#164177 - Tyson - Thu Oct 23, 2008 6:46 am
Hi guys,
I'm on a mission to hard wire a SNES controller to my DS Lite or to my GBA Micro (which I will house in a Snes Cartridge).
I've researched Pin outs and wires on the net, but I'm still a bit hazy.
I have limited soldering skills, is it as simple as wiring each button from the SNES controller to the button areas on the DS?
On the circuit board of the DS where the button goes, it has 2 silver areas, obviously the button closes the connection.
When wiring a button from the Snes Controller, do I bridge the connection on the DS circuit board?
Any advice is greatly appreciated, I'm very eager to give it a shot!
Depending on how much space there is inside the Snes Controller, it would be cool if it were possible to house the Gba Micro inside the Snes Controller, above the Select and Start buttons.
cheers,
#164272 - thesuperone - Sat Oct 25, 2008 5:51 am
What you said would just cause all the buttons on the DS or GBA to be permanently "pressed", no matter what the SNES controller was doing. You could cut all the wires off the controller and just leave the soldered tips and it would still be the same since the connections are soldered together.
I know nothing about GBA and DS hardware, but I have opened up and fized a few NES controllers in my time and do have extensive electronics theory knowledge. The following is a spiel about the connections and why things need to be done and why some things must not be done. Skip to the diagram for simple straight forward instructions.
What you see under the pads (black rubber pads) of each button are two wavy interlocking but not touching silver lines on the circuit board. Think of them as two wires laminated to the board, which is essentially what they are. There is no electrical connection between the two. One side is connected to a voltage source, the "power supply" (although it's NOT connected directly to the battery usually but via some electronics). The other side is connected to the inputs of some solid state circuits (the computer circuits) When the pad touches them it closes the circuit and it becomes like one continuous wire and channels the electricity through the conductor, the supply voltage on the input of the computer chips is interpreted as an "ON" or "1", other parts of the computer are told that the button is pressed, and the software tells it what to do with that information.
So you have four of these pads in your typical D-pad or Y-X-B-A buttons, each one with two conductors close together. Four conductors, one from each button, are connected together and to a voltage common/reference/supply. The second conductor from each of the buttons are separate. To hook it up you would need to wire it up exactly the same, simply extending the existing "input" conductors to the four from the controller, and the voltage supply to the common conductor on the controller.
But you would need to do this directly on the pads of the DS AND the controller, because the controller itself has it's own electronics that add their own functions. To use those electronics, you would need to power the controller directly from the supply and possibly provide it with a clock, rather than just connecting it to the voltage reference and the inputs. The SNES used much different technology than the DS and GBA, which require different operating voltages and frequencies. So it's best to just bypass, especially if your wires are going to be short. You may also need to CUT the connections these traces have to the controller electronics since applying outside voltage where according to the original design none should be applied could cause weird stuff.
Anyways, the following is what you need to do, simply put.
1-------*-------|
2------------*--|____5
3---*-----------|
4--------*------|
The diagram above demonstrates the connections in a D-pad or Y_X_B_A.
* are the the silver areas under the rubber pads of the buttons.
5 is the common reference voltage. 1, 2, 3, 4 are the inputs of the chip circuits. Find 1,2,3,4,and 5 on the controller and connect 1 to 1, 2 to 2, etc. You must make these connections on BOTH ends, bypassing the electronics on the controller. And to do that you'll need to follow the circuit board traces away from where the pad touches them, scrape off the green(or amber or whatever colour) resin off to expose the copper trace, then solder to that. Reinforce each wire so it doesn't break off or pull the trace right off the board - hot glue works well.
#164345 - Tyson - Wed Oct 29, 2008 6:33 am
hi thesuperone.
Thanks for your help, I decided to just give it a shot.
What I did was open the snes controller, using my dremel took off the resin to expose the copper, and connected a wire to each of the buttons. I also connected one wire to the ground (which connects to the ground of all buttons).
I used my dremel to cut circuit access out of the timing chip and dioded on the board rendering them useless.
I wired all the buttons to their corresponding connection points on the Gameboy Advance, and the ground to the ground point near the slot.
I tested it out, and I was very surprised to find it actually worked! ^_^
I am yet to open up my DS Lite, but I am thinking instead, to wire each of the points from the DS Controls to a pin each on the GBA Slot, and then wire a SNES controller to a GBA Dust Cover pins.
That way I can unplug it when I want to. (This will render the GBA Slot useless cause of the ground wire I think).
Cheers,