Dana,
{snipped the repeat...}
The SB port only can access port 201h - there is no jumper to make it read
the other unused ports in that range.
The ACM card was designed with jumper on the board - the jumpers can be
moved so you can address different ports with each ACM card you pu in
your computer.
You can have up to four ACM cards installed in your computer and they won't
conflict with each other - each can address two different unused ports in
the computer. The ACM card has two complete IBM game cards on so with four
of them in your computer you have 8 complete game ports that gives you up
to 32 analog inputs, and 32 buttons. Software producers have so far not
used this capability, however we designed the card (back in 1991) with
the idea of allowing more analog inputs so people could have multiple
individual throttles, analog toe brakes, switch inputs, rheostats, whatever
you want.
The port address would be as follows typically, although you can mix or
match them as you want so long as you don't have two game ports on the
same address:
A B
First ACM Game Card 201 209
Second ACM Game Card 203 20B
Third ACM Game Card 205 20D
Fourth ACM Game Card 207 20F
We even have a patent on this stuff. 8)
Also, MS saw this and adopted it for Win 95, but it's not all working in
there yet - notice they have what appears to be support for 16 joysticks
in the Win 95 Applet. You can't use them all - unless the SDK is used,
but theoretically they would allow accessing the above port assignments
for all sorts of inputs and controllers.
In fact, I have a joystick driver we wrote that allows you to plug in
any controller to any of the above four ACM cards and using an interface
that looks similar to our TMS.EXE diagnostics program, you can drag and
drop the controls logically or physically to any of the 32 inputs you
want and it will work there in a game programmed to simply read the file
that driver outputs.
I have it hooked into Falcon/Mig/Hornet, Red Baron, F-14 and F-15III and
it works great. I've flown with other friends with F-14, Falcon, Mig,
Hornet, F-15III where he flies as the back seater and we can hand off
any of the controls to each other we want (stick, throttle, rudders, etc.)
It's a real kick flying F-14 with him in the back operating all the buttons
and hats on his stick and throttle to run the radars and do the targeting,etc.
I gave this stuff to all the sim companies (SH, Microprose, etc.) none of them
used it. Of course.
< You have several options for the other card functions.
It is supposed to be possible - the issue is - it doesn't work with
many of the systems out there. I do not know which ones do work and
which do not, but with the cards actually built into the motherboard
as far as I know at this point none of them work like they are supposed
to leaving you with one option - you use the game port that comes with
the sound card on the mother board or you use none at all.
<>What would happen if the ACM was a pnp card also. How would the bios
Well, first off it would not be a true 'pnp' card because we'd put a jumper
on it - so it wouldn't get the 'Blessed Holy Water Sticker' from Microsoft.
And the jumper would let you disable it if you needed to, but that wouldn't
help if you need it to correct a problem with a game card on a sound card
that can't keep up with whats in your somputer system.
< I just can't believe there is no effective
Oh, I don't know that they are spineless. Consider Mike Carruthers who was
typing here - I'm sure he's not the guy who makes the decisions to do what
they did with the cards at CL. The specs say you can't have a Win 95 sticker
if you put a jumper on it so someone there had to make a call. His call was
to not put a jumper on it - for whatever reason and it's not just as simple
as saying that they're all spineless. CL is a pretty big company so decisions
are spread out. Tough to make a decision like we'd make in that kind of
environment.
Yeah, I wish they had put a jumper on it, and I really do think they should and
MS be damned and their sticker too - the customer is more important IMHO. But,
they have to make their own decisions based on conditions at their own company.
I can only say what I think is right for ThrustMaster. CL does what they do
for whatever reasons they do it and they didn't become the best sound card
company by operating in the dark. But, all that aside, I still think they
SHOULD have put that jumper on there - but I don't expect they will or will
I get real upset if they don't. I will point out that it causes problems when
someone is encountering the problem though.
< They would rather lose business than risk having to stand up to Bill G.>
As in the above, I don't think it's quite that simple, although it seems like
it on the surface. Got to have that Win 95 sticker ya' know. 8)
< I am sure they(MS) wouldn't even care. They have bigger fish to fry. >
I'm 100% with you on that statment. I know many people at Microsoft and they
are not evil at all. They're pretty much just like all the rest of us and they
don't make all the decisions at MS either. 8)
Buzz