Build Your Own Arcade Controls
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hagstrom KE72 Encoder

The Hagstrom KE72 keyboard encoder is the heart of the Custom Arcade system, and is also available direct from Hagstrom for the do-it-yourselfers.  I was fortunate enough to get my hands on one of the first ones (the KE72T), and I thought I'd give everyone a look :)

Updated! Hooked up my Happs trackball - see below!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Click for a larger view!
(Click for a larger view)

My first impression was "wow" - this looks cool :)  About the size of a small PCI expansion card, it's full of well labelled connectors.  There are connectors for keyboard, keyboard passthru, mouse/trackball, ps/2 mouse, and of course 72 discrete inputs.  Very cool.  Click on the picture above to get a full screen view with the ports and connectors labelled.  The specs of the encoder are:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The trackball cable plugged into the encoder.
(Click for a larger view)

 

(Click for a larger view)
Cables, cables everywhere!  1 to the keyboard, 1 to the keyboard port, 1 to the PS/2 mouse port, and 1 to the trackball.  All the cables here supplied by Hagstrom, the trackball cable supplied by Happs isn't used.

 
Closeup of the trackball cable plugged into the trackball, split into X and Y axis cables.  Notice that rotten yellow wire on the left :)
(Click for a larger view)

 

(Click for a larger view)
The overall view.  Everything looks great, the only potential gotcha I can think of is the length and connection of the trackball interface cable - you'll either have to mount them fairly close together (no problem on a 1-control panel system) or splice the cable and use your own connecting scheme in between the two ends, which is no big deal if you're doing multiple control panels anyway. 

 


 

-- Home --