Author Topic: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.  (Read 196271 times)

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Offline bitseeker

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #300 on: April 08, 2017, 11:09:04 pm »
For identification, it may be helpful to those newer to electronics. More a belt and suspenders thing, I suppose, to minimize assembly errors.

Definitely a good thing for soldering. That board has quite a ground plane. Working on vintage power supplies, I do keep my big ol' Weller soldering gun nearby for just such an occasion. :-+
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Offline timb

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #301 on: April 09, 2017, 10:28:32 am »
For identification, it may be helpful to those newer to electronics. More a belt and suspenders thing, I suppose, to minimize assembly errors.

Definitely a good thing for soldering. That board has quite a ground plane. Working on vintage power supplies, I do keep my big ol' Weller soldering gun nearby for just such an occasion. :-+

Yeah, and the ground plane may be getting bigger! Initially I had planned on two 250x250mm boards stacked, however tonight I've discovered I may be able to fit everything on a single 250x350mm board. The price isn't that much higher for the extra board size ($14 for a single board) but we save by only needing one board.
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Offline timb

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Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #302 on: April 09, 2017, 10:31:59 am »
Looks good. I wonder if you could fit the audio power amplifier in there. A good place for it would be directly in front of the power supply, on its own partitioned ground plane section, star-earthed at the PSU common. That way you won't have the heavy speaker currents (up to several hundred mA) pumping through your board interconnects and ground plane.

I worked on the Sound section tonight. The amplifier is pretty small and easily fits next to the power supply.



I've also added a footprint for a PCB mount right angle pot instead of a connector for an external pot. If the user wants to go that route they could install a terminal block in place of the PCB mount pot, since they're both 5mm pitch.
« Last Edit: April 09, 2017, 10:38:17 am by timb »
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Offline bitseeker

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #303 on: April 10, 2017, 03:32:09 am »
Initially I had planned on two 250x250mm boards stacked, however tonight I've discovered I may be able to fit everything on a single 250x350mm board. The price isn't that much higher for the extra board size ($14 for a single board) but we save by only needing one board.

Sounds good to me.
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Offline MK14

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #304 on: April 10, 2017, 04:32:43 am »
Initially I had planned on two 250x250mm boards stacked, however tonight I've discovered I may be able to fit everything on a single 250x350mm board. The price isn't that much higher for the extra board size ($14 for a single board) but we save by only needing one board.

Sounds good to me.

+1
Yes, one board sounds much better.

It also means that if it is done as a display piece, ALL the electronics can easily be seen. It probably makes casing it less essential, and arguably easier to case if you do.
 

Offline timb

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Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #305 on: April 10, 2017, 11:27:47 am »
Good points, plus then the "Equivalent Circuit" silkscreens will be easily visible for the entire thing, which makes it nice from a display point of view.



Yes, I sat down one night and made a pattern library full of schematic symbols for PCB silkscreens (I could also convert them to the copper layer). They're handy for various things, such as visually labeling components and placing diagrams on boards.

« Last Edit: April 10, 2017, 11:41:06 am by timb »
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Offline bitseeker

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #306 on: April 10, 2017, 06:12:18 pm »
Wow, those silkscreen symbols and schematics look great, Tim! Now this'll have to go in a transparent acrylic case.
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Offline GKTopic starter

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #307 on: April 11, 2017, 01:09:11 pm »
Looks good. I wonder if you could fit the audio power amplifier in there. A good place for it would be directly in front of the power supply, on its own partitioned ground plane section, star-earthed at the PSU common. That way you won't have the heavy speaker currents (up to several hundred mA) pumping through your board interconnects and ground plane.

I worked on the Sound section tonight. The amplifier is pretty small and easily fits next to the power supply.




Looks neat but that's a tiny loudspeaker! Have you used one of those before? I hope the amplifier isn't too powerful for it and deflects the cone to Xmax at 1/4 volume.

BTW, if you're not ponged out already and think you might be hankering for another PCB layout project after this is done, I'm currently well into soldering something together which is taking this discrete transistor Pong thing to another level  ;)
« Last Edit: April 11, 2017, 01:54:55 pm by GK »
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Offline GKTopic starter

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #308 on: April 11, 2017, 01:36:10 pm »
Don't forget a 50hz/60hz switch.  With this, since there is no color, the mono video would work with most TV and video capture cards around the world.  Only the capture cards with super-strict H&V timing, ie they wont support VCR playback in some cases, will fail to lock onto your video.


Actually I intend to implement a fully colour-encoded composite video signal. It's going to be PAL only (15625Hz H, non interlaced, 312 lines V, 50.08Hz). Attempting to accommodate both the PAL standards and the different frame/field rate and vertical resolution of NTSC as well as the alternate colour encoding isn't something I could be bothered with; and more so since I don't have an NTSC TV or monitor to test it with! If this turns out to be a project that anyone in a non-PAL land feels like replicating the option there is to play discrete transistor pong on your modern flat screen TV courtesy of a composite video to HDMI converter, I guess.

The last time I assembled colour composite video from discrete RGB it was with an AD723, but my design reference now for this endeavor is the composite video generator circuit inside my BBC Model B microcomputer, which I've always admired as a feat/demonstration/example of minimalist engineering. They did it with TTL logic and minimal analogue. There is a very thorough technical write up of the circuitry in one of my technical/service manuals and I don't see any real/obvious  hassle with replicating the function with discrete transistors.
     
I currently have all of the horizontal timing and video signal circuits complete and am ~1/2 way through the vertical. Once I've finished the latter in another couple of nights I'll be able to display a basic B&W video raster with blank scoreboard and court net immediately. The step after that will be to get the digits displaying on the scoreboard after soldering up the a gate array which assembles/combines the discrete H and V video signals for the digit segments.

My score counters shown as single digit in my prior post have since been increased by 1/2 a digit to count from zero to 19. I realised that all this added to my score counters in the way of further complication was an additional carry/overflow flip-flop to activate the 1/2 segment, which is trivial enough to accommodate. So my (currently completed) horizontal video generator board (300mm x 150mm) now also produces a discrete video signal high during horizontal timing interval #6 and another high at #18 for the 1/2 segments. The player to reach 19 wins first will be the winner.

Also I've divvied the paddles into sections and the ball will deflect at 45 degrees if it hits the middle section and 67.5 degrees if it hits the outer sections. The bat sizes will also be variable. I'm looking forward to reaching the stage where I can start it take some raster display photos.
« Last Edit: April 11, 2017, 01:57:31 pm by GK »
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Online mikeselectricstuff

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #309 on: April 11, 2017, 02:14:42 pm »
Looks good. I wonder if you could fit the audio power amplifier in there. A good place for it would be directly in front of the power supply, on its own partitioned ground plane section, star-earthed at the PSU common. That way you won't have the heavy speaker currents (up to several hundred mA) pumping through your board interconnects and ground plane.

I worked on the Sound section tonight. The amplifier is pretty small and easily fits next to the power supply.




Looks neat but that's a tiny loudspeaker! Have you used one of those before? I hope the amplifier isn't too powerful for it and deflects the cone to Xmax at 1/4 volume.

BTW, if you're not ponged out already and think you might be hankering for another PCB layout project after this is done, I'm currently well into soldering something together which is taking this discrete transistor Pong thing to another level  ;)
Should at least have an option for terminals for external speaker, maybe 3.5mm jack ( linkable for speaker or line level ?)
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Offline bitseeker

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #310 on: April 11, 2017, 05:02:44 pm »
Actually I intend to implement a fully colour-encoded composite video signal. It's going to be PAL only (15625Hz H, non interlaced, 312 lines V, 50.08Hz).

...snip...

My score counters shown as single digit in my prior post have since been increased by 1/2 a digit to count from zero to 19. I realised that all this added to my score counters in the way of further complication was an additional carry/overflow flip-flop to activate the 1/2 segment, which is trivial enough to accommodate. So my (currently completed) horizontal video generator board (300mm x 150mm) now also produces a discrete video signal high during horizontal timing interval #6 and another high at #18 for the 1/2 segments. The player to reach 19 wins first will be the winner.

Also I've divvied the paddles into sections and the ball will deflect at 45 degrees if it hits the middle section and 67.5 degrees if it hits the outer sections. The bat sizes will also be variable. I'm looking forward to reaching the stage where I can start it take some raster display photos.

Wow! Major upgrade already. Things move fast on the bleeding edge of Pong, The Revival. :popcorn:
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Offline timb

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #311 on: April 11, 2017, 05:28:18 pm »
Looks good. I wonder if you could fit the audio power amplifier in there. A good place for it would be directly in front of the power supply, on its own partitioned ground plane section, star-earthed at the PSU common. That way you won't have the heavy speaker currents (up to several hundred mA) pumping through your board interconnects and ground plane.

I worked on the Sound section tonight. The amplifier is pretty small and easily fits next to the power supply.




Looks neat but that's a tiny loudspeaker! Have you used one of those before? I hope the amplifier isn't too powerful for it and deflects the cone to Xmax at 1/4 volume.

BTW, if you're not ponged out already and think you might be hankering for another PCB layout project after this is done, I'm currently well into soldering something together which is taking this discrete transistor Pong thing to another level  ;)

Last night  I was actually thinking about the speaker. I've used one before, but it's only 200mW, which might be OK (if not a bit weak), however the frequency response is *very* poor below 500Hz, which is where some of our sounds are!

So, I decided to remove the speaker from the PCB itself and simply add a 5mm terminal block. That way the user can implement a 2W 60mm chassis mount speaker, or a 3.5mm audio jack on the chassis, whatever they want. Something like this might be ideal for an external speaker: 14x21mm 1.5W Speaker

That one is still small enough that it could be mounted to the PCB itself (I could provide mounting holes on the PCB, and the user could use standoffs to mount it.)

And yes, I saw that little preview of your next project and I'd love to do a PCB of that one as well! How many components are we looking at on that one? :D
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Offline bitseeker

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #312 on: April 11, 2017, 05:53:15 pm »
Uh oh. Glen, did your site get too much traffic? Seems to have been suspended.
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Offline timb

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Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #313 on: April 11, 2017, 09:33:05 pm »
Uh oh. Glen, did your site get too much traffic? Seems to have been suspended.

Yeah, I see it too.

GK, if you need more bandwidth I can give you space on my server. I've got a several TB bandwidth cap on a dedicated virtual server, so there's plenty to go around.

If you want, you could just point a subdomain at my sever and store assets (PDFs and images) on it or you can host everything there. Just let me know and I'll set you up with some FTP credentials or whatever you need. :)

(I host for a couple of other forum members as well, so this offer applies to anyone who wants some space to setup a website for their projects.)
« Last Edit: April 11, 2017, 09:37:05 pm by timb »
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Offline BrianHG

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #314 on: April 11, 2017, 10:33:40 pm »
Actually I intend to implement a fully colour-encoded composite video signal. It's going to be PAL only (15625Hz H, non interlaced, 312 lines V, 50.08Hz). Attempting to accommodate both the PAL standards and the different frame/field rate and vertical resolution of NTSC as well as the alternate colour encoding isn't something I could be bothered with; and more so since I don't have an NTSC TV or monitor to test it with! If this turns out to be a project that anyone in a non-PAL land feels like replicating the option there is to play discrete transistor pong on your modern flat screen TV courtesy of a composite video to HDMI converter, I guess.

All color for a pong game, in transistors.  Wow.  I mean WOW!  If you were to do monochrome, all you had to do was change your vertical counter to 265 to support all the 60hz formats.  The horizontal is close enough and the text would be a little stretched, or, you could say the text would be a little squished when operating in any 50hz system, PAL or Secam...
« Last Edit: April 11, 2017, 11:10:29 pm by BrianHG »
 

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #315 on: April 11, 2017, 10:37:27 pm »
Actually I intend to implement a fully colour-encoded composite video signal. It's going to be PAL only (15625Hz H, non interlaced, 312 lines V, 50.08Hz). Attempting to accommodate both the PAL standards and the different frame/field rate and vertical resolution of NTSC as well as the alternate colour encoding isn't something I could be bothered with; and more so since I don't have an NTSC TV or monitor to test it with! If this turns out to be a project that anyone in a non-PAL land feels like replicating the option there is to play discrete transistor pong on your modern flat screen TV courtesy of a composite video to HDMI converter, I guess.
I wonder if RGB VGA might be a more versatile choice.

All color for a pong game, in transistors.  Wow.  I mean WOW!  If you were to do monochrome, all you had to do was change your vertical counter to 265 to support all the 60hz formats.  The horizontal is close enough and the text would be a little stretched, or, you could say the text would be a little squished when operating in any 50hz system, PAL or Secam...
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Offline BrianHG

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #316 on: April 11, 2017, 11:09:51 pm »
''' I mean WOW!!!! '''   If I were to attempt it, I would cheaply do a VGA RGB 640x480 60hz, separate H&V 5v sync signals for compatibility with any PC Monitor today with world wide compatibility... Even digital flat panel monitors...  The simplicity of the video outputs being 0v for black & anything else for color.  No mixed in sync or stabilization pulses, or front & back porch signals.

But a PAL carrier burst, H&V front and back porch signals, vertical time stabilization pulses.  Hell, you might even lace the VS for fun and bragging.  I could not imagine going that today with just transistors, diodes, and j-fets.
« Last Edit: April 11, 2017, 11:15:39 pm by BrianHG »
 

Offline bitseeker

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #317 on: April 11, 2017, 11:18:46 pm »
I know, right? Amazing stuff.

What's next, GK? Tempest? :o 8)
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Offline BrianHG

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #318 on: April 11, 2017, 11:28:45 pm »
Tempest in transistors only :scared:

Ok, maybe we got to stay in the world of reality.  Perhaps a simplified version of asteroids, where you either stay in the center and shoot in multiple directions moving/approaching dented/spheres/ovals/maybe rotating of a few sizes.  Say 8 play-field objects.

-or-

Have a play-field of multiple spheres bouncing around, alternating trajectories off the 4 sides of the scope, and you, need to maneuver out of the way with an x/y paddle running against a clock.  The highest time wins...

-or-

16 play-field objects, 1 player, 3 bullets, 12 asteroids, 4 of 3 sizes each.  Skip those silly alien saucers.

I could imagine GK creating one of these 2 games transistor only using the existing functions in the pong game.


GK, pull off one of the first 2, and you blow everyone away.  Pull off the third one and you will be the GOD of the transistor only video game, no one on earth will touch you.  (Variations on the how to multiplex the ball oscillator, mixing in a bit of the triangle and square wave to make a ragged edge, or, shooting the asteroids would instead of destroy them, just push the away from your shot.  You don't need to make a perfect asteroid game simulation, just a game you can play with maybe even 2 players which is much more interesting and complex and fun compared to simple pong...)
« Last Edit: April 12, 2017, 02:27:37 am by BrianHG »
 

Offline GKTopic starter

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #319 on: April 12, 2017, 12:03:17 am »
There was a fiasco 6 months or so back with my hosting service loosing a server and nobody being able to get a response from technical support for weeks on end (my tickets took four weeks or more).

At the time I requested that my account be suspended at the end of the billing period which is due the coming Monday. The host seems to have pulled itself together in the meanwhile and since I'm lazy and haven't bothered shifting to a new host yet and as crunch time is a few days away I emailed the host last night asking if the scheduled cancellation could be reversed. They replied by immediately suspending my account "as requested", FFS.  :palm:

I've notified them of their misinterpretation and am waiting for a response!
« Last Edit: April 12, 2017, 12:24:37 am by GK »
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Offline GKTopic starter

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #320 on: April 12, 2017, 03:00:13 am »
Just had a quick lunch break peekaboo and my site is back on-line. Was just a misinterpretation, not an issue to devote any further thought to! Now I'm hungry............
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Offline bitseeker

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #321 on: April 12, 2017, 03:06:24 am »
Thanks for the update, GK. Bon appetit!
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Offline BrianHG

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #322 on: April 12, 2017, 03:18:27 am »
Just had a quick lunch break peekaboo and my site is back on-line. Was just a misinterpretation, not an issue to devote any further thought to! Now I'm hungry............
Didn't you have the pong game .pdf on your web site?
Your new stuff is gone.  Your current web site is an old backup....
Even your .pdf pong document in this thread's opening topic still says 'You account is still 'Suspended''...  Try downloading it...
You probably need to re-upload everything changed over the past year...
I'd verify the contents of everything else just in case.

So says the evil overseer.  >:D
« Last Edit: April 12, 2017, 03:34:23 am by BrianHG »
 

Offline GKTopic starter

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #323 on: April 12, 2017, 08:58:02 am »
Just had a quick lunch break peekaboo and my site is back on-line. Was just a misinterpretation, not an issue to devote any further thought to! Now I'm hungry............
Didn't you have the pong game .pdf on your web site?
Your new stuff is gone.  Your current web site is an old backup....
Even your .pdf pong document in this thread's opening topic still says 'You account is still 'Suspended''...  Try downloading it...
You probably need to re-upload everything changed over the past year...
I'd verify the contents of everything else just in case.

So says the evil overseer.  >:D


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Offline BrianHG

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Re: Oscilloscope pong for 1 or 2 players.
« Reply #324 on: April 12, 2017, 09:03:12 am »
Just tried it again.  It now works.  Probably something still in cache...
 


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