Noob: iPAC question

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.games.mame (More info?)

All,

This summer I will be building my first MAME. What I'd like to hear from
the group is if there is a "standard" way to program an iPAC. Forgive the
ignorance, but I am worried that I will drive myself up a wall trying to
figure out the "best" way to wire this thing up.

I will probably have two 8 ways w/6 buttons each, a 4 way stick for Pac Man
and the like, a spinner and trackball and a couple fire buttons for those.
Of course, the requisite 1 and 2 player buttons and all that.

Note that I am not worried about the number of inputs - I can figure that
out - I would just like to know what your thoughts are before I tear in to
this project.

Thanks much.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.games.mame (More info?)

Reactor wrote:
> All,
>
> This summer I will be building my first MAME. What I'd like to hear from
> the group is if there is a "standard" way to program an iPAC. Forgive the
> ignorance, but I am worried that I will drive myself up a wall trying to
> figure out the "best" way to wire this thing up.
>
> I will probably have two 8 ways w/6 buttons each, a 4 way stick for Pac Man
> and the like, a spinner and trackball and a couple fire buttons for those.
> Of course, the requisite 1 and 2 player buttons and all that.
>
> Note that I am not worried about the number of inputs - I can figure that
> out - I would just like to know what your thoughts are before I tear in to
> this project.
>
> Thanks much.

The I-PAC comes pre-programmed with the default MAME keyboard mappings
and *should* be able to handle the layout you described for buttons and
joysticks just fine. You might want to wire the single 4-way stick to
the same inputs as the P1 8-way stick.

You'll also need to get the Opti-PAC for your spinner and trackball to work.

Jeff-B

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.games.mame (More info?)

Despite all prevention efforts, "Reactor" <bruce.gettel-at-myactv.net>
wrote in news:dbhqep02sn@enews3.newsguy.com:

> All,
>
> This summer I will be building my first MAME. What I'd like to hear
> from the group is if there is a "standard" way to program an iPAC.
> Forgive the ignorance, but I am worried that I will drive myself up a
> wall trying to figure out the "best" way to wire this thing up.
>

Only note I would make is that you may want to make some adjustments to the
standard MAME setup if you have any plans of adding additional emulators in
the future. My cab supports a large number of console emulators in
addition to MAME, and some of them don't react very well to or allow use of
special keys like shift/alt/ctrl. I forget what other restrictions I ran
into.

> I will probably have two 8 ways w/6 buttons each, a 4 way stick for Pac
> Man and the like, a spinner and trackball and a couple fire buttons for
> those. Of course, the requisite 1 and 2 player buttons and all that.

IIRC, I was able to do that exact configuration using arrow keys and
letters as a base for all emus + ESC for the main exit key. Then, I set up
some shift keys for the various methods needed to get out of the console
emus. You'll find that you'll use the same contacts for your 1st 8-way and
4-way stick and some repeated fire buttons. I suggest programming mouse
buttons for the trackball buttons, assuming you have an optical encode that
allows it.

If you would like to see my exact layout, I can fire up the cabinet tonight
and get a list of the key settings.

--
Slor

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.games.mame (More info?)

I was horribly lazy, and used the default layout. But since I am doing
NES/SNES/PSX and some PC games too, (Need for Speed Underground 2 rocks)
I ended up just using a wireless keyboard and mouse for alot of the
navigation. =]

www.game-art.org/jrod/J-Rcade.html

Slor wrote:
> Despite all prevention efforts, "Reactor" <bruce.gettel-at-myactv.net>
> wrote in news:dbhqep02sn@enews3.newsguy.com:
>
>
>>All,
>>
>>This summer I will be building my first MAME. What I'd like to hear
>>from the group is if there is a "standard" way to program an iPAC.
>>Forgive the ignorance, but I am worried that I will drive myself up a
>>wall trying to figure out the "best" way to wire this thing up.
>>
>
>
> Only note I would make is that you may want to make some adjustments to the
> standard MAME setup if you have any plans of adding additional emulators in
> the future. My cab supports a large number of console emulators in
> addition to MAME, and some of them don't react very well to or allow use of
> special keys like shift/alt/ctrl. I forget what other restrictions I ran
> into.
>
>
>>I will probably have two 8 ways w/6 buttons each, a 4 way stick for Pac
>>Man and the like, a spinner and trackball and a couple fire buttons for
>>those. Of course, the requisite 1 and 2 player buttons and all that.
>
>
> IIRC, I was able to do that exact configuration using arrow keys and
> letters as a base for all emus + ESC for the main exit key. Then, I set up
> some shift keys for the various methods needed to get out of the console
> emus. You'll find that you'll use the same contacts for your 1st 8-way and
> 4-way stick and some repeated fire buttons. I suggest programming mouse
> buttons for the trackball buttons, assuming you have an optical encode that
> allows it.
>
> If you would like to see my exact layout, I can fire up the cabinet tonight
> and get a list of the key settings.
>