Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

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bacteria
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Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by bacteria »

There are many people who ask about relocating a game port (on my forum and sending me PM's), some people try it and fail; seems to be a stickling point for modders new to the scene; so here goes - a simple and easy guide to do the job right first time!

The basic principle of course is to relocate a game cart port with wires so the game cartridge can be horizontally mounted or located into a more convenient place on a portable.

What you need is quite simple - thin wires, the more flexible the better, and preferably at least three colours of wires; solder, wire strippers and soldering iron; useful to have some desoldering braid to hand just in case too.

Why at least three colours of wires you ask - simple, when you've done the wiring, if a wire was to be loose, or if you want to check you've wired the port correctly, it is easy to think "it's the white wire between the blue and red one" rather than having to trace a wire back to location. The reason for flexible wires is simply that you'll have 48 wires to relocate on an N64 game port, if the wires are not flexible you'll break solder joints or bend pins or simply just have a harder job getting the wires where you want them afterwards.

One important thing is to be methodical, and carefully. To date, i've not had an issue with doing this sort of relocation work, always works.

The principles of tinning connections is to give a better solder joint and in the case of wires, stops strands in the wires becoming loose and causing shorts; also makes it far easier to solder to pins without issue of damaging things by having the soldering iron making contact for too long (metal is conductive in heat, to other components after all).

So, firstly, tin the pins on the game port by putting solder onto the soldering iron and then quickly stroking the solder from the iron onto the pins in turn.

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Then cut wires to required length; under 7" or you'll find the game cartridge might not work due to interference on the lines. I've used 6.5" which is fine.

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Tin the solder joints you're connecting the wires to on the motherboard, this will greatly reduce the chance of wires breaking loose due to bad solder joints later.

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Then comes the fun! Wire methodically, one way across to the other, one layer at a time.

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Then turn the motherboard around and you'll notice it is then just as easy to wire up the other side of the game port and to the motherboard.

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Done.

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That wasn't hard, right?

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cornacchia
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by cornacchia »

Very nice guide. Just one question, does the thickness of the wire make a huge difference? Cause thinner wires are more flexible but do they carry the signal as well as the thicker wires? Thanks
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bacteria
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by bacteria »

Thicker wires will carry the signals further, but only about another inch or so; if you want longer you need to use grounded wires, then you could go for metres.
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by Jamisonia »

thats interesting, so how far does say 22AWG wire take signals?

Are you using solid or stranded? I've always used 22AWG stranded for my mods, but recently I need some 30AWG solid to solder to SMT legs. I got the wire wrap and radio shack, and this stuff is inflexible let me tell you what. I assume 22AWG solid would be more inflexible?
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by bacteria »

We don't use AWG as a measurement in the UK for wires unlike our American cousins, so can't read off my wire reels, this is what I use for relocation wiring:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/light-duty-equipment-10-0.1-29

It is very flexible and good quality.

For wiring power, use 3 amp rated wire or better (I think that's around the 20 AWG mark?)

No, use stranded wire for the reason you stated - single strand is inflexible!
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by Hatta »

I'd use a 40 pin hard disk ribbon cable. They're all attached together so you don't have to worry about getting them tangled or switching ends. You can easily keep track of which wire is which by counting. And you don't have to worry about length either.
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by bacteria »

You do have to worry about length, over 6" with IDE cable and you get interference on the lines which will stop a game booting or make it behave strangely, really.
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by ChooChooBot »

Sweet guide man! I have been thinking of making portables for quite some time. For now I'm just a hand held modder. I bookmarked your guide for when I look into making portables.
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by Ziggy »

Nice guide, Bac!
Jamisonia wrote:thats interesting, so how far does say 22AWG wire take signals?

Are you using solid or stranded? I've always used 22AWG stranded for my mods, but recently I need some 30AWG solid to solder to SMT legs. I got the wire wrap and radio shack, and this stuff is inflexible let me tell you what. I assume 22AWG solid would be more inflexible?
Let me tell you a quick little story about 30AWG from Radio Shit. I believe I might have posted this on RB before (it might be in my "I hate Radio Shack" thread). Anyways, years and years ago I bought some 30AWG wire from Radio Shack and only used it in small quantities. Actually, I only used it to repair busted traces on PCB (like I described in the Game Gear capacitor thread) so I only used very little bits of it. When I started getting into doing mods for game consoles and carts and whatnot, I started using it a lot more. Naturally I ran out pretty fast, and my local Radio Shit no longer carried it, so I ordered a bunch from their website. Long story short, in the years since I last bought it, they changed the product. It was instantly recognizable to me, the color and feel of the wire was all of. Worst off, solder just didn't want to take to the wire. No matter what. It was awful. But that's just another brick in the wall between me and The Shack.
bacteria wrote:We don't use AWG as a measurement in the UK for wires unlike our American cousins, so can't read off my wire reels
Talking to both you and Jam here, if you Google "AWG metric comparison" or something similar, you'll find a lot of charts for an easy comparison. It's nice to look at when you're reading on a forum and some one says "I recommends 22AWG for this" (or vise versa) but you have no idea what that means.

http://www.vaplastics.com/elec/referenc ... eComp.html
http://www.victronenergy.com/TechnicalI ... 0Chart.pdf

Et cetera.
Hatta wrote:I'd use a 40 pin hard disk ribbon cable. They're all attached together so you don't have to worry about getting them tangled or switching ends. You can easily keep track of which wire is which by counting. And you don't have to worry about length either.
I've done it before, but a lot of times when some one says, "Use an old IDE cable," I say, "No thanks." Solid conductor wires are a lot easier to work with. The IDE cables can just be annoying some times. But, to each his own. It does come in handy if you're wanting to make some kind of adapter (Sivava actually used IDE cable to make a jumper cable for an adapter) but if it something that's gonna be inside (like the cart slot of a handheld mod) than it wont matter much (other than your own personal preferences).
bacteria wrote:You do have to worry about length, over 6" with IDE cable and you get interference on the lines which will stop a game booting or make it behave strangely, really.
What kind of IDE cable, though? The old 40 conductor cable or 80 conductor cable? I mean, when most people use IDE cables for things like this they'll use older ones that they have lying around. I'm guilty of this myself, but I pretty much only use IDE wires for scraps and tests and stuff like that. The 80 conductor IDE cables, obviously, has twice as many conductors. It will definitely carry the signal further. On top of that, I think it has some kind of shielding. Can't remember, it's been a while. But yeah, the 80 conductor IDE cable is far superior. It's the difference of being able to use cable select (you can't use CS with 40 conductor IDE cables) which says a lot.

edit: I'm not suggesting to use the entire length of an IDE cable, I just wanted to point out that there's 40 and 80 conductor cables. A fact that some people don't know.
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Re: Easy way to relocating a game port for a portable - GUIDE

Post by Hobie-wan »

Ziggy587 wrote:The 80 conductor IDE cables, obviously, has twice as many conductors. It will definitely carry the signal further. On top of that, I think it has some kind of shielding. Can't remember, it's been a while. But yeah, the 80 conductor IDE cable is far superior. It's the difference of being able to use cable select (you can't use CS with 40 conductor IDE cables) which says a lot.

edit: I'm not suggesting to use the entire length of an IDE cable, I just wanted to point out that there's 40 and 80 conductor cables. A fact that some people don't know.
In the 80 conductor wires for ATA 66 and faster IDE, only 40 are used for data transmission. The plug is the same as a 40 conductor cable. The extra 40 wires interspersed act as the shielding a bit like the twisting bit of Unshielded Twisted Pair standard ethernet cable works.
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