ThunderStick LED Arcade trackball (TS-UTB01)

I became interested in an after-market trackball when I realized my scoring potential for the Crystal Castles game was being reduced by the trackball that came with the cabinet. The original trackball is fine for very casual play, but I wanted the best chance possible to reach later screens / maps I could never archive back in the 80s arcades. ^.^ Based on about an hour’s worth of research across various Arcade 1-Up modding community web sites this trackball was mentioned frequently as a great balance of cost & quality. I’m not very skilled in electronics work but a couple of YouTube videos made me confident that I could perform the trackball swap on my own. All you’ll need beyond the new trackball itself is a Phillips head screwdriver (to remove the 15 screws), and a selection of flat-head screwdrivers (to pry the original trackball from the cabinet control deck once the screws are removed — since the trackball housing is also slightly glued into place — and also to pry the new trackball case open because you have to remove a jumper). The three (3) most challenging parts of the install for me were : 1. removing the electrical connection between the original trackball & the control deck’s printed circuit board (since it seemed to be slightly glued into place … but some gentle back-and-forth wiggling eventually solved the problem) 2. prying the original trackball away from the glue securing it to the control deck (the flat head screwdrivers were very useful with this step) 3. removing the jumper from *inside* the new trackball housing (there is a jumper inside the unit designed for ensuring proper input latency for compatibility with legacy devices, and you absolutely 100% _don’t_ want to leave this jumper in place for use in an Atari Legacy Tempest cabinet … trust me! ^.^ … the printed instructions that come with the trackball point out how to find this jumper) From start to finish this successful install took about 90 minutes (and as I mentioned before I’m not skilled with this sort of work). Within three games played of Crystal Castles using this new trackball I’d added 10,000 points to my previous high score. This little modding project has been a great experience, and has also given me a wonderful sense of satisfaction that I made this great piece of tech nostalgia work even better … just like my memories from the 80s arcades! Oh, did I mention you get to select the glow color for this trackball? ^.^ I opted for blue, to carry over from the Tempest livery on the cabinet side panel artwork.

Great looking and works great for Atari Legacy 12 in 1 Tempest cabinet. The original Arcade 1up trackball that came with it was garbage and started sticking 2 days after I got it which was a real disappointment. Glad this one was available and at a reasonable price. This looks and works way better and the blue led light inside looks cool. Only bad part the installation was not plug and play. You have to open the trackball open to pull the tumbler switch. Not so hard but it was not mentioned if you un clip the trackball housing with the ball facing down the entire insides falls out when you open it. That cost me an additional hour installation trying to reverse engineer how the insides are supposed to go back together. I had to open the Arcade1up trackball to see the internals to compare how the new trackball went back together. There should be a warning sticker saying open unit with trackball facing up . I’m betting this has happened to many. Other confusing part in the directions it says you have to hook the stock spinner cord to the new trackball for it to work and that was not the case for me. The cable harness didn’t even fit the new trackball and it worked fine without hooking it up. Mines is the 2020 model non lit riser so maybe the newest version you have to do that step Otherwise a great product definitely worth the 35$!,

This is a fantastic upgrade over the stock trackball!

Greets All, My Trackball came today and was eagerly excited to install it, which I did and played with it a bit and then decided to give my review of the Trackball, this is stock Arcade1up 12n1. So without further procrastinating here it is: The Good: The trackball is a nice drop in replacement, I like the mini wheels as I call them that the recorder rod slips into which gives it the free spinning you get, it is wonderful to have a trackball that actually spins and dont have to break your wrist trying to get the ship across the board. It is responsive to the direction you move it, sometimes too sensitive. I like the touch of the led with picking quite a few colors. The trackball recorder works well where there is no pause when spinning the ball quickly like the original trackball that would freeze or go batty. The Bad: The trackball has a grinding noise it not as noticeable unless you spin it fast as if you had to go left or right quickly, so spinning you will hear this, more so left to right then up or down. The trackball is very light, I understand it has to be to make it glow, but I think it should have been heavier. The original trackball feels good in weight. The recorders or the PCB is way too sensitive, most will see this that have played Millipede or Centipede back in the day. I was a master at both and know how it should be reacting, this is too sensitive, it is also too jerky when trying to move up slightly, instead it moves more then you need to. The quick spin either to the left or right does not move like it should for that little effort, but if you move it by hand slightly it moves much more. When moving little bit during normal play you can see the spaceship jitter which again I believe its too sensitive. Overall: I understand that we are playing with a mame emulator, but after I fixed my original trackball from not spinning freely, my two complaints of the original trackball was the recorder not responding to the quick movement from one end of the screen to the other without it getting stuck and sometimes it not being precise. Short of that I had no issues, but still the spinner was a vast improvement and also has its shortfalls its by far better then what was originally there. With the trackball not so sure. To make this superb, the values of the X & Y axis and sensitivity needs to be adusted quite a bit to make it work properly. I think with the new values it could be near perfect IF the sensitivity, the jitter, and the speed are able to be within the right values. Still have to see if it really will make it playable any better then what I have or not. Clearly the default values are not good at all. I figured out why if you spin the trackball too fast why it moves slow and when you move it slowly it moves faster, its the recorder disc the gap is too small based on the free movement of the axis. The disc was made correctly with 25 spaces/gaps which should work and does with light passing through, but they were made too small which when spun very quickly creates a smaller window for the light to pass through. *EDIT* 7.25.19 I have been testing values, I have uploaded the values that seem to stabilize the jitter and sensitivity. This is for a STOCK 12 n 1. Values may work with the centipede arcade, anyone willing to try. (NOTE: to change values you must have the USB connection. If you do not then you CANNOT change values).