Main > Main Forum
Old Commodore joystick and Atari paddles...
JB:
--- Quote from: Stingray on April 06, 2005, 01:37:32 pm ---Rather than using Atari padles, you'd be better off just buying a suitable pot at Radio Shack and building your own. Those old Atari paddles are notoriously jittery.
-S
--- End quote ---
That's because they have 20 years of dirt in them. Clean 'em and they work really well.
JODY:
Years ago when I used some on my Atari computer they weren't jittery, but yeah, I've read to spray electrical cleaner in them and let them dry and should be good to go.
daywane:
How about the track ball? I still have one. I loved the track ball , even has a switch for track ball and joystick
I allready have a real track ball but would be neat to see it work again
MajorLag:
from what I recall, the driving controlers and trackballs worked the same way (except the trackball used 2 axis instead of one obviously). It is a failry odd encoding:
--- Quote ---Trackball in trackball mode.
----------------------------
Again, both fire buttons mapped onto the joystick trigger line.
Left/Right information mapped onto joystick L & R lines.
Up/Down information mapped onto joystick U & D lines.
LR
Ball moving left 00
10<-|
00---
LR
Ball moving right 01
11<-|
01---
UD
Ball moving up 00
10<-|
00---
UD
Ball moving down 01
11<-|
01---
Note that the sequence can start with either L/U at 0 or 1, but the direction
indication bit R/D changes as soon as the trackball detects a direction change.
The faster bit L/U toggles, the faster the ball is rolling. It is a good idea
to check about 8 times during screen display (DLI on 8 bit Atari computers,
part of display loop on VCS), and during vertical blank. Checking only during
vblank will only allow the controlled item to move at scan rate/2, i.e. one
pixel every two frames, and transitions will be missed, causing the item to
SLOW DOWN when the ball is rotated faster!
If either of you have any questions about this, please ask. The reason for
doing this now, is because I am in the process of selling all my 8 bit stuff,
having already sold all my VCS collection. :-(
--- End quote ---
this information brought to you by:
markh AT inmos.co.uk
via some document I had laying around.
RayB:
Atari paddles would get jittery even after only a year or two of use.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version