On Wed, 10 Dec 2003, Christopher Prest wrote: > Maybe there is a simple explanation, but I always found it odd > that most 64 games want you to pop the joystick in port 2.
> Why would they not have used port 1?
Port 1 and the keyboard are both connected to the same lines on one of the CIA chips, so pressing certain keys on the keyboard interferes with joystick operation.
> Maybe there is a simple explanation, but I always found it odd > that most 64 games want you to pop the joystick in port 2.
> Why would they not have used port 1?
The CIA chip that controls the joystick ports also double as the keyboard scanner. The way it's wired up, motions in port 1 will simulate false keyboard presses, while port 2 has a far lesser effect. So if a game requires keyboard input along with the joystick, port 2 is a necessity. Then it just became standard.
I think, and I am clasping at straws here, I ain't used the real c64 for a while.....
put a joystick in port 2, and moving the joystick doesn't intefere with the keyboard, put it in port 1 and it used to, so to stop wear and tear of removing joysticks from the port?
or am I spouting it here?
"Christopher Prest" <ex...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote in message
ex...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Christopher Prest) writes: > That makes sense, since many a time I have forgotten, and then > wnet and used joystick 1, and started getting crazy things > happening.
By the way, aren't the ports marked as A and B rather than 1 and 2? I'll have to check when I get home. Since the register for reading "port 2" also is located before the register to read "port 1", it would have made sense to label them from the power button and forward towards the user.
-- Anders Carlsson
Ye wonder, she's thirteen beyond an invisible carefully preserved leather mouse. Sunday dungeons promising horseback cause loud guessed scissors.
ex...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Christopher Prest) writes: > Yep, it looks like you are right Anders about them being > called 'A' and 'B'
No, I was wrong. :)
I just checked both my old brown breadbin and the new grey flat one, and both say control port 1 and 2. However, the CIA seems to label them A (2) and B (1) which is terribly logic.
Regarding my signature(s).. someone else already asked, so here it goes:
The previous one ("not close to hair" etc) was an excerpt from a toy car manual translated from Chinese into very poor English. I have had the original text evaluated by a Mandarin speaking, and he confirmed some words had both been translated with the wrong meaning and at the same time misspelled. Once I put together a ~50 lines text document of the "highlights" if anyone is interested to find out more.
The current one was picked up from one of these random porno spams one gets, where a number of odd words have been put together and a few "keywords" are inserted. I rearranged the words into barely parseable sentences and shortened it to fit in a signature. I don't know when I'll get tired of this and wait for next porno spam.
-- Anders Carlsson
Ye wonder, she's thirteen beyond an invisible carefully preserved leather mouse. Sunday dungeons promising horseback cause loud guessed scissors.
On 12/10/03 8:44 AM Eastern Standard Time, watson...@ten.tsacmoc wrote...
>On Wed, 10 Dec 2003, Christopher Prest wrote:
>> Maybe there is a simple explanation, but I always found it odd >> that most 64 games want you to pop the joystick in port 2.
>> Why would they not have used port 1?
>Port 1 and the keyboard are both connected to the same lines on one of the >CIA chips, so pressing certain keys on the keyboard interferes with >joystick operation.
And vice versa! You can witness the joystick having an affect on the keyboard matrix by plugging a 'stick into port 1 and rotating it around briskly. I seem to remember the character "2" showing up a lot and also "space"... which gave me an idea.
I did a little experimenting (might have looked it up in "Mapping") to see which joystick positon was responsible for a space/chr$(32). I then removed the wires from an old broken stick and attached the wires for that position to a microswitch in a foot pedal I had kicking around. I fired up the game "Commando" which required pressing the space bar to throw bombs. I hated that cuz it forced me to let go of the joystick for a brief moment. Not anymore. I continued to shoot while tapping the foot pedal to toss bombs at the enemy without ever letting go of the stick.
I left the foot pedal plugged in for a quite sometime and used it anytime software (mostly games) required that I use the space bar. I still have it somewhere.
I believe that the "LipStick" voice activated input controller that came with Echelon worked on this same principal. Rather than say "fire", like the instruction said, I just used to blow into it ever so lightly. Same results. I liked my home-made foot pedal better. I kinda felt like a dork wearing the Lipstick on my head and shouting "FIRE FIRE FIRE". :)
nospam9...@aol.commune (Nospam9212) wrote: > Not anymore. I continued to shoot > while tapping the foot pedal to toss bombs at the enemy > without ever letting go of the stick.
.... I'm dumbfounded.... What a wonderful, SIMPLE, idea! :o I Might just have to try that one! Anyone else do this?
This is a big problem when hacking a KB for mame.. Ultimately, you can avoid i by adding diodes on each key.. Or for the sake of a joystick port, pehaps a line buffer would do the trick.. a 74ls244 or 245..
I like to use a Sega genesis controller, works awesome except that it nerfs the kb due to ghosting..
> "Christopher Prest" <ex...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> wrote in message > news:br752s$aok$1@freenet9.carleton.ca... > > Maybe there is a simple explanation, but I always found it odd > > that most 64 games want you to pop the joystick in port 2.
> > Why would they not have used port 1?
> The CIA chip that controls the joystick ports also double as the keyboard > scanner. The way it's wired up, motions in port 1 will simulate false > keyboard presses, while port 2 has a far lesser effect. So if a game > requires keyboard input along with the joystick, port 2 is a necessity. > Then it just became standard.
