HELP- universal DC sgetec stick mod

[kingbuzzo]

SO here's what I'm doing...

I got a SEGA/AGETEC DC arcade stick and I'm modding it to work with all my consoles. TO do this, I wired each button and a ground to a vga port, and did the same thing to my controllers for other consoles.

So for each button in the stick, there is a wire comming from where's its connected to the board, and this runs to a pin in the vga connector.

I did the EXACT same thing with a saturn pad and wired each solder point to the matching vga connector. When I was done, I connected the two ports with a vga cable, and plugged in the saturn controller which is now connected to the arcade stick to see how it goes.

Nothing happened...

none of the wires are touching, everything is properly grounded, both controller work on their own....so what's the deal? I've double checked everything to make sure, there just must be an error in my logic.

Anyone got some ideas?

thanks,

Kingbuzzo.

[semicolo]

Maybe the switches of one of the two pads don't tie to ground but power.
You should check the tensions you've got on switches, pressed or not.
Check if there's some pullups/pulldown (connect an ampmeter to the switches pins).
When you know exactly how each pad works, you should be able to make it work.

[ptr.exe]

Maybe the switches of one of the two pads don't tie to ground but power.
But this wouldn't matter would it? as whatever they connect to would be running through the +5V or ground. attached to the VGA?
The only thing I can think of is you've fried something on the saturn pad when you were soldering, i did this mod using a PS1 arcade pad and it worked fine with a NES and SNES pad.

Have you tried doing it with a differant saturn pad or maybe a differant console? eg. NES or SNES.

[kingbuzzo]

Ya, the saturn pad is officially fried. Good thing it was only the UFO model one :p. And what do you mean by the 5v+? There's a wire that connects that every single button and is the only extra one that connects to the board of the arcade stick. I'd assume that this is the ground. So any voltage at all should be coming from the actual DC connector cord and not anywhere near my microswitches-->VGA rig.

[kingbuzzo]

Started from scratch this time. going alright so far, I bough a multimeter and I now have clear signal coming from the wires to the vga port and through to the end of the vga cable. Now it's just a matter of....everything else..

one thing that's a real bitch is soldering to the freakin buttons on the saturn pad.

many guides mention putting in a hold where the button is and soldering into it, but you'd really need a very fine drill to pull this off cause those circuit boards snap very easily.

Might be a better idea to get a bunch of cicuit boards from a buch of console, and just put em all in a box so I don't have to worry about carrying around a bunch of controllers. I could even put them into something amusic like a toaster, or an oven mit.... or cat!

woohoo!

[kingbuzzo]

so far so good.

http://img139.echo.cx/img139/6453/dcstickvga1ck.th.jpg (http://img139.echo.cx/my.php?image=dcstickvga1ck.jpg)

I noticed that there are two ground points on the pcb in the dreamcast stick. One is where the buttons connect to the pcb, and the other is where the stick connects. I figure I'll solder to both points, connect the wires, and just use one pin as the ground in the vga port.

http://img139.echo.cx/img139/473/dcpcbpaint8fv.th.jpg (http://img139.echo.cx/my.php?image=dcpcbpaint8fv.jpg)

now I just have to find the ground on this beast.

http://img233.echo.cx/img233/8725/saturnpadpcb8ei.th.jpg (http://img233.echo.cx/my.php?image=saturnpadpcb8ei.jpg)

Jup, that's the pcb for a wireless saturn pad. See that little black blob? I was hoping to find a chip I could solder to, but now I have to solder to the buttons somehow and then find the ground =/

any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

King.

[ptr.exe]

And what do you mean by the 5v+?
semicolo, suggested that possibly the pins in one of the pads connected to power (eg. +5V) not ground i was saying that that wouldnt matter as your not using the circuitry from the pad only the buttons, but that could make a differance if the saturn pad used power rather than ground anywhere although that is very unlikely.

Yeah i hate those black blobs, its a cheap way of covering chips but makes reverse engineering much harder.

Find ground? please tell me your joking - maybe ive misunderstood you.

Ground will be what all the button pads connect to, you should notice it - if you have trouble finding ground on a circuit im amazed you got this far. If you mean find ground on that pic of the saturn pad, i can see at least two points.

The pics of the arcade stick look good, the VGA port fits in well.

[kingbuzzo]

Well I'm not used to reading pcb's at all :P I was able to find the ground on the ufo saturn pad just fine, but I can't seem to find it on this pad =/

would you mind pointing it out to me? I'm still very green...

thanks,

Kingbuzzo.

[ptr.exe]

To the right and just below the black blob, you see the big patch of shiny green, theres ground, you can tell because it links all the buttons together, when the button is pressed it lets ground through to the chip.

To solder on, use a knife or flathead screw driver and scrape some of the green coating away to show some copper and solder on to that, if you want to make a more secure join and there's nothing on the other side then make a patch of copper visible and then drill a very small hole through the visible copper and pass the wire through the back and solder it onto the copper patch.

[kingbuzzo]

well I'd love to begin working on hooking this up to the saturn and psc pads...but for some reason... whenever I solder to the directional points, the dc will only accept directions down and right from the stick....wtf!!!11

it all works when I detatch the wires from the pcb though. I used my multimeter, and found that each wire is totally separated from each other. I just can't understand it.

any one know what this might be?


thanks,

King.

[ptr.exe]

What directions? the analogue or the d-pad?

The DC analogue may not be compatible with hardwiring a d-pad to, i'll check and see if i can get it to work.

[semicolo]

the only thing that could work 100% is to use 2 wires per switch, if your arcade controller has 4 directions 6 buttons and a start it won't fit on the vga connector.

You can remove unused wires by making sure they connect to the same points with an ohmmeter (but will it be possible for different game consoles ?).

So you start by checking what switches pins are connected together on all the gamepads you want to use, you reserve a wire for each of those commons signals and connect a wire to the opposite side of the switches.

And of course you keep us informed of your results and informations :-)

[semicolo]

of course I'm talking of digital buttons/directions, if there's some circuitry to convert digital inputs into analog (like some pads for pc gameport), it won't work (that's why you need to know how your pads are really working).

[ptr.exe]

Semicolo, there is a such thing as a common ground which almost all basic circuits use, what purpose would having differant ground? i can assure you it is a common signal - ground.

Therefore you wouldnt need 2 for each, just one plus a common ground for all to connect to when the switch/button is closed.

Kingbuzzo, hardwiring a DC analogue input to a standard d-pad definately works, perhaps the problem is at the other end.

[kingbuzzo]

the problem is that I can't even get my stick to work properly when I solder to the board. I assume that there are "illegal" connections between up down left and right that I need to get rid of.

I've decided to once again start over, and this time I will be using a one of those 15 pin connectors I've seen other people use. Soldering to only two rows of pins should be a LOT easier than soldering to 3 rows.

[ptr.exe]

King, i admire your persistance, however i'd admire you even more if you got it right first time :p

I used a VGA connector and they arent too bad to solder to just make sure you start on the outside connections first, i know the 15 pin connector with two rows your talking about, that should be easier.

[kingbuzzo]

well I've mastered soldering to 15pin vga. but soldering to the controller pcb seems to be destroying all my 3rd party psx controllers =/ damn 35watt iron.

anyone willing to soldering wires to a white dual shock controller and maybe solder to a male vga port with my specifications?

I've just about given up here.

[ptr.exe]

King, i think you need to practice a bit more with a soldering iron. Although a 35w is too high for this sort of stuff and will make things harder. Just get a 15w for £5.

When i did a universal controller mod, i used a 15 pin vga wired to the DC, i soldered to the traces rather than the buttons so that the controller could still be used, then i wired a NES controller to work on the other end. Again soldered to the traces as otherwise it would stop the buttons hitting properly, then i scored the traces leading to the IC in the NES contr. deep enough so there was no more connection (obviously left the common ground connection) that way i was sure there would be no interference from the old IC.

It took about 2 hours.

Also King, i know why you're VGA mod isnt working. Remember when you said that DevCast said you only need to ground pin 7, that wont work. As i said in the tut. you need to ground both 6 and 7, to ensure the DC outputs RGB and the V and H syncs, i fou ground only 7 it seems to do the syncs but no RGB. So you have to ground the RGB select (pin6).

[kingbuzzo]

I'll go pick up a new soldering iron today.

I"ll try the vga mod again one day as well.

But I just can't see myself soldering to those tiny pins on the dualshock. I'll check out the white psONE controllers since those are supposed to have larger pins. we'll see I guess. =/

[ptr.exe]

Get a really thin soldering tip, that'll make it easier. Those pins arent so bad, i've done a couple of mods on PS2 controllers. I doubt the Ps1 ones are much better.

I recommend soldering to the traces, just scratch off the green on a trace and then solder to the copper trace underneath, that way you can solder to loads of differant places meaning to nearby pins/open traces to accidentally solder to.

Also that is definately the reason your VGA isnt working, i tried it and no image will come on the screen if only pin 7 is grounded, you need pin 6 grounded.

[kingbuzzo]

Got a nice mastercraft soldering station with a 20/40w switch.

I also picked up a white psOne DualShock for $17canadian.

http://img265.imageshack.us/img265/2969/psone7ji.th.jpg (http://img265.imageshack.us/my.php?image=psone7ji.jpg)

it's just a pain that I'll have to solder to the legs of that tiny chip in the top left. It seems almost impossible to me, even with this tiny soldering tip.

And the traces? those are even smaller! I assume you were using a 3rd party controller?

thanks,

King.

[ptr.exe]

No mine was a first party controller. The traces are as big as you want them to be although they are very thin, so be careful not to pull them up. As long as the traces next to the object one are covered still it doesnt matter if you do a crap job as long as the solder sticks, you need'nt worry about a short.

It's hard to do, make sure you secure the wire in place as any little tug on the wire by mistake will pull up the trace. Alot of people use hot glue guns to make a seal of the solder join, but i'm cheap and just use wax.

[kingbuzzo]

I think I'll try the solderless method.

http://home.comcast.net/~spiffyshoes/DualShockHack/

I got everything is needs, here goes nothing!