The rgb / s-video / stereo sound famicom

[fastbilly1]

If it makes you guys feel better most of my rgb ppus came from playchoices that were basically trashed (missing parts and probably would have shorted if I fired them up). I call what I do "repurposing". I had to fix up some of my ppus too they came with bent pins, dents on the top, dead spiders underneath, surprisingly they all worked.

The couple I sold in the past were that way aswell. Before this was popular, I could go to an auction and buy a dead or loose PCB for a Playchoice or Vs for around $20. Now they go for $200ish.

Sorry to take your topic offtopic Drakon, your work is amazing.

[Drakon]

Ah, well hopefully you held onto the boards themselves and everything. If there's ever a reliable and cheap way down the line to rgb mod an NES without needed that PPU, might be an interesting project to fix up those playchoice-10s.

I did hold onto all of them but some of them are in terrible shape. There's really nothing special about the playchoice pcb it doesn't accept nes or famicom carts and it outputs inverted rgb. It's not even standard jamma wiring from my memory. I couldn't even find buyers for my playchoice pcbs all people want is the rgb chips from them.

The couple I sold in the past were that way aswell. Before this was popular, I could go to an auction and buy a dead or loose PCB for a Playchoice or Vs for around $20. Now they go for $200ish.

Sorry to take your topic offtopic Drakon, your work is amazing.

I'm very loose with what I consider to be "off topic" it's totally fine. This's basically all stuff I've done before, but this's the first time I've done it with an original famicom. I still wish I knew how the av famicom audio circuit is wired so I could recreate it in other models. Unfortunately the audio circuit in these kits is tweaked for the av famicom audio circuit. The av famicom audio circuit is unique to the av famicom, all other models of the nes / famicom came with different audio circuits. Luckily this famicom contains an audio circuit similar enough to the av famicom that the kit sounds great with it.

[Ziggy]

Just so you know, Drakon, I'm not looking down my nose at you for taking PPUs from Playchoice boards. As I'm sure most of you have heard me say plenty of times, I'm more about preservation at this point. I'll still mod, as long as it isn't destructive to anything. But aside from voicing my opinion, I'm not gonna go around telling any one what they should or shouldn't do.

That being said, I lost a lot of interest in the NES/Famicom RGB mods after learning a couple of things. Wrong colors makes me never wanna bother. But getting a better TV has improved my composite quality. I scored a Trinitron in a thrift store last summer. Composite looks so much better on this TV than any other CRT I've ever used. Since I have a multi console composite/S-Video cable, I've mistaken composite for S-Video a few times now. NES looks fantastic on it, and I am perfectly fine using composite for it.

But don't get me wrong, if something ever comes along that I can build and get S-Video out of a NES, then I'll definitely consider it.

[ApolloBoy]

There's also an FPGA-based PPU replacement in the works, which should output both RGB and VGA: http://universalppu.com

[Ziggy]

There's also an FPGA-based PPU replacement in the works, which should output both RGB and VGA: http://universalppu.com

Ah, that sounds awesome. He said he hopes his final version is not much bigger than the PPU chip, so if everything works out this will be what a lot of people are wishing for. Pop out the PPU, pop in this thing, have RGB!

[Drakon]

Just so you know, Drakon, I'm not looking down my nose at you for taking PPUs from Playchoice boards. As I'm sure most of you have heard me say plenty of times, I'm more about preservation at this point. I'll still mod, as long as it isn't destructive to anything. But aside from voicing my opinion, I'm not gonna go around telling any one what they should or shouldn't do.

That being said, I lost a lot of interest in the NES/Famicom RGB mods after learning a couple of things. Wrong colors makes me never wanna bother. But getting a better TV has improved my composite quality. I scored a Trinitron in a thrift store last summer. Composite looks so much better on this TV than any other CRT I've ever used. Since I have a multi console composite/S-Video cable, I've mistaken composite for S-Video a few times now. NES looks fantastic on it, and I am perfectly fine using composite for it.

But don't get me wrong, if something ever comes along that I can build and get S-Video out of a NES, then I'll definitely consider it.

Hey man you're cool I'm fine with your opinion. I like taking mostly useless hardware, and using the good parts for other projects. Honestly I see the playchoice pcb as a piece of junk, there's really nothing special about it except for the rgb ppu. If it makes you feel better I could be making overclocked superfx carts out of yoshis island but I choose to only use doom and winter gold because those two games suck and their pcbs would be better put to use running starfox at 45 mhz. Yoshi's island is too good of a game to use as a donor.

Anyway, pic of the famicom pcb:



Like most stuff I work with this famicom was a cheap thing that nobody wanted (like 50$ shipped from ebay). Now it friggen rocks.

And yes that fpga ppu thing is awesome. Although at that point you have to wonder if it's the real thing or emulation. Still I'm glad it exists.

http://www.nintendoage.com/forum/messag ... adid=92557

My personal favourite one:

http://forums.nesdev.com/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=9561

[Drakon]

Done:



Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkdapA2x ... e=youtu.be