Unofficial Pi Position Q&A & Support Thread

I just finished installing one for a buddy and I had it in my garage and I noticed it change games one time when I touched the coin door and had some static electricity. Never had it change games except that one time.
 
Well, I officially give up. I've spent well over $1,000 on everything to hopefully get everything up and running. Had 3-4 other people more knowledgeable than me do a paid house call to help troubleshoot. Can confirm that the Pi Position and Raspberry Pi get power. All of this may just be way over my head.

Anyone that wants to buy this complete setup from me, hit me up. Complete with Pi Position, Raspberry Pi 3+, SD card with image loaded and cable. According to everyone else, this should be 100% plug and play. I just can't get it to work. To say I'm frustrated is an understatement.

Will sell for whatever someone wants to offer me. Or trade for a 6-pack of beer. Don't care at this point.
 

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No I never figured it out. I'm going to try to hook a scope up to it and figure out what it's doing when it resets, it's pretty frustrating. Glad to hear at least one other person on the planet has the same issue. I've probably spent 20 hours trying to figure it out, but I don't really know what I'm doing, if I spent that same 20 hours working on the original pcb's I could have fixed 3 or 4 sets by now.
Have you tried changing the test button that is used to switch games? Not saying this is my issue but I opened the coin door and the coin mech bumped the counter and boom reset. Then I barely grazed the button and rest. I and going to change that and give it a try.
 
Well, I officially give up. I've spent well over $1,000 on everything to hopefully get everything up and running. Had 3-4 other people more knowledgeable than me do a paid house call to help troubleshoot. Can confirm that the Pi Position and Raspberry Pi get power. All of this may just be way over my head.

Anyone that wants to buy this complete setup from me, hit me up. Complete with Pi Position, Raspberry Pi 3+, SD card with image loaded and cable. According to everyone else, this should be 100% plug and play. I just can't get it to work. To say I'm frustrated is an understatement.

Will sell for whatever someone wants to offer me. Or trade for a 6-pack of beer. Don't care at this point.
I hear your frustrations and I wish I could give you some advise because I sure have had several issues with my project:
First was a brand new wiring harness that I bought for the cabinet had 2 wires reversed. Lucky no damage happened
Then the cable I used from the pie to Jason's board was not the correct type even though it fit and I thought it was the right one but not all cords are created equally.
Then I had gas pedal issues when I would switch games and I would reverse it in the settings. Then try again and nope all messed up…. I switched the wires around on the pot and seems to be working reliable now

Down to the last issue I hope of the resetting ordeal.
 
Mine switches games even with the button removed, tried new software, new card, new Pi, etc. my latest is a friend is going to attempt to rewrite the code lol
 
I think there's a slightly different wiring situation in my cabinet, I didn't have video on it originally because the wiring harness was different in some of the Pole Positions, so I think there may be something different with the grounds in my harness than in other people's harnesses.
 
Hello. I was one of the original Pi-Position purchasers, and while it worked fine in my machine, the graphics seemed blurry compared to the graphics of the original PCB and also the tire screeching sound was too far off from the original and it just wasn't the same as playing the real game. Has anyone noticed that the graphics are not as crisp as the original PCB? Is this a resolution issue? Has the SD Card image been updated to a newer version of MAME that has more accurate tire screeching sounds? This seems like such a great product that could be perfect with just these two minor improvements. Mine has gone unused after my initial installation. Once I heard how it sounded and saw the blurry graphics, I went back to my original PCB. I have a MAME cabinet that plays Pole Position and it looks and sounds perfect. Was hoping the Pi-Position would be the same experience.
 
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I just figured out a piece of the puzzle. I went back to the original software and the picture syncs up perfectly. I had never tried the original version since I didn't get to my pole project until recently. So at this point, I have the original software with perfect picture, but no sound or controls (and I imagine dip switch problems) and an updated version with sound, controls , but bad sync. I will try re-downloading the new versions and see what happens.

So I guess what I am trying to say is that sync issues can be a software configuration problem.
I'm having the same issue with the sync issue, I've tried the newest version of software and the issue is on 3 different monitors. Where can I get a copy of the original pi position software to see if the sync works ok.
 
Well, I officially give up. I've spent well over $1,000 on everything to hopefully get everything up and running. Had 3-4 other people more knowledgeable than me do a paid house call to help troubleshoot. Can confirm that the Pi Position and Raspberry Pi get power. All of this may just be way over my head.

Anyone that wants to buy this complete setup from me, hit me up. Complete with Pi Position, Raspberry Pi 3+, SD card with image loaded and cable. According to everyone else, this should be 100% plug and play. I just can't get it to work. To say I'm frustrated is an understatement.

Will sell for whatever someone wants to offer me. Or trade for a 6-pack of beer. Don't care at this point.
What does it do when you power it up?
 
Issue: Pi Position would not boot. Saw a blank screen [Fixed!!]

Received my Pi Position and other parts needed in the mail today. I used the Raspberry Pi 3B+. Put it all together and before putting it my upright I checked the voltages and the were at 5.02v. Installed the board turned on the power and saw nothing. No sounds, screen was blank, controls seem to not be responsive.

I checked out the lights on the Raspberry board, the red one was solid and the green one was blinking with a specific pattern. It slow flashed four times the quick flashed 7 times. I assumed the Raspberry was not booting.

I found this thread and downloaded a white paper that had this link to download the last stable Pi release. I copied over the firmware files in the boot folder (fixup*.dat and start*.elf, and bootcode.bin) to the SD card and then put the card back in my Pi.

Pi Position now boots successfully.
 
Follow up question, some players when they get to that tight left turn on Fuji like to spin the wheel. On real boards the car would keep turning left as the wheel spun, in Pi Position, once the wheel goes too far it starts turn the other direction. I keeps flipping between left and right as you spin the while in one direction, rather than staying in the direction the wheel is spinning. Is this normal for Mame? Or is there a setting to change that?
 
Hello :D

First of all I would like to tell you about my cabinet. It's an original spanish Pole Position II, distributed by Sega Of Spain (SEGASA) . It uses the Atari board and the original romset. It works and both AR2 and the power supply are in working condition. I leave you some old links to my channel
  • Power supply:
  • Adjusting the gas pedal:
  • Repairing the power brick:
These are the problems I have encountered

1.- No sound. Only a buzz from the only speaker. Constant buzz that does not change depending on the game or what happens on the screen. If I plug headphones into the Pi (3B+) the game plays without any problems, so I understand it's a connection problem.

As you can see in the photo of my CPU edge conector, the sound 1+, 2+, 3+ and 4+ are not populated. The machine has only one speaker (from the factory) so there is only one input on the AR2 and this input is connected to the sound 4 - pin (and the game works with all the sounds).

pinout.png

What is the difference between - and + sound pins? The - sounds pin are not in use in the pi position, should i change the cable conected in the sound 4- to the sound 4+?


2.- The steering wheel stops registering if i steer too fast. I'm using the sensor that came with the machine because the extra one that came with the kit doesn't have the extra holes that my machine needs (I could use my original PP2 sensor board as a template to drill new ones.)

What I do notice is that it spins a lot more than with the original board, my first thought was to change the sensitivity settings but i think the problem is in the Arduino when it converts from optical to digital.

This is the code: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YhePTCH-g3Q5nUvoZYmrBNE_Mj4qc-9d/view

2 problems:

a) Two uncommented serial.print

b) The worst, polling is being used and not interruptions. https://forum.arduino.cc/t/rotary-encoder-software-debounce-or-hardware-polling-or-interrupts/510163

Anyone else having the same problem?

3.- Not a clear image. The image is a bit blurry and somewhat distorted. I have used the same raspberry with a VGA666 and I know the possibilities, in this setup the quality has been noticeably reduced. I have seen that some of you have the same problem but at the moment it seems to be an unrecognized bug.

I will keep you posted on my progress. If anyone can give me a hand, it would be appreciated. Best regards.
 
Follow up question, some players when they get to that tight left turn on Fuji like to spin the wheel. On real boards the car would keep turning left as the wheel spun, in Pi Position, once the wheel goes too far it starts turn the other direction. I keeps flipping between left and right as you spin the while in one direction, rather than staying in the direction the wheel is spinning. Is this normal for Mame? Or is there a setting to change that?
I thought this was an ArPiCade thread, but oh well I am here now. Disclaimer: I don't own a Piposition.

Your problem is a common one with MAME trackball/spinner sensitivity settings, if they are too high you can overrun them and the game will register the opposite direction. Spin slower or turn down the sensitivity.
 
My cockpit seems to be dialed in pretty good except If I spin the wheel, like you need to in some turns, it doesn't register and just keeps going straight. I've tried adjusting the sensitivity up and down and I get the same result. Is the there something I'm missing?
 
I've fixed the problem that caused inputs to be lost when the steering wheel was turned too fast.

As I mentioned in my previous post, the original code in pp_joy4r2.ino uses polling and, in my opinion, it's not the best solution. In my version (which ChatGPT generated for me, it worked on the first try and I haven't changed a single comma, I just added the comments) interruptions are used.

The new code: https://mega.nz/file/KxwhWKoQ#c3oVcwfc3uJa3yaP9fbjt9mZFgcEVBCZ9TpaHILD_ug (my conversation with ChatGPT: https://chatgpt.com/share/281cd5a1-7298-4755-85a6-4d8c9c9672f0)

It works like a charm and now I can play PP/PP2, Super Sprint, and other games like I'm used to.

Vídeo using the new code:

I just need to adjust the steering wheel sensitivity in mame so that the feel is exactly like the original machine.
 
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Fixed sound issue on my version of the cabinet

As you can hear in the video in my previous post, I have now fixed the audio issue. I confirm that it is a problem with the wiring of my machine. From the factory, none of the Sound + are connected and the Pi Position does not use the Sound - which are the ones used by my wiring.

pinout (1).png


In fact, and being mono, all the Sound - are connected to each other and from the Sound 4 - the cable goes to the AR2 to amplify it to the single speaker.

Given this, and since the outputs of the Pi Position are grouped in pairs (4 with 2 and 1 with 3), I have bridged both outputs to the W pin (Sound 4 -) and now I have sound :)

Since the original wiring of my Spanish version is sacred, I have made the changes in the Pi Position itself.

vlcsnap-2024-07-29-13h14m07s789.png

A quality job :sneaky:

Finally, and to avoid distortions, it is important that in MAME the sound amplification is at 0.

I understand that the Pi Position may not support 100% of the wiring on all versions of the world, but I think more could have been done here, at least documenting it.

Now I have to check the sharpness and distortion problems in the video output. I think this is not going to be so simple.

Greetings!
 
2 issues any help please
Extra games
So i've had my pi position for a year or so now but only started to use it properly past week and it works fine for pp1 and pp2 but trying to add other games im having little success i managed to get ssprint to work but no success on buggyboy or turbo comes up with a Jason splash screen saying no rom found
I've edited the config file to what i think should work
GAMELIST=poleposa polepos2 ssprint buggyboy turbo

Also even with it just like this
GAMELIST=poleposa polepos2 ssprint
on each toggle of the game it comes up with an error at line 20 message but does seem to work.

HiScores/dip setting not saving
should the high score table be saved on a power cycle? and also the dip settings as mine keeps loosing them both on a fresh boot...

Many thanks
 
I've fixed the problem that caused inputs to be lost when the steering wheel was turned too fast.

As I mentioned in my previous post, the original code in pp_joy4r2.ino uses polling and, in my opinion, it's not the best solution. In my version (which ChatGPT generated for me, it worked on the first try and I haven't changed a single comma, I just added the comments) interruptions are used.

The new code: https://mega.nz/file/KxwhWKoQ#c3oVcwfc3uJa3yaP9fbjt9mZFgcEVBCZ9TpaHILD_ug (my conversation with ChatGPT: https://chatgpt.com/share/281cd5a1-7298-4755-85a6-4d8c9c9672f0)

It works like a charm and now I can play PP/PP2, Super Sprint, and other games like I'm used to.

Vídeo using the new code:

I just need to adjust the steering wheel sensitivity in mame so that the feel is exactly like the original machine.
thanks for your help. where do i put your new file? i downloaded it and when i look thru my sd card i dont see any file named pp_joy4r2.ino. the closest i found was in the avrup_old folder and it is pp_joy.ino.leonardo.hex and pp.joy.ino.leonardo.hex.orig. also the avrup folder is empty if that means anything.
 
thanks for your help. where do i put your new file? i downloaded it and when i look thru my sd card i dont see any file named pp_joy4r2.ino. the closest i found was in the avrup_old folder and it is pp_joy.ino.leonardo.hex and pp.joy.ino.leonardo.hex.orig. also the avrup folder is empty if that means anything.
This is about updating the Arduino firmware, you can use this post as a reference: https://forums.arcade-museum.com/th...sition-q-a-support-thread.478900/post-4719355
 
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