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Main => Raspberry Pi & Dev Board => Topic started by: Erzak on March 05, 2019, 11:42:17 am

Title: questions on Pi and Ultimarc setup
Post by: Erzak on March 05, 2019, 11:42:17 am
My cabinet is powered by a ~12 year old PC, with a 2.8 GHz Pentium D, a Nvidia GeForce 8600 GT video card, WinXP SP3, and a hard drive that is starting to have some issues.  I primarily use it for arcade games, though have a few console emulators installed.  I am using an I-PAC2 with a SpinTrak spinner and a U-Trak trackball connected to the I-PAC2, and two UltraStik 360's that are plugged directly into USB.  To turn the system on/off, I have an arcade button that's hooked to the PC's motherboard power toggle, and everything else is on a current sensing power strip, so turning the PC on then turns on the monitor, marquee light, USB hub, etc.

That being said, I'm thinking about replacing this PC since it's really on it's last legs.  I like the idea of a Raspberry Pi, both from the low energy use and low noise point of view, plus I like to tinker as much as I like to play, and there's plenty of tinkering to do with a Pi.  Seems like the 3 B+ would be the Pi board to go with.  I've been doing some reading, both here and elsewhere on the internet and not quite sure how seamless it would be.

Main concern is the I-PAC2/spinner/trackball and U360's will work properly and easily.  My Ultimarc stuff is all ~2 years old, have read that some earlier models do not work well under Linux, that the utilities are not as robust as those for Windows, etc. I do not have any buttons connected to the U360's, and read someplace that they may not work properly unless there is at least one button connected to them?

Secondary question is how to handle powering the system on/off, but it looks like there are several solutions, the Mausberry Shutdown Circuit looks like an easy way to use a standard arcade button to handle this, though I wonder if the Pi draws enough current to activate the current sensing power strip?   It's a Bits Limited Smart Strip.

My other option would be to buy another PC, probably a refurbished one with more current hardware and OS.  Costwise, there's probably not too much difference between the two options.  I expect I'd spend <$100 on a Pi and all the accessories, and probably spend ~$100-150 for a refurbished Win7 PC.

Thanks,
Eric
Title: Re: questions on Pi and Ultimarc setup
Post by: J_K_M_A_N on March 05, 2019, 03:21:45 pm
Well, I have a circa 2000 IPAC2 that I use with a pi. But it is just buttons and joysticks connected to it. It does work though. I also just bought a U360 for a new build I am working on and it works great on the PI3. I am figuring out how to use RGB Commander to change maps automatically and it seems to work great.

You will probably have a decent amount to learn to get it exactly how you want and hopefully someone will chime in on if the spinner and trackball will work with it. I do have a GGG spinner that works also but it is just a USB interface. I also don't run anything newer than about 1990 on mine so if you like the newer arcade games, you may have to test them out to see if they will run full speed. It is not a super powerful system.

J_K_M_A_N
Title: Re: questions on Pi and Ultimarc setup
Post by: daywane on March 17, 2019, 12:26:28 am
If your happy with what you have and it is just your hard drive going bad.
Why don't you just clone your old hard drive?
Title: Re: questions on Pi and Ultimarc setup
Post by: ballboff on March 19, 2019, 04:13:33 am
not sure if this will be of any help, but i've had a i-pac for nearly 10 years now and i'm currently using it with a pi3.  As it is recognised as a keyboard controller, it pretty much works with anything as each button I assign is a different key on the keyboard.  Pretty much anything recognises a keyboard.  However, mine doesn't have the spinner bit, so maybe that works more like a mouse, or completely different controller,  I dunno.