Help - PC use of Red Octane Ignition pad

[sdudleyg]

I need help.
Briefly,
new RedOctane Ignition dance pad, multi-platform
have connected to PC via USB
have dance game: Prex3 (can get total name if needed)
also have downloaded Stepmania free game
I need steps to get it all working?
Do I need a different game?
Under Game Controllers in Control Panel I can get the X's to show up sometimes
but no activity through game
I can problem-solve myself if someone(s) can give me steps to go through and overall introduction to how to set this stuff up. I don't know enough to know if the pad is faulty (and I should return it) or if I just need more knowledge about dance programs and their connection with the pad. The Prex game says the pad is not connected, whereas the computer says it is, by the way.
Thanks for any info.
Susan, mother of two who are waiting

[abrannan]

Prex 3 is Pump it Up, you will not be able to play this on an ignition, as it requires a center button that the ignition pads lack. You will also need simfiles for Stepmania to be able to do anything with it. I cannot and will not point you directly to Stepmania simfiles, but advise you to do some google searches. The Stepmania readme file has all the information you need to get started.

[sdudleyg]

Had already thrown away the Pump It Up program when I read this, but thanks for telling me it won't work with the Ignition pad anyway. Our problem was prior to that, when it doesn't recognize the pad as we had it connected.
Of course we had already searched for a very long time at Google and also read in Stepmania ReadMe, but, due to inexperience, did not understand how to configure the pad or even get it to register with the game. Someone was extremely helpful at the forum DDRFreak.com, a person with some experience who had himself raised a similar question. He said:

"Ok, you know when you double click Stepmania to load it and the screen comes up loading all the songs?

Well, when it comes to that, make sure the Pad is plugged in, and pess Start+Select and the Up arrow at the same time. Hold it for 3 seconds than get off.

Go to Options -> Joy Config

Now click on say where it was Left Arrow, hit enter on the keyboard, than hit the left arrow on the pad. should say sumthing, cant remember off top of my head. now just do that for the rest of the buttons =) lemee know if u need more help than that."

Somehow, as a 57-year-old psychologist, I had expected the greatest help to come from this forum.

Have a happy new year in 2006!
Susan

[abrannan]

First, my apologies if I was a bit terse in my prior reply. I should know better than to try to reply helpfully at 2am when I'm having trouble sleeping.

You actually shouldn't need to do the start+select+up with the Ignition 3.0 pad, that is a button combination used by certain Playstation->usb adapters to remove the "joystick axis" problem (where the system refuses to register up and down simultaneously, or left & right as the case may be). The USB controller used in the Ignitions is already programmed to remove the axis issue.

[sdudleyg]

You don't understand - I guess I wasn't clear enough. I copied to this forum the instructions I got because they worked right away -- I only had to do that start+ sequence one time and from then on everything works great.
Before I did that nothing worked and after I did that everything worked. When something works, it doesn't matter whether it shouldn't need to be done, does it : )
Even if it was unnecesary (as you suggest and which could be true), it didn't hurt anything.
It also helped that the other person was clear about how to enter the configurations - whether that was the whole problem, or the necessary step to use the buttons correctly.
However, it was true that we did not get any response at all before following his instructions, so it doesn't seem that only the configuration was incorrect.
The pad is getting quite a workout and we have added additional songs to Stepmania, that we found on Googe.
Best wishes.
Susan

[stillakidatheart]

I am giving up on soft pads. I just ordered a cobalt flux should be here around the middle of January. I cant wait to see how well it works.