ASCII Optical stick vs Sanwa Flash?

Tech Talk
21

I’m sure if all the srk tech talk norms congregated and consodilated all their tools, they could build their own optical stick from scratch.

22

That’s because HAPP used to make the PCB for Sanwa. Or something like that. The Real Neo Geo and Toodles know the whole story.

23

Huh.

I wonder if I can disassemble a P360 assy and make a sanwa compatable flash style assembly.

24

I have the Ascii Stick FT SNK version. I was wondering how close it was to Sanwa Flash, and this thread has answered my question. I actually don’t use it much, so if anyone is interested…

25

Oooh, it’s tempting since it’s one of the few I don’t have yet…hrm…you should probably expect a PM from me soon!

~Paik

26

hey, does the ascii stick FT have a optical inside it?

27

so the thing does have an ascii optical inside it right? and it looks like this http://i87.photobucket.com/albums/k159/Send0/Stick4.jpg ?

and it’s full name is the ascii stick FT special snk verison correct? How much are you asking for it?

28

That is exactly the stick I have. I have all of the SNK instruction cards and other items that came with it. I think the box is still at my parents’ house but I can get that if it is. The stick is mint. PM for more info.

29

there is one on ebay as of now.

30

I wonder who here won the one on ebay?
so anyone know how to wire this up to the ps dualshock? the ascii one.

31

Same way as the Flash1. The only thing you really need to concern yourself with is the +5V which is to the red wire on the DS1.

~Paik

32

yeah but the flash has 2 extra pins compare to the ascii. the 5 pin one is ground so I know that, but the other 3 (5V+, gruond, and what is the third one?)

hey paik, if you’re planning on modding this stick, mind writing up a small tut on it? the only part I care about is the wiring of the stick. I read the p360 thread a long while back when I thought about getting one but seems a bit confusing to me since I don’t konw much about circuit boards and electricity. I just don’t want to burn out the pcb or something. read about using battery which I don’t mind but just don’t know how to wire it.

33

The Flash1 has the same number of wires coming out of it. They are not in the same exact position. There are 5 wires on each. I assume the reason you think there is 2 extra pins is because of the 3-pin used on the Flash1. Although it is a 3-pin, only one of the pins is actually used (the middle one which is reserved for the +5V). The other two pins are only there to make a more stable mount. If it was just a one pin, it would be less sturdy and could easily be bent.

So to sum up:

Flash1:
5-pin (all 4 directions and the ground)
3-pin (2 empty pins and the +5V)

ASCII:
4 wires (all 4 directions)
2 wires (ground and +5V)

In both cases, ground is black and +5V is red. All others are directions which you can find out by testing or tracing the connections.

To be more accurate, the ASCII one is powered by +3.3V (which is the PS standard). The Flash1 is designed for +5V since it was designed for arcade use, but it works sufficiently with the +3.3V provided by the PS. The PS does NOT have a +5V.

I may or may not mod the stick itself. I will probably use the optical mechanism for a custom stick. As for writing a tutorial, I don’t normally like doing that just because I hate taking the time to stop and take pics during the process, but we’ll see.

~Paik

34

A few things I’ve noticed with my ASCIIs:

  1. 2 out of the 3 PS ones I have only work when plugged into the 2P port on my slim PS2 (haven’t tried it on my old fat one). Only the Zero 3 stick seems to work on 1P.

  2. All the PS sticks are mounted too high, resulting in too much shaft above the panel. The DC one is mounted at the correct height (I haven’t opened it yet to see if this is due to lower mounting or shorter shaft).

I’ll examine each of them more thoroughly to see if there are any other differences in the next few days.

~Paik

35

the shaft on the dc ascii optical is about 1/4 inch shorter than a standard sanwa jlf shaft. I recently mounted the one out of my dc ascii ft special inside my Finkle PS2 stick. Works fine on both sides, no problems whatsoever.

36

Yeah, my DC one has no problems either. Just 2 of my PS ones. I’m just wondering if that’s normal. It’s a little too coincidental for 2/3 of mine to only work on 2P side.

~Paik

37

ok, so I wired the ascii stick up to a dualshock. surprise surprise didn’t work. well…did work (up down left right) but diagonals doesn’t work at all. only 1 diagonal works. when I use my finger to block the optical to see if it works, everything is fine. how I did it is I cut the 3V+ on the ps and splice the 3v+ to the optical pcb and splice it to the ps pcb (don’t ask me why I did it, there’s an ulterior motive involved).

so is the optical for this pcb really use 3V+?

yes I am aware that flash suppose to work with ps, and p360 that doesn’t hit diagonals is due to not enough voltage running through it and that was fix by having a larger “pipe” inserted.

anyways, any ideas on how to fix this? suggestions? seems like such a waste for if I don’t get it to work. I would rather see this in ps than dc.

38

I couldn’t find any other threads on how to mod the DC ASCII FT Special so I thought I’d give this a shot. I have one of these and was wondering if anyone was able to get this to work. If so, what method did you use to get the necessary 5 volts to run the optical stick? I’ve been looking for a standalone power source that is battery-operated and small enough to mount inside the stick but so far no luck. Any suggestions would be great.

39

Well the stock PCB already has it wired…

If you’re using another pad, they all have a power source where you can solder. Be a bit more specific with what you want to do with this mod, and I can offer more help.

~Paik

40

Thanks for the response.

Basically I would like to get this ASCII stick to work on the PS2. I didn’t know that pads output the 5V necessary for the optical stick to work. A friend of mine did a crude hack of this stick a while back that forced him to have the stick plugged in to a Dreamcast (turned on) in order for it to work, which is why I asked about the power source. I ended up finding a couple of these sticks so we are revisiting this mod. I actually have a universal stick (PS2, Xbox, GC) that I would like to use for the cord as opposed to having just one PS2 cord. Pardon me if I am not asking the right questions, I am really new to stick modding but I am trying to learn.