CTFan's Genesis Portable Worklog

[CronoTriggerfan]

Hey all! I'm gearing up to make a Genesis portable; I've got all the supplies, and my aim with this case design is to have it exactly as big as the Genesis 3 motherboard itself, and I think I may have it, and the case work will commence, if not today, early tomorrow morning (as in late tonight ). However, before I start the wiring process, I want to make sure 100% that I don't cook anything, as I don't have the time or funds to replace it at this point.

Could anyone please look over this diagram I drew up and tell me if you see anything wrong with it?

I was worried about the ground lines, so I did some possibly excessive grounding in some places, tell me if this could cause any trouble. Thanks in advance, and look for progress soon!

CTFan

[Kurt_]

Enough Grounds! I'm not sure with this system and screen, but one ground link should be enough, and should be considerably less soldering/mess.

Just make sure you're soldering to the right spots.

Also I would tend to connect the different grounds closer to the battery, in case any current flow in one ground would mess up the signal from another. I doubt anything would happen, but you never know, right?

Your diagrams fine. Was it even necessary? I mean, you hook video up to video, audio to audio, power to power, and ground to ground...

[CronoTriggerfan]

Meh, I guess I just like to make sure things are right before I fry them.

And now for a day's worth of work! Sorry on some of the pics, I forgot to set it to macro mode so they look like utter crap.











It's gonna be a VERY tight squeeze, as you can see, but I'm pretty sure I can do it. It's really quite tiny, I'll have a size comparison with some other gaming devices when I'm done.

I'll be having some warts burned off my feet tomorrow, so I'll be spending my time sitting down getting this thing bondo'd up. Wish me luck!

CTFan

[DeathJr89]

heh, its looks good. its actually pretty much the same thing i had planned for my genesis portable, but i have a portable TV, so i had to abandon that plan because its so big :/. but yeah, lookin good man, cant wait to see it finished.

[CronoTriggerfan]

heh, its looks good. its actually pretty much the same thing i had planned for my genesis portable, but i have a portable TV, so i had to abandon that plan because its so big :/. but yeah, lookin good man, cant wait to see it finished.

Well, it's good to see someone else had the same idea as me! The first thing my friends said when they saw the design was, "Why the hell are the controls so far up?" First is, of course, for space; though I could have made the screen higher and simply put the controls down low, however, the way the Genesis 3 case curves, it's actually very ergonomic and matches the natural contour of your hand. I've been sanding, gluing, and bondoing for the past few days, and I'll post the finished case tonight! I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

CTFan

[CronoTriggerfan]

Okay, pics as promised!


(The hole drilled in the right-hand corner is the headphone jack)


Inside of the case

And two layers of primer later...


A close-up of the bondo job:


I'm proud of how it turned out. There's no glaring imperfections, and everything is integrated very seemlessly, what with the bondo and all. Here's to hoping I can get the electronics crammed in there! *raises glass*

PS: Man, the Genesis forum really IS dead! C'mon people, the Nomad wasn't THAT good!

CTFan

[DeathJr89]

wow, that IS really nice. i love the design, and i hope you can cram everything in there. it would be amazing. mine is gonna be much bigger sadly, but here's to you and yours man! ::raises glass as well::

[toby dawg]

Yeah man thats a sweet case. Real small. My genesis portable is way bigger.

[Turbo Tax 1.0]

lookin good. its nice to see another genesis portable in the works

[CronoTriggerfan]

Thanks for all the kind words, guys!

I wired up most of the custom controller board last night, and I'm going to try to get most of the wiring out of the way today; though I can't finish this thing until at least Thursday, however; it's running off of 6AA batteries, and it seems RadioShack no longer carries the coverless 2 AA battery pack holders anymore. I ended up going the DigiKey route and shipping via 2nd Day Air, hopefully they get here on time so I can install the custom battery pack!

And just a few notes about the project; the unit will run off of 6 AA cells (7.2v) with a capacity of 2650mAh. The 6 button section actually isn't from a Genesis controller at all, but instead from a Famiclone controller that was modeled after the 6-button Genesis pad. The plastic was surprisingly sturdy, so I used it due to its small size. The nifty start button came from that same controller. The d-pad section is actually off of one of my two GameBoy colors. It's small, comfy, and I had to keep SOMETHING Nintendo-related on there, what with all that Sega crap!

More updates soon, stay tuned! And thanks for looking!

CTFan

[CronoTriggerfan]

Damn, ran into a brick wall. The freaking screen is being all finnicky because of that orange ribbon cable. Anyone care to help?

EDIT: Screw it. While dinking around with this damn cable, the Genesis fell, and now it doesn't work. Right now, I have neither the funds nor the patience to deal with this BS, so consider this project dead for a month or so.

CTFan

[PeglegJimmy]

Oh well, good luck whenever you buy a new genesis.

[Gump-in-space]

You've done more in 4 days to your genesis then I've done since my first post last year. I'm sad now. That thing is beutiful! Whenever you can, I'd like to see it finished.

[THON]

I think you're going to have problems fitting the controller, screen, and Genesis II into that tiny case...

[CronoTriggerfan]

I think you're going to have problems fitting the controller, screen, and Genesis II into that tiny case...

I'm using a Genesis 3...

And actually, it does all fit quite nicely. I made a custom controller board with the Genesis IC and tact switches, really small if you ask me.

CTFan