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PostPosted: Wed Oct 03, 2001 3:52 am 
Grizzled Veteran
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Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2001 1:00 am
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Location: Columbus, OH
The emulated scoreboard on the host PC is nice, but I'm a fan of _real_ blinky lights. Given how rare the real hardware is, I was contemplating constructing a replica of the scoreboard. I found the pinout for the parallel-port adapter cable, so I have an idea of what signals go into it, but I don't know exactly what active electronics are on it.

Has anyone scanned the schematics? Is there a parts-list anywhere? I found a photograph of one on a completed eBay auction. It looks like it's a bunch of 7-segment LEDs, a connector, a couple of caps and a pair of mysterious 28-pin parts. Can someone with a real scoreboard (or schematics) tell me what the part numbers are? Better yet, can someone stick one on a scanner and make a scan?

-ethan


Last edited by Ethan on Tue Oct 02, 2001 10:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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PostPosted: Wed Oct 03, 2001 10:22 am 
DAPHNE Team
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Joined: Mon Feb 12, 2001 1:00 am
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I believe the schematics for the scoreboard are included with the other Dragon's Lair schematics on www.d-l-p.com in the tech center.

The two 28 pin chips are the display drivers, icm7218diji. I looked into these at one time and found out that they've been replaced by a newer part that isn't pin compatible. That doesn't really matter though since you want to build a display from scratch and can redesign as necessary.

The digits are man8940's and they are still available:
<A HREF="http://www.mouser.com/products/detail.cfm?MPart=512-MAN8940&CustRef=.&source=search&CFID=9876558&CFTOKEN=27822535">MAN 8940</A>

The only other things on the board are a couple filter capacitors for the two ic's and a big capacitor for the whole thing.

Mark


Last edited by Mark Broadhead on Wed Oct 03, 2001 4:25 am, edited 1 time in total.

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PostPosted: Wed Oct 03, 2001 9:20 pm 
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Thanks for the info. From following your links and doing a little more digging, I've found the MAN8940s at DigiKey @ 0.63 (but only if you buy in precise 660 unit lots!) and at Mouser for $1.30 (q.10); and the ICM7218Ds (Maxim, not Intersil, but still a modern, functional equivalent) at B.G.Micro for $2.25.

The schematics at www.d-l-p.com were helpful to figure out which LED is addressed at what position on each 7218, but I still would like to know where the mounting holes are on the PCB; that way, I could make one that is a drop-in replacement for the real thing. Can someone stick a real scoreboard in a scanner and shoot both sides?

I'm looking at $25 worth of parts that I don't already own (got sockets, caps, etc.) and I was thinking about adding one feature - a 12x2 connector next to the 8x2, wired up to accept a standard DB-25-on-a-ribbon-cable (got a large box of 'em) so I can easily attach it to a PC.

It's a lot of work for a totally optional accessory, but it means that I can rig up a dedicated PC to fire off the game in a standard way and not have to have a monitor right there. If only we had a way to emulate the dip switches with _real_ switches...

-ethan


Last edited by Ethan on Wed Oct 03, 2001 3:23 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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PostPosted: Fri Oct 05, 2001 2:46 pm 
DAPHNE Silver Donator
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Joined: Wed Aug 01, 2001 1:00 am
Posts: 20
Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Ethan,

These aren't the best scans I've ever done, but try these two links (both files are around 600k each):

FRONT
http://onyx_pghpa.tripod.com/dlf.jpg

and BACK
http://onyx_pghpa.tripod.com/dlb.jpg


Joe
(jparisi@adelphia.net)

P.S. If you're going to be making a cable to connect the scoreboard to a PC's parallel port, let me know. I'll pay good money for one! :smile:


Last edited by Joe Parisi on Fri Oct 05, 2001 9:00 am, edited 1 time in total.

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PostPosted: Fri Oct 05, 2001 7:58 pm 
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I tried to get to the files but couldn't. I think Tripod won't serve binaries that aren't arrived at from a link from a Tripod page (they can tell that through the "referer" variable) It's their way of forcing people to view their ads and to reduce the usefulness of being a binary repository.

Can you stick a link to these on your Games page or something? If that's too much work, could you e-mail them to me?


As to the cable, if I build my own scoreboard, I wasn't going to make a 16<->25 pin cable, I was going to put a 16-pin header for the real thing *and* a 24-pin header that is PC-compatible for a standard printer cable header and use one of _those_ to get to the printer port. That way, it works for me now and it works later.

-ethan


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PostPosted: Sat Oct 06, 2001 5:19 pm 
DAPHNE Silver Donator
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Ethan,

Try my main page now. The page isn't even going to come up. There are just the two files (front and back) there.

http://members.tripod.com/Onyx_PghPA/

Joe
(jparisi@adelphia.net)


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PostPosted: Sun Oct 07, 2001 3:00 am 
Grizzled Veteran
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Quote:
On 2001-10-06 10:19, Joe Parisi wrote:
Try my main page now. The page isn't even going to come up


It sure doesn't come up. I get a Tripod page telling me that the requested page is not found.

The problem with the free web page servers is they aren't a raw web server that acts like Apache would if you put it up on your own box. For reasons of ad revenue preservation and to minimize misuse, they straightjacket the users (i.e., "bugs" on Geocities pages, if you remember those)

Bottom line, I still cannot get to those pictures and I would still like to see them.

Thanks,

-ethan


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PostPosted: Mon Oct 08, 2001 10:43 pm 
DAPHNE Silver Donator
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Joined: Wed Aug 01, 2001 1:00 am
Posts: 20
Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Arrrgh! I hate Tripod!

Ok, I've switched hosts and uploaded everything fresh. Try this site:

http://cloud.prohosting.com/onyxpa

and go to the "Games" page. The pics are right there (and I just went there and I can see them).

Let me know how it turns out.

Joe
(jparisi@adelphia.net)


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