GB player for NES? Is it possible?

[toredauei]

so with the knowledge that it is in fact possible, would it be possible to squeaze all of that into a NES cart with todays technology?

[Limewater]

so with the knowledge that it is in fact possible, would it be possible to squeaze all of that into a NES cart with todays technology?

Yes.

[toredauei]

Ok so now that question is: where would I go to have one developed and would it be a costly endeavor?

[Limewater]

Ok so now that question is: where would I go to have one developed and would it be a costly endeavor?

You would either have to find a very talented hobbyist or hire an Engineering firm that does embedded systems work. If you have to hire an engineer, you're probably looking at something on the order of $10,000-$20,000. If you are lucky and get a hobbyist to volunteer his time if you pay for parts, you might be able to do it for under $300, assuming you can find a cheap source to get a custom PCB made. You might have some major difficulties getting it all to fit inside a cartif you go this route, though. I answered "yes" under the assumption that you could get a chip fabricated, but that really is cost-prohibitive unless you are exceedingly wealthy. If someone has already designed a gameboy-on-a-chip, then that makes a whole lot easier.

[toredauei]

$10,000-$20,000.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

$10,000-$20,000.

Yup, back when I was going to try to make Sega CD Model 1 drive gear repair kits I was told that it would cost me about $5,000 to make the molds for the gears, but after that it would only cost me between 5-15 cents per gear. It's incredible how much they can charge for this freaking stuff, so unless I get investor lined up there's no way I'm going to try doing that again.

[Limewater]

Yup, back when I was going to try to make Sega CD Model 1 drive gear repair kits I was told that it would cost me about $5,000 to make the molds for the gears, but after that it would only cost me between 5-15 cents per gear. It's incredible how much they can charge for this freaking stuff, so unless I get investor lined up there's no way I'm going to try doing that again.

Yeah. Making ONE of something is crazy expensive. They don't just charge this much because they can- it costs a lot for them to build one of something as well. If you can mass-produce it, things get a lot cheaper because the non-recoverable engineering costs are amortized over each unit.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Yup, back when I was going to try to make Sega CD Model 1 drive gear repair kits I was told that it would cost me about $5,000 to make the molds for the gears, but after that it would only cost me between 5-15 cents per gear. It's incredible how much they can charge for this freaking stuff, so unless I get investor lined up there's no way I'm going to try doing that again.

Yeah. Making ONE of something is crazy expensive. They don't just charge this much because they can- it costs a lot for them to build one of something as well. If you can mass-produce it, things get a lot cheaper because the non-recoverable engineering costs are amortized over each unit.

Well I meant that it would have cost me $5.000 for just the molds regardless of how many gears I made, plus I'm not just going to make a million of them and let them all sit there wasting away.

[emwearz]

what would have been the point? that thing would cost more than a gameboy to make.

It is how the original Super Gameboy was made.

[Limewater]

Well I meant that it would have cost me $5.000 for just the molds regardless of how many gears I made, plus I'm not just going to make a million of them and let them all sit there wasting away.

Yeah, I understood you. I was just expanding your example to talk about why it costs so much to make something simple, when you can buy similar things so cheaply.

In your example, just the non-recoverable engineering costs of getting the molds made runs about $5,000. Since the gears themselves are cheap, making one set costs about $5,000. If you make two sets, they're about $2500 each. If you made a thousand, they would be a little over five bucks each, and so on.

Similarly, with the gameboy-to-NES adaptor, building the first one would be crazy expensive. The more you build, however, the cheaper they are per unit.

But, of course, neither of these things would likely be mass-produced.