The UniBios & IR-Maze thread.

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
I tried the trackball on a 4-slot today and it didn't work. The 8-pin harness was connected to the joy ports as shown in the pic:

http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/7912/im8pinharness6vc.png
Note that the pin functions are reversed on the interface (ground is pin 1 on the mobo but pin 2 on the interface, etc.), in the 1st post Raz uses the pinout on the mobo.

As I suspected, when the trackball is connected to the P1 input pins (on the jamma connector) a joystick plugged into the P1 joy port doesn't work. This is a problem because you have to use normal controls to enable the trackball cheat. To solve this I made the connection from the interface to the mobo disconnectable, however after the cheat is on and the trackball interface connected back to the mobo the trackball doesn't respond. The trackball is the official one that came with the IM kit and I know it works (I tested it on a Forgotten Worlds PCB).

I'll try again on the MV-1C (a mobo that, like the MV-1B, has trackball support) once I've made a harness for it. I'm not sure whether to leave pin 2 (= pin 7 on the interface) disconnected or not though.
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
Thanks for the update. I think the best bet is to confirm its working on the MV-1B or 1C first and work from there.

In fact you can try the patches I gave you in that email some time ago and confirm the lines are setting high on the 4 slot joystick ports.

Raz
 
Last edited:

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
Razoola said:
In fact you can try the patches I gave you in that email some time ago and confirm the lines are setting high on the 4 slot joystick ports.

With the MV-1C the results were:

0x01 pin 8 = high
0x02 pin 7 = high
0x04 pin 6 = high
0x08 pin 5 = high
0x10 pin 4 = high
0x20 pin 3 = high
(pin numbers as on the connector on the MV-1C)

With the 4-slot the results are:

0x01 P1 joy port pin 9 = high
0x02 P1 joy port pin 9 = high
0x04 all pins = low*
0x08 P1 joy port pin 9 = high
0x10 P1 joy port pin 9 = high
0x20 P1 joy port pin 9 = high

*but pin 9 was 0.28v as opposed to 0.14v of the other low values.
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
Hmmm, thats not right, I get differnet to that on my MV-1FZ

0x01 P1 joy port pin 10 = high
0x02 P1 joy port pin 02 = high
0x04 P1 joy port pin 09 = high
0x08 P2 joy port pin 10 = high
0x10 P2 joy port pin 02 = high
0x20 P2 joy port pin 09 = high

Are you sure your checking the correct pins in the joy port? When I say pin 2 for example that means the 2nd pin from the left on the top row of 8 pins.

I'm taking the reading from pin 8 to each pin I mention, for example after a 0x01 patch I put one section of multimeter on pin 8 and the other on pin 10 and get the high reading.

If anyone else want to try this the 6 patches to do with unibios are 0x01, 0x02, 0x03, 0x04, 0x08, 0x10 and 0x20. You patch one of these 6 to address 0x380001 and then use multimeter to read pins.

Raz
 
Last edited:

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
I'm checking the right pins but I forgot that Neo sticks have button D connected to both pin 4 (the actual D pin) and pin 9, that's why pin 9 was always high. After removing the wire connecting pin 9 to the D button all the 6 pins are always low.

I'll try this on a 2-slot later.
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
I think I can see whats happening. I actually realise that maybe those pins do not go high, instead they become open to ground (this may be the wrong way to explain it)

For example after patching 0x01 pin 10 only gives a high reading if testing against pin 8, if I test against ground (pin1) I only get the low reading. If I patch 0x00 then I don't get the high reading between pin 8 and 10. Its almost like this pin can actually be controlled to be open as ground I get the same result using any of the other normal button pins in the joy port. Does this make sence?

Raz
 

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
Ahh, I was checking against ground (as I did with the MV-1C). When testing against +5v I get the same result that you posted.
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
This means it works slightly different through the joystick ports then and some small circuit will be needed to replicate what the MV-1B and 1C does?

Raz
 

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
I've finally tried with the MV-1C and the trackball works!

It really makes a world of difference when you play it with the trackball although it's still quite difficult, but at least I could get past the robot stage... :)
 

bulletnyourass

noble trader
Joined
Dec 6, 2002
Posts
2,162
If only there was a way to play this on the AES with some sort of 3rd party add on or homemade trackball setup. I was looking at the IR Conversion on Ebay. Do any of you know if it's possible to use a 3rd party trackball of some sort to work on the AES?

Phillip
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
MKL said:
I've finally tried with the MV-1C and the trackball works!

It really makes a world of difference when you play it with the trackball although it's still quite difficult, but at least I could get past the robot stage... :)


Excellent, so far so good.

Whats needed now is to get it working on older MVS and AES. Did you see my other post about the difference between the pins on the joy port compared to the 1B / 1C? How hard will it be to make a small circuit to fix that?

Raz
 

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
Got it to work on the 4-slot by connecting the trackball interface harness to the inputs of the hex inverters (74LS06) just before the joy ports. Basically I'm bypassing the LS06. This means it'll work on all the other boards with joy ports, including AES.
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
MKL said:
Got it to work on the 4-slot by connecting the trackball interface harness to the inputs of the hex inverters (74LS06) just before the joy ports. Basically I'm bypassing the LS06. This means it'll work on all the other boards with joy ports, including AES.

Thats amasing :)

I have actually adjusted the unibios so the trackball is enabled by default. It's only disabled if you enable the joystick control cheat. This will solve the problem of trying to set the cheat up.

I think what really needs to be done is to get a controller working directly from the joystick ports. I have had a look though the bios and have worked out that a custom controller board would only need to understand 5 switches from a possible 8.

000 = trackball X or spinner
001 = trackball Y or mahjong controller.
010 = mahjong controller, 2nd stick
100 = mahjong controller
011 = Always has p1 joystick & buttons

The last 3 are easy because its simply 8 lines that can be easily wired. Im not sure about the first because I don't know how a Spinner wires up off hand but if its the same as a trackball Axis then thats simple also. The 2nd will need a jumper on the pcb to choose wether that bank is trackball or mahjong.

A simple diagram of what I mean...

Raz

Code:
Gnd  St Sl  O1 O2 O3 O4 O5 O6 O7 O8  1 2 3
 o   o  o   o  o  o  o  o  o  o  o   o o o
 |   |  |   |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |   | | |
 |   |  |   |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |   | | |
 |   |  |   ------------------------------
 |   |  |   |                            |
 |   |  |   |             C              |
 |   |  |   |                            |
 |   |  |   ------------------------------
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||     |     |
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||  -------  |
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||  |  D  |  |
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||  -------  |
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||  ||||  |  |
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||  ||||  -  -
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||  ||||  B  A
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||  ||||  -  -
 |   |  |   ||||  ||||  ||||  ||||  |  |
 |   |  |   oooo  oooo  oooo  oooo  o  o
 o   o  o   oooo  oooo  oooo  oooo  o  o
Gnd  St Sl  Joy1  MAH3  MAH2  MAH1  Y  X               

A = Convert trackball X1 and X2 into 8 bit value (8 lines)
    will also convert spinner in the same way maybe?

B = Convert trackball Y1 and Y2 into 8 bit value (8 lines).

C = bank controller, decides which bank goes to neogeo based
    on data sent (3 lines in);

      000 = TrackX / Spinner
      001 = MAH1 or TrackY
      010 = MAH2 / 2nd stick
      100 = MAH3
      110 = JOY1

D  Jumper to choose which goes to bank, MAH1 or TrackY.

What this basically means is that using this controller board one could build a NeoGeo UBER controller. On it would be Joystick plus 4 buttons, full mahjong buttons, trackball and spinner. You could also use the same pcb to make smaller controllers (say mahjong or trackball only).

Raz
 
Last edited:

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
I guess there is some PIC (or other microcontroller) programming involved in that?

Little update: the interface harness actually only needs the P1 connections, as you said.

edit: but I think you'll always need to use both joy ports as the IM button is wired to the P2 inputs...
 
Last edited:

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
MKL said:
I guess there is some PIC (or other microcontroller) programming involved in that?

Little update: the interface harness actually only needs the P1 connections, as you said.

edit: but I think you'll always need to use both joy ports as the IM button is wired to the P2 inputs...

With a custom built controller it could all work from one controller only, there would be no need to use player 2. I'm not sure if it would need a programmable micro controller but it would probably be the easyest way. I'm no expert at electronics so I would not personally know how to design/build the PCB. Making a PCB however does have many benefits over modding to use the original IR controller PCB. I'll List all I can think of now.

- Only one joystick port would be needed
- Passthrough so a normal joystick can still plug in at the same time
- PCB could be used to make a Mahjong Controller
- PCB could be used to make a 2way stick (2 joysticks in one joystick port)
- PCB could be used to make a paddle.
- Unibios control would he easy as one could still use a joystick

I soppose this raises the issue of the best way forward. From what you have done so far its going to be possible to rig it to an AES like you say with a little modding. My question is this. What is the best way to do a mod. I was thinking of a 3rd joystick type port on the AES (not the same shape as the normal ports). This new port would carry the needed 3 lines (1up only) and power for the PCB. Doing this will surely work as you have already confirmed on the 4SLOT. The main problem is using the controller with the unibios. Its difficult because it would need to work from both joystick and trackball (this would not be a problem with a custom controller).

I could make the unibios use the 2up controller for control, the only problem would be directions. For this reason one would need the ability to use a joystick in the 2up port while the trackball is still plugged in. The other option is to simply have trackball support enabled by default and forfit using the unibios cheats and stuff while using a trackball.

Thinking about it there are several ways to do it, one could even reverse the trackball controls so the trackball axis goto 2up and buttons goto 1up, this would remove the unibios having to use the 2up controller as long as you also wired up the up,down,left and right buttons in the 1up port. The only downside here is doing this is fine for AES but it would mean the PCB controller could no longer use the JAMMA on MVS and thus in turn make the system only work on systems with joystick ports (maybe this is not a bad thing if you want the controller PCB hidden away in a controller).

These things need to be decided before going forward because in reality the unibios will only beable to support one kind of trackball. It has to be decided whats way is going to be the best.

My own personal preferance is to build the custom PCB though I have no idea how to build it. Doing this will allow many people to enjoy the game because I'm sure the IR kits are hard to find. Maybe Im simply thinking to hard about the best way to do it, surely the easyest method is to simply enable the trackball by default if this game is used and to forfit unibios cheats.

Raz
 

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
Razoola said:
I soppose this raises the issue of the best way forward. From what you have done so far its going to be possible to rig it to an AES like you say with a little modding. My question is this. What is the best way to do a mod. I was thinking of a 3rd joystick type port on the AES (not the same shape as the normal ports). This new port would carry the needed 3 lines (1up only) and power for the PCB. Doing this will surely work as you have already confirmed on the 4SLOT. The main problem is using the controller with the unibios. Its difficult because it would need to work from both joystick and trackball (this would not be a problem with a custom controller).

I don't understand why the AES should be different from MVS boards with ports. Why would an additional port be needed for the 3 lines and power when you could get all that from the standard ports? As of now the trackball w/ official interface could easily be hooked up through the ports of an AES. Not to mention that if a third port really was necessary I doubt AES owners would be enthusiastic about altering the aesthetics of their systems.

Razoola said:
I could make the unibios use the 2up controller for control, the only problem would be directions. For this reason one would need the ability to use a joystick in the 2up port while the trackball is still plugged in. The other option is to simply have trackball support enabled by default and forfit using the unibios cheats and stuff while using a trackball.

Or one could access the in-game menu (select and start buttons would have to be available on the trackball controller), disconnect the interface on the fly and set up the cheat options with a joystick, then plug back the interface & trackball. A bit of a hassle but doable after all... I'm not even sure what kind of cheats could be come up with. Invincibility maybe, but wouldn't it defeat the purpose of the game?

Razoola said:
Thinking about it there are several ways to do it, one could even reverse the trackball controls so the trackball axis goto 2up and buttons goto 1up, this would remove the unibios having to use the 2up controller as long as you also wired up the up,down,left and right buttons in the 1up port. The only downside here is doing this is fine for AES but it would mean the PCB controller could no longer use the JAMMA on MVS and thus in turn make the system only work on systems with joystick ports (maybe this is not a bad thing if you want the controller PCB hidden away in a controller).

Hmm... I don't follow you here. I thought the MVS boards without controller ports couldn't possibly be used with IM/trackball.

Razoola said:
These things need to be decided before going forward because in reality the unibios will only beable to support one kind of trackball. It has to be decided whats way is going to be the best.

My own personal preferance is to build the custom PCB though I have no idea how to build it. Doing this will allow many people to enjoy the game because I'm sure the IR kits are hard to find. Maybe Im simply thinking to hard about the best way to do it, surely the easyest method is to simply enable the trackball by default if this game is used and to forfit unibios cheats.

I don't think I have the resources for building it either. Maybe Jeff Kurtz could be of help here? I would like to hear from him on this matter. I agree that a homebrew interface would be great because anyone could potentially build it and enjoy the game. However, it doesn't sound like it's the easiest thing to build so the question is: how many people will actually be able to build it? And on the other hand I'm not too happy that the original interface would no longer be usable? Is this really unavoidable? Maybe two separate unibios versions could be made available, one for the custom (if it'll ever be made) and one for the official interface? Also, it would be nice if someone had info about the availability of the IM cart: is it rare? Is it found as a loose cart more often than with the kit (esp. the interface)?
 

RevQuixo

Rugal's Panther
20 Year Member
Joined
Apr 6, 2001
Posts
3,890
NeoTurfMasta said:
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....?

The only way I'd be able to help out is if I get both a Uni-Bios and the joystick port adapter for the IR interface board to the joystick ports of my MV-1

Raz, if you could whip up a joystick port adapter I would be more than willing to buy it and the uni-bios for for testing. I'm useless with soldering alas. :(

I'd love to be able to jettison the MV-1B it means I can use everything on one board.
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
MKL...

I thought we discovered that the 3 outputs in each joystick port do not work in the same was as expected compared to the MC1B and 1C. On the joystick port they open to ground, on the MV1B and 1C they are high or low. From this some modification is needed internally enless you already know how to fix this externally? Also does pin 8 of the joystick port give enough power to run the controller?

Yea unplugging the trackball and then using a standard stick for cheats and then putting the trackball back in is one way of doing it. One just needs to be careful of the D button wiring if the joyport is going to be altered in any way.

If a custom controller is made it could be possible to use 2 different types as long as a method was built into it to detect it (IE a set value return on a certin bank).

By the way, remember I said that that 3 lines that come from the 2up joystick side may not be needed and you confirmed it? I think its also possible that 2 of the lines from the 1up side are also not needed and only the first line is. Can you confirm this?

I think the best way forward at present then is to base everything off the current IRmaze controller if your not sure how to build one either. I always understood that the cart with controller was always quite hard to find.

Raz
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
RevQuixo said:
The only way I'd be able to help out is if I get both a Uni-Bios and the joystick port adapter for the IR interface board to the joystick ports of my MV-1

Raz, if you could whip up a joystick port adapter I would be more than willing to buy it and the uni-bios for for testing. I'm useless with soldering alas. :(

I'd love to be able to jettison the MV-1B it means I can use everything on one board.

I think its not at that stage yet because MKL has already pointed out it cannot wire into the joystick ports directly as the needed pins work slightly differently.

Raz
 

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
Razoola said:
MKL...

I thought we discovered that the 3 outputs in each joystick port do not work in the same was as expected compared to the MC1B and 1C. On the joystick port they open to ground, on the MV1B and 1C they are high or low. From this some modification is needed internally enless you already know how to fix this externally? Also does pin 8 of the joystick port give enough power to run the controller?

This is the little mod I've done to my 4-slot to have high/low values on the joy ports like you have on the dedicated connector of the MV-1B/1C:

http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/5559/s20224453nq.jpg

It can be done on any other mobo with joy ports, including the AES. If it would cause the mahjong controller not to work anymore it would be easy to add the removed parts (hex inverter and resistors) inside the controller itself. But it should also be possible to leave the board unmodded and do an external fix.
As for powering the trackball and its interface from the ports, I think it's possible. On the interface there is only the FPGA and another chip that need power, and another couple of chips on the trackball PCBs. If the wiring from the ports to the interface is kept short and if you get power from both ports I think there will be no problems.

Razoola said:
By the way, remember I said that that 3 lines that come from the 2up joystick side may not be needed and you confirmed it? I think its also possible that 2 of the lines from the 1up side are also not needed and only the first line is. Can you confirm this?

Yes, only the 1st line is needed.
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
MKL said:
This is the little mod I've done to my 4-slot to have high/low values on the joy ports like you have on the dedicated connector of the MV-1B/1C:

http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/5559/s20224453nq.jpg

It can be done on any other mobo with joy ports, including the AES. If it would cause the mahjong controller not to work anymore it would be easy to add the removed parts (hex inverter and resistors) inside the controller itself. But it should also be possible to leave the board unmodded and do an external fix.
As for powering the trackball and its interface from the ports, I think it's possible. On the interface there is only the FPGA and another chip that need power, and another couple of chips on the trackball PCBs. If the wiring from the ports to the interface is kept short and if you get power from both ports I think there will be no problems.



Yes, only the 1st line is needed.

Nice one.

I have a concern about the MOD you have done. I could be way off here but I have a worry about the way button 'D' is normally wired and what would be the concequences of that when plugging in a normal joystick into a modded port like you show.

As only one line is needed wouldent it be easier to leave the MVS/AES alone and add an inverter on that one line only externally in the cable?

Also I have not confirmed this but maybe you can. Pin 8 of the joystick port is high and I don't think its wired up as a input (never checked). Maybe +5v can be taken from here with no modding needed to power the PCB? ground of course would go to Pin 1.

Raz
 

JMKurtz

Tech Support Moderator,
20 Year Member
Joined
Aug 12, 2000
Posts
1,654
You guys have made some very good progress since the last time I read this thread.

I haven't looked as my IM kit is still boxed away, but what is that FPGA used for on the controller board? Is that just for the air jets/etc, or is it used for I/O with the trackball?

Jeff
 

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
Razoola said:
Nice one.

I have a concern about the MOD you have done. I could be way off here but I have a worry about the way button 'D' is normally wired and what would be the concequences of that when plugging in a normal joystick into a modded port like you show.

Yes, pressing the D button would cause one of the output pins of the LS174 (next to the LS06) to short to ground. This wouldn't happen on my sticks as the D button is only wired to pin 4 on the joystick port (the wire to pin 9 is snipped).

Razoola said:
As only one line is needed wouldent it be easier to leave the MVS/AES alone and add an inverter on that one line only externally in the cable?

I'll look into that but then it could be a problem to hook it up to the MV-1B and 1C.

Razoola said:
Also I have not confirmed this but maybe you can. Pin 8 of the joystick port is high and I don't think its wired up as a input (never checked). Maybe +5v can be taken from here with no modding needed to power the PCB? ground of course would go to Pin 1.

Pin 8 is a +5v pin so it can be used to power things.
 

Razoola

Divine Hand of the UniBIOS,
Staff member
20 Year Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2002
Posts
4,662
Razoola said:
As only one line is needed wouldent it be easier to leave the MVS/AES alone and add an inverter on that one line only externally in the cable?

MKL said:
I'll look into that but then it could be a problem to hook it up to the MV-1B and 1C.

Is it not possible to have the inverter built into a new lead without modding the controller PCB? Then you can keep the original 8 line lead (with no mod on it) for the MV-1B / 1C.

Raz
 

MKL

Basara's Blade Keeper
20 Year Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2002
Posts
3,686
Razoola said:
Is it not possible to have the inverter built into a new lead without modding the controller PCB? Then you can keep the original 8 line lead (with no mod on it) for the MV-1B / 1C.

You mean like a short extension that you add or remove depending on what logic state you need for that line? Sure, it could be done.


JMKurtz said:
You guys have made some very good progress since the last time I read this thread.

But your help would be much needed here: what do you think about the possibility of building the custom interface that Raz pointed out?

JMKurtz said:
I haven't looked as my IM kit is still boxed away, but what is that FPGA used for on the controller board? Is that just for the air jets/etc, or is it used for I/O with the trackball?

It's used for everything but most of the other components on the interface are for the air jets etc. so I'm going to trim down the PCB to make it as small as possible.
 
Top