22 Sep
2007
22 Sep
'07
11:14 p.m.
Mine are both that type (quadrature), but with the
same connectors as found on
the BBC micro's User port. However, whilst they appeared originally to be
wired to conform to that port's pinouts (i.e. no TTL outputs shorted to ground
Do the power connections make sense? IIRC, the BBC micro user port has
one row that's 2 power and 8 grounds, the other row is port B of a VIA +
its control lines.
etc.) they weren't wired in any of the common ways
of wiring mice for BBC
machines.
I wasn;'t even aware there was a stnadard way of wiring a mouse to a Beeb.
[...]
They're not particularly nice mice to use IMHO -
but they are rather cool
compared to the boxy alternatives around that time (although I suppose my
Penny & Giles mouse dates from about the same time, and that one's far nicer
I think I have one of htpse Penny and Giles mice somewhere, and IIRC it
has a 20 pin IDC socket on the end which I presumed was for a BBC User
port...
I have a very nice trackball from about the early 1980s. Not only does it
hacve the ball and 4 function buttons, but also 'arrow keys' that when
pressed generate the apporproate quadrature waveforms (as if you were
rolling the ball in that directuon), at a switch-selectable rate.
-tony