Gamecube Disc Drive Connector Question

[Biased]

I'm going to start rewiring the parts of my gamecube for use in a handheld. Since the case I'm going to use has plenty of internal room I'm not going to try to do any heavy modifications that people normally do to make the GC as thin as possible. Mainly all I'm looking to do right now is to disassemble, relocate, and then reconnect everything. From there I'll get into connecting the screen and speakers, modifying the controllers, and powering it by battery. I've got my tools and I'm looking to start tomorrow, so I figured I'd ask tonight before possibly diving headfirst into problems.


Is desoldering this (the port inside the blue rectangle of this picture) and then making it into the male end of a cable to plug into the disc drive feasible? Can I do it with IDE cable? If IDE cable doesn't work, what kind of ribbon cable could I use? I'd like to keep things organized.

[Tchay]

Hey! I'm just glad someone decided to post something in the GC section. This place has been dead lately.

Yes you can use IDE cable. If you mean to make a new female end on the DD board, well that would be kinda tricky. You could wire up the IDE cable to both ends without plugs; however, keep in mind you would be soldering 32 connections and would need thin wire (I would recommend computer wire or enamel wire).

Edit: sorry had that backwards, I see what you're asking. I am not sure how you would make the male plug to fit into the DD board because the already existing plug is complicated. You could just wire the IDE up to the GC mobo plug if you could desolder it properly.

[Biased]

Hey! I'm just glad someone decided to post something in the GC section. This place has been dead lately.

Yes you can use IDE cable. If you mean to make a new female end on the DD board, well that would be kinda tricky. You could wire up the IDE cable to both ends without plugs; however, keep in mind you would be soldering 32 connections and would need thin wire (I would recommend computer wire or enamel wire).

Edit: sorry had that backwards, I see what you're asking. I am not sure how you would make the male plug to fit into the DD board because the already existing plug is complicated. You could just wire the IDE up to the GC mobo plug if you could desolder it properly.

Allow me to demonstrate my Paint skillz.

This is what I want to accomplish. Reasonable?

[Tchay]

Very reasonable, in fact I may end up doing that with my GC portable im working on.

[Biased]

I still haven't started on this yet. All I've gotten done in the past few days was ripping apart the 4-pole video cable for the PS2 screen and soldering on some female RCA jacks to easier test my gamecube with it.



Also, it's quite hard to do any soldering with one of these on your lap ALL THE TIME.

[hailrazer]

OMG who in their right mind would even worry about making a portable with something that tiny and cute to play with !!!

[smitty]

KITTY!! It's so cute! Have you ever tried teaching him(/her) to hold a video game controller? I've seen of pictures of pets playing video games, it's pretty funny.

[Biased]

Haha, no I only just got it three days ago. I never realized how demanding they are of my attention.

EDIT: 5:04 AM. I finished de-soldering the connector around 3:20 AM. The other hour and 45 minutes have been spent re-inserting the pins into the plastic that were ripped out (10 of them) after I thought I had the whole thing completely de-soldered.

This was not fun. Not only did the pins rip out of the connector, the bottom bit of plastic that actually separates the pins from each other has been dislodged as well, and I have to way of re-inserting the pins through those tiny holes. When I wake up I'm setting back to work and soldering a strand of wire to each pin and then threading it back through the separation-doodly-thingy. From there I'll remove the strands of wire and get to the real work. Wish me luck.

P.S. Once I re-thread the pins and solder on the ribbon cable (and prove that it works) I am hot gluing the entire sucker, thus preventing anything of the like from EVER happening again (to me). Time to go watch LOTR: ROTK!!!

EDIT AGAIN 6:16 PM: Forget it, I'm just soldering the ribbon cable on, hot gluing each ribbon and going from there. forget threading.

[Data643]

That is the cutest kitten I have ever seen:). On mine, I'll probably desolder the connecter, shorten it, and then ( ) bend the pins 90 degrees to allow the GC to be thinner.

[eagle5953]

OMG who in their right mind would even worry about making a portable with something that tiny and cute to play with !!!

KITTY!! It's so cute! Have you ever tried teaching him(/her) to hold a video game controller? I've seen of pictures of pets playing video games, it's pretty funny.

[Biased]

Thanks guys now I remember how much I miss my kitty. I do feel more intelligent nowadays though. I'm sure it has nothing to do with being at college... in fact I know it has nothing to do with being at college.