pixelmagic

Dunno if it will work with other boards, not designed it with that in mind. Sorry The current input boards need 5V for the driving, but 3.3 MIGHT work.... Lets keep focused on the Arduino Mega board for now and make that work first, then look for options on V2.0. My preffered situation for V2.0: Raspberry Pi communicating on low-level with Pinmame, Pi driving dedicated Arduino board(s) (for the # outputs). Configuration for your specific tables with hardware done with web-interface running on your own Pi, getting the config data from the internet on request. Live testing and simulation possible for all effects. What ? yeah... let me have my dreams Email answered

Hi Randy, Thanks for the answer, and it sort of confirms the fears we had before. Our current option is not using the VB scripting at all for the communication, as indeed that seems to be where the trouble is coming from. VB just has to many things to do allready in a running table, this seems to be the latest drop. As said before, we are looking into directly 'listening' to the ROM events, much like Russ and UltraVP does. If we could do that, convert the commands in our own software and if needed buffer or maximize the data to the device i think we could have a winner. Anyway, to be continued

Hi Randy, Can you please share the point(s) on where you think some progress can be made with the VBscript ? We are looking into making a separate program for catching the ROM events and then driving the Arduino. If this can be done by VBscript maybe we make some progress. Thanks in advance !

What the H*ll ?? Almost bought a real one last summer !! Hi guys, I will slowly try to get into Pinball-Mode from now on, winter is coming fast and the outside jobs are almost done. First question needs to be: are we still interested in this new additions (ok, year old). No need to spend a lot of time into it if besides Shifter, Chris and me no other people want to be using it. Second one: there seems a lot of news on the market, a new VP, not much news on Unity, Real DMD's are hot, is there other news I need to know ? Latest status update to my best memory: hardware as good as ready driving software as good as ready interfacing in VBscript works, but has stutter like Ledwiz interfacing between VP <> ***x needs work on low-level interfacing Played a game last week (yes, MM) with ***x, works, but stutters on lots of action Oh yeah, and the sh*tload of effects possible is totaly awesome !! Lets hear it, now gonna do some reading in this forum. Erwin

Sorry guys, been real busy with other stuff lately, will post more details asap.

One important thing in pinball: speed, when you hook up 5 meters to 2 pins (it is possible) and you want to set the first and last to green and red, you have to address all the 160 leds in the strip.... not very speedy You are indeed missing some things here, solenoids and contactors have got nothing to do with the led strips. The strips have PWM build in and it can be used. Driving other on/off items is done via the ULN boards.

The PI will be a nice thing in the future, but given the problems they have at the moment, the Arduino is much more stable at this moment. Who knows what the future will bring, but for now we have chosen for stability and availability in the long run. Finaly the cat is out of the bag Check out this link: http://www.pieterfloris.nl/shop/product.php?id_product=507 for the LED strips. We fully support this type with a maximum of 8 strips of 1 meter (32 leds) from the software. Basicly you need 4 wires for 32 leds/1 meter (or 16 leds/50cm or whatever size you choose), Power supply (5Volt), ground, and 2 data lines to the Arduino. Let's say you have a 'very big' cab and truly can fit 8x 1 meter of the strip, then you would have 8x32=256 RGB leds, all can be driven individualy, and you would only use 8x2=16 output lines on the arduino. At the same time you can still use 4 ULN extention boards with 32 outputs each (4x32=128) and have also have 12 real pwm outputs on the Arduino available. Sounds like some serious connections to me. You want more ? No problem, connect a second Arduino and double the number of outputs. More ? No problem, more is possible. We will keep that in mind !

There will be much more info and schematics when it is all done and working, don't worry about that. For someone @ 4 posts you got a lot of knowledge, so things will fall into place at the time. Just don't buy to many flashers, I seriously doubt if you gonna notice them when you have our new toys active (watch my last video for more insight)

Noted ! No, they are designed for fast communications from a cpu like arduino, ledwiz is just a 'dumb' on/off switcher and cannot send fast data as required. Sorry about that. The basics are correct, 16x0.5A and 16x1A, BUT (!!!!) with the same limitations as the ledwiz, if you gonna use to much current from 1 chip, YOU WILL blow it. On the good side, the ULN chips are easy exchangeble without soldering and are low cost, soe if it happens, no biggie is my thought. And you can attach 6 of the new driver boards to the shield/software, not 4. You cannot use pwm on those boards, you can use the 'old' big driver boards to use the PWM from the Arduino and also on the 8 breakout connectors on the new driver board. @Russ: very nice to hear from you in this thread, it would be great is you can give Shifters some pointers on totaly excluding the vbs part on behalf of the speed advantage.

Let me know what you want I think it can be both ways, with or without parts and all-ready. In the mean time have tested the shield, works ok, and also put together the Shift Register/ULN driver board and also works perfectly. Here are some pics: Now soldering the next few boards for Shifter for some more testing of the software, and then we could be ready ! Oh darn, need to write some code for the web-utility...

Ok, next step has arrived, the new pcb's have arrived, waiting on some parts for the second pcb, but assembled the first one, a shield for the Arduino, so there is no need for loose wires and soldering. This pcb will fir exactly on the Arduino Mega, just slide in, connect the wires to the screws or the headers and you are ready to go. Also the option on using most off the Arduino outputs directly and optional serial connectors and analog input (future expansions ?) Here is a picture of a complete soldered one: The second board is a driver board, also dedicated to our software design with 32 outputs, more info on that will follow when parts have arrived.

Nice work We also use the same kind of thing to get more ports, thanks for sharing !

No lights ??

Bonjour ! No links yet, just that the driver board will use 3 digital outputs off the arduino board and outputs 2x16 digital outputs, 16 on ledwiz leven (500ma per output in theory (!!!)) and 16 doubled outputs. All outputs with screw connectors and al IC's can be placed on feet, so when you should blow one, exchanging is easy. Furthermore where will be a Shield for the Adruino available if all goes well, that supply's easy access to connect the driver boards and other hardware. Will be placing updates on that in this topic, so keep watching

There will be new driver boards very soon, that will be with lower power like ledwiz, but also better price. The arduino alone cannot replace the ledwiz, it was not designed that way. BTW, the VP-Fx solution was never designed for a cheaper repalcement of the ledwiz, it is a upgrade from ledwiz with much, much more options.

Hmm, seems I have been to fast in counting, a recount tells me that I have around 134 direct outputs and around 90 RGB leds empty, so no hurry yet. Oh wait, I forget we can put the Arduino's connected to each other, so I still have unlimited ! We are thinking of the best way to do it, while at first glance it looks difficult I hope we can make some nice config tools to make it a lot easyer. At the moment the Arduino configuration (think about what toy is connected to what port/hardware) can be made in a web interface. This can be a lot, I have over 120 lines for my current config (looks like D171 W39 0,D,0,48,53,4,314,9,0). Then we need the reference from the tables, basicly like LEDwiz does, but here comes the event driven approach around the corner. For contactors it could be the same as LEDwiz, but on flashers, do you really only want to flash 2-3 flashers in 1 color on a event ? I think not, you have to think in events, when a Troll in MM comes up, i want a part of the playfield LED's flashing in a ugly green Troll color. Same with the Castle destroy, you will want to have a lot of flashing, even when the Castle is not moving. The approach I have at the moment for this is to put the table config in detail in a webtool, and take it to the next part of the config. Last but not least, as most people will have completely different configs, it is going to be hard to make something default. But I have some ideas on how we can still make it easy to configure, again with a webtool, combining your personal config from the first part, the generic table config from the second producing a ready to work with config file. We are looking on maybe giving some hints (other people have used event xx on group xx for this) to make life easyer. Anyway, we are not done, and the above is only the small part that I have to contribute, the main accomplishment is done by Shifters and his magic creative work on the Arduino. I am truly amazed in what he has made so far and can honestly say that if I would have made this, it would be way less advanced, if working at all. This one is for you Shifters:

I have no more ledwiz in my cab, everything is controlled by VP-Fx, the top flashers, the 60 RGB leds on the playfield, the 28 back box leds, 9 contractors, shaker and more. And still have 75+ unused outputs left... :-)

Ok, got some extra LEDs and installed them, also using the latest version of the software (thank Shifters !) with color driving of each indivudual command and output. Look espacialy at the middle and the end, when the castle goes down, the trolls come up and the catapult is hit. UVKG1llccpo

The stutter is not resolved yet, but we think that it is at the present state allready better then with ledwiz.

Ok, got finaly after some weeks my playfield LCD back in place, ans have done some lines of configuration on 1 table. Off course it's MM Keep in mind there is nothing special done on the weakest part, the vbs. Here is the video, look on the right side when the flashers go off and the pop bumpers also. Czi_tUVBJE0 Edit: current events on the right side are only white, will be full RGB ! Edit 2: need parts for the same lights on the right and top sides

Cree's are so 1970's We have some alternatives at the moment

I have allready started, you're behind !!

Ok, here is the next step video, some example of individual driving of lights: rUvZrFbfmQM I think there is something missing dough... This is driven from colour lookup table with 705 events available. The next version will have full RGB events with millions of possible colors. The next release (version 5) could be the first public beta. Keep in mind that this version is not done yet.

Yes, new hardware on the way to shifters for development.... Also, like mentioned in other topic, new 595 + uln driver board under development, with 16 'normal ledwiz-like outputs and 16 double outputs for more power. We are looking into a alternative on driving the arduino using something other then the vbs script, with speed/less or no stutter in mind (hopefully). Enough?

It look very nice, almost real But i will probibly wait for the RGB version