Zach's Projects

Bridge the two holes with a small piece of bare wire laid across them. Solder it at both ends. I use wires from leftover cat5 ethernet cable, and just strip off the insulation.

When soldering wires and the like, these are really nice to have.

 

As for the dump cart, I wonder if a board already exists with the correct edge connector plus at least two slots? It would probably be for another application, but it seems to me that one could more easily hack in a switch to toggle between chip selects for each slot than to build an entire a dumper board from scratch.

When soldering wires and the like, these are really nice to have.

 

As for the dump cart, I wonder if a board already exists with the correct edge connector plus at least two slots? It would probably be for another application, but it seems to me that one could more easily hack in a switch to toggle between chip selects for each slot than to build an entire a dumper board from scratch.

Well, there are multi-cart players like this, but 34.99 plus 10.00 shipping is quite a bit. I was thinking of designing my cart dumper so that it could eventually be upgraded into a multi-cart player.

When soldering wires and the like, these are really nice to have.

 

As for the dump cart, I wonder if a board already exists with the correct edge connector plus at least two slots? It would probably be for another application, but it seems to me that one could more easily hack in a switch to toggle between chip selects for each slot than to build an entire a dumper board from scratch.

Well, there are multi-cart players like this, but 34.99 plus 10.00 shipping is quite a bit. I was thinking of designing my cart dumper so that it could eventually be upgraded into a multi-cart player.

That wasn't quite what I was thinking... I think

 

I suspect that the above uses a 24 pole, 9 throw switch, which is essentially the same as hot-swapping a cart. I don't know if it will work while keeping the power on (my dumper doesn't actually work unless you insert the cart at an angle, suggesting that simultaneous powerup of all pins wouldn't work.) Even so, while such an approach would be OK for a replaceable FB2, I wouldn't consider it safe for a unique prototype. I suspect this device above uses such a switch because the 2600 probably isn't capable of supplying sufficient current for too many carts at once. Two shouldn't be an issue, however, or maybe 3 or 4, but 9 is getting dubious.

 

The idea I was thinking of keeps constant connections to two carts at the same time and alternates the chip select lines. This is how computers are designed even today, so there is zero chance of damage.

 

But anyway, I did some searching and did find PC hobby boards that come with edge connectors already on them. None of them had 24 pins, but some careful cutting could solve this issue.

But anyway, I did some searching

Online, or elsewhere? Maybe I'll understand once I see it, but I'm not sure what advantage the board you describe would have over an old Pac-Man board.

But anyway, I did some searching

Online, or elsewhere? Maybe I'll understand once I see it, but I'm not sure what advantage the board you describe would have over an old Pac-Man board.

You can fit the EPROM, inverter, resistors and edge connector slots on one of the boards I was thinking of. Might be easier for prototyping.

 

I still can't find any with 24 connectors though. The smallest one that this company sells is 30 connectors. However, none of the smaller ones have the proper spacing for the connectors. It looks like only the 72-pin boards do.

You can fit the EPROM, inverter, resistors and edge connector slots on one of the boards I was thinking of. Might be easier for prototyping.

I see where you're coming from. I wasn't going to worry about resistors, inverters, etc. Since I already have a socketed 4K EPROM board, I was just going to buy a cartridge slot to connect the dumper side. Does that sound feasible?