Can I buy a useless damaged board?


Nardella

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Are there any Pandora main boards that would be thrown out that I can buy instead, I think it would make a neat show piece.
 
Are there any Pandora main boards that would be thrown out that I can buy instead, I think it would make a neat show piece.
Think craig/edd said something about selling bits and pieces of pandys.You would have to pm edd i guess.
 
This is something I wouldn't mind wither. Wouldn't mind testing to see if I could get other SoC's, memory, or USB chipsets to fit on it without ruining my main one first
 
Well, I know there's another SoC that has the same footprint/pinout as the current one, and I could see about adding more memory with the newer SoC
 
Problem is that the SOC pins (CPU and memory all stacked on to of each oher) are tiny and inaccessible.


To have a chance of removing it, you would have to remove the nubs, put the entire PCB in an oven to melt the solder, then use robotic tweezers to remove the chip.
 
Not an expert on reworking, but I don't think an oven is the correct tool. You would probably want to use a rework station so you could heat everything up, but only the soc to the point of melting the solder. This isolates whats being worked on but reduces the chance or warping the board by only heating up the soc. That being said if you think you are going to find a bunch of drop in replacements for different chips on the board you are a little misled. Yes some times there are components that are drop in replacements, but that's not always the case. Even if you can find a chip in the same package it is very likely that the pinout is not the same. Even the same company will change a pinout from one chip to the next.
 
Yeah, your probably right about a rework station -_- , and I think there may actually be drop in replacement SOCs available. However, I think the RAM is maxed out.


Replacing GBA components is certainly an advanced task!
 
TI's DM3730 is a drop-in replacement for the OMAP3530 in the Pandora. The board is already capable of using it, though you might need to replace a few capacitors/resistors as well.


I do wonder where you're going to get a single DM3730 in the proper packaging from, though...
 
TI's DM3730 is a drop-in replacement for the OMAP3530 in the Pandora. The board is already capable of using it, though you might need to replace a few capacitors/resistors as well.


I do wonder where you're going to get a single DM3730 in the proper packaging from, though...

I was looking at two of my electronics supply places... Digi-key only had omap3530's in stock.. Mouser has some dm3730 SoCs, I'm not sure which one would be a direct fit.
 
The drop in soc for the pandora would the dm3730. The package is cbc. It looks like mouser does stock it for just under 50 dollars. link I do not think it is advisable for someone to try and replace the soc in the pandora, Unless you have extensive knowledge in this field it would be very easy to turn your pandora into a brick. Besides any hardware issues there may be, there were some i/o changes on the chip and I do not know if any software needs to be changed to run. As far as building one from a scratch with a board that op has thrown out your adding a whole other list of hurdles. Now when you debug the board after building you have to do double duty. Is there a problem with the part, or is it an issue with the board? On top of that the pandora is no easy easy solder job. At the bare minimum you would have to do all bga chips in an oven or reflow station. It would be best to do as many parts as possible in an oven. Then you have to solder the rest of the parts by hand. Of course this is after you are able to locate all discrete and ic components.
 
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Yeah I only linked a source for the part and definitely don't recommend swapping it yourself, there is a reason robotics are used.
 
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