===== HOW TO MAKE AN USB GUNCON2 PSX LIGHTGUN WORK =====
(ON AN ARCADE CAB WITH AN ARCADE MONITOR)
Ok,
As you can read around there are news on my works on lightguns. Now I am able to play lightgun games on my arcade cabinet with an arcade monitor and a powerstripped VGA (no need for TV-OUT).
I've spent the last month in understanding how those esotheric, as Andrea Mazzoleni [Advance mame] would say, hardware works.
As you probably know there already are commercial products that works fine and much better than my actual solution, but they are way too expensive and probably difficult to obtain.
As you can read around there are news on my works on lightguns. Now I am able to play lightgun games on my arcade cabinet with an arcade monitor and a powerstripped VGA (no need for TV-OUT).
I've spent the last month in understanding how those esotheric, as Andrea Mazzoleni [Advance mame] would say, hardware works.
As you probably know there already are commercial products that works fine and much better than my actual solution, but they are way too expensive and probably difficult to obtain.
Knowing exactly how it all works, I was sure that a very cheap playstation guncon2 compatible gun had all the requisites to make our day, so I started plannig to use this one for my own ludic and innatural purposes (well, what are you thinking about ? I mean using it on an arcade monitor).
So, I :
1) Wrote a simple application to read from USB.
2) Reversed the guncon2 protocol (not so much work indeed)
3) Connected the CSYNC-IN of the gun to my VGA joining toghether the pins 13 and 14
... NOWAY!!! The gun didn't seem to like my intentions ...
After that I started investigating the reason of this defeat. It had to work !!!
What did I discover ? That, obiouvsly (well now it's easy to say), the gun didn't like the TTL level of VGA-SYNC signals.
So I put some circuit togheter whose purpose is:
1) Being independent from the VGA sync polarity
2) Obtaining a good composite sync signal XORing HSync and VSync toghether
3) Converting the signal level to the composite standard signal (not TTL)
2) Obtaining a good composite sync signal XORing HSync and VSync toghether
3) Converting the signal level to the composite standard signal (not TTL)
You can easily find a schematic on internet 'cause the problem is the same of connecting a VGA to a scart (Google "VGA to scart").
Well, What new ? it DOES work ... the gun gives me a good reference to be translated into coordinates. Kinda magic, isn't it ?
What do we need now ? A good driver. Yes this is the problem. By now, the only thing I have to share with you is a test application I made. You can find it at
It's just an application and it is developed with a shareware tool for USB driver designing so it will work for just 30 days. I am currently writing a real WDM driver, but since I am a UNIX/C developer you can imagine I have to study a bit before being able to do it in XP.
To start using it :
1) Decompress the zip and run the install.bat
2) Connect the lightgun on USB and wait for windows to prompt for the drivers (it should do it, if it doesn't pull&push the USB connector)
3) Pick the inf guncon2.inf
4) Start the application lightgun_diag.exe
5) Enjoy your new light-mouse :D
By now, the program reads the gun trigger as a left mouse button and the second button as the right one, so you should configure mame in the proper way
There is no way to calibrate the gun. Before complaining, remember it's just a test.
