Bacteria project: N64³: --abandoned--

[palmertech]

Which is why I keep saying to use tin short bits of wire right from the trace edges.

[Skyone]

Seriously. Behemoth wires like the ones you are using have a higher latency.

[bacteria]

I have been told before not to expect success on my unusual projects, like powering a system via game cart traces (my Multi Platform system), or a car adapter in my first N64 (Nintendo 64 Advance); I tend to try things out anyway!

palmertech - sure, but trying to tin the thin traces on the N64 board is far from straightforward; there are some traces I will have to do it however.

Triton - I am keeping away from the main two chips and the two RAM chips and the expansion slot themselves. Tampering here would certainly fail I am sure. I am however going to have to extend the wires to the DEC-NUS chip a bit (the NTSC version has a smaller VDC-NUS chip instead, (and a ENC-NUS chip that the PAL doesn't have) and to the PIF chip, however, as most of these traces lead to the game cart pins, they should respond fine to relocation.

Working with one trace at a time, and testing the system each time, gives the advantage that if something fails, I can try thicker wires, shorter wires, different wires, etc until I hopefully find a combination that works. If however I find traces that are intolerant to different frequencies or timings and the system fails, then so be it - at least I gave it my best shot!

There is one thing I would like advice on please - a few traces lead to small blobs of solder marked as jumpers. They don't seem to connect to anything, yet have traces connecting to them.. Are these jumpers relevant / what do they do? Are they likely to dislike being extended? Would soldering a wire to the blob cause problems (ie is it dependent on a certain mass of solder there)? Comments welcome!

[ShockSlayer]

Yes, one wire at a time sounds like you would easily be able to get past the aforementioned problems. And, you also gotta remember, this is like, 1996 technology. As in THIRTEEN years ago. So trace size in relevance to timing/clock speed/resistance/whatever was robably not even considered by the devbelopers themselves.

There is one thing I would like advice on please - a few traces lead to small blobs of solder marked as jumpers. They don't seem to connect to anything, yet have traces connecting to them.. Are these jumpers relevant / what do they do? Are they likely to dislike being extended? Would soldering a wire to the blob cause problems (ie is it dependent on a certain mass of solder there)?

I don't think soldering to them would hurt; I've done it before.

SS

[Mario]

Bacteria: It'll be fine. Those pads are there because of the different revisions. Earlier revisions may have had more components, but they found ways to cut costs with later boards. There used to be components there, but they took them out and didn't change the board design.

In short, yes, you may solder there with no problems.

[bacteria]

Thanks. It's almost like it doesn't lead anywhere, so the trace in question may be redundant. Whilst the other blob also doesn't connect to the first one, the hole through in the white circle goes to a pin on the other side of the board to a small chip. As you say Mario, perhaps they had something there before, like a capacitor or whatever, but decided it wasn't needed and removed it. One way to find out I guess.

If you are right, SS, then my relocation should end up working fine. Let's hope.

I just tried to do too much on my first attempt; after all, I only needed to miss a ground somewhere which was disconnected, or whatever, and the board would have failed. This approach now is very methodical. I am also not trying to connect a trace to the other side of the board to its final destination, now I am connecting a trace to the same part of the board; by definition then, it will either be a case of soldering to a through hole or the component it runs to; or a branch (I will have to solder to that place instead in that scenario).

What I have done so far proves soldering to through holes is fine. I use my dremel to grind down a corner of a through hole, then add flux, and solder to fill the hole, then solder a wire to it - works.

[bacteria]

Ok, I think I can state accurately that those jumper blobs are there for a purpose and not down to different revisions, etc. I used short wires for both of these two connections (in previous pic) - video is distorted to a point of having many horizontal lines but nothing showing, and the audio sounds like the system has been overclocked to double speed. This means, as Triton stated, the board must be extremely sensitive to change. Even using 1/4" long wires didn't help to make the system work. One factor I had been wary of was the grounding middle to two strips to the right of the memory chips, which indicated the board might be rather sensitive - if sensitive here after all, probably in many other places on the board too.

There are several of these "jumpers" over the board, especially at the back; many connect to grounding, so if they are sensitive to this variation too on the board itself, the project is screwed to fail.

I only have two N64's left that work now at home; one is unmodded, and one is from my old Multi system. I will use that one in my N64 in my case, and keep the unmodded one as is. If/when I buy another N64 cheaply at a car boot sale I will revisit this project again (one I can afford to destroy). It might be if I can bypass the jumpers, although by the looks of it that might not be enough to make this board work. Rats.

Hey, gave it my best shot. Nothing wrong with my wiring, that I proved; however the N64 board clearly doesn't want to be messed with to the extent I tried!

When I get another cheap N64 (like £3-£5 as I was buying last year) I will have another, final go. Might be if I cut the board in a wavy line to bypass awkward chunks I can get better results; or it may be I am wasting my time whatever I do on this board reduction (hence I will get a cheap board).

[XCVG]

Wow, you failed twice and yet are still trying. You must have either more guts or more money than me. Or both.

[eurddrue]

definitely both

At least your still trying bateria I tried to do this last night and only got a black screen that occasionally tried to load n64 #3 toasted

[bacteria]

Money isn't an issue, within reason. I want ideally to buy two more N64's cheaply and have a try with those - doesn't matter if they die if they are cheap.

[bacteria]

Ok, got back from two car boot sales today; bought all in the pic apart from one of the N64's for £3 and the second N64 for £2. That means I got the lot for £5 (about $7). Missed out on a third one at a similar price as someone beat me to it, however, I wanted two more N64's and now I have them.



BTW - one of these N64's has a jumper pack, the other one an expansion pack! I can sell that on e-bay and get my money back on all the above!

Tomorrow I will have another go at this board reduction, however, I will have to choose a path now that bypasses jumper areas on the board which will mean a fairly haphazard line. Obviously, any interference with the jumper blobs will spell disaster.

Only other option is to wire between the main two chips themselves (ie the CPU), which would mean about 200 solder joints which would be a nightmare!

Changed title again of this thread to 3rd attempt

[ShockSlayer]

Well, it looks like, to an extent, that you might not be able to accomplish this. Just remember, just because you can't do it that way(assuming this fails) doesn't mean you can make the n64 cubed. You could always try sifuf's way, w/ the cart slot, AV, and power directly to the board.

SS

[XCVG]

Wow, there's no deals like that where I live.

[eurddrue]

soo many official nintendo controllers I want I want I want
Good luck on your third try

[bacteria]

I have spare N64 controllers if anyone wants them; for a small fee and postage of course! I still have a package ready for Silver; he hasn't sent me his money yet and seems to have gone/doing other things as he hasn't read my last PM either. Never mind.

ShockSlayer - I have two train of thoughts now - 1) see if I can find a route which doesn't get in the path of any of the jumper parts; no matter if that means a wavy cutline or not; or 2) cut the board to the right of the CPU itself; drastic yes, nightmare wiring yes (about 200 connections), however the traces are quite long on the board anyway, but unbroken and no jumpers in the way (so no timing issues, unless the length of the wires affect the CPU handing the data, in which case i'm still screwed; also, wiring to 200 or so tiny pins will be a test of endurance and patience! Might have to use IDE cable. This is of course assuming that both of the N64's I bought work fine at the moment (unmodded) - not tested them out yet.

Just to state my intentions: my 3rd attempt will be a similar route to before but bypass any jumpers or similar - if there is no such path, the CPU route - if fails, that is it; if not, that will be 4th and final attempt. I will have to admit defeat by then! I might give up after the 3rd attempt - no sense banging my head against a wall; the N64 board is very sensitive to change so what I am trying isn't probably possible anyway. At least what I have learned helped me reduce the TurboGrafx board down, and will also help me cutting the Amstrad GX4000 board down too.

No, Sifuf removed and rewired the cart slot, pins to the controller ports and all surplus grounding. The best part of his work was the PSone mobo reduction, that was awesome! To me, my initial topic title summed it up - "smallest N64 system or bust" - if I can't make the smallest, I won't make "smallest as" as this has no point to me, and I will instead be very happy to make a portable N64 in my casing (which I am going to do anyway, as planned), which BTW needs barely any trimming to at all to fit - hardest part of project will be getting as many cells in there as I can get away with for the most amperage.