[aquamire]

Seriously, anybody know how the hell these things even work? When I first got my Intuos and hooked it up, I was totally baffled and mystified, having to hover the pen to move the cursor. If you hover it just so, and press on the nib with your finger, it responds just as it would when your applying pressure to the tablet. How the fark do these things work without batteries?? It's as mysterious to me as those old Nintendo guns you used for Duck Hunt, but didnt need an actual IR reciever to use.

[MrPumpernickel]

You wanna know how the Zapper (the nintendo gun) works?

I've heard that the as you press the button the screen becomes black and the birds (or whatever it is you gonna shoot) go white...and somehow the IR signal from the Zapper detects if it's black or white it hits...but how the channel goes back to the gun is beyond my belief cause it works shooting at extreme angles (like 10 deg of the screen) instead of the normal 90 degrees.

Btw, click here for a lil fun

[ June 17, 2001: Message edited by: MrPumpernickel ]

[jwalk]

I wanted to lurk even longer, but I couldn't help myself.. how DOES the Zapper work?!

MrPumpernickel: I've heard about the screen flashing black and all, but do the ducks flash as different colors or something? How would it tell which one you hit when there's two? The question you brought up is interesting, too.

Great picture.

[Awetopsy]

MrPumpernickel: whoa. now thats nostalgia.....

[Impaler]

I think it works through a Capacitive surface system. Basically, a plastic or glass sheet is coated on both sides with a conductive material. The outer surface is covered with scratch-resistant coating.

Electrons around the panel's edge distribute a low-voltage filed uniformly across the outer conductive layer. The inner layer provides shielding and acts as a noise reducer.

When the stylus, with it's magnetic conductive tip inside, touches the resistor layer (and more specifically the conductor layer inside). it causes a capacitive coupling (lightining bolts shoot from magnet to electrogrid) and draws a minute current. The electrodes measure the current flow from the corners, and a controller determines the stylus' coordinates. The harder you press, the more electricity is conducted, and thus you get pressure sensitivity.

[MrPumpernickel]

Aaaaaaaaaah!......huh?

[MrPumpernickel]

And he scores!!! Here comes a quote from a site (adress at the bottom):

"Q: How does the Duck Hunt Gun work? -Anonymous

A: First things first, let’s get something straight: the duck hunt gun has a name. It’s called “the zapper.” It hurts the zapper’s feelings when you call it “the duck hunt gun.” Please, show it some respect.

According to the zapper manual: “The Zapper works by receiving the light from the screen. The contrast and brightness controls of the TV must be adjusted properly or the shots may not register. (The characters should be as bright as possible while the background areas should be as dark as possible.)” This answer it really quite useless. Being unsatisfied with this answer, I had my buban call up Nintendo to get a better answer. According to Nintendo of America, the zapper works by plugging it into the second controller slot on the Nintendo and turning the Nintendo on. This answer is useless.

Again not satisfied with the official answer, I asked my buban to do whatever it takes to get a real answer. The next evening on the news I heard that the police had shot a man who was wandering around town asking “How work the zapper?” and punching people who couldn’t answer. Fortunately, this man was not my buban. My buban undertook his task in a far more sophisticated manner: he stole a seven year old’s zapper and took it apart. He then hit the kid over the head with the gun and proclaimed that Nintendo had invented witchcraft to make the zapper work.

While my buban was satisfied with this answer, I wanted to know more. As usual, I turned to the internet. I have never once found a question that the internet could not answer. Once again I was not disappointed. The zapper works in the following way: The zapper is really nothing more than a lens that focuses very tightly on whatever is right in front of it. So, when you point it at something blue it will see blue, and likewise for other colors. When you’re playing duck hunt and you pull the trigger, the screen will momentarily flash black and the ducks will turn different colors. The gun tells the Nintendo what color it sees, and knowing that, the Nintendo knows what you shot. And that is how the zapper works."

Adress: http://gadfly.sjca.edu/XXII7/askgusandbuban.htm

[jwalk]

MrPumpernickel: Thanks! Though I wonder what happens if I point the gun at something that isn't on the screen, yet has the same color as a duck when the screen flashes..

[Chris]

you know what i want to know how it works, is that gameboy game pokemon (<- spelling) game works.

where you tilt the gameboy and it pushes the ball in that direction, you don't even need the arrows anymore, just tilt the gameboy up wards!

how does that work? btw, i never played it, i just saw it on a commecial...

[aquamire]

Well I just learned a whole lot through this thread.. thanks for the great info guys! Impaler, what's your background? You seem to know a lot about crap like that from what I've read in your previous postings.

MrPumpernickel: Nice rendering! I miss playing with my nintendo.. emulation just isnt the same, ya know?

Chris: Thats pretty simple.. have a real ball in a tube, and have a sensor tell which direction it rolls as you tilt the gameboy. Typically, I think you would have two balls.. one for the x axis, and one for the y. Make sense? It's probably more complicated that, but theres a simple answer from a rather simple mind.

[MrPumpernickel]

Emulation isn't the same, I know...

When I turned 18 guess what my mom and dad got me? A NES!!! I was overjoied that I once again would be able to play on the console which I grew up with, on the console which I had to sell to buy me my first computer...

I lub it!

[Frost]

chris: ...or some tiny mercury switch...

[Chris]

ahh...they put that in the game then?

that makes sence..i didn't even think of the game card part...

[Peaches]

ok, but seriously, are there batteries in wacom pens? i have mine for years and never needed to change a battery (if it has one).

[Magicman]

that�s the wacom secret...

ftp://ftp.wacom.de/pub/pdf/Tech_ergonomic/andpen_e.pdf

[Bishop_Six]

I remember playing Duck Hunt before my primitive mind could handle such coordinated games as Mario... yes, I'm young I gave my original nintendo to my cousin, so we try to get it to work every once in a while. But the old thing just can't take much more.. *sniff* such fond memories

[leat hacksaw]

cant remember what happened to my NES...

probably gone to console heaven...*sniff*

still have my SNES though (Megaman still rocks )