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Joystick Switcher by Alexander Poplawski of Germany

10 posts by 6 people · 10 Feb 1998 - 21 Feb 1998

Does anyone have this piece of software. It is supposed to fix the problem of swapping joysticks in Win95. It runs in your system tray. I found it mentioned at http://www.gamesdomain.com/gdreview/ "Joystick Management" by Edward Fielding. It would sure make it nicer when switching between my Flightstick, Wheel, and Joypad. He says you can download it from CHproducts website but I can't find it mentioned on their html pages nor find it on their ftp server. -- Please remove the NOSPAM from my email address to reply to me directly. I am sorry for this inconvenience but I have been overwhelmed by junkmail.
AJB 10 Feb 1998#396094
Quoted text (7 lines)> Does anyone have this piece of software. It is supposed to fix the problem > of swapping joysticks in Win95. It runs in your system tray. I found it > mentioned at http://www.gamesdomain.com/gdreview/ in an article named > "Joystick Management" by Edward Fielding. It would sure make it nicer when > switching between my Flightstick, Wheel, and Joypad. He says you can > download it from CHproducts website but I can't find it mentioned on their > html pages nor find it on their ftp server.
I emailed Mr. Fielding and he sent it to me zipped in an email - let me know if anyone wants me to send it! Real email address is ajburke (the funny at sign) amigo.net. AJB
AJB 11 Feb 1998#396161
It looks good on further review, but I am apparently too stupid to figure out how to get it to work. I setup different templates for my two joysticks, but when I go to select my choice it uses the current W95 setup instead of switching to the setup I supposedly saved. Any ideas, anyone? AJB
Greg Cisko 11 Feb 1998#396162
It may be better to manually change your control device via the ControlPanel joystick applet. I would suggest setting up your joystick first. Then remove it and ADD a custom device. There is a checkbox where you can specify that it is a driving controller. I think that should get around the problem where the joystick and driving controller are both using the same joystick #1 calibration data. FWIW, this is what I did. It seems to me that the Joystick Switcher goes through just as many steps as if you did this with the Control Panel applet. -- Header intentionally scrambled to ward off the spamming hordes. >It looks good on further review, but I am apparently too stupid to figure out how >to get it to work. I setup different templates for my two joysticks, but when I >go to select my choice it uses the current W95 setup instead of switching to the >setup I supposedly saved. Any ideas, anyone? >AJB
darksta 11 Feb 1998#396163
>It looks good on further review, but I am apparently too stupid to figure out how >to get it to work. I setup different templates for my two joysticks, but when I >go to select my choice it uses the current W95 setup instead of switching to the >setup I supposedly saved. Any ideas, anyone? >AJB I missed the original post, but if I get the gist of things, you have 2 sticks and are trying to switch between them in W95? If this is the case, you need to realize that only Controller #1 (found under the Advanced tab) will be the active controller, assuming that all the sticks you use are analog in nature. Don't ask me why Ms decided to only recognize 1 analog device. Probably so everyone would by their hunk-o-junk Sidewinder. But I digress. Here's the solution. Under the Advanced tab, choose device #2 and change it to your 1st stick. Then choose device #3 and set it up with your other stick. Then choose device #1 and set it to whichever of your 2 sticks you want to use. When you want to use your other stick, merely change device #1 to whichever stick you like. It is important that you do not delete either Device #2 or #3. By leaving them as active devices and swapping them into spot #1, you retain all the calibration info. I hope I haven't confused things too much. DarkStar
Bill Arnet 12 Feb 1998#396240
Quoted text (9 lines)>It looks good on further review, but I am apparently too stupid to figure out > how >to get it to work. I setup different templates for my two joysticks, but when > I >go to select my choice it uses the current W95 setup instead of switching to > the >setup I supposedly saved. Any ideas, anyone? >AJB
It would appear that this program does absolutely nothing. If you look at the values in the registry (HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\AP) they are all zeros so apparently it isn't saving anything. Perhaps this is a work in progress or it needs to be registered in order to work at all. Bill -- Bill Arnette
Bill Arnet 12 Feb 1998#396241
The Joystick Switcher program AJB is talking about does this for you. You configure one stick and it copies the registry values for the joystick into its own registry entry. You do this for all of your joystick configurations. Then from the tray you select the configuration you want to use and the program copies the saved registry entires into the joystick registry entries. Unfortunately the version of the program AJB has is old and has a bug where it will not work if you have multiple joystick ports due to multiple soundcards/joystick cards. Also, the link on the Games Domain page that talks about the program is to a registered copy instead of an unregistered copy. Bill
Quoted text (31 lines)>>It looks good on further review, but I am apparently too stupid to figure >out how >>to get it to work. I setup different templates for my two joysticks, but >when I >>go to select my choice it uses the current W95 setup instead of switching >to the >>setup I supposedly saved. Any ideas, anyone? >>AJB >I missed the original post, but if I get the gist of things, you have 2 >sticks and are trying to switch between them in W95? If this is the case, >you need to realize that only Controller #1 (found under the Advanced tab) >will be the active controller, assuming that all the sticks you use are >analog in nature. Don't ask me why Ms decided to only recognize 1 analog >device. Probably so everyone would by their hunk-o-junk Sidewinder. But I >digress. >Here's the solution. >Under the Advanced tab, choose device #2 and change it to your 1st stick. >Then choose device #3 and set it up with your other stick. Then choose >device #1 and set it to whichever of your 2 sticks you want to use. When >you want to use your other stick, merely change device #1 to whichever stick >you like. It is important that you do not delete either Device #2 or #3. >By leaving them as active devices and swapping them into spot #1, you retain >all the calibration info. >I hope I haven't confused things too much. >DarkStar
-- Bill Arnette
AJB 12 Feb 1998#396242
Yeah, sorry folks. Seems that I got a copy I shouldn't have and one that is an older version as well. I'll let everyone know if I can get the shareware version of a working copy so that we can try it out. I'll certainly pay the $10 if it works, but I want to be sure that it does first! Apologies all around. AJB
If you want to manage joysticks in Win95, your best bet is to upgrade to DirectX 5. It puts the new game controller applet in the control panel, and allows you to have several devices installed at once. Most new games will be compatible with this system, allowing the computer to detect when you switch from one controller to another. Of course, if you're playing any of the newer games, you must have DirectX 5 installed already. Check out the control panel applet. It has a few nice features, not the least of which is its ability to keep track of all your different controllers even though only one is attached at a time. There have been a few glitches (e.g., some games can only detect a controller if its among the first couple in your list of installed controllers) but for the most part it works pretty well. It's particularly striking to those of us who remember what joystick switching and recalibration was like in the DOS days when every game handled it differently. Anyway, who wants to have extra third-party programs running in their system trays eating up resources and creating the risk of unanticipated conflicts?
Bill Arnet 21 Feb 1998#397202
>If you want to manage joysticks in Win95, your best bet is to upgrade >to DirectX 5. It puts the new game controller applet in the control >panel, and allows you to have several devices installed at once. Most >new games will be compatible with this system, allowing the computer >to detect when you switch from one controller to another. But it currently does not work with multiple configurations. When we have USB sticks it will work. This is from a MS support engineer when I asked them about this with respect to FS98: Me: MS: -- Bill Arnette

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