Opinions on a rumble (tremor) pack mod

[CidC]

I recently learned of a way to get the official rumble pack to work without batteries. Here is some info:

(Scroll to the bottom where the pictures are)
http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/13 ... ble-packs/

& a video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEn6LT4DUNA

I figured it would be possible with the tremor pack plus (the only rumble packs I have). I did some Google searches and didn't see any other battery-free mods done with a third-party rumble pack. I saw some people that asked if it was possible with any rumble pack and mentioned that the controller receives power from the console so it could be taken from that, but I didn't see anyone that did such a method. The mods I've posted move a resistor from one point to another.

I decided to go ahead and perform the mod with my tremor pack plus anyway (Thanks to skyone for the controller pinout and this forum that keeps it posted). I simply wired the V+ that normally attached to battery terminals to the 3.3V line that goes into the rumble pack from the N64. It works great; I used it for 30 min. Theoretically it would be more powerful than two batteries that equaled 3V~, though I haven't compared.

Here's a picture of the mod:


My ultimate question is do any of you see anything wrong with this mod? The "common" mod involves a resistor and on a page I looked at that dealt with the mod there were naysayers (here is the page: http://www.assemblergames.com/forums/ar ... 21639.html). The naysayers stated the N64 power supply wasn't meant to handle the load. I say it is an insignificant load, as did others. Since this forum deals with the N64 power system the most, I would trust its members to have the best opinions.

[eagle5953]

Why didn't they just wire it that way instead of using batteries?

[CidC]

I wonder. Must have been a conspiracy with battery companies so we'll buy more batteries.

There were some third-party rumble packs that didn't use batteries.

It still works with me after a playtime of 3 hours or so. I know that the official rumble pack mod hasn't caused problems so I doubt this will. There was a theory that if all 4 controllers used battery-less rumble, there was potential for problems but I doubt I'll have the chance anytime soon to have 3 others to test if I modded more. Since there hasn't been any naysayers here, I'll assume most of you see this as fine.

If anyone uses a tremor pack I recommend this mod to save batteries and lighten the controller. As I've said, I haven't tested it much so, as always, mod at your own risk. If anything does happen I will post back.

[Basement_Modder]

This makes me want to trim a rumble pack board as much as possible and try to cram it in the controller's case.

[cpldexploder]

My ultimate question is do any of you see anything wrong with this mod?

It generates a lot of noise on the 3.3v rail.

[kibble]

The only problem I would see with this is that if you have four rumble paks modded this way, all working at the same time, you could put a bit too much strain on the 3.3V line if all four of the motors were running at the same time, possibly dropping the voltage enough to cause the system to crash. Other than that, I've done it meeself on one pak with no issues. As far as the noise on the 3.3V line goes, a small and inductor and cap could take care of that.