Super Gp2x Mod Project Underway

[bacteria]

holy crap at this turn out to get interesting. It really is a super-mod. I wonder if it will turn out to your liking... nice idea to expand the room for additional controls though ;-)

Thanks!

What are your thoughts "to expand the room for additional controls"?

 

[bacteria]

that's given me an idea!! i'm thinking of making a tabletop version with arcade controls etc.. will be a bit simpler than hacking up old n64 pads

does anyone know if the gp2x has an i/o out type thing for controls?

Sure, no reason why not - only prohibitor at the moment is tv-out and the fact you can't seem to boot straight into it when you turn on the GP2x - then you could make a tabletop arcade machine (powered by a GP2x) to your own spec - although it is worth mentioning that the output quality is "not perfect yet". If the output quality improved, and you could boot straight to tv-out, this could be quite feasible and desirable...

Control wise, you could get a HotRod (or similar) - joystick and arcade buttons (look on MAME sites), which looks like the control centre for an arcade machine. You just need to mod these controls to connect to the GP2x joystick connections and control buttons; and hook up a screen with tv-out; and some nice big speakers! Job done (at least, in theory).

 

[Nighty]

A tip many of you may find useful when doing mods on the GP2x...

Nik166 (on his D-pad topic, so credit to him for his idea about the IDE cable - cheers!) had a good solution to this, which I decided to try - there are about 40 single wires on an IDE cable - flexible, thin, single wire - ideal!

And if those are still too thick for your liking, you can always use one of the "newer" (UDMA/66) IDE cables. They have 80 wires instead of 40, so each wire is thinner than the wires found in the older 40-wire cables.

 

[bacteria]

A tip many of you may find useful when doing mods on the GP2x...

Nik166 (on his D-pad topic, so credit to him for his idea about the IDE cable - cheers!) had a good solution to this, which I decided to try - there are about 40 single wires on an IDE cable - flexible, thin, single wire - ideal!

And if those are still too thick for your liking, you can always use one of the "newer" (UDMA/66) IDE cables. They have 80 wires instead of 40, so each wire is thinner than the wires found in the older 40-wire cables.

The standard IDE cable's wires are thin, don't need to go any thinner; the wires are far thinner than the contacts I need to secure them onto are, which is ideal. One IDE cable is all you need for this project. I just need to make sure I put a label on each pair when I connect them, so I know what pair of wires does what (all the cables are the same colour after all)!

Does anyone know if the resistance of using such wires on a distance of about 20cm (circa 8") would be an issue? One end of the wires will be hot-glued to motherboard contacts, the other ends will be hotglued/soldered to commercial (Maplins) buttons. I could always do my "have a go and test it" approach, but I thought it makes sense to ask the question!

At least with this mod, the only home-made element visible will be the case itself - all the other components are commercial and of commerial quality (Nintendo joystick and D-pad, Maplin buttons, GP2x screen).

 

[Lint]

no, there should be not problem if you connected it correctly

that would mean you should _solder_ it to the board, not hot glue-ing it as contacts will likely loss it's contact or have noisy bad contact sooner or later, specially if it gets too hot inside the case

soldering/desoldering is not a hard job if you've got a decent solder iron and desolder pump (you should really not to buy the cheapest desolder pump)

 

[bacteria]

no, there should be not problem if you connected it correctly

that would mean you should _solder_ it to the board, not hot glue-ing it as contacts will likely loss it's contact or have noisy bad contact sooner or later, specially if it gets too hot inside the case

soldering/desoldering is not a hard job if you've got a decent solder iron and desolder pump (you should really not to buy the cheapest desolder pump)

Soldering 2 wires to the 2 contacts on the motherboard (for each button), isn't that rather difficult to solder to without getting solder in the wrong places, and rather liable to melt through the board with the heat of a soldering iron? I am interested in comments on this please - I know soldering makes better sense, but if I am not confident enough, I will have to use hot-glue (plenty of it). Anyone got any thoughts??

 

[nik166]

And if those are still too thick for your liking, you can always use one of the "newer" (UDMA/66) IDE cables. They have 80 wires instead of 40, so each wire is thinner than the wires found in the older 40-wire cables.

that's what i used


bacteria: don't bother about the resistance: graphite pads into old control pad have much more resistance than dosens of meters of any cable you can use and it works fine

 

[jmetal88]

no, there should be not problem if you connected it correctly

that would mean you should _solder_ it to the board, not hot glue-ing it as contacts will likely loss it's contact or have noisy bad contact sooner or later, specially if it gets too hot inside the case

soldering/desoldering is not a hard job if you've got a decent solder iron and desolder pump (you should really not to buy the cheapest desolder pump)

Soldering 2 wires to the 2 contacts on the motherboard (for each button), isn't that rather difficult to solder to without getting solder in the wrong places, and rather liable to melt through the board with the heat of a soldering iron? I am interested in comments on this please - I know soldering makes better sense, but if I am not confident enough, I will have to use hot-glue (plenty of it). Anyone got any thoughts??

You'll never melt thorugh the board. You could discolor it, but that takes quite a while. Go ahead and solder. If you know where to put the wires, you'll know where to put the solder, just don't put a huge blob and it'll do fine.

 

[BenScar]

but if I am not confident enough, I will have to use hot-glue (plenty of it). Anyone got any thoughts??

Well I have a soldering iron, plenty of cables and some spare parts (old mother boards with small places to solder to). If you fancy a trial run and some soldering practice PM me, we'll see what we can sort out.
I'm all the way down by London but this MB is defunct and you're more than welcome to do some practice soldering on it, get your confidence up (There's always the post!)

Burning though the board would take quite a hot iron, I use a 15Watt iron for delicate work and a 100Watt one for "major" jobs. The 100W one would take some time to burn though a PCB.

 

[bacteria]

Thanks guys for the advice. Perhaps I was erring on the side of caution a bit too much.

BenScar - thanks for the offer mate - I have a couple of old game controller boards to play on (a small DreamCast mini-game unit and a GameCube board - that should give me the testing materials I need. Appreciate your offer though, thanks.

Good, I will try this out, it is a better idea than hot-glue in the longer term.

If I was to scrape away some of the contact area on the motherboard, heat a blob of solder onto the board, and solder a wire to this, would this work and stay adhered to the board securely? The reason I was also considering hot glue was that the button connections (where the carbon makes contact) are about 1mm wide only; I was intending to hot glue a wire onto this (tested it, seems ok) - accurate, but obviously not as good as soldering. If I bodge with the GP2x board, the project dies; but with hot glue I just remove it. Anyway, I will experiment with soldering to see if I can make it work.

Thanks, please keep the comments coming!

 

[BenScar]

BenScar - thanks for the offer mate

Have a look at BSoD - IPTV, one of the eps gives an overview of soldering (plus it's quite a funky little show!), might be able to gain a few hints and tips from there.
Sorry I forget which episdoe it is! There's only 5 so far though, so not to many.

 

[bacteria]

BenScar - thanks for the offer mate

Have a look at BSoD - IPTV, one of the eps gives an overview of soldering (plus it's quite a funky little show!), might be able to gain a few hints and tips from there.
Sorry I forget which episdoe it is! There's only 5 so far though, so not to many.

Thanks, but I couldn't see a topic on soldering - which one is it please? <_<

And if those are still too thick for your liking, you can always use one of the "newer" (UDMA/66) IDE cables. They have 80 wires instead of 40, so each wire is thinner than the wires found in the older 40-wire cables.

that's what i used


bacteria: don't bother about the resistance: graphite pads into old control pad have much more resistance than dosens of meters of any cable you can use and it works fine

Great. One less issue for me to be concerned about!

 

[BenScar]

Thanks, but I couldn't see a topic on soldering - which one is it please? <_<

Ah, it's not as good as I thought... Anyway, it's Ep2, about 23 minutes into the ep.
It comes straight after the talk about basic componenets.

See what you think anyway

 

[bacteria]

Thanks, but I couldn't see a topic on soldering - which one is it please? <_<

Ah, it's not as good as I thought... Anyway, it's Ep2, about 23 minutes into the ep.
It comes straight after the talk about basic componenets.

See what you think anyway

It was a little painful to watch, and was rather out of sync. Don't you love American speaking - in the UK we call it "soldering", they pronounce it "soddering"

The tutorial was basic, I can do what he shows; the problem I have with the soldering for this project is not soldering to an existing solder joint, but onto a button contact (which has no solder, and is very small - you don't want to make a mistake here).

I think on reflection, I may have to resort to hot glue after all - I will probably connect 2 wires to each contact pair so that if one joint is not perfect, the other one will work fine (redundancy). I will hot glue the wires directly to the board and further hot glue the cables to "safe" places on the board to ensure there is no movement. Hot gluing may not be as good as soldering, but it is accurate, and as long as the wires cannot move, the connections should stay in place. If the wire is covered on all sides by hot glue, air cannot get onto the wires to corrode them either, so the contact should stay conductive. Does this sound logical and plausible??


Small update:

I covered the front of the case (top) with polyfiller and left it overnight to dry and set. The next morning, I flexed the case plastic about a bit - nothing cracked or broke off (success). I gave it an initial sanding to make it smooth and flat, but needs more sanding to finish it (I will post pics in due course). I had a quandry - if I waited and put in the holes I needed for the controls into the case and then polyfillered it, the case would not be finished to a smooth quality. Downside of doing it early (as I did) is that now I have to cut through plastic and polyfiller, nicely, and without the benefit of a clear plastic case to see through to make it easy to position everything easier. Either way, different issues - so I went for the option whereby I should have a nicer finished surface in the end. I hope I made the right choice, otherwise I will need to start the case again. No point posting a pic until I think I am on the right track - will have a play tomorrow. Hopefully this will work out ok.

I intend to get the top casing completed, with the joystick, D-pad and button holes made (everything in place), then paint the case, before fitting and sealing in the components. Once done, I can post a pic. Bottom of case will not need polyfiller work done, just sanding and painting; it is the underside after all.

 

[bacteria]

Being a little careless with a powerdrill, some of the polyfiller came off the casing, so I ended up having to remove all of it. This made it easier then to make the rest of the holes in the front of the casing for the joystick, D-pad and buttons. I then covered the case with a crack-filler gunge, which set fine but wasn't happy to be sandpapered as it turned out. I painted it anyway, but decided that the finish wasn't too bad but wasn't good enough, and the D-pad area was a bit too raised on the case which I didn't like much; so I have just added a layer of polyfiller onto the case to get rid of any bumps and make the case nice and smooth and uniform, and have given it an initial sanding. The finish looks far better now, I just need to let it dry and give it a quick second sanding.

Tomorrow, I intend to give the case a paint (again!), and attach all the controls onto the case. Once the paint dries (I will apply 2 or 3 layers) I can take some pics and post them here. I then need to get the wires connected, and also work out how to mount the battery compartments and make them easily accessable from the rear; mount the speakers, and cut a groove into the top of the case, for insertion/removal of the SD card and headphone jack. Then I can cut out and prepare the back case.

There is a lot of work left to do, but I have the next two days off, of which I intend to spend a few hours more on this project. I like projects like this!

 

[bacteria]

Update (small):

Ok, case painted with 2 coats so far, looks quite nice. Needs quick sanding and another coat yet. More on that later.

I experimented with soldering wires to an old board I had, placing a drop of solder onto each button contact, soldering a wire to it, and testing. This worked fine, all be it that the solder joint was not strong enough, but that could have been strengthened by hot-glue too. I then tried this on the GP2x motherboard, but the solder refused to stick to the board. I tried a few times, no luck. It has a similar adhesion to toothpaste!

I then decided I had no option (as solder is an issue) of using hot glue. I could have bought some solder tracer, but there is no guarantee that it would work, and it costs £19.99 from Maplin (far too expensive for a mod).

Problem with using hot glue is that you only have a very, very tiny contact area between a wire and the motherboard - literally a tip. This means that it is a fine line between making a contact and not making contact. Once you make contact, you then need to smother the area with more hot glue to stop the wire moving. Quite touch and go, and takes a lot of time to get it right.

Other problem with doing this method is that you need to have the GP2x on, in T-mode, so you know if a wire is connected correctly while you are gluing the area. Basically, you have an external battery pack connected to the GP2x, with everything laid exposed on the board. You have to be careful not to damage the LCD screen cable, and there is a risk of damaging the GP2x (as power is on) while your fingers move around the motherboard manouvering the wires to connect to the buttons. This is not ideal; and if my GP2x stops working (short-circuit?) and dies, this project will terminate and all the work I have done so far on this project will cease.

So far, I have got one button connected to two wires successfully on the GP2x, lots of hot-glue - but fine; seven more to go - seven more chances to blow the motherboard! Time for sod's law now, now I have said this, I am sure it will go tits up and my GP2x will blow! <_< ... here goes...

 

[Vimacs]

Just buy a flux pen for the soldering, costs like 3$ and works wonders
And scratch the contacts a bit with a knife, very lightly you dont want to cut the trace.

 

[bacteria]

Just buy a flux pen for the soldering, costs like 3$ and works wonders
And scratch the contacts a bit with a knife, very lightly you dont want to cut the trace.

Costs considerably more than this at Maplins (looked at this too), cheaper than solder tracer though.

Anyway, getting success with hot glue solution, so will carry on with this - if it fails, I will take your advice Vimacs.

Update:

This is a pic of my poor GP2x at the moment, naked, exposed! Pic shows separate battery pack (hot glued and wrapped around GP2x contacts), IDE cables (separated into single strands) hot-glued to each button contact. The wires (2 per button) have been wrapped around each other at the other ends, so I know contact on the buttons is maintained (separate the wires and of course contact is broken).

So far I have connected 3 buttons working. I have wrapped a piece of paper tape around the other ends of the wires and marked it to way what the wires connect to (for my reference!).

If found the GP2x didn't boot this morning (ouch!), thought it bricked, but it turned out that I was trying to boot it and the LCD connectors must have been touching something on the motherboard - I separated this with a piece of paper (as in pic) and all was well again (phew!).

 

[saboteur]

This is better than watching LOST.....

Will bacteria short his board , will the batteries last, who knows why women park cars that way, find out in the next episode of 'DR BACTERIAS GP2X EXPERIMENTS'.

 

[plounted]

will he find his imaginary gp2x that is someone he met in the mental clinic while recuperating from an eating disorder brought on by his haunting past?
will he sacrifice his gp2x to free his son from the others and then leave it to die on the island with the rest of them and then decid e not to press the button and accidentally make some big flash of light that could wipe out all gp2xs as we know them!??!