Extension cables for Atari joysticks ...

[moving2]

fiddlepaddle- thanks for your very helpful post. I just wanted to post to confirm (for potential future readers) that this was, indeed, the problem. Working on getting full 9-pin passthru extension cables now.

 

Thread resurrection:

 

I am having some problems using Atari paddles with extension cables and I'm wondering if anyone else has run into this problem. When using the paddles through the extension cable (my extension cables are pretty long, at 20 feet), the fire buttons work, but rotating the dial has no effect at all. When I connect the paddles directly, I have no problems. Has anyone else experienced this? If I switch to 10' cables, will this likely solve my problem? Thanks in adv.

I bet your extension cable does not have all 9 wires in it, or possibly one or more are broken or somehow disconnected from the connector. Not all db9 extension cables run all wires, since not all wires are required for the joystick to work. Try a continuity check on each pin to see if this is the case...

[Cynicaster]

It'd be cool if you could mod a joystick with an additional momentary switch that acts as a "shift" key. Then set it up so that you hit (for example) shift-up for select, shift-down for reset, etc. If the shift key is not being pressed, the joystick outputs act as normal. Of course, this probably wouldn't be very practical because you'd have to modify the wiring at the console joystick port as well, which would probably screw up something (paddle functionality, etc).

[+wongojack]

Digging up an old thead here, but can you use these 9 pin straight through cables as extensions?

 

http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3109713

 

another example:

 

http://www.cablesunlimited.com/products/prod_Group.aspx?groupcode=G0155&itemNo=PCM-2100-01

 

 

Just wondering . . .