Rumble Pak Hardware Possibility?

[First Spear]

In an effort to distract those with Intellivision Hardware Knowledge from doing other productive things, could any comment on what would it take to make a kind of add-on "rumble pak" vibration generator for the Intellivision?

 

Thinking of what happens with Q*Bert arcade when he jumps off the edge, or how Dreamcast and newer consoles make their controllers vibrate when certain events are triggered, maybe it would be possible to have something else that acted as a cartridge pass-through (similar to Intellivoice) with a solenoid or two to make the console (and the desk it's on) shake and etc during certain games. Maybe for existing games the add-on hardware would catch certain commands to the PSG and rumble automagically, and it could take commands to rumble and rattle from new games that were aware of the hardware. Thanks to the Arduino/Netduino "revolution", the physical rumbling parts might be relatively inexpensive, but the Intellivision interfacing might be a real barrier.

 

Joe Z's info on the Intellivoice is very detailed - so detailed that I barely understand it after two reads.

 

 

(Not prefixing this topic title with "Wishing for" to keep from irritating jaybird3rd)

Edited December 24, 2014 by First Spear

[intvnut]

The PSG I/O ports on the ECS are bidirectional. You can configure them for output and drive hardware with them. They're standard DB9, so if you can find connectors without flanges, you can interface to it pretty easily.

 

If you want something more self-contained inside the Intellivision itself, that's trickier, as there's not a ready place to plug in or tap signals inside a standard unit. You'd have to have a soldering iron.

[freewheel]

ECS + custom controller - should be doable. The controller might be the hardest part, although there are people making custom INTV controllers. One option would be to keep regular controllers, but use ports 3/4 from the ECS to hook up a separate device for the rumbling only. The Dreamcast did this with Rev, if memory serves. A stand-alone vibration pod. Which had its own story, but that's for another thread.

[intvnut]

I almost forgot: The ECS actually has a crappy sort of Rumble Pak built in. There's a bit you can toggle to control the cassette relay. Toggle that at the right rate and you get a nice mechanical buzz.

Edited December 24, 2014 by intvnut

[First Spear]

 

 

Why would an ECS be needed? Couldn't an "IntelliRumble" just replace an Intellivoice in the chain between a cart and the Master Component using its own AC power to rumble on-demand?

 

 

The PSG I/O ports on the ECS are bidirectional. You can configure them for output and drive hardware with them. They're standard DB9, so if you can find connectors without flanges, you can interface to it pretty easily.

 

If you want something more self-contained inside the Intellivision itself, that's trickier, as there's not a ready place to plug in or tap signals inside a standard unit. You'd have to have a soldering iron.

[intvnut]

Why would an ECS be needed? Couldn't an "IntelliRumble" just replace an Intellivoice in the chain between a cart and the Master Component using its own AC power to rumble on-demand?

 

I was thinking in terms of the "simplest possible project." The ECS provides two 8-bit I/O ports that are already fully decoded into the Intellivision memory map and known to work. It's something you could attempt with minimal electronics knowledge, a motor (or other rumble-making device), some transistors. and maybe a 74LS00 from Radio Shack or equivalent.

 

You can also interface to the riser on an Intellivoice. (Difficulty: Most Intellivoices don't have the riser installed.) The SPB640 does bus decoding, and so a similar circuit could be used there, although you might need some additional components to make it useful (a latch or a 555 timer, for example), since the riser's port is still a partially-decoded bus. The hack would be to use the address decode strobes the SPB640 provides to simplify the hardware somewhat.

 

If you want to interface directly to the Intellivision bus, you now need some additional digital logic to decode the bus to identify requests from the software to rumble. I was merely trying to suggest a route that leverages the hardware that already exists as much as possible.

 

Heck, if you have a JLP-based cart and don't mind wires sticking out of it, I do break out some pins that could be put under software control with a minor firmware revision, and that could be used. Solder a few wires for the rumble circuit to the PCB and off you go.

 

Or, one could design an add-on module based on my existing JLP work (or any of the other cartridge designs that know how to decode the bus) and make it accessible to multiple games. But then you need to make an appropriate case to house it. I'm not sure if the Intellivoice shell has enough room for an Intellivision cartridge in the top-port (which would be necessary for the readily available 44-pin card edge connectors), and I haven't found a source for appropriate horizontal-mounted card-edge connectors.

 

It all comes down to how effort vs. cost vs. reward, I suppose. Lots of options.

Edited December 24, 2014 by intvnut

[First Spear]

 

I was thinking of not touching the controllers at all because modification might make them even harder to deal with. . However, a dedicated box that sits on the shelf/table/floor with the Intv might be easier to build and distribute. I think that there are quite a few options for Arduinos and solenoids and speakers out there that might do the job of vibrating, etc, but that smells like the easiest part...

 

 

ECS + custom controller - should be doable. The controller might be the hardest part, although there are people making custom INTV controllers. One option would be to keep regular controllers, but use ports 3/4 from the ECS to hook up a separate device for the rumbling only. The Dreamcast did this with Rev, if memory serves. A stand-alone vibration pod. Which had its own story, but that's for another thread.

[freewheel]

I'm envisioning a special JLP run with a small connector (3.5mm maybe) mounted in the cart shell - if there's room for that sort of thing. Plug in your add-on device and off you go. It's too bad we don't have the dead space of an Atari cartridge, because you could in theory put several plugs onto one of those.

 

Heck... do this with an LTO Flash and then "any" game could be written to take advantage of it. It wouldn't be cheap, but it could be made fairly open to a lot of possibilities.

Edited December 24, 2014 by freeweed

[intvnut]

I'm envisioning a special JLP run with a small connector (3.5mm maybe) mounted in the cart shell - if there's room for that sort of thing. Plug in your add-on device and off you go. It's too bad we don't have the dead space of an Atari cartridge, because you could in theory put several plugs onto one of those.

 

Heck... do this with an LTO Flash and then "any" game could be written to take advantage of it. It wouldn't be cheap, but it could be made fairly open to a lot of possibilities.

 

 

Well, there is a bit of dead space available if you're using JLP04. It's tiny.

 

 

As for LTO Flash!, it's a bit late. I have the entire first run of hardware sitting in my living room. Any hardware changes would have to wait for the next batch.

 

(The good news is that I'm making significant progress closing up the firmware over this holiday break. Light at the end of the tunnel!)

[JohnPCAE]

(envisions a USB mouse connector in a cart)

 

Now that could make for some really interesting ECS games.

[First Spear]

 

 

I just discovered the rumble chair... Perfect.

[intvnut]

I just discovered the rumble chair... Perfect.

 

 

 

For some reason when I see that, the phrase "Awesom-e power!" comes to mind.

 

 

The Japanese. What will they think of next?