Alex_rcpilot

Dude, tell us about the mysterious infection you got after you recover. And you're welcome about the help. It's kinda fun to work out problems from tens of thousands of miles away. :lol: I figured I may help you cut some corners by drawing a couple of schematics to explain our work. H-bridge fundamental: The direction of DC motor's rotation can be controlled with the direction of current. An H-bridge enables this control by activating(asserting) appropriate switching components located on its arms across the bridge. The table below explains how it works. Without proper protection, an inadvertent simultaneous assertion with both switching components on either side will cause a short circuit and fry the bridge. Half bridges: By having trigger's hands full examining the PCB, we found out that each of the 4 SO-8 chips is a "half bridge" chip, as illustrated below: The 4 output pins are internally connected together to fit in the standard SO-8 package, they don't contribute much in carrying more current since power comes from pins #1 and #3. Digging deeper: By overwhelming trigger with the multimeter in hand probing throughout the board, we were able to picture the layout of the original motor driving circuitry on the MS FFB stick as shown below, but let's not hurry down at this moment, coz the diagram also shows a portion of the L6202 datasheet. We're trying to migrate the Microsoft FFB control board to an electro-mechanical system composed of two motors with two L6202 full H-bridge chips. What the L6202 requires is a power supply (which is 24V in this case), and two control signals that tell the chip how to turn the motor. The diagrams I copied from the datasheet explains what combinations the chip needs, and what magnitude they are of. I didn't spend much time to speculate what model those SOT23-5 / SOT23* transistors could be, that would require more testing data from trigger. Currently we already have enough information to draw the table with "InputA | InputB | Motor" combinations. And I think those transistors somehow estabilishe a protection mechanism to prevent cross-conduction damage from inadvertent false assertion. That's why I put "STOP" after the wrong combination instead of "screwed". If we cross-reference the two tables within this diagram, we may find many similarities, and that means by stealling inputs A & B from the Microsoft FFB circuit board, we will have the required feed for our own FFB motors which are more powerful. However, a resister ladder will be required to confine the input voltage well within 7V. The following values yield approximately 5.1V. Depending on the fact that IN1 / IN2 from the L6202 only require very weak current (-10~30uA), a resistor ladder of 20K+15K may still guarantee good singal transmission. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ *SOT23-5 and SOT23: standard surface mount packages with either 5 pins or 3 pins as shown in the photographs above. *Edit: Trigger was worried about possible confusions we might result in by explaining PWM in this thread. So I put it up here as an appendix. Pulse Width Modulation is actually a combination of two distinctive states alternating so rapidly that they produce something "in between". Like when the motor turns clockwise as explained in the diagrams above, it spins at full power producing maximum torque(100%). And when it stops there's no torque at all(0%). If we need half torque output, we may basically spin it at full speed for a duration of time(Ton), and let it lose for a while(Toff) after that. By repeating this ON and OFF operation at a very high frequency, say 10KHz(Ton + Toff = 100 microseconds), the motor output appears very smooth. By adjusting the duty, which is equal to Ton / (Ton + Toff), we may control how much torque is output from the motor. A small side-note: a motor is an inductive load, which means when PWM is implemented, though the voltage across the motor is alternating rapidly between 0 and maximum, the current doesn't swing as abruptly.

Once the startup status is obtained, are you using built-in firmware algorithm in your microcontroller to "synchronize" the panel indicators with the game? I guess that's what happens without ED's pit interface. I'm expecting this kit too.

lol, yes but only when I don't pan my head. Two things about TH2G that I like: A. Bezel correction; B. Ultra low power consumption compared with a secondary graphics card. Two things I hate about it: A. Overprice B. Doesn't allow single monitor rotation. I do a lot of programing, rotating a monitor introduces higher efficiency by showing more lines. The 2209WA monitors are capable of rotating 90 deg. clockwise, which is a handy feature I don't wanna waste.

I'm running SoftTH with the setup listed in my signitrue. And I'm getting an average of 34FPS in Black Shark at 5040X1050. Before this test, I was even able to run a low-end ATi card as the secondary card for Crysis with SoftTH. Mixed cards work fine. The primary card does all the rendering job and dispatches a portion of the image to the secondary card. So the secondary card is basically only a video multiplexor. Here's an image of my 5040X1050 gameplay, if you take a closer look at this picture you will see the number 53. And Schwinn, you were talking about using a fourth monitor for Shkval and ABRIS, please feed me with more information if I fail to present below. I haven't found any embeded multi monitor support in Blackshark. So when you run it at full-screen with multi monitors, you have to make them appear to be a single monitor to Black Shark. That's what TH2G and SothTH do. And TH2G is actually making the operating system think there's only one monitor. With a fourth monitor working in conjunction with TH2G, this monitor appears as a sencondary monitor to Black Shark. As far as I know, there's no way to expand the game image to this monitor in full screen. Assume you had 5040X1050 with TH2G and 1680X1050 on a fourth monitor located on the right hand side. To get the stuff running, you'd have to run Black Shark in window mode, and edit options.lua. Modify width parameter to 5040+1680, and if the program manages to start normally, you will find the entire image centered along the centerline of the "primary"(5040X1050) monitor, which is 2520 pixels from the left. That means there's an invisible 840X1050 area of the image outside the left boundary of the primary monitor. Which also means that Black Shark window only covers the left half of the secondary monitor. That's what happens to a geometrically asymmetrical monitor setup. And by the way, having Black Shark running in window mode significantly reduces FPS.

Cat, the multi-USB device will work, and I did think about it. And there are two ways of accomplishing that: A - a compound device composed of an internal hub and multiple devices like CyBerkut said. B - a composite device which is a single device but with multiple "interfaces" each acting as an individual device. Composite devices are actually more commonly used because they require less hardware resources. A couple of more endpoints inside configurable to multiple interfaces are all it needs. They reason I don't like this either is that you will have to go through a list of devices with similar names and even identical keycodes to setup a setting profile. It's prety much like working with an n*32 matrix, a confusing job, though applicable.

Thanks for the information, dude. And I have to thank Trigger for his help - it was not until he relayed me the page you provided that I could learn about the suggestion. "If your joystick has more than 32 buttons (!), you can use the dwButtonNumber to see if a particular button is pressed." This sounds like the "Array" attribute of an INPUT item from the Report Descriptor of an HID device. Basically the INPUT item can declare a data report with one out of two attributes - Array / Variable. Take one byte as an example. When you have 8 buttons #1~8, you can use one bit to represent on=1/off=0 for each button. Which allows multiple keystrokes. And that makes a "variable", or bitmap which I prefer. Or you may have 255 buttons, with 0 representing no button pressed, and 1~255 representing ONLY ONE of the 255 buttons. It's called an "Array", and I'd prefer the word "index". It's strange to have this limitation in DirectX, coz the USB HID specification does allow 255 buttons, even as "Variables". I may probably try more buttons in Linux some day to find out the difference. I think I'm gonna have to import a keyboard emulator like many other devices did. This 32 button limitation really sucks. The interface adaptor function you mentioned could certainly be real handy for users with old devices. I will consider that, but I can't guarantee anything because each interface has a dedicated protocol behind it. It takes energy and time to go through. I'll try, anyway.

CyBerkut, I'm trying to make it way better than boards currently on the market. I'll fill you guys up a little later after most of the work is done. Currently I'm still trying to overcome the 32 button limitation from DirectX, any idea? Thanks.

Trigger, I sent you a message through MSN just a couple of hours ago. If you see my reply here, please log on. I've got some good news for you - I've learned how to build my own USB I/O board and I've got one working like magic right in front of me!!! *edit: btw, when did you send the email? I've checked my box and nothing came up. weak!

Good work, dude! Tell me about the scar on your head:music_whistling:

:megalol: Never liked sanding either.

My concern for all the pits for DCS series, is the downstreaming peripheral data connection, which may be customized USB, LAN or whatever that works. I'm starting to wonder how the third party support package will handle the downstreaming data into pit peripherals. Every add-on will have its unique pit configuration and objects, I suppose this package won't be released as an all-in one kit? Note when it comes to hardware, it's best to keep pervious protocols & configurations unchanged should there be any update.

Dude! We've got the same G5 laser mouse!! lol Nice job with the pit.

I think trigger has solidworks. I've also got sw running on my PC.

lol, trigger's house is gonna get sooooo crowded. LMAO~!

I think a mod would be good enough to conclude this debate. Thanks for the information.

Alright guys, obviously wolf made you think he was trying to report a bug by putting up this thread in this "Problems and Bugs" section, which wasn't what he really meant. And yes, it's no big deal having a DV-like visual effect in a flight sim, and like you all said it ain't gonna bring hard feelings since we all fly INSIDE the cockpit. However, his point is - since this current visual effect involves calculating blurred rotor blade images, presumably introducing more calculation workload than just visualizing a translucent disc in the F2 view, he's curious with possible performance loss in exteral views. Which of course won't be an issue when you're within the cockpit.

Does stretch mode support two monitors with different aspect ratio & resolution? I use nVidia control panel, and stretch mode doesn't work under Vista, even though I have two identical monitors.

Dude thanks for the note. I wasn't quit sure about the internal mechanism of softTH, so I didn't enlist this solution. Actually before I fully upgraded my rig, I was able to try it out once, with an ATi card and an nVidia card on my old motherboard. I ran Crysis Warhead on it, with triple 22' monitors configured at 800x600x3 from softTH. Gameplay was smooth enough for the old CPU and MB, but some polygons were in the wrong place. I think I'll first get a GTX260+ as a secondary graphic card for softTH. To be honest, I'd prefer going with Matrox TH2G, coz it features much lower power consumption. However, I also need to rotate monitor(s) for scripting purposes, and it's really important to me. If Matrox TH2G had the support for rotated display on individual monitors, I would definitely have bought one.

I'm afraid you are. The manual does state that it supports triple monitors. But the default configuration only works on a Matrox TH2G setup, which actually has the triple monitors recognized as one. If you are using dual head graphic cards, then as far as I know, you will have to work on the scripts to make it work. I have triple 22' 1680x1050 monitors, and I am planing to get a TH2G later. Right now, two of them are connected to my GTX295, with the 3rd one temporarily unused. I tried putting shkval to the right of the main camera, but was stuck on the phantom monitor part. The entire 3360x1050 picture was centered in reference with the primary monitor, which left an 840x1050 area on the right monitor empty. At my best attempt I was only getting an intact cockpit view and the left half of the shkval window. Just learned about the phantom fix from this thread, and I'll try it asap. Good luck with yours.

Way to go, guys! I can see it's moving forward. Real quick.

Ah.....Nice command center, the YF-23 model looks neat! Man I'm still trying to get a decent job while working on my current projects. Things are kinda hard here, even I know there's meant to be possitive changes to my career.

Well, to have ultra-wide screen-shot wallpapers, the source must by a rig equiped with triple monitors as well. That would eliminate the needs of stretching normal pictures in a deformed shape. oops my PSU....actually it belongs to my new rig. I'm having problem with the GTX295 - system freezes when temperature of GPU1 reaches 71 Celsius. Anyway, it's being taken care of by the dealer.

Hey guys, I'll been searching for triple monitor wallpapers and found some intersting picutres. But none of them have anything to do with military. I have the UltraMon software which is capable of implementing a single ultra-wide jpg across three or even four monitors, or assigning a particular picture to each monitor respectively. So I resized some of the huge pictures and added 130-pixel bezel correction to them. Here's what my current desktop looks like. I may click on the "switch screen" button to easily send each window to another monitor. And this is the actual rig with the wallpaper on it. Of course I can assign three different BS pictures like this: But that looks just like putting a bunch of monitors from three computers together, and is totally not fun. My Black Shark DVD is still on its way. And I can't wait to have some nice Black Shark pictures, so if anyone is in possession of some good pics, I'd appreciate of you'd share with me. Thanks!:)

It's a quad-rotor aircraft. The Germans are really good at autonomous control of such an aircraft. Its physical model is way less complicated than a conventional helicopter, which makes it easier for embeded micro controller/processor systems to carry out autonomous control on it.

Looks awesome. Way to go, 443, way to go!!:thumbup: Replace the F-5E, clear its payload and put it on a reconnaissance mission at dispatch. Would be kinda weird to have two missiles floating beside the bird. I'm SN1090 by the way. Have a nice day.:joystick: