All sold out of Minimaids. Thanks!

I am definitely interested in a minimaid or two if there's another run. I just got a DDR cab and would absolutely love to convert it. I can't seem to find a secondary market for minimaids; is there a certain place they are trading that anyone knows of?

as of right now i think everyone is gonna hang on to it... if they are willing to give it up it wont be cheap either

Just putting it out there that I'd be interested in a minimaid if there was another run, as well. Hopefully if enough people show interest, production will be able to pick up again.

I think these would sell even if the price went up. They're worth it.

There's absolutely nothing wrong this right? It means it'll work and not care if the video is 15khz or w/e, right?



For some reason, it's just not outputting video at all and I've tested with two different cables and computers.

4-5-6 control video... not 3-4-5

2 and 4-5-6 should be down

Oh thank fuck. Ok, I'll try that.

Worked, thanks.

np

This sucks.

There are many people who are searching for this card.

Every time there is one for sale at the bigger or less public DDR sites, it gets picked up immediately.

There is no reason to not have another batch (depending on the batch size of course)

ill sell you mine for 1k USD ...

lower that to 400 and we can talk

Planning to get a DDR cab when i have the funds to do so and i would love a Minimaid if another batch is made, i don't want to screw around with a PACDrive and a J-PAC if the Minimaid controls the input of both the pads and buttons and the lights.

Sorry to hike a comment back to the top of the thread from ~8.5months ago but it may be useful to other owners of boards who are looking to upgrade to new hardware.

I've just installed a new system which uses the minimaid based on an Intel NUC 5th Gen Broadwell processor and associated chipset (QS-77, I think) this one to be exact:
http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/nuc/nuc-kit-nuc5i5myhe-board-nuc5i5mybe.html

Currently running on Windows7. I think what you have reported in Linux might actually shed light on what I've just had to work around in Windows.

I've not been using oITG as you requested but instead Stepmania 5.0.7. The simulation software in use was not really the key here for me so much as the hardware configuration and associated drivers. I also ran into some driver/hardware related issues even though the device enumerates as a simple HID device under windows:

The initial symptom presented that if the minimaid was left connected and windows restarted then when windows started up it would get to the windows animation and promptly crash with little to no information as to why (this should be I think when its doing its hardware enum but I dont have access to a LeCroy USB analyser to look at what it was doing on the bus to work out if its the driver doing something odd on the hardwares response that upset windows). When windows then rebooted next it would ask you to attempt recovery and send you down the path of a system restore and claim it was due to a "bad driver" with a signature of 6.1.7600.16385. It seems that this is slightly more catastrophic behavior from windows than Linux.

After a little bit of fiddling about I've gotten it working, initially i was using the Intel provided USB3 drivers with the controller set to xHCI mode enabled in the BIOS, this led to the boot issue every time. I've now disabled xHCI at the BIOS level (it was a handy checkbox under USB settings in the NUC BIOS but since every hardware vendors BIOS is different, YMMV). Once that was done, the USB controller was listed in windows device manager at next boot as an EHCI controller using the Microsoft driver (2006 vintage I think, though I am trying to recall from lasts nights prodding, I've been to bed since then). This now successfully survives the boot.

In this configuration all lights are working but I've not yet had a chance to play on the cab and check if it holds up under this configuration for extended use. I'll report back any additional findings if I encounter further problems with the systems when I next use it, probably this weekend.

As ever advice on the internet is worth what you pay for it but in the interest of helping out other folks that might try this hardware I hope to help save you some time and hair pulling - for anyone looking to use windows7 on the newer Intel chipsets, here is the order I did things in and I would suggest to you to try on a system such as the NUC (some of which is just general good practice anyway):
1. Perform the base installation of windows7
2. Apply the latest BIOS for your hardware
3. Download and apply all windows updates, this took quite some time so ended up doing this over night.
4. Install all of the latest drivers for the hardware from Intel
5. Disable xHCI mode in the BIOS and reboot, check that the USB controller in device manager appears as an EHCI using the Microsoft driver

The only thing stopping me from using Linux + sm-ssc rather than a Windows base solution is the lighting driver for stepmania, unless I missed something I didn't see a port of the needed lights driver from windows to Linux for use in Stepmania (at the moment I use mmmagic (threaded).dll in windows), feel free to correct me if I have missed anything there.

HTH.

24bitlen,

Thanks for your post ! I'm actually using the minimaid with an old dell optiplex and I was looking into the NUC because of it's size primarily ;)

My concern was to be able to output 15khz (I'm currently using soft15khz) and was wondering if it would work with the integrated card on the NUC.

Can you please shed some light on that ? Do you have 15khz output or or you're using the HDMI out ?


Thanks a lot !

Mine did not use any soft15khz. I did not connect my DDR VGA Arcade display to the minimaid. It is connected to my dedicated video card's DVI with DVI to VGA adaptor attached. If your OS is a Windows XP and set quickres to 640x480, you should be fine. I turned dipswitch no. 2 and 4 only, as opposed to 2, 4, 5 & 6.

This is bad advice to anyone that is new. Don't do it without checking what kind of monitor you have first. If you have a trisync monitor then you can get away without having to force the graphics card to output 15khz or if you have one of those arcade vga cards from ultramarc that will work too without any software hacks, ect. Also if your monitor is a svga monitor then soft15khz isn't needed and won't work anyway.

Since the thread was bumped, I want to mention that there is a possibility of a new run of Minimaids. RyogAkari is quite busy so they are being distributed by a different person this time around, and no support will be offered save for replacement of defective units. Currently, to express interest, you'll need to join the Facebook Buy/Sell group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/487629124643497/

You need to be approved to see posts there, but it should be fairly easy; it's not exactly an exclusive club. The direct link is here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/487629124643497/permalink/882852508454488/

According to pdf minimaid manual, installing soft15khz should be the last option before anything. If in case it doesn't work without soft15khz, then you should install it. You don't actually have to turn all dipswitches 4 to 6 for video display.

My VGA display is a standard sized DDR flat screen lcd monitor, a standard display since X2. It works anyway without soft15khz

If you have a trisync monitor, it's best to just plug in your VGA cable into it directly. That should yield better results than using the Minimaid as a passthrough device. The Minimaid is designed with 15KHz monitors in mind, as that is what most DDR machines in the US shipped with.

The important thing is never to send 31KHz to a monitor not capable of displaying it, as arcade monitors do not protect themselves from damage due to attempting to display out of range signals. That is why the Minimaid, by default, blocks 31KHz signals from being passed through it.

this is what the dips 4-6 are for... dip 4 is 15khz ONLY dip 5 is 24Khz and dip 6 is 31 respectively ... turning ANY of them off blocks the signals that correspond with the dips. in my case i have dip 4 on to allow a 15khz signal and ONLY that because im using an original AC monitor... it has the same effect as the jpacs jumper... to allow all or none at all