Star Citizen keyboard project

[MTManiac]

Star Citizen is a space based flight sim game.
I want to modify one of my old Abekas A51's to use as my 'control panel for my ship'
It's a non standard board with a lever and stick incorporated. And it's built like a freaking tank!
I have 2 extra teensy 2.0's laying around for this project but would prefer to use only 1 if possible.
(14x6 matrix plus the lever and joystick)
Whoever decides to hold my hand and give me guidance through this project will be greatly rewarded!
(I will let you pick your reward whether it be something from my old stock, old gaming stuffs, gold nuggets, or just cold hard cash!)
Rewards for helping will be based on your contribution to the project. (Don't worry, I am not stingy, and anyone who contributes will get something, leave no helping hand behind!)
Here is a picture of the controller board I want to mod.

[CPTBadAss]

That's a really cool board. Do you know what it's original usage was for?

Anyways, I'm not an expert on conversions like this but I think I can point you in the right direction. I think the Teensy should be able to handle the keyboard portion but I'm not sure how the joystick and lever would work. Haata actually does keyboard converters for odd or older boards. He might be a good person to talk to. And dorkvader would also be a good guy to PM.

[MTManiac]

That's a really cool board. Do you know what it's original usage was for?

Anyways, I'm not an expert on conversions like this but I think I can point you in the right direction. I think the Teensy should be able to handle the keyboard portion but I'm not sure how the joystick and lever would work. Haata actually does keyboard converters for odd or older boards. He might be a good person to talk to. And dorkvader would also be a good guy to PM.

Thanks CPT!  It was used for digital effects for live TV. It brought live 3D effects in 2D space like throwing a picture or video next to the anchorman's head. Think of the bad guys being flipped in a trapped sphere in Superman: The Movie or George Lucas' skewed titles rolling into a galaxy far away at a trapezoid-angle. These bad boys cost ~$250,000 back in the 70's and early 80's 

Yea, I was doubtful a single teensy would be able to handle both input streams, but hopeful at the same time considering the amount of keyboard mouse combo's out there like the Cherry G84, IBM model M13, etc...
Either way, it might just be simpler to use one Teensy for the key matrix, and a separate one for the joystick and lever controls

I will be sending Haata and dorkvader PM's regarding this project, thanks for pointing me in their direction!

[IvanIvanovich]

Cool project idea.
Might be easier to cheat a bit and use 2 connections or put a USB hub inside it, maybe you could find a 'broken' hotas or something to gut for the stick and throttle? Showing how the internals are laid out would probably get you some better help.

[MTManiac]

Connector pin listing
(yes it says A53, but according to what I have read, it is the same pin layout as the A51 I possess)

[MTManiac]

Cool project idea.
Might be easier to cheat a bit and use 2 connections or put a USB hub inside it, maybe you could find a 'broken' hotas or something to gut for the stick and throttle? Showing how the internals are laid out would probably get you some better help.

Thanks

I can take pics of the connectors on the back panel and the internal guys tonight after work.
My preference on this is to make an external adapter box (board<--cable-->box<--cable-->PC)
I understand this might not be possible, but I don't think I want to risk ruining the original pcb with my less than stellar soldering work.

[IvanIvanovich]

Hmn, RS422 with 24v power huh? I think replacing the controller is going to be the only way, and not a converter box. Rs422 is going to be slow as hell for game controller, I don't think that would work out well at all. Not to mention using the original connection would probably require that power so you would have to rig up some sort of wallwart or something for it then.

[MTManiac]

I found a couple pics of the back

[Oobly]

You're gonna have to open her up for us to see. Extensive hacking will most likely be required. I agree with Ivan, a converter isn't practical.

You should be able to run the whole thing off a single Teensy (depending how many lines are needed for the key matrix and which ADC lines you use for the joystick axes), with it reporting as multiple devices (a keyboard and a game controller with 3 axes).

We need to see the actual keyswitch connections and joystick / lever potentiometer values.

As an aside, those machines were pretty awesome back in the day. Really powerful for their time.

[MTManiac]

I wasn't able to open her up last night but I did pull her out of storage
Project operation A51 will commence tonight after work.
Willing to bet the internals will be pretty sweet!

HaaTa was kind enough to point me towards some pre-existing RS422-USB converters. I should be able to at least test the device preemptively this way. Might even be able to hack one of the pre-existing converters with a Teensy without having to mess with the PCB (still one of my main concerns since sourcing a replacement is improbable of not near impossible)

I fully expect to have to reprogram the code to read the switches input. That will be half the fun! (If you can call python fun) :-p

I e-mailed Abekas corporate and should be getting full technical specs soon!

Yea, back when a standard computer didn't even come close to enough power (processing, graphics, etc...) to handle on the fly video editing, computing, and all the fun stuff this bad boy could do.
That being said, this is just the control panel.  The computing hardware was a separate beast.

[MTManiac]

The switches exposed!

http://s38.photobucket.com/user/sdaem/slideshow/Abekas%20A51