The UniBios & IR-Maze thread.

Razoola

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Ok, thanks to the help of Michele Nassivera who has taken some time to get a Universe Bios rigged up to a MV-1C I now have the info to wire a IR Maze kit to _ANY_ MVS with joysticks ports. This is a first port of call, once everything is confirmed working it should be very easy to get a kit wired up to an AES also.

I must point out first that still no one has given any feedback on if IR maze even works with v2.2. and no one has yet tried this to confirm that it works. Also the Unibios only communicates with the trackball and button parts of the P.C.B, everything related to the lights and air etc is simply not controlled.

Ok, on to the info...

The JAMMA section of the IR MAZE kit simply plugs into the MVS as it would on a MC-1B or 1C so that part is easy. The next step is the hard part but if you know how to use a soldering iron to make a lead then even this is easy. Basically there is a 8 pin connector on the IR P.C.B kit that normally plugs into the MV-1B or 1C. You wire this as follows.


Code:
CON1

pin 1 - NC
pin 2 - NC
pin 3 - pin  9 of 2up joystick port
pin 4 - pin  2 of 2up joystick port
pin 5 - pin 10 of 2up joystick port
pin 6 - pin  9 of 1up joystick port
pin 7 - pin  2 of 1up joystick port
pin 8 - pin 10 of 1up joystick port

NOTE
- Pin 1 is ground and may need connecting to any of the two (or both) joystick port grounds (pin 1 of both joystick ports) if the P.C.B dosn't take ground from the JAMMA.
- Pins 3,4,5 probably don't need wiring up either but I just mention them because if they did, this is where they would need to go.

Basically this is all that would be needed. All you need to do now is start the game and enable the trackball cheat and it should all work (fingers crossed).

The next step to get this working on an AES is simply in theory. First you simply take all the JAMMA 1up and 2up joystick and buttons and wire them into the correct joystick ports. You will of course also need to wire the ground. Lastly I don't know what power the P.C.B runs on but of course youll need to get power into it from somewhere.

It should be quite easy to make a custom P.C.B and trackball so the actual IR maze kit is not needed. Its a simple case of those 6 lines selecting what info is returned to the joystick inputs. I'm hoping someone will do this becuse it would be very easy to get a trackball working through 1 joystick port only instead of two that this IRmaze kit requires by default.

I'm hoping some people are going to try this and give feedback.

Raz
 
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Verythrax

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Excuse if I didn't get everything but... Playing IR with a conventional Neo Stick is a no no?
 

Kpj

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Raz,

Thanks for the update/info. I'll try IM on the AES shortly (via Phantom1)

Kpj
 

Razoola

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Verythrax said:
Excuse if I didn't get everything but... Playing IR with a conventional Neo Stick is a no no?

There is an option in 2.2 to play it with a joystick too. I added joystick and trackball support.

Raz
 

MKL

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If I understand correctly you will always need some trackball interface, either the official one or a home-made one (following the schematics you posted time ago?). If one has a MV-1B or MV-1C with Unibios 2.2 and the official IM interface it will be plug and play. If one has a different motherboard he'll have to do that extra wiring from the interface to the controller ports. Correct?
 

Razoola

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MKL said:
If I understand correctly you will always need some trackball interface, either the official one or a home-made one (following the schematics you posted time ago?). If one has a MV-1B or MV-1C with Unibios 2.2 and the official IM interface it will be plug and play. If one has a different motherboard he'll have to do that extra wiring from the interface to the controller ports. Correct?

Yes you are correct on all counts. Thinking about it, with the extra wiring you probably dont even have to wire up the ones which goto the 2up joystick port either. The ones for the 1up joystick port are needed though. I'll update the first post to mention this.

Actually one _could_ wire up a trackball without the need of an interface. The problem would be that there would be no room for buttons unless you took the 8bit X and 8bit Y values and made them 7 bits each instead, that would allow for 2 buttons at the exspence of some trackball control smoothness. Then you could wire 7 bit X + 1 button + 1up start + 1up select to player 1 joystick port and 7 bit Y + 1 button + 2up start + 2up select to player 2 joystick port. This would then work once I added support for it to be wired like that in the bios.

Basically the control pins of the 8 pin connector are either high or low so the actual interface isn't really that advanced, its simply a switch to control what bits are going to the joystick port. As there are 3 lines per port, in effect the joystick port can handle 8 different presets. A trackball and buttons only requires 3.

If someone was to make one it could even be multi purpose as I'm sure some people would like to use it to make a mahjong controller also which basically works on the same principle... And the game paddle (pop n bounce)... And the 4 player joystick (kizuna) for that matter.

Raz
 
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werejag

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this seems interesting Razoola , i didnt understand your chart anywhere else i can look to see if i could build one?
 

Razoola

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werejag said:
this seems interesting Razoola , i didnt understand your chart anywhere else i can look to see if i could build one?

The chart is simply a lead to be built for an original IR maze kit to work on a MVS with joystick ports.

Raz
 

MKL

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Razoola said:
It should be quite easy to make a custom P.C.B and trackball so the actual IR maze kit is not needed. Its a simple case of those 6 lines selecting what info is returned to the joystick inputs. I'm hoping someone will do this becuse it would be very easy to get a trackball working through 1 joystick port only instead of two that this IRmaze kit requires by default.

On the official interface I see 8 lines coming out of the FPGA and going to the Jamma connector to the pins that are normally used for P1 up/down/left/right/A/B/C/D (= P1 joy port). And the 4 buttons (but only 1 actually used?) of the official cab are on the pins normall used for P2 A/B/C/D (= P2 joy port). Wouldn't a home-made interface be supposed to do the same as the FPGA but using standard logic gates? If so, what joy port pin(s) would be used for the button(s) if the button pins on the same port are already used by 4 of the 8 trackball lines? Probably I'm confused...
 

Razoola

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MKL said:
On the official interface I see 8 lines coming out of the FPGA and going to the Jamma connector to the pins that are normally used for P1 up/down/left/right/A/B/C/D (= P1 joy port). And the 4 buttons (but only 1 actually used?) of the official cab are on the pins normall used for P2 A/B/C/D (= P2 joy port). Wouldn't a home-made interface be supposed to do the same as the FPGA but using standard logic gates? If so, what joy port pin(s) would be used for the button(s) if the button pins on the same port are already used by 4 of the 8 trackball lines? Probably I'm confused...

Yes IR maze only uses 1 button but it can handle 4 like you say. If you copied the current interface exactly you would need to wire to 1up and 2up ports (1up for trackball 2up for buttons).

If your going to build a custom controller pcb though I would more advise not to copy exactly what the IR controller does but rather do it so everying for the trackball and buttons goes through one controller port only. This would allow for using the controller not just for IR maze but for the other types of controllers like I mentioned before (2 sticks in one joy port for 4 player game). It would also look alot neater. I would need to update the unibios to accept this configuration but that part is easy to do.

If you picture in your head 8 banks of 8 buttons. Then a switch that has 8 possible positions, thats one position for each bank. Basically only one bank of 8 buttons is sent to the controller inputs (the one that corrosponds to the switch position). As soon as the switch position is changed the new bank corrosponding to the new position is sent only.

The switch is basically 3 lines from the 1up joystick port (each are either low or high). That give you 8 possible settings from all low to all high (0 to 7). What the Bios does is set the required switch for the bank it wants to read, wait a short time and finally read the joystick inputs.

I sopose all this is getting ahead of ourselves though, I still need to know if it works with the current IR controller.

Raz
 

JMKurtz

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Ahh, an IM thread - nice :) I've stuck the thread for you.

Has Kenny reported his testings yet? If not, and if he can't get you the info, I'll hook mine up and give it a go.

Jeff
 

Razoola

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JMKurtz said:
Ahh, an IM thread - nice :) I've stuck the thread for you.

Has Kenny reported his testings yet? If not, and if he can't get you the info, I'll hook mine up and give it a go.

Jeff

No he hasen't said anything yet. MKL is going to look at this also, hes just waiting on his v2.2 unibios to arrive still.

I'm sure things will get intresting soon with this thread.

Raz
 

Razoola

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NeoTurfMasta has just confirmed in another thread that IR Maze can be played with Joystick. So far so good.

Raz
 

NeoTurfMasta

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Whoops, sorry I just saw this thread.

I can confirm that the IM cart works fine on my 1-b bios-swapped board. Played with joysticks and BC speed buttons without any problems.
 

Razoola

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NeoTurfMasta said:
Whoops, sorry I just saw this thread.

I can confirm that the IM cart works fine on my 1-b bios-swapped board. Played with joysticks and BC speed buttons without any problems.

Yes, this is good news. You don't have the IR kit so you can try with the trackball also?

Raz
 

NeoTurfMasta

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its in pieces... I have that jamma track ball adapter laying around close by, but I havent seen my actual track ball set in a long ass time. Its in a box somewhere, but it would probably be quicker if someone had theirs on hand. RevQuixo, I'm looking at you....?
 

Kpj

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Razoola said:
No he hasen't said anything yet. MKL is going to look at this also, hes just waiting on his v2.2 unibios to arrive still.

I'm sure things will get intresting soon with this thread.

Raz

I'll have my AES up & running today with the 2.2 & IM MVS cart.
 

Kpj

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Well, I have great news :)

IM works great on an AES (Uni-Bios 2.2 is installed) with a standard controller/joystick. Obviously, the cheat "Enable Joystick Play" is activated.

Buttons B&C speed up the stick. All directions work perfectly.

I'll have this running for a bit, so if any of you have questions on it's functionality, post a message & I'll have a look.

Kpj

EDIT = Once I find my trackball/controller board, I'll try testing it with the AES
 
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Razoola

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I sopose my main question would be how playable is it using a joystick first off. I mean, is it to hard to control etc?

Raz
 

Kpj

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Razoola said:
I sopose my main question would be how playable is it using a joystick first off. I mean, is it to hard to control etc?

Raz

It's not bad at all. the diagonal motion is "steppy" since you must go up & then right or left (similar to Thrash Rally). The speed is fine, especially with both boost buttons (B & C).

I imagine the trackball would be a smoother. I've never used it in this way.

Kpj
 

MKL

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The main problem with playing with a joystick is that the maze is full of slanted paths that aren't 45° angled:

irrmaze_4.png


If they were 45° a diagonal joystick movement would be as smooth as a horizontal or vertical one. With differently angled paths you have to constantly adjust the joystick direction which results in a zigzag motion that is obviously slower than using a trackball.

I haven't tested it with the trackball yet. My trackball interface doesn't have its connectors anymore so rigging everything up will take some time, sorry...
 
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Razoola

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MKL said:
The main problem with playing with a joystick is that the maze is full of slanted paths that aren't 45° angled:

irrmaze_4.png


If they were 45° a diagonal joystick movement would be as smooth as a horizontal or vertical one. With differently angled paths you have to constantly adjust the joystick direction which results in a zigzag motion that is obviously slower than using a trackball.

I haven't tested it with the trackball yet. My trackball interface doesn't have its connectors anymore so rigging everything up will take some time, sorry...

You got the 2.2 bios back now then?

I think you only need to worry about the trackball side of the controller as the unibios does not attempt to control the air and such.

Raz
 

MKL

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Yes, in fact I removed all that parts from the interface, the fact is that I removed the output Jamma connector as well, so I'll have to do some hardwiring:



 

Razoola

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MKL said:
Yes, in fact I removed all that parts from the interface, the fact is that I removed the output Jamma connector as well, so I'll have to do some hardwiring:[/IMG][/URL]

Ok. btw, it may be worth making sure it works on the MVS with unibios before attemping to get it working on the AES.
 
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