Posted by Tim on 21, 2001 at 1:30 PM:
In Reply to: Circuitry posted by Munich on 21, 2001 at 1:19 PM:
It's pretty simple, really. All the 49-way stick has is basically three switches on each axis. The switches are activated as you press further in a direction. If you press in the other direction, it toggles a "direction" bit to use the same three switches for going the other way. To use one in place of an 8 way, all you'd have to do is connect the right input to the first X switch, the left input to the X direction, the up input to the first Y switch and the down input to the Y direction. (or visaversa)
Tim
: Well, since the 49 ways that the joystick can be positioned are in the form of a 7x7 grid, couldn't a circuit be developed that would assign an 8 way "position" to each square of the 49-way grid so that it could talk to MAME?
:
: : How is this grid of photocells interpreted by the end-system? The reason I'm asking is that maybe a rotary/optical kind of interface similar to a mouse controller via the PS/2 or serial port might be able to pull it off.
: : conceivably, a mouse cursor can go in many more than 49 directions, depending on the resolution, speed and angle of the ball movement.
: :
: : : I don't know of anybody that's ever come up with an interface for that thing. I've asked on this board and others with no replies. It uses a grid of photocells to sort of emulate an analog response, so a mechanincal interface would be tricky, and MAME software support will be very unlikely as well. If anybody does come up with a solution, please post it - I'd love to know!