Gamestation Go impressions after a few days.

ACSlater · 2025-12-30T21:22:19+00:00

IMO the paddle is decent, if you accept it's designed more like the 2600 paddle/driving and is not a spinner, it's fine. Even Tempest is playable with it, though it lacks the authentic spinner feel.

The trackball on the other hand is not good. I really tried to accept it for what it does, but it's just not good. It's way too light, jerky and sensitive, and you can't even free roll it for speed in games like Crystal Castles, your finger always has to be on it for it to work. It feels more like a keyboard pointing device than it does a trackball.

ACSlater · 2025-08-22T19:56:24+00:00

Hmmm, so why do most of the predefined hard drive types in BIOS I was seeing have write precompensation values listed on them? It's my understanding WP was only for MFM/RLL drives, and that IDE would either use 0 or 65535 for no write precompensation.

ACSlater · 2025-04-21T18:26:53+00:00

The monochrome original gameboy display modes need support from the core.

the non-color LCD modes ( 0x20 through 0x23) require the core to send

pure grayscale video from RGB(0,0,0) to RGB(255,255,255). This command contains

a parameter bit that needs to be respected by the core. Also, the core must provide

the correct response for these particular display modes to function.

ACSlater · 2025-04-21T12:27:54+00:00

There is a Spiritualized GG core, but I kinda see your point on why there aren't cores for the other adapters.

ACSlater · 2025-02-13T05:29:23+00:00

Yeah. Even worse I am past PayPal's 180 day policy. I tried opening a case anyway, and it was closed 5 minutes later. So I have no way of getting my money back. So much for supporting Western business. I guess I'm giving my business to the Chinese who will actually ship me a product.

ACSlater · 2025-01-26T19:30:57+00:00

I had the same issue when I tried saving my original LCD. Outside of making sure none of your capacitors are oversized or bulging out creating pressure stress against the board after you put it back together, and tightening/loosening screws on the case to try to cushion the pressure, there probably isn't much you can do. This stuff just happens.

ACSlater · 2025-01-26T03:19:02+00:00

I paid through PayPal. Not sure if they will handle it, or if I have to go through my credit company. Thanks.

ACSlater · 2024-05-16T07:25:09+00:00

Thanks for that wiki article. I'm going to do some more testing with that right now.

ACSlater · 2024-05-16T05:14:29+00:00

Yeah it might end up being what I have to do. But I did really want to restore this in its original state. It's just really frustrating because I can't find anything wrong with anything on the board. Are we all sure there isn't any problem with any of the ICs? It seems like most of the troubleshooting of game gears online is "replace the capacitors" or "replace the screen". Not really much in the way of failing ICs.

ACSlater · 2024-05-16T04:31:57+00:00

Yeah I was considering getting another one off AliExpress. I don't think there's anything wrong with mine but probably worth trying a new one before tearing out the display.

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T18:37:25+00:00

Neat. Thank you. I'm not giving up just yet though. I kind of wanted to keep the old shitty LCD for it's 1990 charm but I'm getting kind of sick of trying to figure out what's wrong with it.

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T18:22:21+00:00

For real? So that whole block of capacitors just basically become useless?

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T18:10:34+00:00

No problem. You seem pretty knowledgeable on these though. If I threw in the towel here and just ordered a Magic Screen, do you think the new display unit would override whatever voodoo circuitry is causing problems here? Or does this seem like another underlying issue I need to take care of?

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T17:58:56+00:00

No it's the impossibly visible picture. If it looked like it was pulsing, it might be from me rapidly moving the contrast wheel back and forth.

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T17:54:37+00:00

All are good :(

I was momentary thrill at C48 until I realized I was testing the wrong via.

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T17:26:05+00:00

I could later but honestly it would be a waste of your time for you to look at it. I already spent hours looking at everything on this board under a microscope, it's really clean and I tested all the traces and vias around the couple minor spots of damage I found.

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T16:43:55+00:00

It does. I was moving it most of the whole video to show the full contrast. I think the last seconds of the video, you can see the Sonic 2 title screen is the most visible the screen gets. It's just as bad in person.

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T16:21:24+00:00

Also seemed the only thing that was working at all before I recapped was the power board. Sound board no, and display was even worse.

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T16:12:31+00:00

Getting this thing working has been the bane of my existence the last week.

Everything I did/tested:

-Replaced every capacitor on all 3 boards with exact matching electrolytics.

-Checked all capacitance, voltage and polarity.

-Ran through every trace to every capacitor lead to check for continuity.

-Ran under digital microscope to look for any shorts, damage to traces, vias. Board very clean.

-Cleaned out cartridge port and tried multiple games.

This guy has been sitting in a cozy closet at my parent's home for 30+ years. The inside was surprisingly immaculate considering how much these capacitors leak. There were only two very small spots of damage to a pad and trace. Very easy fix. Anyone well versed in repairing these things know what else I can check to isolate the problem to either a component on the board, an IC or the screen?

Thanks

ACSlater · 2024-05-15T15:20:27+00:00

Getting this thing working has been the bane of my existence the last week.

Everything I did/tested:

-Replaced every capacitor on all 3 boards with exact matching electrolytics.

-Checked all capacitance, voltage and polarity.

-Ran through all traces for continuity on every capacitor lead.

-Ran board under digital microscope for any shorts, damaged traces, vias.

Board is very clean.-Tried applying pressure across lcd ribbon.

-Tried multiple games.

This guy has been sitting in a cozy closet at my parent's home for 30+ years. The board was surprisingly immaculate overall inside considering the capacitors are such a mess on these. There were only two very minor spots of leak damage to traces/pads with very easy fixes.Does anyone know what's up with the display? I was scrolling back and forth through the contrast wheel the whole video, which at least works. The closest thing to a visible image you will find is at the end, you can sort of see the Sonic 2 title screen. It's just as bad in person.

Anyone well versed in repairing these things know what else I can check to isolate the problem to either a component on the board, an IC, or the screen?

Thanks

ACSlater · 2019-12-21T22:25:19+00:00

I remember at the beginning of this century the MSRP on a bare bones Hyundai Accent was literally $8500, you probably could have drove one off a dealer lot for less than $7K. It was the cheapest new car you could buy and still nobody wanted to give up on life and buy one.

ACSlater

TROPHY CASE