SHHH! SIDE QUEST IN PROGRESS

Super busy!

Here is an update on the garage/workshop progress. Have put new shelves up on the right for storage and general-purpose extra space. Quite pleased with these. The last ones I had up here were all too big, very square (MDF hurts when you smack your head into a corner) and cluttered. Have put up soft-edged shelves with random sizes and shapes. The only one that was planned was the printer, that one needed to have clearance above.

Reduced the size of the desk. It used to be one large desk that was too deep. Have built a new main desk that is much smaller, just enough for mouse and keyboard and a few bits, it is a work in progress so excuse the visible screw holes. All the shelves and the desk space to the right and left have holes in the corner for cable management. 

Need to build more storage in that blank space on the left. Not sure what yet. More shelves would be easy but am tempted, if I have enough wood, to make a unit with possibly doors and drawers. Not sure yet.

I am beginning to form an idea for the desk too. I want a slot under the front edge that will accept a board that will have different things attached to it. Steering wheel. Different arcade controls. Will have one that is for general use with fight stick type setup, one that will have fewer buttons and a 4-way gate on the stick for pacman and other games, and for sure, and probably the first one I make after the wheel, a fake pinball machine. Basically a box with a button on each side.

All of this is still germinating in my brain. But I hope to do a few tests tomorrow.

SIDE QUEST DISTRACTION.

Going to have to do something useful. My workshop/office/mancave/garage needs a bit of love. I started clearing my desk off and then got carried away. 

This was what it looked like. 

Now it looks like this.

So the arcade projects are all on pause till I finish this. 

Promise it will be awesome! Or just less messy. 

The Next Big Thing (possibly smaller)

This came a few days ago. I wasn't completely aware of its existence. It's a Pi 3a+ and I am told it shares almost identical specs to the Pi 3b+. The differences being the lack of an ethernet port, only a single full-size USB port, and half the ram of the b+. I used a b+ on a previous bartop and it was really good.

My intention was to use this Pi Zero W for the next project.

This 17" Acer monitor was going to pair with it. I looked into what I would need to use the Pi zero, and the main thing I would need was a USB sound card. Of course, this would then use up the only USB socket on the board which would mean using the GPIO (or a powered USB hub, not cheap), and you might have noticed the GPIO pins are missing and I would need to solder those in. Added to that, the Pi Zero is underpowered for a lot of games I would like to run. If I was going to use this one it would be a low expense build.

Then I spotted the Pi 3a+ on Amazon for £23 delivered. Although it only has the single USB port, it does have a GPIO header and a 3.5mm sound output. Also, a full-size HDMI port is a bonus, negating the need for cable converters. So I ordered this one and then the problems started. 

That 17" Acer screen gave me a headache for a couple of days. I could not get that thing to work. Actually, that's not entirely true. I got it to work. Twice. Each time with a freshly burned SD card. And then the next boot it would not wake the screen. Very frustrating. And so the 17" Acer is going back to its actual owner and I will move onto another project instead.

Other Pi's I have hanging about waiting for a home. This Pi4 2gb.

And this Pi b+

And on the left here is probably the monitor I will use for the next build. Its a 19" HP IPS display. Very nice quality screen. I picked it up very cheap off Facebook around December, paid £30 for two of them.

And so I have to come up with a project to fit around that screen. It isn't what I wanted to use so my plans for an ultra-tiny and slim, one-player bartop, have gone out the window. I might possibly revert to making a normal size bartop with a view to selling to fund the next project. That might be fun. If I do that I will probably use the pi 4 instead. The extra USB ports will be needed for the two-player controls (I am not going to go down the GPIO route unless I have no other choice).

An Additional Arcade Addendum

I forgot to add the first part of the build to this log. Apart from the hours daydreaming about it over the washing up the most important thing I missed was the plans. I designed the whole thing in Sketchup (its fantastic) and below you can see the results. I followed this plan to the millimetre and what you see here is exactly how it turned out. Almost. Nearly. It's about the same size :)

Here is a LINK to the Sketchup plans. Feel free to use them any way you wish, but if you do please let me know via my Twitter (@ZZleeZZ) so I can see what you did. Just because that would be really cool. If you do want to use it you might need to adjust it around the screen you use. The one I used was really tight in the case.

ITS THE END!

May 4th and May 5th. The final post in this series.

No, don't cry. It's going to be OK. 

How?

Because I'm already planning the NEXT project and it will be done without time pressure and a larger (but not by much) budget. 

Before finishing the arcade cabinet I was ordered by management to build a new shelf for the kitchen. 

There. Now we can get to business.

Now all the wires are in place its time to get the software setup. I found a few guides on enabling GPIO controllers in Retropie, but there were many that were out of date or had various problems. This worked a treat. Pretty easy, just a few lines and then a simple setup. All the buttons and the sticks were detected during setup so I knew they all worked as they should.

And, after a couple of restarts of Emulation Station, the controllers were detected. The third one is the wired Xbox 360 controller I was using for testing.

Had some problems getting the right controllers to be active. That was an easy fix: unplug the Xbox pad!

The next morning. Need to get some chores out of the way before I can carry on. Shelves glued together.

After some playtesting, I find that player one has a dodgy stick. Down is intermittent. I pat myself on the back for wiring this with unpluggable dupont connectors. Should be easy to whip this joystick out and fix it.

Then I realise I have soldered all the grounds to the stick. And they are not unpluggable. Facepalm.

Still got enough room to strip down the stick. This is the errant microswitch. With a multimeter connected to it, I can see it's not making good contact.

I have this spare, but it doesn't have the long lever arm the one in the stick has over the switch.

Useful to poke around inside though, I can see how it should look. The faulty one opened just as easy as this, just pry open the cover, and a quick rub over the contacts sorted it out. 

Software still needs sorting. The image I am using is by someone that calls themselves by the humourous moniker of Tits McGee. I have to get rid of the boobs. Very young nephews would find them far too funny and I can't have that. A dig around in the menus and settings sorts that. Also managed to turn off the Irish background music that was good for the first five minutes and then got pretty annoying. I'd be just as annoyed by any national music to be fair, nothing against the Irish.

Final touches. Dust cover missing on player two stick.

I need to play this again. Selected at random. It's a Streets of Rage type game called Powered Gear. I had a blast playing this.

Dust cover robbed from a new stick. I will need to replace that when I get my 3d printer up and running later.

And it is FINISHED.

I spent around £40 on everything I didn't already own. 

I had a screen. 

I had controls.

I had speakers.

I bought wood (£10)

I bought paint (£20)

I bought fixings, cables and adaptors (£10)

I suppose if you add the value of the previous items I already owned. 

Screen (£20)

Controls (£30)

Speakers (£20)

A few other cables (£5)

The whole thing is worth £115 in parts. Not bad!

But anyway. We are done. That is it, finished.

Wait a minute! 

Oh look, a pi 3A+ 

This is going in the next build, so stay tuned. Keep an eye on Twitter or subscribe to this blog if you want to know what happens next! Hope you found this interesting, and thanks for taking a look!

Gus says BYE! (Or "What year is it?")

I LOVE THE SMELL OF SOLDER IN THE EVENING

May 2nd and 3rd coming right up.

Small distraction before I kick-off. Had to make a picture frame for a birthday present for my dear ole ma. Was nice to make some sawdust again. I'm happiest in the sun making a lot of noise and dust. My neighbours actually like me!

Once that was done it was time to continue wiring the controls. A daisy chain of ground wires. Tedious work cutting, stripping, twisting, fluxing, tinning, soldering each one of these to the terminals. 

All done. I made a separate loop for each controller to make diagnosing faults easier.

Checked with my trusty multimeter. No problems at this stage but the wires would be pulled around through the next stages so these will need checking again.

Love these! A few pounds on Amazon. Dupont connectors. Some are male/male some are female/female some are female/male. I think they are all equally lovely ;) 

I used a male/male to soldered to each terminal.

Kept the colour coding the same on each side.

Now I needed to find somewhere to mount the raspberry pi. There is a lot less room than it looks in this case.

Cut a thin piece of ply and glued it in place with hot glue. Also glued on the monitor controls so they don't move about.

See them better here.

I looked at plastic spacers for mounting the pi, they were really fiddly. I went into my PC screw nest and found some matching height motherboard standoffs. Drilled some holes the right size and screwed them right into the wood.

The screws were not very secure so I glued them in place with hot glue.

Oh, look! Another mistake! The power, HDMI, and 3.5mm audio are all facing out. They need to be facing in.

I still hadn't spotted the mistake. Connected the first wires to the GPIO, these are the start buttons from under the bezel. You can see the back of them covered in hot glue.

And we caught it just in time. Power, sound and picture all plugged in now. 

Wires all fed up through the back of the control cavity. They plug into matching female/female cables which are then plugged onto the GPIO connector on the pi.

Spotted a broken solder joint. Would not be the last one!

And all the wires are in the right places.

Fired it up to check everything things still work. They do. Next, I need to configure the GPIO drivers to enable the controls.