Introducing the Cheapvid

[kipper2k]

Hi all,

here is some pron on my new prototype cheapvid. It is a built in Svideo mod for the A600 and A1200...

First the preps... There will be no wires to be seen on the top of the board, all the necessary board connections are out of sight under the board. The long blue one is tied in to the 1mb Rom chip... more on that in a bit.





Here is a close up of the actual board, if you look closely you can see the trace that i had to repair. The mod itself is based on the Genesis video mod, (Sorry, don't know the who should get the credits). If you look on the motherboard you will see i used a fibre pencil to remove the soldermask so the svideo connector can be secured to the motherboard by soldering.




Here is a pic of the Svideo connector, A perfect fit, no interference with the cable connector at all.





Here is a look at the cheapvid installed, If you look at the motherboard you will notice no wires attached to the CXA 1145 (Hoorayyy!!) and no wire coming from the 1mb rom chip. The wires are fed up through unused via's making it nice and simple.

The 3 pin header attached to the cheapvid board is there so the OS select switch can be unplugged in case you want to remove the motherboard from the case.



Here is a picture of Alien Breed Tower Assault on my screen, the quality is really good, colours are true, no dot crawl, no wobbling, it is really a very good picture.

The reason i call it the cheapmod, it will cost about $12 to build, as there are very few components required. If people are interested then i will create a design for a commercial run of the boards to make them look prettier (and also a bit smaller).

Let me know what you all think.

[cosmicfrog]

I think....
Yummy with extra ribbits on top

[Allen1]

That is BRILLIANT M8

This looks like something every electronics enthusiast could manage (after they have seen it done for the first time). It always amazes me when I see how clever the members of this forum are, you could also use standard pin in hole components in that design at a push by the looks of things with maybe a bit of shielding to stop interference.

[Mad-Matt]

Its cool and all, but were blessed with scart tv, so it this mod is not for me

[kipper2k]

Originally Posted by Allen1

That is BRILLIANT M8

This looks like something every electronics enthusiast could manage (after they have seen it done for the first time). It always amazes me when I see how clever the members of this forum are, you could also use standard pin in hole components in that design at a push by the looks of things with maybe a bit of shielding to stop interference.

Hi,

thanks for the kind words . I will post the eagle board and component list once i iron out the wrinkles. It is actually easier using surface mount components as there is less drilling to do if you want to make this board yourself. A pair of tweezers and a good eye should work. There is absolutely no interference at all with the picture, it is great!

All revision boards of the A600 and 1200 that i have seen will have vias on the underside where you can tap in for your video signals

@Matt

Europe is definately blessed with scart, the rest of us not so lucky

[Allen1]

I've got a TV tuner adapter that you can plug a PC monitor into and either use it on the PC or to watch TV etc, it also has an Svideo input so this little mod would be great for that (plus the TV modulator on my 1200 is duff). I do have a scart lead but it would be nice to use a monitor again

About the interference I mentioned, it was meant as a possibility if using pin in hole components where the leads were exposed and able to pick up noise, slim chance but a slight possibility. I look forward to your eagle board design, the surface mount parts are the better choice as you say though.

[rkauer]

Schematics, please?

[kipper2k]

Originally Posted by rkauer

Schematics, please?

Here ya go,

not very pretty but functional. R7 and R10 can be raised or lowered to increase or decrease brightness as required (anywhere between 20 - 75 ohm is probably the limits, dependant on your tv/Monitor

[Matt020]

Originally Posted by kipper2k

Let me know what you all think.

I think you need a better quality picture of the image on the screen, it looks grainy and Im sure it's better than that

Could you take a couple more pics, that are of better quality?

Cheers,
Matt.

[alexh]

How stable is it? I mean it looks like it doesn't bolt to anything. Would it survive a few rough plugging and unplugging?