I am ready to take on your Taiko coding project!

[QKillerQ]

Hi!!

I recently built an Arcade-scale Taiko drum for use on my PC. I have been trying many different GIT projects for this, and they all seem outdated or abandoned - yours is the first that I have seen that seems current and active.

I have already built my custom Drum and electronics module with piezos that works great - but it uses the typical HID key press emulation, and I would like the more accurate Analog style to mimic the Arcade experience. Here are some pics of my build: https://imgur.com/a/n2H1Jys

I have every electronic component and board imaginable at my disposal, haha. I also have a ton of Leonardo boards and several different variations of ESP32-S3 boards - so I am sure i'll have what's needed for your project - so I can finally bring my hardware to life like it should be!

My Main goal, actually at the moment, is to be able to get my current drum's analog output (set to left trigger directions) to be seen as stick trigger presses so that it's more compatible with the arcade port. I am currently trying the analog version of this with not much luck: https://github.com/ShikyC/Taiko-Drum-Controller-Arduino?tab=readme-ov-file

Thanks for doing this!

[ravinrabbid]

Hi,

First of all, nice build!

This project is aimed at RP2040 based boards (hence the name ;) ). Using it on other boards is not possible at the moment. You'll also probably need some kind of analogue circuitry to filter your sensor signals to get good results (see here for more details: https://github.com/ravinrabbid/DonCon2040/tree/main/pcb/DonConIO). You might get away without it, but I've never tried. If you want to evaluate if it works for you at all, consider using just any RP2040 board and configure the software to use the internal ADCs.

The DonConIO circuit tries to imitate the original arcade board as close as possible, and therefore was only tested with the arcade sensors (those however are also just fancy piezos, so theoretically it should work with any of-the-shelf piezo with some tuning).

Finally, I personally feel that using the analog inputs is a bit less reliable than just using trigger style inputs. But I don't know if this is a general truth, some issue with the firmware or just my inability to be good at the game. So if you want to find out for yourself, by all means go ahead!

[QKillerQ]

Got it!

Well, you've convinced me to go back to keypress output for simplicity and reliability sakes!

You've also convinced me to go grab a Rpi Pico (the only board I DON'T already have a spare laying around, haha).

My question is now - after watching this video (https://youtu.be/RNcjTIn9fzE?si=jcqfSD9YDZ4-fONO) it made me wonder if, after downloading the firmware, if I could keep it so simple as assigning the 4 Piezo sensors in my custom Taiko drum to buttons in the firmware and Not need to do anything else?

That is, since I am using this on the PC version of the game, I don't need any menu or navigation buttons to be handled by the raspberry pie, I will just use the keyboard and mouse for that stuff. Will this software allow me to just assign the four buttons?

Thanks!!

[ravinrabbid]

I must warn you that this project is not as easy to set up and configure as GP2040 (used in the video), since it is intended to be used with the specific hardware from this project.

If you want to use it for anything else, you need to be comfortable with adjusting and compiling the firmware for your hardware set up (though changes https://github.com/ravinrabbid/DonCon2040/blob/main/include/GlobalConfiguration.h should be sufficient for most use cases).

Further the attached controller is used to do configuration, if you don't have it, you also need to compile the changes into the firmware.

Lastly, directly connecting the piezos could work, but most likely won't yield good results. The DonConIO does a lot with regards to capping voltages to protect the uC, amplifying and smoothing the signal. The firmware is optimized to work with such a pre-conditioned signal.

I hope I don't sound like I'm trying to talk you out of this, I just want to make sure you know what to expect :)

[QKillerQ]

Hey again, thanks for the detailed reply!!

Soooo....

I Just grabbed the pico. Dumped the 'generic' GP2040 CE firmware, used the web configurator to put it in keyboard mode and set a pin to the “d” key since I’ll only be using this on the PC

I tested in notepad by connecting my piezo directly to the pico. Worked right away. Tapping the piezo caused an instant “d” keystroke.

Now I have to do some research and see if my current circuits will work. I don’t see why they won’t since they are just adding voltage regulation and resistors - but it’s the configuring the sensitivity and all of that that will be the tricky part.

It's a start!!

Basically I'm trying to make it work without the specialized PCB from the doncon project , which I don't have :-).

[QKillerQ]

Hey again, thanks for the detailed reply!!

Soooo....

I Just grabbed the pico. Dumped the 'generic' GP2040 CE firmware, used the web configurator to put it in keyboard mode and set a pin to the “d” key since I’ll only be using this on the PC

I tested in notepad by connecting my piezo directly to the pico. Worked right away. Tapping the piezo caused an instant “d” keystroke.

Now I have to do some research and see if my current circuits will work. I don’t see why they won’t since they are just adding voltage regulation and resistors - but it’s the configuring the sensitivity and all of that that will be the tricky part.

It's a start!!

Basically I'm trying to make it work without the specialized PCB from the doncon project , which I don't have :-).

[QKillerQ]

Yo - I've come a long way! Still using the base GP2040-CE firmware, but it's performing beautifully.