Posted by Raptor||| on 11, 2000 at 8:17 PM:
In Reply to: Re: Off topic ? Is there a way (i.e. a software) which would make possible to use a cabinet as a jukebox playing mp3s ? That means an arcade controls/monitor friendly player. TIA posted by Druin on 11, 2000 at 5:40 PM:
: Well aside from finding an mp3 player that likes normal keyboard keys (hence cabinet joystick/button keys)....you can always use trackballs/other serial controls for navigation in windows mp3 players, but what I wanted to say was that Winamp has a plug in that lets you use the PC joystick as a control - and I use this just on my normal computer.
: I almost fully use MP3s now, mostly because I've been away from home for 2.5years in school temporary housing, so I stopped carrying my cds and cd player around, and just mp3'd anything I wanted to hear....and I play music EVERY day no matter what I'm doing unless I'm hung over.
: So to control the mp3s without having to use the keyboard/mouse, and without having to go up to the computer (yes it's possible to be that lazy, screen saver being on that you have to overcome etc)...I just have my gamepad set up so that Up/Down is track forward/reverse skip, and Left/Right is song 5 second skip forward/reverse into the track, and one button toggles play/pause and another is the stop button. So the joystick can reach across the room, and if I"m sitting over there studying, I just cue a big playlist and grab the joystick and when I get bored I start pressing the up/down to get more songs.
: Although most cabinets probably won't use the PC joystick port in their controls, you COULD just even have a little gamepad laying around for controlling jukebox functions. As long as Winamp is loaded and set up for joystick input, you can control it no matter what the PC is doing (screen saver on, other task in foreground, even while MAME is running you can control the mp3s)...I found that to be actually a bother - since I have no cabinet, and I play mame on my normal computer, I always have to close winamp first because whenI go to use the gamepad in mame, the keys also mess with winamp...
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: So that's my feedback.
There are also remote controls that can be used as mice and various stuff that are programmable, so you would press a button to load winamp then assign each buttons to a particular key. I think you can get them for about 40 bucks, thats what I'm planning on using for my cabinet