USB Hub Laggy / Missing inputs

Discussion of keyboards, gamepads, joysticks and other input related peripherals.
finite9
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Joined: Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:56 pm

USB Hub Laggy / Missing inputs

Unread post by finite9 »

I've got the official USB hub on my mister, and when playing various cores with various controllers, it seems to miss certain inputs. I've edited u-boot.txt and tried polling =1 but this didn't make any difference.

I've got 2 Xbox One controllers with wired connection, two Speedlink Competition Pro 5000 joysticks (USB) and an 8BitDo Arcade stick and they all lag in the same way. Dmesg shows that they do take on the correct polling rates when connected.

If I launch eg Vice C64 emulator on Linux or FS-UAE and start eg. IK+, which requires precise input, then there is no input lag/missed inputs with any of those controllers.

Is this a known limitation of the USB hub? 10ms lag is one thing but missing the inputs is a bit more of a glaring problem, so it feels like something is wrong.
FPGA64
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Re: USB Hub Laggy / Missing inputs

Unread post by FPGA64 »

Try this for latency measurement

https://rpubs.com/misteraddons/inputlatency

For a USB connection the best and fastest is usually obtained with a Daemonbite adapter

https://github.com/MickGyver/DaemonBite ... ollers-USB

They are really easy to build thanks to the Author making his work Open Source. Various people sell the devices.
finite9
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Joined: Sun Oct 03, 2021 1:56 pm

Re: USB Hub Laggy / Missing inputs

Unread post by finite9 »

Thanks for the links but I had already read the latency spreadsheet and that had lead me to buy the 8BitDo Arcade Stick.

Really I suppose the heading should read: "missing inputs", because I don't think it's a latency problem, more like the input just doesn't get registered full stop. I even notice it in the menu when i'm browsing with the keyboards arrow keys--sometimes a key press just doesn't register at all. I'm using a Das Keyboard 4MK Pro wired connection.

Thanks for the tip about the Daemonbite products, I didn't know about them, but i'm not interested in original controllers: I just want to solve the problem I have with mine. I'm fully aware that Xbox controllers don't have the best latency, and might get some 8BitDo M30 2.4GHz controllers instead. Besides, aren't the Daemonbite products a bit useless if you've just got the standard USB Hub? Aren't they mainly targetted at BlisSTer boards? scrap that. Was confusing BlisSTer with SNAC adapters.
caad
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Re: USB Hub Laggy / Missing inputs

Unread post by caad »

The daemonbite Arduino-based adapter is for discrete inputs -> USB, so it's basically like the controller board inside your 8bitdo.

Now, missing inputs should be considered a bug, IMO.
finite9
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Re: USB Hub Laggy / Missing inputs

Unread post by finite9 »

I tried setting jspoll/cpad polling to 2 yesterday--in case controllers can't handle 1000Hz polling. Don't know if that's logical but I've got a very vague memory from many years ago that some USB products didn't play well if you highered the polling too much in Windows. Please correct me if i'm wrong. Now i've set it to 500Hz, and I didn't notice any missing inputs yesterday whilst gaming, but I didn't test it enough... will have to do some dedicated testing.
caad
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Re: USB Hub Laggy / Missing inputs

Unread post by caad »

Aha, that makes sense.
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