BABBAGES DROP FLIGHT STICK PRO $$$
Jeff Gardner
was no longer $99.99 but $69.99. Needless to say the stick is worth it at
that price. Picked it up and hooked it up and simply put....WING
COMMANDER III, though totally awesome with the regular control pad, was a
lot more enjoyable with the flight stick pro. I really recommend it for
this game. I am sure it will do wonders for Flying Nightmares and Prowler.
ry...@lehigh.edu
again for basically the same thing! Heck, can I do it myself?
--
______________________________________________________________________________
The forbidden jungle. Tangles of colors, laced with captivating textures and
foliage folds. The fruits quench a primal hunger, but their touch means death,
if not from Eve's hand. Unknown orbs cast invisible spears. The only shelter
is the worship of ones sole. The leader signals me to stay. She has found the
hidden temple and enters with the proper offerings. Forever sets in. I imagine
Dave Platt
>again for basically the same thing! Heck, can I do it myself?
In theory, yes, with a lot of work, if you're good at analog and digital
design. In practice, it's not worth trying.
There is a big _internal_ difference between a PC flightstick and a 3DO
flightstick. The PC flightstick is basically a switch-and-potentiometer
box; the positional translations (converting X, Y, and Z values into
numbers) are performed by the joystick hardware in your PC.
The 3DO flightstick is a purely digital device (as seen by the 3DO
console). The flightstick actually has 3 analog-to-digital converters
in it (or one multiplexed converter with 3 inputs) and quite a
significant amount of digital logic. It does all of the position
sampling and A-to-D conversion itself, and simply delivers a digital
data string to the 3DO console.
You can think of a 3DO flightstick as being a PC flightstick, plus a
three-way joystick converter card built right inside.
You can't convert an analog-out PC flightstick into a 3DO flightstick
without adding the ADC chips and some pretty hairy custom digital logic
to implement the 3DO Control Port protocol. Quite frankly, unless
you're a real electronics wizard with a big junk-box of spare parts to
play with, you'd find it more expensive than simply buying a 3DO
flightstick.
--
Dave Platt dpl...@3do.com
USNAIL: The 3DO Company, Systems Software group
600 Galveston Drive
Redwood City, CA 94063
Adam Vanth Madill
>What we really need is a PC-flightstick to 3do converter! I really hate paying
>again for basically the same thing! Heck, can I do it myself?
You probably could, but it wouldn't do you much good: The 3DO
Flightstick PRO has 4 buttons on the base that the PC version lacks.
I own both, so I'm not talking out my a$$. As to how it would effect
gameplay, well.... Wing 3 (3DO vers.) uses ALL the buttons.
Adam M
<Ada...@ix.netcom.com> "Imagination is more important
<Va...@aol.com> than knowledge" - A. Einstein
"The Force is strong in this one..." - James Earl Jones
as the voice of Darth Vader
David Gonzalez
: You can think of a 3DO flightstick as being a PC flightstick, plus a
: three-way joystick converter card built right inside.
Humm..
I can see now why the much higher price for the Flightstick Pro
for the 3d0 compared to the PC version.
On the other hand, it sounds to me like a very poor engineering
decision to require all the A-D hardware to be on the joystick instead
of on the 3d0.
After all, all joysticks and mouse hw will need to incorporate
this A-D hardware. Therefore, they will be more expensive....
I guess there may be two reasons for not including the A-D in
the 3d0:
1. Cost - It's cheaper to NOT have all the A-D circuitry on the
3d0. And in your case (3d0) I can see why this is so critical.
2. Added functionality - Since the input circuitry is Digital,
this can provide an enhanced data path to be used by external devices.
Other things beside joysticks and controllers can easily be added to
the port.
Interesting choices... BTW, it's nice to hear from you at 3d0...
David
A happy owner of an FZ-1 3d0....
--
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David Gonzalez | les...@ctt.bellcore.com (Work) |
Bellcore | Secure Communications and Services Group |
RRC 1-K233 |------------------------------------------|
444 Hoes Lane |Dislaimer: These are my opinions and I do |
Piscataway, NJ 08854 | not speak for Bellcore. |
Mike Sone
Jeff Gardner <SVY...@prodigy.com> wrote:
>I was in Babbage's yesterday. I noticed that the FLight Stick Pro for 3DO
>was no longer $99.99 but $69.99. Needless to say the stick is worth it at
Sounds like great news but do you know if this is the version that will
have the feed through option like the the standard control pad?
David Nagy
: I can see now why the much higher price for the Flightstick Pro
: for the 3d0 compared to the PC version.
How much does the PC version sell for? US$60 doesn't seem very expensive
to me. I paid considerably more for my first "good" PC joystick.
: On the other hand, it sounds to me like a very poor engineering
: decision to require all the A-D hardware to be on the joystick instead
: of on the 3d0.
Perhaps you'll explain the "proper" engineering that should have been
used to allow multiple analog and digital devices plus stereo audio to
all be carried over one bus. 50 terminal ribbon cables perhaps? :)
: After all, all joysticks and mouse hw will need to incorporate
: this A-D hardware. Therefore, they will be more expensive...
True... But not much more, if the Flightstick is any indication. I'm
sure the fact that the 3DO market is a tiny one contributes FAR more to
the cost of 3DO controllers than does the inclusion of the "extra"
hardware.
: I guess there may be two reasons for not including the A-D in
: the 3d0:
It's "3DO" by the way.
: 1. Cost - It's cheaper to NOT have all the A-D circuitry on the
: 3d0. And in your case (3d0) I can see why this is so critical.
Cost is not a factor in other designs, eh? I agree though. Why include
an A-D converter when the customer may not ever use it.
: 2. Added functionality - Since the input circuitry is Digital,
: this can provide an enhanced data path to be used by external devices.
: Other things beside joysticks and controllers can easily be added to
: the port.
There you go...
: Interesting choices... BTW, it's nice to hear from you at 3d0...
Nice to hear from somebody at be11korp... :)
Dave Nagy
Roger Huebner
: After all, all joysticks and mouse hw will need to incorporate
: this A-D hardware. Therefore, they will be more expensive....
Not really. Since even an IBM mouse is serial, it can be sent
fine across a digital-only port.
/-------------------------------------------------------------------------\
"The porcupine with the sharpest quills gets stuck on a tree more often."
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------/
Dave Platt
>the 3d0:
>3d0. And in your case (3d0) I can see why this is so critical.
Right. This way, the only people who have to pay for the A/D circuitry
are those who _want_ it. We only need one Control Port jack, rather
than one digital jack and a large&hairy analog jack (or two, or
three...).
By the way, the mouse does not require an on-board A/D - it's strictly
digital. I believe that the 3DO Mouse (OEM'ed by Logitech) has a
single-chip design - as with many mice (like many PC and Mac mice) it
uses a jellybean PIC microcontroller to handle the buttons, track the
rotary quadrature optoencoders for the X and Y axes, and "talk" the
appropriate digital communication protocol.
> 2. Added functionality - Since the input circuitry is Digital,
>this can provide an enhanced data path to be used by external devices.
>Other things beside joysticks and controllers can easily be added to
>the port.
Yup - that was the whole idea. Controllers (several different kinds),
mice, flightsticks, stereoscopic-shutter goggles, gameguns, cybernetic
dog-walking leashes (no, I'm not joking!), etc. can all be hooked to
this bus. Most of them support daisy-chain capability (and the reason
that some don't is a cost issue for the peripheral, not a technical
issue). We can define new types of device which had not even been
thought of at the time when we designed the 3DO console and the Control
Port... just assign them a digital ID and data-length codes, write a
driverlet, stick the driverlet on the CD with the game which wants to
support that device, and ZAP, we're on the air.
In fact, this is precisely the set of steps we took when designing the
Adam Vanth Madill
[some stuff deleted]
>Yup - that was the whole idea. Controllers (several different kinds),
>mice, flightsticks, stereoscopic-shutter goggles, gameguns, cybernetic
>dog-walking leashes (no, I'm not joking!), etc. can all be hooked to
>this bus.
CYBERNETIC DOG-WALKING LEASHES!?!? I don't own a dog, but I'm going
out to get one now! Where can I get one of these babies for my 3DO,
Dave? Who makes them?
[P.T. Barnum said, "There's one born every minute." I say, "Sell him
the dog-walking peripheral!"] ;)
Until Later,
Adam M
<Ada...@ix.netcom.com>
<Va...@aol.com>
"...misery loves company, we could form a company and make misery,
Frustrated, Incorporated...
...we could create a cure, we make the disease,
Frustrated, Incorporated..." - Soul Asylum
Dave Platt
>out to get one now! Where can I get one of these babies for my 3DO,
>Dave? Who makes them?
#chortle#. As far as I know, there was only ever one of these made.
One of our Advanced Technology Group guys designed and built it for an
industry trade show or conference of some sort. There's no plan at all
to ever market this design for any useful purpose - it was a one-off to
demonstrate the possibility of doing some force-feedback sorts of
things.
I imagine that the person who demo'ed it had a license from the Ministry
of Silly Walks (thank you, John Cleese!)