Full VGA resolution (640x480) 3.5" display, composite in

[Ganreizu]

Damnit, the board of mine is too wide. I have to get rid of 1mm. Anyone has got an idea?
I wanted to dremel a bit off, but the traces are really close to the edges.
This really ruined my day.

1mm is not much isn't it possible to cut some space from the gameboy housing, os you don't have to cut the board itself?

This is what i did to make my screen fit. Dremeled a bit off the sides on the inside of the case to get the screen/board to fit flush with the screen window.

[Fleder]

I dremel'd like half a mm from the board itself. 1/4mm of every side, because the next trace was very close.
Then i did dremel the case. Now it fits, but this god damn board is eating up my space inside this shell.
I hope i can fit everything inside. I am surely not able to do a Cartridge SD Card Reader,
since i also need to fit in the VGA Port and a VGA to HDMI Adapter.

Did someone try to just solder wires from VGA to a board? Is this possible? [mention]Cannikin[/mention] maybe?
Because those VGA Ports really do need a lot of space.

[spoiler="not much space left"][/spoiler]

[Popcorn]

I dremel'd like half a mm from the board itself. 1/4mm of every side, because the next trace was very close.
Then i did dremel the case. Now it fits, but this god damn board is eating up my space inside this shell.
I hope i can fit everything inside. I am surely not able to do a Cartridge SD Card Reader,
since i also need to fit in the VGA Port and a VGA to HDMI Adapter.

Did someone try to just solder wires from VGA to a board? Is this possible? [mention]Cannikin[/mention] maybe?
Because those VGA Ports really do need a lot of space.

[spoiler="not much space left"][/spoiler]

You should abandon VGA -> HDMI and just go Composite Video. You can't solder VGA directly to the board because VGA is analog and HDMI is digital so you will need an adapter which will take up more space, and damn, you don't have much left in there. And for all that trouble, the clarity between going composite at 640 vs. straight VGA on that small screen is going to be negligible.

[Fleder]

You should abandon VGA -> HDMI and just go Composite Video. You can't solder VGA directly to the board because VGA is analog and HDMI is digital so you will need an adapter which will take up more space, and damn, you don't have much left in there. And for all that trouble, the clarity between going composite at 640 vs. straight VGA on that small screen is going to be negligible.

Yes, i know. But i meant soldering the wires onto the adapter, not from VGA to RPi0
I already bought the VGA to HDMI active adapter, and it would fit, but what's really stealing space here are the VGA ports.
If i could ditch the ports and just solder the wires directly, i would save a lot.
Sure, i could go with composite, but the composite board is even bigger and i am not sure if i could ditch it.
See for yourself:

left to right - VGA to HDMI, VGA Board of display, Composite Board of display + power button; control buttons in the back:
http://s20.postimg.org/ak1c3itst/IMG_20 ... 170307.jpg

closeup of composite board:
http://s20.postimg.org/x66ng97j1/IMG_20 ... 170351.jpg

closeup of VGA to HDMI and VGA Board:
http://s20.postimg.org/7oo8wnpst/IMG_20 ... 170454.jpg

What i have to do right now:
http://s20.postimg.org/kdijgbvx9/IMG_20 ... 170537.jpg

If i could ditch those damn adapters, the boards would be small and i could fit them in somehow.

There are soldering points, at least on the board of the display, but i never did this before, so i am cautious as not do damage this expensive display.

[Popcorn]

You should abandon VGA -> HDMI and just go Composite Video. You can't solder VGA directly to the board because VGA is analog and HDMI is digital so you will need an adapter which will take up more space, and damn, you don't have much left in there. And for all that trouble, the clarity between going composite at 640 vs. straight VGA on that small screen is going to be negligible.

Yes, i know. But i meant soldering the wires onto the adapter, not from VGA to RPi0
I already bought the VGA to HDMI active adapter, and it would fit, but what's really stealing space here are the VGA ports.
If i could ditch the ports and just solder the wires directly, i would save a lot.
Sure, i could go with composite, but the composite board is even bigger and i am not sure if i could ditch it.
See for yourself:

left to right - VGA to HDMI, VGA Board of display, Composite Board of display + power button; control buttons in the back:
http://s20.postimg.org/ak1c3itst/IMG_20 ... 170307.jpg

closeup of composite board:
http://s20.postimg.org/x66ng97j1/IMG_20 ... 170351.jpg

closeup of VGA to HDMI and VGA Board:
http://s20.postimg.org/7oo8wnpst/IMG_20 ... 170454.jpg

What i have to do right now:
http://s20.postimg.org/kdijgbvx9/IMG_20 ... 170537.jpg

If i could ditch those damn adapters, the boards would be small and i could fit them in somehow.

You don't need that massive composite board. I can see the traces from the photo. Solder from the driver board from pin 5 (video) and 6 (GND) for "Video 1" and directly onto the PI.

[Popcorn]

Btw, yes you can remove the VGA port and solder directly onto the board, but don't forget it's a DB15 connector. So that means you need to solder 15 wires up. I think one or two are reserved so you might be able to get by with a couple less but still, that's gonna be some work especially when the termination points are quite close so it's going to be some very fine solder work. If it was me, you already know I'd go composite

[Fleder]

Yes, you are right.
Then i have to solder another wire for the power, since it gets its power over the composite board, as you can see.
But the traces are visible. So i need to go from PowerBoost to Step-Up (does not work with 5v ) to the main display board.
That sounds doable. Still i can't yet imagine how everyone else packs their stuff into this small space. I mean, okay, my board is huge, but it is not that much more space if i would've went with the other one.

Do you have got the positions of your modules and stuff planned out yet? Where do you place everything?

[Popcorn]

Yes, you are right.
Then i have to solder another wire for the power, since it gets its power over the composite board, as you can see.
But the traces are visible. So i need to go from PowerBoost to Step-Up (does not work with 5v ) to the main display board.
That sounds doable. Still i can't yet imagine how everyone else packs their stuff into this small space. I mean, okay, my board is huge, but it is not that much more space if i would've went with the other one.

Do you have got the positions of your modules and stuff planned out yet? Where do you place everything?

Probably not the right thread to talk about space management but, I was working on that this afternoon actually. This huge battery is a bit problematic afterall. I hot glued a bunch of the main boards together and I'm slowly working it all out. I still want to get the audio all finished so I know exactly what I'm dealing with as far as footprint. I also bought some kapton tape because I have a feeling that I'm going to be slacking a bunch of this stuff on top of each other like a four layer sandwich. let's see.

[Popcorn]

@Fleder Google "GERT VGA 666". Might be a viable solution although you'll lose all your GPIOs

Edit: according to this, there are still 6 GPIOs free
With some remapping, you could still get PWM audio or graceful shutdowns

[Retrohead95]

What's the quality of the screen like? Is it worth the $100? I have the adafruit screen and I'm deciding if I should just delay the build a bit and get this one?