Projects/racesim
From 757Labs
Participants: Doug, Ethan, MarkG, and Matt (others are welcome; just contact any of us)
Goals:
1. fun for us
- - fun to build
- - for lab play
2. build a working prototype soon
3. portability
- - fit through a doorway
4. single-player (for now)
- - but networked for multiplayer
5. ergonomic & comfortable
6. good choice of tunes (music)
Software:
OS - Fedora Linux 13 or Ubuntu 10.04 (with dual-boot to Windows XP just for testing)
Sys - TBD: VDrift, TORCS, or ?
Hardware:
1. infrastructure
- A. platform / base
- B. seat
- C. HID frame
- D. backend storage
- E. electrical / power block (12v)
2. heads-up display (HID)
- A. displays (30" LCD TV AVAILABLE)
- B. pedals / steering / shifting
- (USB pedals & steering wheel AVAILABLE, on-loan from MarkG until upgraded)
3. optional items
- A. gauges
- B. LED indicators
- C. rotary knobs / radio
- D. radio track VFD / LCD
- E. timer
4. sound
- A. basic
- B. frequency-tuned drivers
5. tactile transducer (for seat-of-the-pants rumbling)
6. headset / headset jack or speakers
7. computer (donated by MarkG):
- CPU: Pentium 4 at 1.7 GHz
- RAM: 640 MB RDRAM (Rambus)
- HD: 20 GB PATA Seagate hard drive (XP) + 120 GB PATA Western Digital (Fedora)
- video: ATI Radeon 7000 AGP --> replaced by some NVidia Geforce card
- audio/sound: Intel on-board
- NIC: Intel Pro/100 on-board
- optical drive: Creative 52x CD-ROM
- floppy drive: of course!
- case: mid-tower
- ports: 2 rear USB, 1 parallel, 1 serial, audio (3.5mm line, mic, & speaker)
Timeline:
2010 August - set goals
2010 Sept. - check-out existing driving simulators, visit a junkyard for parts
2010 Oct. - lock software platform, select music tracks
2010 Nov. - assemble hardware, determine name
2010 Dec. - playtest
2011 Jan. - verify stability & playability, demo / display at MAGFest, demo / display at ShmooCon ?
2011 spring - demo / display at FreePlay
