Bacteria's project: "Project Unity"

[bacteria]

Wasted some HOURS trying to work out why the triangle shaped 1.5mm thick piece of solid metal stuck onto the three chips on the Intellivision with heat conductive epoxy glue worked better than various things I tried:

Used a sheet of steel, 1mm thick, from the grounding strip on the N64 console - wasn't easy to get the arctic silver paste to get a match between that and the chips, so after about 4 mins the Intellivision cut out.

Used heatsinks in various combinations using the thermal paste gunk you get in DreamCast and N64 consoles (others use it too probably), far easier to make contact between the chip and the heatsinks as the "gunk" is foamy - after a few minutes the console again tripped out. (?)

Used large metal plate, and thicker heatsinks, same result. This is nuts - there is no way bits of metal are better than proper heatsinks. Applied a fan nearby, same result. Getting a pattern here....

Tried tying sheathed wires around the chips to secure the heatsinks in place to ensure good contact - same result. Definately a pattern here; system tripping out.

Remembered something in the back of my mind from something I read about ages ago, and have vague memory about from 30 years ago - "sleep mode" :facepalm: - after a few minutes the screen goes off...sleep mode...press any button on your controller and the video is back up again....

So, after all that messing about and a few wasted hours, I can report that after trying various methods, all of which it turns out would have worked fine as the chips get hot but with metal plate on top or heatsinks only get warm to touch only, I have now put on a 1mm plate of copper onto the thermal paste gunk to connect to the chips - works fine, not very warm at all, no issue being in a portable without a fan, let alone my Alpha Omega system.

The beauty of using the copper plate (could have used the steel, although copper is better as conducting heat away from a source) is that I have a nice flat piece of metal with no further cutting needed. The metal, as quite thin (1mm thick) lays low on the casing so the system is as flat as it can be. I need now to do the following work on this console:

* Secure the copper plate to the board so it doesn't move off

* Relocate components that are taller than the chips with the plate on top - ie a handful of capacitors, if that - or bend them back and elongate their contacts a bit with a tiny anount of extra wiring to one side per capacitor so it lays flat enough against the board

* Remake the composite mod I received (will review that later) with components i've bought, so the composite circuit lays flat on the console board in the space where the old RF box used to be

* Arrange the system on the foam mounting board with the SMS and NES on the other side of the board.

* Relocate the daughter board that generates the video signal before it goes to output - shown in pic below, to the top right of the pic:

[jeffro11]

Looks good! Good on ya for using copper!

[bacteria]

Credit to this site *Beeslife* for providing the guide for the composite video mod for an Intellivision console. I've had various email discussions with Oliver Puschatzki who does the commercial version of the mod, which he got his friends Joe Zbiciak and Tim Linder, who is knowledgeable on electronics, to assist him originally in the schematics for the video mod.

Tim Linder has a Wiki page which shows the schematics so others can replicate the work, the wiki is *here* . I tried to replicate the mod a while back and failed, now I have a little more experience, did it and made it work fine.

Basically, from what I understand, the video mod brings the amplification of the video signal right down to a range that's compatible with a normal television.

All you do with the commercial mod is to connect 5v, ground and the video in and audio in to the boards, simple. The item is small, and as you see in the pic, is small and very compact.



The item costs about £40 to buy if you want to (look on his website for details).

The image quality you get is similar to the RF quality, which frankly is fine, the little shadows you get on the characters were how it used to be in the old days, so very "retro" for memories!

If you have a French Intellivision, you can get RGB or composite out as standard, however these units are rare and very expensive - you can buy a normal Intellivision console for about £20-£25 normally, plus this mod £40, so about £60-£65 all in (or about £22-£27 if you make your own mod from the diagram and have the parts); the French console costs well over £100 if you can even find one.

On a personal note, i'd recommend this mod, "it does what it says on the box".

The diagram on the Wiki is this:



I found another diagram on the net for a different composite mod for the console but it doesn't seem to correlate to the board!

So, I have an "official" video mod, and have also got my own one working, as well. Didn't use a PCB to save some money, you don't need a PCB for your own use for this mod really. When wired up, stuck the capacitors onto cardboard to keep the whole thing in place. Doesn't look tidy, but is flat, the whole assembly is lower than the height of the chips nearby, which is the other reason for not using a PCB for my project - I wanted it flat.



The silver pot on the right of the pic above adjusts the brightness/contrast, BTW. You may also notice I have removed the old RF box - it isn't needed, and I don't want any RF boxes in my project as don't want to incorporate shielding on the console boards i'm using on my projects to reduce radio waves. The video/audio mod doesn't need the old RF box, so you can keep or remove yours if you like.

Here is my project so far, working as you see on an old 14" television, seen running off one battery source. The separate video daughter board will be located against the motherboard and the controller board i've made will fill in the gaps; all the spaghetti of wiring will be removed and left with clean wiring - that's the next jobs.



I promised Oliver i'd do a review of his mod, as this is (I am a man of my word). This mod he sells and the schematics gets my approval and i'd recommend it to others; you can make your own version for about £2, or buy a commercial one; up to you. The commercial one is ideal if you aren't good at soldering as there are only 4 solder points you need to do with the commercial mod.

[bacteria]

BTW - if you get "ladders" on the composite with this mod, cut the video wire you connect for video in on the RF box from going into the RF, it improves the quality of video.

[bacteria]

Finished relocating the video processor board, relocated the controller matrix to the board, hot glued the boards onto the reverse side of the existing board (with a NES and SMS console in place on the reverse side), tidied and labeled the wiring. Tested, works great! The Intellivision system has taken a lot of work to get to this completed stage. I'll be making a video on the Intellivision over the next few days and posting it; few more things to do yet.

FYI - I have in effect, used one sheet of 6mm thick plastic sandwiched foam between the mounted consoles, between the NES, SMS and Intellivision consoles, the whole thickness, including the foam plate, is about 34mm thick only, that's pretty good!

Next system i'll do will be Amstrad GX4000, then probably MegaDrive; then ColecoVision, etc.

[bacteria]

Done the Intellivision video and uploaded it onto my website. Normally i'd link the YouTube video here, however on this occasion i'll direct you to my webpage as it has the video, diagrams, and a few links that are relevant and of interest to Intellivision users.

http://moddedbybacteria.wordpress.com/m ... elivision/

[bacteria]

This is what I have worked out so far with a DVD ROM computer drive. As the tray closes, it raises the platform underneath for the disc spindle to insert to the DVD, and in pressing upwards the disc is pressed in place by a small casing which presses onto the other holder, thus securing the DVD in place. Quite clever, and mechanical too. The tray opens and closes by one motor which runs happily on 5v. The positive and negative terminals swap depending on if the tray is closing or opening.

Not a great gif file but shows the point:



The holder is metal and can be cut to size, to fit the console CD drive unit. This means, if successful, the CD drive will pop out a tray and load the disc internally in the system - neat! I was going to do the Amstrad GX4000 next, however as I have a desire to continue this CD pop-out drive now, so i'll probably do a CD based system instead....so think i'll do GameCube next therefore - my system will have six CD based consoles, GameCube, PS2, Amiga CD32, Sega Saturn, DreamCast and Xbox. I've had several requests to do GameCube, so what the heck! I'll try and work everything out for myself rather than guides around if I can, that way I might even discover new tips or way to do things. I'll make everything flat as much as I can of course and be looking at having quite long wires to feed into the system, and take my time with the project, after all, in no rush and enjoying what i'm doing...

[The Apprentice]

Dude, you are an inspiration. I'm also Gump-in-Space from the Benheck forums, and I've been watching your skills pretty much since you first showed up doing things like this. Just letting you know that I just started an NES portable day before last and have already desoldered a game genie cartridge slot for it. Just now, seeing what you did with relocating just about everything you've given me inspiration to get back to work on my project.

Just thought you'd like to hear that.

[bacteria]

Thanks for that update, hopefully you'll update your work onto my forum too?

[Hardie]

Iv've been following your work every day and I just thought I had to say something. You`re really, really good!. I`m also wondering if you gonna do the "Longhorn Egineer" sega neptune mod when you`re beginning with the megadrive (http://www.longhornengineer.com/Projects/Neptune)

Have a really nice day and keep up the good work

Greetings from Norway