Decoding pinouts?

[drjayphd]

A couple months back, I spotted what looked to be an entirely new-to-me console at a thrift store. Four controller ports, had two controllers already, and most importantly, an ANTENNA! Turns out it's not a console, but rather a Rokenbok control unit. Eventually, I decided to buy it after deciding to gut it and make an 8-in-1 plug-and-play console with it (you can see why from the pic)... it's an older version of this, so it's a bit bigger and the decals are infinitely more hideous:



No sooner did I get back to the office and check here than I saw Bacteria's Plug'n'Play Handheld. Okay, so it's officially not the most original idea ever anymore, but more importantly, it's my idea.

Since pinouts.ru has nothing on Rokenbok systems, and since I'd rather re-use the controllers without modding them, how can I get the pinouts? This uses pretty standard D-sub 9-pin connectors, and as you can see, it can't exactly be one pin, one button. How can I figure out the pinouts for the controllers and (more importantly) feed the right signals to the plug-and-play games?

[Rekarp]

Open up the controllers and see if theres any IC the sends signals down the cable. I seriously doubt that there is one and its probably like a 2600 controller where it just pulls the signal to ground.

[totokan]

Wow, Rokenbok, brings back memories of the most expensive products at the local toy store...

[drjayphd]

Open up the controllers and see if theres any IC the sends signals down the cable. I seriously doubt that there is one and its probably like a 2600 controller where it just pulls the signal to ground.

Problem is, as you can see, there's 10 possible buttons and only nine pins on the connector. How would I wire that so a game that's expecting separate signals for up and down if, say, up and down are different signals off the same pin?

[Rekarp]

Open up the controllers and see if theres any IC the sends signals down the cable. I seriously doubt that there is one and its probably like a 2600 controller where it just pulls the signal to ground.

Problem is, as you can see, there's 10 possible buttons and only nine pins on the connector. How would I wire that so a game that's expecting separate signals for up and down if, say, up and down are different signals off the same pin?

Then is has a chip mush like the NES has a 4021 inside it.

[drjayphd]

Open up the controllers and see if theres any IC the sends signals down the cable. I seriously doubt that there is one and its probably like a 2600 controller where it just pulls the signal to ground.

Problem is, as you can see, there's 10 possible buttons and only nine pins on the connector. How would I wire that so a game that's expecting separate signals for up and down if, say, up and down are different signals off the same pin?

Then is has a chip mush like the NES has a 4021 inside it.

Greeeeat. Is that the kind of thing that can be easily replaced on the console end or does it need to be custom-programmed?

[Rekarp]

Open up the controllers and see if theres any IC the sends signals down the cable. I seriously doubt that there is one and its probably like a 2600 controller where it just pulls the signal to ground.

Problem is, as you can see, there's 10 possible buttons and only nine pins on the connector. How would I wire that so a game that's expecting separate signals for up and down if, say, up and down are different signals off the same pin?

Then is has a chip mush like the NES has a 4021 inside it.

Greeeeat. Is that the kind of thing that can be easily replaced on the console end or does it need to be custom-programmed?

Nope you will have to replicate it on the Controller end.

[drjayphd]

Open up the controllers and see if theres any IC the sends signals down the cable. I seriously doubt that there is one and its probably like a 2600 controller where it just pulls the signal to ground.

Problem is, as you can see, there's 10 possible buttons and only nine pins on the connector. How would I wire that so a game that's expecting separate signals for up and down if, say, up and down are different signals off the same pin?

Then is has a chip mush like the NES has a 4021 inside it.

Greeeeat. Is that the kind of thing that can be easily replaced on the console end or does it need to be custom-programmed?

Nope you will have to replicate it on the Controller end.

I meant that, say, if it is a 4021, is that just a standard chip?

Second question: if there's a chip to decode the signals for each controller jack, how would I determine what it's outputting?