Visual Pinball physics can only be called good, compared to Future pinball physics (which are horrid)

I'm thrilled this is being improved!!!

I've not downloaded or updated any tables in a few months on my cabinet... looking forward to checking this out.

Ironman and Tron are a couple of FP tables I've played recently and I think those play fine. Then again... being into both real and virtual pins I accept the fact that not everything is going to be exactly 100% and VP regardless of platform is after all a video game emulation of something physical. As long as the flipper to ball release point is not way out of whack I'm good. There is a version of Avatar I've played recently also that I really like the music and sound package they used which is largely completely different than the original, but still really nice... that being said the shots are super hard to hit because on that table there is something not right with the release angle or something. 85 vette said he did one and I have NOT yet tried his. Need to get around to setting up the new Sam system for his Tron and Avatar tables so I hear.

Tron plays awesome in the new SAM VP program. One of my most played tables at the moment.

That very Tron is the one I want to get setup on mine. At the moment I have one cab about 80% done... built a new one for myself and haven't got it all together yet. I've really enjoyed the Future Pin version and from what I have seen that one is great too. Anyone compared the 2 yet?

from the dev,

"Unfortunately, with so many drastic changes, this new physics engine is not completely backwards compatible with old tables. Several physics parameters have to be retuned for these new features to work. I'll however shortly post a test build with which you can play around a bit."

This physics engine does have better flipper physics, although it seems to have some other issues. But it is a big improvement. Will be interesting once it's more ironed out.

Joined the club myself with markmons help on the build last week

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That's awesome that FX2 added that second screen support. Does it stop zooming when you plunge, too?

Lots of exciting things on the horizon for virtual pinball!

Yeah, its done this for a long time I think. Just zooms in on plunger and then locks in view, which you can update.

I have pinball arcade on it and it can be fun to play regular tables too sometimes, but physix isnt as sweet. Plus, pinballfx2 is on steam so i play with my local buddies online and we can see friend's leader boards etc. That makes it really fun

is there going to be a new version of Visual Pinball coming out? ha ha not sure what you all are talking about?
I have another dumb question to ask. whats the Difference in Future pinball and Visual pinball?? Thanks for the help..

Future Pinball does not use actual game Roms for sound and DMD display. It is all done by the programmer.
Visual Pinball uses the actual game Roms and reacts exactly like the real machine.
This point can be argued to death but Visual Pinball has much better ball physics than Future Pinball.

And as for your first question, Yes, there is new version of Visual Pinball on the horizon.
It is in testing phase for Direct X 9 right now, which you can download and play with.
I believe the next big upgrade will be for Direct X 10 coming soon.

Thanks for info.. appreciate it. Hope the next version of VP will be more user friendly haha

Arcade I have one more question to ask you. I was wondering why most people use Windows XP to run VP?
does it run better with XP? Iam in the process of building a virtual. would Windows 7 work as well or Use XP????
Thanks again!!

Gregh... just to chime in... I have a good majority of tables I like that seem to work fine under my win 7 machine which is just a desktop machine (not a pinball cab), but there are weird driver things that can come up. I forget right off what driver version I'm using for my video cards, but some tables under some revisions can give launching/loading or even exiting issues. I believe the drivers I'm using are probably a couple or 3 years old. I think a lot of issues that can happen are DX support related stuff since they aren't optimizing for DX8 or 9 anymore. I just know that with the setup I use that basically 140-150 tables work really well.

Here are some shots of my setup. Revision_4-625.jpg Revision_4_1-841.jpg Built as a compact space-saving unit out of spare materials, and using the 24" monitors that I already had. I initially built this as a conversion to my triple-screen racing simulation rig Cockpit-193.jpg Monitor Stand After-781.jpg, but as I got more into it I built it as a standalone unit. The table portion now sits next to the wall-mounted MAME rig, all running off the same computer. MAMEPanel_finished.jpg

The material I work with is called 8020 T-slot, and it is primarily used for industrial automation applications. They call it "the adult erector set". The white board is just shelving that I picked up from Lowes. The most expensive part of all of this are the actual buttons and control boards. You can pick up the T-slot aluminum on ebay from 8020garagesale. I am using almost all 4040 series metric, as I picked up a pallet of the stuff from an old job on auction.

Revision 4 is the latest, as I've added the VirtuaPin controller, to give me the analog plunger (still needs alot of work, IMO) and analog nudging. Previously had a HAPP board running all of the buttons. I plan to flush mount all of the button panels for a cleaner look, but it plays very well right now. Getting the height and width close to a real machine makes it feel more authentic than it looks. Still need to hard-mount the backbox screen, as it is just sitting on a hidden shelf at the moment. I may just mount it to the wall, like I did the MAME setup. The wall-mounted MAME setup is running off an IPAC4. 8 buttons and two joysticks per player.

The PC is 4 years old now, but was bleeding edge when I built it: Core i7 980x, 2 GTX480 video cards, and some serious cooling upgrades to keep it quiet yet overclockable.Revision_4_1-841.jpg

Running Dracula Backglass and DMD working.jpg

In my opinion, windows 7 is preferred. There was a time when XP drivers for video cards resulted in faster FPS, but the software is moving to more modern OS. And you get better performance in games like Pinball FX and Pinball Arcade in windows 7 since they use the newer APIs. All my cabinets are set up with Windows 7.

Thanks Bub and Markmon. Was thinking on using a I7 processor is that overkill
or what is the optimum processor to run them smooth and no lagging?

I am running on windows 7 as well just fine.
My cabinet is running on an AMD Phenom 950 processor and an ATI 5670 video card.
Plays all tables very smooth and my cabinet is coming up on 3 years old.
The framerates on the new DX9 release are even better.

Thanks again Arcade. Pinsiders are the nicest and most
helpful.. never get any help from any users on VP Forums....
any idea when the new VP program and DX 10
are coming out?? does anyone know if theres a updated Guns N Roses
table out or coming out.. thanks again

Yikes... things have changed then.

I found folks there to be incredibly helpful.... one member offered to stop at my house and help troubleshoot a digital plunger, another member actually copied his ENTIRE hardrive and sent it to me to resolve an odd config issue....

oh and dont forget the folks that MAKE the tables and give them away free.... pretty cool community.

I5 or i7 is fine. Video card is more important.

I've found that basically ANY processor that is 4,6,or 8 core that runs at 3.4+ Ghz runs fine... AMD or Intel. (I've got a setup on my mame machine which is a 3ghz core 2 that runs the few tables on it I have) I think I remember testing a couple of things with a buddy's i7 compared to an i5 and don't remember really seeing much of a difference. Given the choice if a 5ghz quad core existed I'd take that over an 8 core 4ghz processor any day since VP as it sits does not really do much else with the extra cores. I have stuck with the Nvidia cards for video though. I'm sure others have used ATi also though.

Depends on who you are. I don't get much love over there. All good though, I just release my tables at VPuniverse whom is more than happy to have me there

I've met some really nice people on both sites as well as some real pricks on both sites. Reminds me of another site I know of. Good and bad apples everywhere.

Thanks again to you all.. really appreciate all your
expertise. iam learning alot in a short time. How about
Force Feedback and having solenoids. is that
must for a true pinball experience? or is it just a luxury to have?
i wanna build a nice machine but dont wanna go over
budget. it will be a widebody with 46' screen

Anyone have any custom decals designed
for sale? to use on the virtual.. was thinking
the guns n roses decals or star trek next
generation. but would like something cool

That looks nice. I've been looking into 8020 to rebuild my own rig. Would you mind sharing some plans if you have them? It's sort of daunting to enter the world of 8020..

I can take some measurements, but there were no actual plans made. The good thing about 8020 is that trial and error can actually work. Just cut, tap, drill and assemble. What part of the setup were you looking for?

The most important thing when working with 8020 for the first time is to choose a profile type (most common are the 4040 metric - 40mm x 40mm, or the 1515 standard - 1.5in x 1.5in) and go from there. The 8020garagesale store on ebay makes it easy to find compatible pieces and fasteners from there. For tools, it is best to have a chop saw or miter saw and a good blade (the more teeth the better - and don't use an abrasive cutoff wheel). A small drill press works well, but a hand drill is fine. Then just a tap for the ends for the button head cap screws.

_{Post edited by neurokinetik: moar info}

jrivelli, check out the thread at PartsExpress about upgrading Lepai 2020A+, it was pretty easy just did my 3 of em.
amazing what swapping out some caps and upping the input supply current can do:
http://techtalk.parts-express.com/showthread.php?226235-Modding-the-Lepai-T2020A&highlight=modify+lepai

Sweet, thanks for the link. The speakers sound awesome (just some cheap $5 speakers) and 10" inch sub, it erally pounds, nice and deep.

This mod should be even better, but it just seems like a lot of work for what is already a good sounding setup. imo of course. And I'm lazy on this stuff

I'll convince MArkmon how good of an idea this is, then complain my audio sucks and get him to do it since he is an audio nazi

How would i go about converting my pincab hyperpin win xp running VP, fx2 and TPA.Over to win 7.I know it will benefit TPA when they do the DX11 upgrade.Do i have to start from scratch?.

I am pretty sure you can do an upgrade if you use win 7 pro....now if it botches it up or not .....dunno. I'd say if it performs fine now why bother?

Got a lot of help from toyotaboy today on adding some FuturePinball games to the machine I picked up this week. It's all foreign to me, but after an hour, I got a table added! The table image and backglass didn't make it over to Hyperpin, but the wheel image did. I need to figure out VisualPinball now too. Lots of great EM's I'd love to add, as well as stuff like Capcom Kingpin and a lot of the custom games people have created. I've been in the hobby for several years, but this all feels totally new and different to me!

hey boogies where on ebay did you find
force feedback? or do you know any sites to order from
thats reasonable?? thanks

Thanks ill check it out

8020 is not the only manufacturer of this type of material. The generic name for it is aluminum T-slot. Item and Bosch also have their own versions of it. In fact, the Item stuff comes in some of the exact same sizes as the 8020, and is mostly interchangeable.

Here's mine. It's has Williams widebody dimensions with a 46" Samsung LED TV for the playfield, 32" Samsung LED for the back glass, real Vishay DMD, force feedback, analog nudge, flashers, shaker motor, Infinity sound system with 8" sub and color changing under-cab and rear accent lighting.

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Nice cabinet artwork!

Thanks!

yes agree, cool cabinet art.

+1 nice job for sure !

If anyone's interested in a cool frontend to use with VP / FP / MAME / any other emulator, there's nothing else quite like 3dArcade. Here's a few pinball-specific screenshots I made of 3dArk in action:

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Thanks for the compliments guys!

Yeah, I have mixed feelings about the LCD DMD stuff. I guess it's more important to some than others. For me, the most compelling reason I'm seeing for one at the moment is it's the only way to get PBFX2 to work with a dedicated DMD. Still holding out hope that PinDMD support will still make it in eventually though. They (Zen) have had one in their possession for a while...

There are lots of pinball simulators coming out, and supporting archaic real dmds just won't be in their charters. Even many of us with real pins are swapping dmds for led, color DMD, etc. DMD in a vpincab is a bad move with no real justifiable pro. A nice led monitor can look just as bright and nearly as black as a plasma dmd anyway. Why limit your flexibility.