GameBoy Advance Mod

[Vort]

Hey there everyone,

About a month ago, I received a GBA from a co-worker at the movie theater where I used to work. I got it in pretty much mint condition with a pretty big scratch on the lens and a replaced battery cover (slightly wrong color). He gave it to me because he knew I was into modding, and it was sitting in his closet not getting any use.

I owned a GBA SP when I was younger and never owned this form of GBA. So, I basically made up for that by playing hours onto it. Muahah. Anyway, time to mod. I picked up a 15W soldering iron (I also have a more powerful one, not sure how powerful it is.), I'm picking up some 24 gauge wire tomorrow, I've ordered 50 Blue LEDs off eBay and 20 8MHz Crystal Oscillators. (For overclocking)

So the plan here is to LED mod it (hoping to use as many of the LEDs as I can fit) Of course I'll have a switch to turn them off. I'll also overclock it (again with a switch to turn it off). I'll also replace the lens and batter cover.

I pretty much know how to wire everything. If someone could just re-assure me it'd be greatly appreciated.
So the wiring for the overclock would just be in series with the original 4.194MHz oscillator, the switch and the 8MHz one. And the LEDs are simply wired in parallel from the BT (battery terminal) points.
Also, would 3mm LEDs work?

Thanks,

-Vort

[kylechu]

Can't backlight the GBA's screen, you have to frontlight it, which you need the piece out of the sp to do anyway, so there's really no reason to.

[Vort]

I didn't mean backlight, I meant I wanted to illuminate it completely. xD

[hailrazer]

The only way to illuminate it completely is , as mentioned, to use the frontlight out of a GBA Sp.

You can not illuminate the screen with LEDs only. You need a way of distributing the light across the screen. This is done with a piece of plastic with precisely cut angled grooves in it. And since we can't make this we have to use the one in the older GBA Sp's.

[snowpenguin]

The LEDs are blue. I believe he's just going to stick them in the casing to light up the whole GBA.

[hailrazer]

Maybe just maybe one day Miss Jenkins "Reading for Comprehension" course will sink in for me.

[Vort]

The LEDs are blue. I believe he's just going to stick them in the casing to light up the whole GBA.

Yeah, XD

I'm not attempting to do any screen mod whatsoever.

[schmellyfart]

Here is an excellent overclocking guide if you havent seen it yet. http://forums.benheck.com/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=25718

[Vort]

Yeah thanks, that's the one that I learned from.

[Vort]

Oh and can anyone recommend a GBA flash cart? I'm not going to be using it to run ROMs or anything, just a few movies (purchased legally through iTunes).

[chainfire95]

Ez flash IV- just got it, its awesome.

[Vort]

Thanks!

[Vort]

Hey everyone, I thought I'd show a small update, the parts came in and I started working on it (barely) in this pic I have 4 LEDs wired up, because I only got one side of the back done.

Anyway, here it is.