A little something.

[Nimphious]

This could be fun...



The CPU is upside down, which means all the pins have to be bent backwards. The pitch of the CPU's pins is more coarse than that of the RCP, so I chose that since it would be easier to bend without too much trouble.

Would be possible to make it smaller still with a 3 or 4 layer board, but that would be more expensive. Two layer boards are also easier to make with home equipment.

That being said, depending on the power quality, and how much noise the processors throw onto the data lines, having a third layer just for ground to eliminate as much noise as possible might be necessary. All depends on how much trouble eliminating a lot of noise management is going to be in favor of cleaner power.

So which DACs are the best for portables anyway? Which one would be best for a redesign? The latest revision of the US NTSC board's PIF/DAC look like a good way to go from what I've seen. Any suggestions?

[hidiosoman]

Woah! This is awesome!

Making custom PCBs is the next level of portabilizing!

[bassmasta]

Kibble's already been working on this, maybe you could share some ideas?

http://forums.benheck.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=32430" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://forums.benheck.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=41240" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[stuntpenguin007]

Nice work! I know a few people have been working on this, but it's never been completed. I think Kibble, timmeh87, and Marshallh have all worked on this if you ever want to PM them for help.

Kibble's thread: http://forums.benheck.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=41240" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I started working on this once too, but haven't gotten nearly as far as the others. Timmeh posted his work in this thread: http://forums.benheck.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=38916" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Nimphious]

Yeah I've been watching their progress for a while now, and I like what kibble's doing, but I think it can still be even smaller. His design is nice, and everything is on the one board, but the size difference is just not big enough to make the whole redesign worth the trouble.

Fortunately because of all the different mods put onto the board itself, kibble's board will allow for much thinner portables since there will be a lot less wiring all over the place. Moving the cart slot is as simple as wiring it to a ribbon cable and slamming it into the board.

As for marshallh, his emulator is going to be really nice, and combined with such a small board could potentially make a portable a whole lot smaller. Depending on how he handles the finished product, the options could be to support plugging it straight into the board, or even embedding it directly onto it to keep parts count and adapter overhead to a minimum.

This is just the first time I've tried laying it out this way, so I'm not even sure how well it will work. Depending on how much noise there is coming out of the CPU, the memory might have problems being on the opposite side of the board like that. I might have to make it a 4 layer board because of that. The advantage of a 4 layer board however is I could shrink everything down even further.

We'll see how it goes for now.

[bassmasta]

Good Luck.

IIRC, you can replace the two 4MB chips with one 8MB chip, as long as you leave the pullup resistors. Then you'll have expansion pack functionality with less space.

[kibble]

Good Luck.

IIRC, you can replace the two 4MB chips with one 8MB chip, as long as you leave the pullup resistors. Then you'll have expansion pack functionality with less space.

Where are these 8MB chips you speak of? Normally the 64's have two 2MB chips or one 4MB chip built in and you add the other 4MB through the expansion pak.

Nimphious, what software are you using? Also, I would definitely add a ground layer in between for a design like that. Not just for noise from the chips, but also to protect from external sources.

[bassmasta]

I don't know; I've only heard that it could be done.

I know you can replace the 2 x 2MB chips with 4MB chips, but I don't think I've actually heard of someone using a single 8MB chip...

[Reubensupernerd]

Did anyone ever figure out whether those lower latency ram modules with the same pinout as the N64 ones were compatible? I vaguely recall a discussion of this during my time lurking (prior to joining this forum).