I have an NES front-loader where I fried something in the “silver box” that handles power and A/V (this NES part has no consistent name in the repair/modding community, that I can tell, so I’m calling it the front loader’s “silver box”).
I was using poor technique with my multimeter trying to test the voltage regulator and I think I shunted 12v to ground. I have an entirely socketed NES for chip testing and all of the IC’s work fine. The issue seems entirely limited to the silver box.
Rather than try and rebuild the silver box, I was thinking of seeing what “no-cut” options are out there. TheRealPhoenix used to sell Borti’s no-cut NES-IO but COVID part shortages made the PIC it relies on hard to get, and he lost interest in returning it to production as certain features it had are now unnecessary (e.g., game controller activated in-game reset and palette mod changing is now available with v4 of the Tim Worthington NESRGB mod).
Does anyone know where I can order a “silver box replacement kit” that has the following features: (1) interfaces with v4 of NESRGB, and (2) uses a mini-DIN for RGB output and also has s-video output?
I know I could locate an appropriate PCB that comes with a BOM (parts list) where I could source parts separately, but I’d rather buy a kit.
A lot of the bare PCB’s that are posted online seem to require trimming a corner of the NES PCB or the internal case to make it fit, or rely on cutting a hole in the brittle NES case to install a SNES multi-out)
Givent the above info, can anyone recommend either:
- a no-cut kit that is available for purchase, or, if none exists,
- a straightforward PCB that requires no trimming of the hardware or the case with a BOM/parts listing that doesn’t require unobtainium
Sorry about starting a second reply thread under your comment, but I went down the cable rabbit hole on the other thread and I want to be sure you see this. Are you hooking up your “silver box” replacement to a NESRGB mod? Could you document it for us here on consolerepairs? I’d love to see your thoughts.
Do they expect you to install a pin header on the NESRGB to connect to the pin header on their “silver box” replacement, and to connect them with some sort of custom cable (rather than hardwiring or adding a fancy voultar-style QSB with a modern ribbon cable)? If so, how? Do you make the cable or what?
I’m not sure about the NESRGB yet, that’s why I chose that model. It supports both the mod and composite out of the system directly. It uses a JTAG style connector to connector to the power board with wires soldered to the mod. Luckily the GitHub already has the guide to wire it up.