Page 1 of 2

Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2016 5:43 pm
by Flowlance
Greetings! A norwegian guy here.
I finally decided to finish up this project after working on it for months. This project has been a major trial and error until i got things right, but I've learned a lot, especially how to remove hot glue :lol: But here's my project, start to finish. I didn't take pictures of everything along the way though.

I probably re-wired and re-positioned everything 4-5 times, switched components I was not happy with and such.

[spoiler="Tons of images - be ready"]This is where I work (my garage). It's a mess in here. Probably the one place I cannot keep clean and tidy.
Image

This is the original GB case I intended to use. It had some bad yellowing
Image

35% hydrogen peroxide used to make retr0bright
Image

Might as well whiten up some other stuff while I'm at it :D
Image

Here's the result (gameboy in the top-right corner). It turned out whiter than the other ones (for comparison) which i already thought was as white as could be :lol:

Image

However, I ended up not using this gameboy case. I bought a white reproduction case since I didn't want to screw up the original on my first attempt, and I really liked the white one. The first picture I took of the white case, while dremeling the screen area.
Image

Custom button holders made of acrylic. I ended up not using this as it wasn't deep enough.
Image

Button holders from a original nes pad fit better though.
Image

Button holes
Image

Holes and screen area ready
Image

Testing the circuit and display (5v modded). Also trying to decide between the original cartridge reader or a NDS cartridge reader.
Image

Test-fit with the display upside down and original cartridge reader. I mounted the display upside down because otherwise i had to trim down the button holders even more. However, i ended up mounting it the right way later, because when using display_rotate=2 in the config, it also rotates the hdmi output to TV, so I trimmed the button holders a bit later on...
Image

Fifa 2000, sorry to see you go. And in with a brand new board from kitch-bent:
Image

I used adhesive-bandage remover to get the label off. It came right off when applying this!
Image

Soldering the sd card thingy on the kitch-bent board into place. I hated this part, since I'm not good at such fine soldering. Thankfully I didn't screw up this time. Next time I will order it pre-assembled for sure
Image

I got my multiplayer adapter, some usb hubs and tons of usb headers. This will be used to create a usb hub, using the original multiplayer adapter and EXT-port
Image

Here's the adapter. This is the only working piece I had to kill (sorry guys, but it was so cheap...)
Image

Adapter and hub opened up
Image

Hub headers extended so it can fit. It's an octopus.
Image

Now I tested it if it worked, and it did. Then I glued everything into place, closed it up, but then ofcourse, after testing it again it didn't work anymore. And I never got this to work again on the Pi Zero. (It worked on the Pi 3 though, so I have no idea what the issue was)
Image

... many hours and days later, all I've been doing is debugging the problem with the usb hub. I tried many different usb hubs, but it always stops working after closing it up, and there's no shorts! Once in a while it started working, then stops again. This was the part of the project I struggled the most with. Finally I found a working cheap chinese usb hub. After a lot of hot-glue removal and soldering, it is now like this
Image

While I was stuck with the usb-hub problem, I needed a break and backlight-biverted my working DMG. Also added some nice silicone buttons from kitch-bent and a glass screen from handheld legend:
Image

Ok, back to business. Since I wanted to use the original ports, I am also using the original power port and power switch. I am using a micro-usb to gameboy adapter, and it works great!
Image

Here's everything finally wired up. It's a bit messy, but I will work on my cable management later. I've ordered some 3d printed screw brackets - but I didn't want to wait for it to arrive so i hot glued the screw posts into place with a major amount of hot glue :D
Image

I went out in my car to test the charging and aux jack, since I had easy access to it here. This is without a battery - so it works :D
Image

Here's some images of the finished result, after mounting the battery
Image

Forgot to mention, but i desoldered the original volume wheel potentiometer and soldered on a new one to the original board. It didn't make much of a difference though, but it was a perfect fit. The pins were exactly the same too.
Image

Battery compartment with a wifi dongle
Image

I'm happy with the BW screen - aside from reading text in the menus.
Image

Here's the back buttons. I wasn't happy with the feel of the tactile buttons (i did try this out first, no images though), so I settled with this. Buttons taken from a transparent DMG. Also using the easy-buttons pcb from kitch-bent.
Image. The buttons doesn't touch the table when I put it down, which I'm happy with.

Cartridge view:
Image

Usb hub with keyboard hooked up. After countless of hours I've successfully turned a 4-way usb hub into a 3-way usb hub, and made it only usable with this one machine. Great. :D
Image

Original EXT-port works
Image

Original DC port works too
Image

Here's the adapter I'm using
Image

Image

And here's my 17 months old son fiddling with it. I don't think he gets what this thing is, but he kept smiling :D
Image[/spoiler]

What I have left to do when I have time, is figuring out why the USB hubs (external and internal) doesn't accept all devices. Wifi and wireless keyboard dongle works great, usb sound works great, but gamepads and certains keyboards (apple keyboard) doesn't work. Probably a power issue of some kind.
Also, the volume is pretty low, and turning the wheel just a tad turns the volume almost all the way down, still trying to figure out what's wrong here. I tried turning the wheel on the amplifier, but it didn't help much.
And there's some cable management to do, but it closes pretty easily now.
Other than that, I'm pretty much done. I ordered multiple of almost every item in this build, so I will probably get started on another using the original DMG case I have left.

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2016 5:51 pm
by Kilren
Awesome build. It was fun to read

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2016 7:44 pm
by dboSS
Where did you get that adapter (micro USB to GB power port)?

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2016 7:48 pm
by toiletpaper69
Looks great!

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2016 7:51 pm
by Flowlance
dboSS wrote:Where did you get that adapter (micro USB to GB power port)?
http://www.ebay.com/itm/121597092890
toiletpaper69 wrote:Looks great!
Thanks!

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2016 12:53 am
by alien0matic
Well documented and fun to read. I like your GBZ.

I ordered an multiplayer adapter too, now that I've seen your solution I'm a b it sad I put a normal USB port where the link port was.

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2016 4:01 am
by dboSS
Flowlance wrote:
dboSS wrote:Where did you get that adapter (micro USB to GB power port)?
http://www.ebay.com/itm/121597092890
toiletpaper69 wrote:Looks great!
Thanks!
Thanks.

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2016 5:24 am
by jazzy
Hi there,

Can i ask where you got the white GB shell from? was it from a european supplier, would like to avoid china for delivery if possible!

Thanks

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2016 6:33 am
by Flowlance
alien0matic wrote:Well documented and fun to read. I like your GBZ.

I ordered an multiplayer adapter too, now that I've seen your solution I'm a b it sad I put a normal USB port where the link port was.
Hehe it's not that big of a deal though, at least you can plug in anything :D

Re: Flowlance's GBZ - A lot of images

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2016 6:26 pm
by Rod2D2
Do you have any pictures of the rear buttons from the inside. How did you manage to mount the buttons and easy PCb on the back?