The NEW Build Your Own Arcade Controls
Main => Main Forum => Topic started by: joe on May 08, 2002, 04:45:39 pm
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i saw on this site: http://www.webajm.com/ajmconsulting/
of something mounted on a powerstrip, with some pictures and this caption: "Remote turn wired into relay and power strip (thanks Scott)"
is this some kind of switch or what? what does this mean? if it is some type of switch i would be intrested in learning more. well if u know any info. about this reply and thanks in advance.
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There is a circuit diagram on the site but not quite enough info to determine exactly what he has in mind. Why not send him an email and ask the question directly?
Just a thought.
Bob
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I have seen this on another site, but I am not sure which one. Here is what he is doing, some PC's (most newer ones) can be turned on by pressing the space bar.
Some MAMErs take advantage of this by connecting a relay to one of the spare power leads on the PC's power supply. The relay is the wired into the power strip so that when the PC powers up, everything plugged into the power strip turns on.
The final step is to have a button on the control panel for the space bar. That way you can turn on the whole cabinet by pressing a button on the control panel.
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Or.....
plug your powerstrip into the switched outlet on your powersupply (the female one) This was designed to plug your monitor into, you just have to get the right power cord.
-C
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That is easier, if you have the second power plug. None of the four PC's that I have access to have the female power plug on the back. Monitors that turn them selves on when there is a signal have made the second plug less common than it used to be.
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I still don't understand why all the electronics? What I did was wire a switched outlet inside my cab. I bought a black 15' heavy duty extension cord and cut off the female end. I then inserted it into an outlet box I nailed into the side of the cab. I wired the common (white) and ground (copper) to the correct terminals on the outlet. I took a spare piece of romex (the stuff used for household wiring) and wired the hot (black) to the black wire in the romex. I also covered the exposed white insulation of the white wire with black electrical tape so I get a visual reminder that the wire is being used as a hot wire. I ran the romex to the upper part of my cab behind the marquee. I made a hole and installed a rocker switch (from Home Depot sku #541265, mine has no lettering on it unlike the pic on Home Depot's site). I connected the black wire to one terminal of the rocker switch and connected the black covered white wire to the other terminal. I then connected the other end of the black covered white wire to the hot side of the outlet. I plugged the surge protector into the switch outlet. All I have to do is press the rocker switch and poof! everything turns on.
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JustMicheal,
I am doing the same that thing that you did.
I guess some people want to do something a little more impressive. If you have a PC that powers up from the space bar, all you need is a relay and some wire.
I wasn't sure why he had the 555 timer circuit on there at first. I took a look at the site again, and I still don't understand why the timer circuit was needed.
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Ah Haaa!
I just looked again, there is a pictue of the back of the television set that he used.
It appears that the timer circuit is used to automaticaly turn the TV on when the rest of the cab powers up. When the power is turned on, the first stage of the timer waits for one second, then the second stage generates a one second pulse. This pulse is probably connect to the power button on the TV to turn it on.
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Awesome deduction ErikRudd! That is exactly what the timer delay is for.
Unfourtunately I haven't had the time to put together a full start to finsih write up but I will when completed, please stop back by if your interested.
The 2 555 timers do exactly what you said, they create a delay between my PC and the TV Remote turn on wire. I found that my power strip relay worked great but my TV would sometimes not turn on and that was because my turn on switch for my cabinet boots my PC as well as turns ON my TV. The only problem with the setup is that the power strip relay doesn't get energized until the motherboard powers up, so there isn't any power for the TV to turn ON. So my solution was to build the timer delay...
I use 12 volts from the power supply to energize the relay on the power strip not the spacebar, that lets me use a regular ON/OFF pushbutton switch to power on the cabinet.
Yes, I could have done it differently and I wasn't looking to be all that "impressive", I mean who's going to see it?? It was more of a project similar to the cabinet itself. I could have bought an Arcade cabinet instead of making one...
Great deduction! :D
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Definitely post a writeup--I need to do this for my cabinet too!
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Just wanted to let you know that I finally posted a witeup on the ON/OFF switch that I made.
You can check it out on my site.
http://www.ajmmame.webajm.com/Monitor.htm
AJM,
:D