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need help with my minipac

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rockmes:
Hi guys,

Got a small problem-

Currently l have my control panel connected all to i-pac4 - 2 x 8way joysticks ,1 x 4way joystick, 7 button layout plus admin buttons. l am using a homemade spinner with a mouse hack to serial port . And l also have a 3 inch Betson Imperial trackball which is connected to a mouse hack to a ps2 port. l am using winXp home edition and havent had any problems with this setup, apart from the usual backspin problem of the trackball with the mouse hack. l now got my hands on a mini-pac and would like to install the trackball to it but nothing else.

How would l go about hooking up the mini-pac with the i-pac4? would l use the mini-pac connected to usb, then i-pac4 to the pass-thru ps2 port of the mini-pac. And the keyboard connected to the pass-thru ps2 port of the i-pac4?

 l have tried this but nothing works, and l have made sure that the mini-pac is grounded to my i-pac4.

l have the trackball connected to the mini-pac's 5v power on header pin 7, and ground to pin 5. then l have mouse buttons right and left to the appproriate pin and the y and x's as well, just like the diagram shows on the Ultimarc website .
When l plug in the minipac to the usb port of my computer it shows the green light.

What do you think l am doing wrong?

markrvp:
The minipac should not be connected to the Ipac at all.  The minipac plugs into a USB port all by itself.  It will show up in XP as an HID keyboard, and two mice.  All you need to do is hook your trackball to the minipac and you'll be off and running.

Don't worry that you XP will show you as having 3 keyboards and 2 mice.  It treats them all the same no matter which you use.

rockmes:
are there different version of the mini-pac? l just noticed that there are 2 types -1 with opti  and 2 -just for joysticks and buttons. How can l tell the difference? Maybe thats why mine isnt working

markrvp:
There are different harnesses.  My understanding is that their isn't any difference in the actual hardware.  If all the pin headers do not have wires connected to them through the connectors then you will need to make the appropriate harness to connect the trackball.

Important note:  the minipac must be connected through USB for the trackball/spinner to work.  When connected by PS2, only the keyboard encoder part shows up to the computer and the trackball/spinner would not work.

If this still doesn't get you going, then e-mail Andy at Ultimarc and he will talk you through it.

rockmes:
l have made my own harness using the end of usb cables but modifying it and leaving the wires l need just for the trackball.
As you see in the photo l have left (in the yellow harness) pin 2 for 5v, and pin 5 for gnd
In the black harness l have pins 31 & 32 for mouse buttons, pins 35,36,37,38, for X & Y axis, and also pin 40 for gnd foe my mouse buttons.

Anything wrong here?

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