Interesting 'Gift' from eBay

[Chapel]

After lurking on these forums for a bit, I got hankering to start playing those old Atari games that we all know and love. So, I purchased an Atari 2600 on eBay (actually I ended up winning two because of a Second Chance offer, but that is neither here nor there). Well, one of them shipped with 2 controllers. I plugged it in and have played a bit here and there until the shakes went down for several weeks. Now, I finally got around to realizing that one of the controllers has a different plug. It reminded me suspiciously of an A/V cable so I plugged it into the back of my TV. Low and behold, it is one of these:

http://www.amazon.com/Jakks-Atari-Class ... B0000645DD

Now, I was originally going to attempt to make one of the Atari systems into a portable. Would this be an infinitely better first project provided I just wanted to play the included 10 games or would it be so easy that it would provide no real insight to how to make a 'real' portable?

I have a decent bit of experience with electronics (built my own computer, fixed countless PS2 + 1 xBox 360), and a below average ability to solder.

Thanks for the input.

[bicostp]

If all you really want is the 10 built in games, make the dedicated TV games unit portable. However, I suggest going with real hardware because it's more authentic and you have the opportunity to play cartridges (which the dedicated unit cannot do).

Make a composite circuit on a piece of Rat Shack PC board, and either snake a composite/audio cable out the original RF cable hole or mount the AV jacks in the bottom of the case, something like this:



It's far easier than dealing with the RF switch, and gives a cleaner picture.