My MiSTer FPGA set-up, and some controller issues

+5-11under · April 3, 2021

My MiSTer FPGA set-up, and some questions/issues...

First of all, here's my MiSTer FPGA set-up, in a basic aluminum box that I found in the garage. I had a smaller box available, but the USB hub would have had difficulty in fitting, and I didn't want this to be an exercise in getting something to fit into something really small. It's not too fancy, but it'll only sit behind or underneath the TV anyway. Maybe I'll paint it red, or better yet, put an Atari logo on it. :grin:

With many of these types of boards, it can be annoying that there's I/O on several sides of the board, making it sometimes difficult to put the thing in a generic box. I opted to put the board in a corner, so on the left side in the pictures, there's power and HDMI, and on the front is the MicroSD card, and breakout from the USB hub. I did make sure the USB hub only had inputs on one end. I forgot to buy an OTG hub with microSD connection, so I have a separate OTG adapter cable plugged in between the MiSTer and the USB hub. Plugged into the USB hub I have a wi-fi dongle, and mini-keyboard dongle. There's of course space for USB controller. I have a 32 MB SDRAM board plugged into the DE10-nano board. This SDRAM will play about 98% of the games/systems available, and only cost about $20-25 instead of $80-100.

Apparently when you buy the DE10-nano board from different places, there are different extras such as power supply, cable, and 8 GB microSD card. I bought from Digi-Key, and it came with all these. I'm using a 32GB card, but I think the supplied 8 GB card likely would have been enough (at least enough to start with), unless getting into CD based games, and that sort of thing. The MiSTer also seems to play well with zip files, which is a bonus.

I'm also currently using an HDMI to VGA adapter. This a ~$10 device. I made sure it included a 3.5mm audio output. Note that my MiSTer does not have the standard stack of 3 boards that you'll often see. That's too pricey for me. I'll probably switch to HDMI to a large TV, but for now, the VGA adapter works well on my desk. One thing I'll be looking for is a heatsink for the FPGA. I'm still looking for one that is cheap and uses tape to connect.

If you want a simple set-up that can play thousands and thousands of games, get the DE10-nano from Digi-Key ($135), 32MB SDRAM ($20), OTG USB hub ($10), wired keyboard (you have already?), wired mouse if you want (you have already?), USB SNES controller ($15), case ($10), heatsink ($10). All prices estimated. Total is about $200 US. Not too cheap, but in my opinion, great value, for a very stable system.

So far I've been pretty happy with the system. There's definitely some growing pains, setting up different things, though.

It took me a while, with a few false start with some of the scripts out there, but I found a script that downloads all the arcade ROMs, as well as updating other things. Search for "All-in-one script for updating your MiSTer".

Next is the good news, bad news, for the controller. I had been testing with a cheap SNEZ USB controller, which worked okay for what it was, but I really wanted to make my own controller... one that fits my style of play, and my style of games that I like to play. So, I built this:

The thing is huge. I'm not compensating for anything, except for years of trying to use controllers for all sorts of systems, most of which don't work well for me. I wanted a single controller that would do all the things I wanted it to do. I grew up with early '80s arcade games, and CX-10 style joysticks, and really, anything else doesn't work for me at all. Don't get me started on D-Pads where I can only effectively move in one of 4 directions successfully. That's just me... my kids seem to do just fine. Anyway, I've got a digital joystick, analog joystick, paddle, keypad for Intellivision/ColecoVision, menu/select/start buttons, a shift button (for some reason), and a bunch of multi-colored buttons. Also space for a keyboard, that I'll Velcro on at some point. I'm not likely to get into the computers too much, but if I do, I'd be using a different keyboard than this one. This one was lying around, so here it is. If I had to buy another mini keyboard today, I'd find one a bit bigger, with clearer lettering (for computers, I'd buy something at or near full size). The digital joystick and main buttons use leaf switches, so they're pretty quiet, which works best for me. The joystick has a circular "gate" - for me this is fine, as I've never had a problem playing Pac-Man or Time Pilot or whatever else on this type of joystick. I don't need 2/4/8 way gates. Your mileage may vary.

I haven't built a case yet, but so far I'm happy with it physically. If I can get it working well, I'll build a simple wooden frame for it. The panel is built from an aluminum/plastic/aluminum laminated sheet that I had in the garage. I quickly painted it black. It holds fingerprints well. If I like the joystick the way it is, maybe I'll fix it up so it looks better. Maybe not - it's not too bad right now.

Unfortunately, however, I seem to have spent money on the wrong thing. I bought an Ultimarc A-PAC which can handle up to 4 analog controls and quite a few buttons, including enough for the keypad. I thought it had a couple more, actually, but I was able to double up on some of the buttons vs. keypad, so it's okay. It's perfect, except that the A-PAC is intended to be used for 2 players on the one USB input, but the MiSTer FPGA is intended to be used one player per USB input. There doesn't seem to be a way to use two joysticks for one player. I did some quick rewiring, so at the moment the analog controller and the keypad can't really be used, but the basic digital controls can be.

If anyone has any suggestions on how best to proceed on getting all the controls to work, that would be awesome! Ideally with the existing A-PAC, but if I need to build/buy something else, that's not the end of the world, either.

There's a few other quirks in the MiSTer FPGA, but I'm sure I'll get those figured out at some point... coin and start buttons for the arcade games, and getting the paddle controller set up for the Atari 2600 core simply/easily.

Other than the controller issues I've got, I'm very happy with the MiSTer FPGA. This is basically my Zimba 3000 system. It's got everything I need in one package, and hopefully one day, I'll be able to control all the systems with one controller, which for me, will be pretty awesome!

A big thank you to anyone who's contributed to the MiSTer FPGA project!