Questions about MVS, 1069-in-1, and Kick Harnesses

[CorruptionDee]

Hey fellas, I know it's been a long time since I posted, and that it seems like everytime when I make a post I'm always asking questions, but it's because I value the advice and opinions more from the members of this forum than I do on other forums. Guys like Yakumo etc., have always given solid advice in the past.

In any case, enough with the blabbing and on with the questions. Long story short, I recently purchased a nice Dynamo 25 cabinet wired for CPS 2. It came with Marvel Superheroes vs. Street Fighter, but I would like to swap out that game and install a single slot MVS. The problem is that the MVS is not 100% JAMMA compliant. Meaning that while it will work fine, it is wired for stereo differently and my CPS 2 kick harness is worthless for trying to get the 4th button working. I have had another cab in the past, but at that time I just had a bunch of CPS 1, System 16, System 32, Data East, and Taito games. Most of these games were 3 buttons or less, so I never had to worry about kick harnesses. I'm straight for CPS 1 and CPS 2 because of my kick harness adapter, but if I ever wanted to buy an MK or Killer Instinct board I would be screwed. I have zero experience with wiring these cabinets, so I was wondering if it's difficult, and if there are any workarounds.

In addition to this, while I know that the 1069-in-1 board is frowned upon by many elitists who only play the pure PCBs and are vehemently against emulation, I was looking in to buying the Killer Edition from Jammaboards.com, because it is fitted with a superior Pentium 4 2.8 GHz processor and I hear it runs the later titles perfectly. The problem is that it uses a funky harness that doesn't resemble any other kick harness, and uses its own harness for action buttons 5 and 6, but has button 4 wired through JAMMA. It sounds like a real pain, so I was wondering if anyone here has any experience with this board.


For the record, I bought a Blue Elf 2009 JAMMA board recently out of sheer curiosity, and the emulation pretty much sucks for the fighting games. The audio is muffled, and they all run at 30 FPS. Thanks in advance.

[Jamtex]

The easiest way is to wire up a JAMMA to MVS loom, that way the 4th button can be wired from the MVS side of the loom and the Stereo output of the MVS board can be wired direct to the stereo speakers of the cabinet. By using spade connectors you could wire up the A, B and C buttons are you want them and you could wire it up so that you don't have to disconnect the kick harness.

[CorruptionDee]

Jamtex, thanks for the response. I was wondering if you could direct me to a site where I would find out how to do such a thing. Thanks again.

[Blur2040]

http://www.jammaboards.com/store/neo.../prod_198.html

That would be a start in the right direction for you...but I think the price is kinda a ripoff. Easier than making your own Jamma to MVS loom, though.

If I was the one doing this, though, I'd probably just wire the extra button straight to my harness, use a single slot and forgo stereo. Then again, I'm kinda lazy.

[CorruptionDee]

http://www.jammaboards.com/store/neo.../prod_198.html

That would be a start in the right direction for you...but I think the price is kinda a ripoff. Easier than making your own Jamma to MVS loom, though.

If I was the one doing this, though, I'd probably just wire the extra button straight to my harness, use a single slot and forgo stereo. Then again, I'm kinda lazy.

Thanks for the link. I frequently browse that site on a regular basis. I can't believe I missed that. Aside from this, I'm lazy and I won't touch soldering because I never have.

[Jamtex]

It's easy enough to do, all you need is a 56 way 0.1" connector and a finger board. Both of which are quite cheap.

Then wire up pin to pin MVS connector to JAMMA fingerboard (ie A to A, 1 to 1, B to B, etc...) except... letters are solder side and number are parts (chips) side.

E 5 (-5v is not used on the mvs system)
H 7 (This is a gap in the board)
J 8 (Coin counters, not needed)
K 9 (Coin lock out, not needed)
S 15 (coin switch 4 and 3 (not needed))
L 10 (L and 10 are stereo output (see notes)
d game select down
26 game select up (see notes)

And these are the only ones that need to be swapped...

M to 15 test switch
11 to 10 Mono output (see notes)

Buttons are

Z 2p button a
22 1p button a
a 2p button b
23 1p button b
b 2p button c
24 1p button c
c 2p button d
25 1p button d (see notes)



1 - If you want stereo sound then Connect wires to L and 10 and another set to any gnd and connect to your arcade stereo connector.
2 - If you want mono sound then connect A on MVS side to pin L on the JAMMA side
Remember to switch the MVS switch to the correct place
3 - Button D is connected on some JAMMA cabinets howeve wire a wire from pin c and another to pin 25 and connect it to your 4th (D) button on your control panel
4 - On a single slot the game select buttons won't matter, else for a multislot connect a wire to pin 26 to a unused button on your control panel

[retro]

Ahh, I should have got my arse in gear and got my site up by now, really - then I could have linked you to the relevant info! Anyway, Jamtex has given you some good advice there ;-)

Yup, best bet is to have the cab wired as JAMMA and then use an MVS harness (bought or homemade). You can have switches for mono/stereo operation of speakers if you wish. As for kick harnesses, you could hard-wire a harness to the extra buttons, terminating in a suitable multi-pin connector. You can then make up kick harnesses for different kinds of boards (e.g. SF2) using the relevant mating connector (where the other end goes to the board). That would make it easy to play all sorts of boards in the cab - all you need is a harness (and kick harness) for each type of game.

As for soldering, it is very helpful for an arcade machine owner to give it a go. Get a cheap iron from Radio Shack and give it a try ;-) If you really don't want to, you should find a friend or even a TV repair man who will do it for you for cheap. And if the worst comes to the worst, if you're still in a pickle when I'm next in NYC, I'll give you a hand ;-) heh. Don't hold your breath on that being any time soon, mind!!

[CorruptionDee]

Ahh, I should have got my arse in gear and got my site up by now, really - then I could have linked you to the relevant info! Anyway, Jamtex has given you some good advice there ;-)

Yup, best bet is to have the cab wired as JAMMA and then use an MVS harness (bought or homemade). You can have switches for mono/stereo operation of speakers if you wish. As for kick harnesses, you could hard-wire a harness to the extra buttons, terminating in a suitable multi-pin connector. You can then make up kick harnesses for different kinds of boards (e.g. SF2) using the relevant mating connector (where the other end goes to the board). That would make it easy to play all sorts of boards in the cab - all you need is a harness (and kick harness) for each type of game.

As for soldering, it is very helpful for an arcade machine owner to give it a go. Get a cheap iron from Radio Shack and give it a try ;-) If you really don't want to, you should find a friend or even a TV repair man who will do it for you for cheap. And if the worst comes to the worst, if you're still in a pickle when I'm next in NYC, I'll give you a hand ;-) heh. Don't hold your breath on that being any time soon, mind!!

Hey Retro, you never know. I might have to take you up on that offer. I have zero experience when it comes to wiring cabinets, so looking at it from the inside, it can be a bit disheartening for the average rookie (me). I just got the Killer Edition of the 1069-in-1 board, and while I like the game selection, even the sound had to be calibrated because it was too loud and harsh sounding out of the box. In addition to this, the kick harness they gave me for buttons 5 and 6 are bare wires that must be wired to the control panel? How? I have no clue. Add this to the fact that button 4 gets wired through the JAMMA harness and you have something I won't even attempt to touch out of fear that I may most likely screw something up.