Based on kernel version 2.6.26. Page generated on 2008-07-16 21:13 EST.
1 Linux Joystick parport drivers v2.0 2 (c) 1998-2000 Vojtech Pavlik <vojtech[AT]ucw[DOT]cz> 3 (c) 1998 Andree Borrmann <a.borrmann[AT]tu-bs[DOT]de> 4 Sponsored by SuSE 5 $Id: joystick-parport.txt,v 1.6 2001/09/25 09:31:32 vojtech Exp $ 6 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7 8 0. Disclaimer 9 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 10 Any information in this file is provided as-is, without any guarantee that 11 it will be true. So, use it at your own risk. The possible damages that can 12 happen include burning your parallel port, and/or the sticks and joystick 13 and maybe even more. Like when a lightning kills you it is not our problem. 14 15 1. Intro 16 ~~~~~~~~ 17 The joystick parport drivers are used for joysticks and gamepads not 18 originally designed for PCs and other computers Linux runs on. Because of 19 that, PCs usually lack the right ports to connect these devices to. Parallel 20 port, because of its ability to change single bits at will, and providing 21 both output and input bits is the most suitable port on the PC for 22 connecting such devices. 23 24 2. Devices supported 25 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 26 Many console and 8-bit computer gamepads and joysticks are supported. The 27 following subsections discuss usage of each. 28 29 2.1 NES and SNES 30 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 31 The Nintendo Entertainment System and Super Nintendo Entertainment System 32 gamepads are widely available, and easy to get. Also, they are quite easy to 33 connect to a PC, and don't need much processing speed (108 us for NES and 34 165 us for SNES, compared to about 1000 us for PC gamepads) to communicate 35 with them. 36 37 All NES and SNES use the same synchronous serial protocol, clocked from 38 the computer's side (and thus timing insensitive). To allow up to 5 NES 39 and/or SNES gamepads and/or SNES mice connected to the parallel port at once, 40 the output lines of the parallel port are shared, while one of 5 available 41 input lines is assigned to each gamepad. 42 43 This protocol is handled by the gamecon.c driver, so that's the one 44 you'll use for NES, SNES gamepads and SNES mice. 45 46 The main problem with PC parallel ports is that they don't have +5V power 47 source on any of their pins. So, if you want a reliable source of power 48 for your pads, use either keyboard or joystick port, and make a pass-through 49 cable. You can also pull the power directly from the power supply (the red 50 wire is +5V). 51 52 If you want to use the parallel port only, you can take the power is from 53 some data pin. For most gamepad and parport implementations only one pin is 54 needed, and I'd recommend pin 9 for that, the highest data bit. On the other 55 hand, if you are not planning to use anything else than NES / SNES on the 56 port, anything between and including pin 4 and pin 9 will work. 57 58 (pin 9) -----> Power 59 60 Unfortunately, there are pads that need a lot more of power, and parallel 61 ports that can't give much current through the data pins. If this is your 62 case, you'll need to use diodes (as a prevention of destroying your parallel 63 port), and combine the currents of two or more data bits together. 64 65 Diodes 66 (pin 9) ----|>|-------+------> Power 67 | 68 (pin 8) ----|>|-------+ 69 | 70 (pin 7) ----|>|-------+ 71 | 72 <and so on> : 73 | 74 (pin 4) ----|>|-------+ 75 76 Ground is quite easy. On PC's parallel port the ground is on any of the 77 pins from pin 18 to pin 25. So use any pin of these you like for the ground. 78 79 (pin 18) -----> Ground 80 81 NES and SNES pads have two input bits, Clock and Latch, which drive the 82 serial transfer. These are connected to pins 2 and 3 of the parallel port, 83 respectively. 84 85 (pin 2) -----> Clock 86 (pin 3) -----> Latch 87 88 And the last thing is the NES / SNES data wire. Only that isn't shared and 89 each pad needs its own data pin. The parallel port pins are: 90 91 (pin 10) -----> Pad 1 data 92 (pin 11) -----> Pad 2 data 93 (pin 12) -----> Pad 3 data 94 (pin 13) -----> Pad 4 data 95 (pin 15) -----> Pad 5 data 96 97 Note that pin 14 is not used, since it is not an input pin on the parallel 98 port. 99 100 This is everything you need on the PC's side of the connection, now on to 101 the gamepads side. The NES and SNES have different connectors. Also, there 102 are quite a lot of NES clones, and because Nintendo used proprietary 103 connectors for their machines, the cloners couldn't and used standard D-Cannon 104 connectors. Anyway, if you've got a gamepad, and it has buttons A, B, Turbo 105 A, Turbo B, Select and Start, and is connected through 5 wires, then it is 106 either a NES or NES clone and will work with this connection. SNES gamepads 107 also use 5 wires, but have more buttons. They will work as well, of course. 108 109 Pinout for NES gamepads Pinout for SNES gamepads and mice 110 111 +----> Power +-----------------------\ 112 | 7 | o o o o | x x o | 1 113 5 +---------+ 7 +-----------------------/ 114 | x x o \ | | | | | 115 | o o o o | | | | | +-> Ground 116 4 +------------+ 1 | | | +------------> Data 117 | | | | | | +---------------> Latch 118 | | | +-> Ground | +------------------> Clock 119 | | +----> Clock +---------------------> Power 120 | +-------> Latch 121 +----------> Data 122 123 Pinout for NES clone (db9) gamepads Pinout for NES clone (db15) gamepads 124 125 +---------> Clock +-----------------> Data 126 | +-------> Latch | +---> Ground 127 | | +-----> Data | | 128 | | | ___________________ 129 _____________ 8 \ o x x x x x x o / 1 130 5 \ x o o o x / 1 \ o x x o x x o / 131 \ x o x o / 15 `~~~~~~~~~~~~~' 9 132 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 | | | 133 | | | | +----> Clock 134 | +----> Power | +----------> Latch 135 +--------> Ground +----------------> Power 136 137 2.2 Multisystem joysticks 138 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 139 In the era of 8-bit machines, there was something like de-facto standard 140 for joystick ports. They were all digital, and all used D-Cannon 9 pin 141 connectors (db9). Because of that, a single joystick could be used without 142 hassle on Atari (130, 800XE, 800XL, 2600, 7200), Amiga, Commodore C64, 143 Amstrad CPC, Sinclair ZX Spectrum and many other machines. That's why these 144 joysticks are called "Multisystem". 145 146 Now their pinout: 147 148 +---------> Right 149 | +-------> Left 150 | | +-----> Down 151 | | | +---> Up 152 | | | | 153 _____________ 154 5 \ x o o o o / 1 155 \ x o x o / 156 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 157 | | 158 | +----> Button 159 +--------> Ground 160 161 However, as time passed, extensions to this standard developed, and these 162 were not compatible with each other: 163 164 165 Atari 130, 800/XL/XE MSX 166 167 +-----------> Power 168 +---------> Right | +---------> Right 169 | +-------> Left | | +-------> Left 170 | | +-----> Down | | | +-----> Down 171 | | | +---> Up | | | | +---> Up 172 | | | | | | | | | 173 _____________ _____________ 174 5 \ x o o o o / 1 5 \ o o o o o / 1 175 \ x o o o / \ o o o o / 176 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 177 | | | | | | | 178 | | +----> Button | | | +----> Button 1 179 | +------> Power | | +------> Button 2 180 +--------> Ground | +--------> Output 3 181 +----------> Ground 182 183 Amstrad CPC Commodore C64 184 185 +-----------> Analog Y 186 +---------> Right | +---------> Right 187 | +-------> Left | | +-------> Left 188 | | +-----> Down | | | +-----> Down 189 | | | +---> Up | | | | +---> Up 190 | | | | | | | | | 191 _____________ _____________ 192 5 \ x o o o o / 1 5 \ o o o o o / 1 193 \ x o o o / \ o o o o / 194 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 195 | | | | | | | 196 | | +----> Button 1 | | | +----> Button 197 | +------> Button 2 | | +------> Power 198 +--------> Ground | +--------> Ground 199 +----------> Analog X 200 201 Sinclair Spectrum +2A/+3 Amiga 1200 202 203 +-----------> Up +-----------> Button 3 204 | +---------> Fire | +---------> Right 205 | | | | +-------> Left 206 | | +-----> Ground | | | +-----> Down 207 | | | | | | | +---> Up 208 | | | | | | | | 209 _____________ _____________ 210 5 \ o o x o x / 1 5 \ o o o o o / 1 211 \ o o o o / \ o o o o / 212 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 213 | | | | | | | | 214 | | | +----> Right | | | +----> Button 1 215 | | +------> Left | | +------> Power 216 | +--------> Ground | +--------> Ground 217 +----------> Down +----------> Button 2 218 219 And there were many others. 220 221 2.2.1 Multisystem joysticks using db9.c 222 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 223 For the Multisystem joysticks, and their derivatives, the db9.c driver 224 was written. It allows only one joystick / gamepad per parallel port, but 225 the interface is easy to build and works with almost anything. 226 227 For the basic 1-button Multisystem joystick you connect its wires to the 228 parallel port like this: 229 230 (pin 1) -----> Power 231 (pin 18) -----> Ground 232 233 (pin 2) -----> Up 234 (pin 3) -----> Down 235 (pin 4) -----> Left 236 (pin 5) -----> Right 237 (pin 6) -----> Button 1 238 239 However, if the joystick is switch based (eg. clicks when you move it), 240 you might or might not, depending on your parallel port, need 10 kOhm pullup 241 resistors on each of the direction and button signals, like this: 242 243 (pin 2) ------------+------> Up 244 Resistor | 245 (pin 1) --[10kOhm]--+ 246 247 Try without, and if it doesn't work, add them. For TTL based joysticks / 248 gamepads the pullups are not needed. 249 250 For joysticks with two buttons you connect the second button to pin 7 on 251 the parallel port. 252 253 (pin 7) -----> Button 2 254 255 And that's it. 256 257 On a side note, if you have already built a different adapter for use with 258 the digital joystick driver 0.8.0.2, this is also supported by the db9.c 259 driver, as device type 8. (See section 3.2) 260 261 2.2.2 Multisystem joysticks using gamecon.c 262 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 263 For some people just one joystick per parallel port is not enough, and/or 264 want to use them on one parallel port together with NES/SNES/PSX pads. This is 265 possible using the gamecon.c. It supports up to 5 devices of the above types, 266 including 1 and 2 buttons Multisystem joysticks. 267 268 However, there is nothing for free. To allow more sticks to be used at 269 once, you need the sticks to be purely switch based (that is non-TTL), and 270 not to need power. Just a plain simple six switches inside. If your 271 joystick can do more (eg. turbofire) you'll need to disable it totally first 272 if you want to use gamecon.c. 273 274 Also, the connection is a bit more complex. You'll need a bunch of diodes, 275 and one pullup resistor. First, you connect the Directions and the button 276 the same as for db9, however with the diodes inbetween. 277 278 Diodes 279 (pin 2) -----|<|----> Up 280 (pin 3) -----|<|----> Down 281 (pin 4) -----|<|----> Left 282 (pin 5) -----|<|----> Right 283 (pin 6) -----|<|----> Button 1 284 285 For two button sticks you also connect the other button. 286 287 (pin 7) -----|<|----> Button 2 288 289 And finally, you connect the Ground wire of the joystick, like done in 290 this little schematic to Power and Data on the parallel port, as described 291 for the NES / SNES pads in section 2.1 of this file - that is, one data pin 292 for each joystick. The power source is shared. 293 294 Data ------------+-----> Ground 295 Resistor | 296 Power --[10kOhm]--+ 297 298 And that's all, here we go! 299 300 2.2.3 Multisystem joysticks using turbografx.c 301 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 302 The TurboGraFX interface, designed by 303 304 Steffen Schwenke <schwenke[AT]burg-halle[DOT]de> 305 306 allows up to 7 Multisystem joysticks connected to the parallel port. In 307 Steffen's version, there is support for up to 5 buttons per joystick. However, 308 since this doesn't work reliably on all parallel ports, the turbografx.c driver 309 supports only one button per joystick. For more information on how to build the 310 interface, see 311 312 http://www2.burg-halle.de/~schwenke/parport.html 313 314 2.3 Sony Playstation 315 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 316 317 The PSX controller is supported by the gamecon.c. Pinout of the PSX 318 controller (compatible with DirectPadPro): 319 320 +---------+---------+---------+ 321 9 | o o o | o o o | o o o | 1 parallel 322 \________|_________|________/ port pins 323 | | | | | | 324 | | | | | +--------> Clock --- (4) 325 | | | | +------------> Select --- (3) 326 | | | +---------------> Power --- (5-9) 327 | | +------------------> Ground --- (18-25) 328 | +-------------------------> Command --- (2) 329 +----------------------------> Data --- (one of 10,11,12,13,15) 330 331 The driver supports these controllers: 332 333 * Standard PSX Pad 334 * NegCon PSX Pad 335 * Analog PSX Pad (red mode) 336 * Analog PSX Pad (green mode) 337 * PSX Rumble Pad 338 * PSX DDR Pad 339 340 2.4 Sega 341 ~~~~~~~~ 342 All the Sega controllers are more or less based on the standard 2-button 343 Multisystem joystick. However, since they don't use switches and use TTL 344 logic, the only driver usable with them is the db9.c driver. 345 346 2.4.1 Sega Master System 347 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 348 The SMS gamepads are almost exactly the same as normal 2-button 349 Multisystem joysticks. Set the driver to Multi2 mode, use the corresponding 350 parallel port pins, and the following schematic: 351 352 +-----------> Power 353 | +---------> Right 354 | | +-------> Left 355 | | | +-----> Down 356 | | | | +---> Up 357 | | | | | 358 _____________ 359 5 \ o o o o o / 1 360 \ o o x o / 361 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 362 | | | 363 | | +----> Button 1 364 | +--------> Ground 365 +----------> Button 2 366 367 2.4.2 Sega Genesis aka MegaDrive 368 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 369 The Sega Genesis (in Europe sold as Sega MegaDrive) pads are an extension 370 to the Sega Master System pads. They use more buttons (3+1, 5+1, 6+1). Use 371 the following schematic: 372 373 +-----------> Power 374 | +---------> Right 375 | | +-------> Left 376 | | | +-----> Down 377 | | | | +---> Up 378 | | | | | 379 _____________ 380 5 \ o o o o o / 1 381 \ o o o o / 382 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 383 | | | | 384 | | | +----> Button 1 385 | | +------> Select 386 | +--------> Ground 387 +----------> Button 2 388 389 The Select pin goes to pin 14 on the parallel port. 390 391 (pin 14) -----> Select 392 393 The rest is the same as for Multi2 joysticks using db9.c 394 395 2.4.3 Sega Saturn 396 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 397 Sega Saturn has eight buttons, and to transfer that, without hacks like 398 Genesis 6 pads use, it needs one more select pin. Anyway, it is still 399 handled by the db9.c driver. Its pinout is very different from anything 400 else. Use this schematic: 401 402 +-----------> Select 1 403 | +---------> Power 404 | | +-------> Up 405 | | | +-----> Down 406 | | | | +---> Ground 407 | | | | | 408 _____________ 409 5 \ o o o o o / 1 410 \ o o o o / 411 9 `~~~~~~~' 6 412 | | | | 413 | | | +----> Select 2 414 | | +------> Right 415 | +--------> Left 416 +----------> Power 417 418 Select 1 is pin 14 on the parallel port, Select 2 is pin 16 on the 419 parallel port. 420 421 (pin 14) -----> Select 1 422 (pin 16) -----> Select 2 423 424 The other pins (Up, Down, Right, Left, Power, Ground) are the same as for 425 Multi joysticks using db9.c 426 427 3. The drivers 428 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 429 There are three drivers for the parallel port interfaces. Each, as 430 described above, allows to connect a different group of joysticks and pads. 431 Here are described their command lines: 432 433 3.1 gamecon.c 434 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 435 Using gamecon.c you can connect up to five devices to one parallel port. It 436 uses the following kernel/module command line: 437 438 gamecon.map=port,pad1,pad2,pad3,pad4,pad5 439 440 Where 'port' the number of the parport interface (eg. 0 for parport0). 441 442 And 'pad1' to 'pad5' are pad types connected to different data input pins 443 (10,11,12,13,15), as described in section 2.1 of this file. 444 445 The types are: 446 447 Type | Joystick/Pad 448 -------------------- 449 0 | None 450 1 | SNES pad 451 2 | NES pad 452 4 | Multisystem 1-button joystick 453 5 | Multisystem 2-button joystick 454 6 | N64 pad 455 7 | Sony PSX controller 456 8 | Sony PSX DDR controller 457 9 | SNES mouse 458 459 The exact type of the PSX controller type is autoprobed when used, so 460 hot swapping should work (but is not recommended). 461 462 Should you want to use more than one of parallel ports at once, you can use 463 gamecon.map2 and gamecon.map3 as additional command line parameters for two 464 more parallel ports. 465 466 There are two options specific to PSX driver portion. gamecon.psx_delay sets 467 the command delay when talking to the controllers. The default of 25 should 468 work but you can try lowering it for better performance. If your pads don't 469 respond try raising it until they work. Setting the type to 8 allows the 470 driver to be used with Dance Dance Revolution or similar games. Arrow keys are 471 registered as key presses instead of X and Y axes. 472 473 3.2 db9.c 474 ~~~~~~~~~ 475 Apart from making an interface, there is nothing difficult on using the 476 db9.c driver. It uses the following kernel/module command line: 477 478 db9.dev=port,type 479 480 Where 'port' is the number of the parport interface (eg. 0 for parport0). 481 482 Caveat here: This driver only works on bidirectional parallel ports. If 483 your parallel port is recent enough, you should have no trouble with this. 484 Old parallel ports may not have this feature. 485 486 'Type' is the type of joystick or pad attached: 487 488 Type | Joystick/Pad 489 -------------------- 490 0 | None 491 1 | Multisystem 1-button joystick 492 2 | Multisystem 2-button joystick 493 3 | Genesis pad (3+1 buttons) 494 5 | Genesis pad (5+1 buttons) 495 6 | Genesis pad (6+2 buttons) 496 7 | Saturn pad (8 buttons) 497 8 | Multisystem 1-button joystick (v0.8.0.2 pin-out) 498 9 | Two Multisystem 1-button joysticks (v0.8.0.2 pin-out) 499 10 | Amiga CD32 pad 500 501 Should you want to use more than one of these joysticks/pads at once, you 502 can use db9.dev2 and db9.dev3 as additional command line parameters for two 503 more joysticks/pads. 504 505 3.3 turbografx.c 506 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 507 The turbografx.c driver uses a very simple kernel/module command line: 508 509 turbografx.map=port,js1,js2,js3,js4,js5,js6,js7 510 511 Where 'port' is the number of the parport interface (eg. 0 for parport0). 512 513 'jsX' is the number of buttons the Multisystem joysticks connected to the 514 interface ports 1-7 have. For a standard multisystem joystick, this is 1. 515 516 Should you want to use more than one of these interfaces at once, you can 517 use turbografx.map2 and turbografx.map3 as additional command line parameters 518 for two more interfaces. 519 520 3.4 PC parallel port pinout 521 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 522 .----------------------------------------. 523 At the PC: \ 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 / 524 \ 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 / 525 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 526 527 Pin | Name | Description 528 ~~~~~~|~~~~~~~~~|~~~~~~~~~~ 529 1 | /STROBE | Strobe 530 2-9 | D0-D7 | Data Bit 0-7 531 10 | /ACK | Acknowledge 532 11 | BUSY | Busy 533 12 | PE | Paper End 534 13 | SELIN | Select In 535 14 | /AUTOFD | Autofeed 536 15 | /ERROR | Error 537 16 | /INIT | Initialize 538 17 | /SEL | Select 539 18-25 | GND | Signal Ground 540 541 3.5 End 542 ~~~~~~~ 543 That's all, folks! Have fun!