
There is virtually nothing in common with the U-HID board other than the actual PCB which was designed from the outset to be universal. Thats good design.
Other examples of this are the U-HID Nano, PS3 adaptor, Trackball USB interface, Spinner USB interface. All of these use the same PCB but have different functions.