Replacement Membranes for Creativision controllers

[Scouter3d]

Hi Chesh, what was the problem with the Creativision?

btw: great news the joystickpart ist working!

Cheers, TOM:0)

[cheshirenoir]

Not entirely sure what the problem was. I set it all up to test and it worked. At the time of the first issue, I had a huge pile of other projects I was working on, so it was probably something minor

My plan for this week is to start testing all the connections and see where I went wrong with the keyboard section, and, if needed, wire it into a breadboard for further testing.

[cheshirenoir]

OK I had a few hours spare this morning and I have done some investigation. I have rapidly moved from "Why doesn't this work?" to "How did this ever work?"
I'm going to have to do a complete respin of all the PCBs. All need revision and another spin. It looks like the Schematics, at least, are fine.
For far I have hit:

• Traces that go nowhere. Pin 10 simply vanished off to a dead end between the bottom board and the top board.
• footprints that are 90 degrees out, leading to buttons that are "always on".
• pin connections that are backwards on their markings but are correct otherwise. (If you solder the connection backwards to the markings, it works)
• connections that are too far away from the edge.
• places where the PCB doesn't allow for penetrations of things like mounting screws and alignment pins

That's the bad news. The good news is a lot of other stuff is now working. If I have a bit of a tailwind this evening I may even be finally able to play crazy chicky!

John

[Mobsie]

Respect

[cheshirenoir]

Haha! I've been playing Crazy Chicky!

The controls are sideways, which is interesting. No idea what went wrong there. The buttons work, except the one where I pulled the pad clean off the PCB. (Oversized diodes mounted on a tiny SMD pad.)

It ain't pretty but it proves the concept is valid!

Oh, and it doesn't make the creativision joysticks any more ergonomic. If anything, they're stiffer

But still, I was playing a game!

OMG! *Does the dance of joy. I'll start spitting out a new PCB design over the next few days and try and order next week.

John

[cheshirenoir]

Quick question:
If I only implemented Shift, left arrow, control, 1, Q, A, B, G, T and 6 (which is enough to play all the non keyboard games I'm aware of), would that be enough for people?

John

[Scouter3d]

Hi Chesh, why would you cut it down?
Cheers, TOM:0)

[cheshirenoir]

I'd cut it down to make it simpler to build
10 switches, 20 SMD diodes vs 24 switches, 46 SMD diodes.

I'm going to move the diodes to the top of the PCB, use larger footprint diodes and larger SMD switches on the next version.

If there's definitely demand for all 24 switches, I'll make the pads for them all, but if everyone was only going to solder on switches for the minimum viable buttons, I thought I'd save some effort

John

[Scouter3d]

Hi, i would really like all the keys to work, else BASIC, the CSL Cart and a few features of the MegaSDCart would not work... :0(

Cheers, TOM:0)

[cheshirenoir]

OK all the pads it is, then

I'm personally only going to populate a handful of pads. As I have had to give up on compatibility with overlays, I'll make sure everything is labelled on the PCB. I'm going to use standard SMD Tac switches as they're commonly available, cheap and robust. Still need a good solution for the fire buttons but I have... ideas