Worklog Madmorda's First Wii Portable (Wii S Lite)

[Stitches]

:O you live in Australia? I have no idea how my mail got to the US first lol. Do you get free shipping from China too? My gvt has this deal where they will pay for any shipping from China, but then eBay was invented so now I can order a Nintendo screwdriver and have it shipped to me for 79 cents.


Thank you so much! Hopefully tonight . I've been putting it off because I was lazy and then I was sick but I feel better and my stuff is pretty much all here so there's no reason not to. I've been working on little things like the L/R buttons lately. I did pick up a second backup wii though so I will get this done!

Yeah I picked free shipping, but the estimator says 25-50 days. I have no idea if we have a trade deal like that.

 

[Madmorda]

Yeah I picked free shipping, but the estimator says 25-50 days. I have no idea if we have a trade deal like that.

Aliexpress pretty much always has free shipping. But on eBay if you can get things for the price of 2 gumballs, they have the deal. Mine said I think 10 to 20 days if I remember right, so it must've been a different seller.

 

[jefflongo]

Loving the progress! Keep the pictures coming!

 

[Madmorda]

I installed my U10 before trimming this time. I don't think that was my issue the last couple times because it went just fine the first time.

After I installed it, I tested it out with my 3.5" screen, and then promptly dropped the screen, ripping the ribbon cable. -_-
So I had to go out of my way to get this 7" going instead. I'm pretty sure the 3.5" had better resolution haha don't ever use a 7" composite screen.

I trimmed out the basic shape of the motherboard, but have a bunch of sanding to do, which probably won't happen today since I have company over.

I also tested out what the screen should look like when the usb isn't connected, that way I know if I'm getting video or not.


Something that I'm a bit worried about is this component. In the bottom picture, there are a couple components that need 3.3v, and the line goes right next to them. My question is, is the 3.3v going through them, or bypassing them because of the trim? In other words, do I need to keep them intact and connected? The red line makes me think they wouldn't be connected to anything.

 

[Shank]

Those components are just filtration components for the memory cards. In other words, they aren't important, so you can cut them off

 

[Madmorda]

Those components are just filtration components for the memory cards. In other words, they aren't important, so you can cut them off

Thanks! That makes me feel better. I was kinda stressing about them because I thought maybe that's what I did wrong before.

 

[Proxamity]

 

[Stitches]

View attachment 1887
I installed my U10 before trimming this time. I don't think that was my issue the last couple times because it went just fine the first time.
View attachment 1888
After I installed it, I tested it out with my 3.5" screen, and then promptly dropped the screen, ripping the ribbon cable. -_-
So I had to go out of my way to get this 7" going instead. I'm pretty sure the 3.5" had better resolution haha don't ever use a 7" composite screen.

I trimmed out the basic shape of the motherboard, but have a bunch of sanding to do, which probably won't happen today since I have company over.

I also tested out what the screen should look like when the usb isn't connected, that way I know if I'm getting video or not.

View attachment 1889 View attachment 1890
Something that I'm a bit worried about is this component. In the bottom picture, there are a couple components that need 3.3v, and the line goes right next to them. My question is, is the 3.3v going through them, or bypassing them because of the trim? In other words, do I need to keep them intact and connected? The red line makes me think they wouldn't be connected to anything.

It's moreso due to interlacing being REALLY obvious on bigger screens. The 3.5 inch ones have a smaller resolution, but look better at distance because the interlacing is harder to see.

 

[Madmorda]

What should the resistance from the 3.3v line to ground be? My 1.15 is like 30 ohms, the 1v is 70, but the 3.3v is 16,000. Did I cut a trace or is that normal?


Here it is all nice and trimmed.


And the new shell came in today so I put the L and R button holes in. The epoxy is drying and tomorrow I'll try and put in the fan vent and bondo the shell. Hopefully I'll get my regs hooked up too.

 

[Gman]

What should the resistance from the 3.3v line to ground be? My 1.15 is like 30 ohms, the 1v is 70, but the 3.3v is 16,000. Did I cut a trace or is that normal?

View attachment 1895
Here it is all nice and trimmed.

View attachment 1896
And the new shell came in today so I put the L and R button holes in. The epoxy is drying and tomorrow I'll try and put in the fan vent and bondo the shell. Hopefully I'll get my regs hooked up too.

I measure around 500-600 ohms on my board although with custom regulators. But the cut looks clean and conservative from what I can tell in the picture.

 

[Madmorda]

I found a new shell that's even bigger lol. Top right is the one I'm using, bottom right is a Gameboy, top left is the slightly larger case, and bottom left is the huge one I found today. This might be a case for a matching gamecube portable later on haha. My 7" screen fits in it. Is there no end to the ds lite style cases?

UPDATE:
YEEEAAAH, BITCHES!

I got my wii going, so I guess the third time really is the charm lol. I trimmed, sanded, checked for shorts, checked my regulators, adjusted the resistors a bit to be slightly more accurate, and used thicker wires for all the power lines. Hooked it up my battery and screen and it booted up right away It goes to the PM menu after about 20 seconds without a USB inserted.


I also picked up a junk sensor bar and pulled the IR LEDs out to play with. It looks like wii remotes can be used as close as you want, so I'll be putting these in for sure. Full functionality for the wiin!


I was going to put the fan vent in today as well. I thought that pulling one out of something else would be slightly sturdier than printing one, so I chose this one from a ps2 shell. I was going to put it in, but then I decided it would be a good idea to wait until I have my heatsink so I know exactly how high it should be. If I'm feeling up to it, I might do some sanding / bondoing the L and R buttons tonight. More to come soon!

 

[Madmorda]

Today is USB attachment day.

I cut out a double decker usb port from a broken wii (the one from this one was a little bent) and 3d printed a faceplate for it, since the one from the wii allows the usb plug to fall through it. I'll add this design to the thread with the double tact brackets later on when I update the brackets.


I've decided to put the usb next to the L and Start buttons because that still gives the fan room to blow out without making me move anything else.


I went ahead and used 28 gauge magnet wire to solder to the cm1 and 2 components. They are so tiny that if I tried to test them out with the ports, they'd break right off. I was afraid soldering to the tiny components repeatedly ran a risk of damaging them with either heat or clumsiness, so I connected the wires, made sure the connections were good and not bridged with my multimeter, and put epoxy on them. It's a bit risky epoxying over connections you haven't tested yet, but I thought it was slightly safer than testing them so fingers crossed! Worst case scenario is I skip those components and solder to the larger points, which is what would happen if I burned one out anyways.

The reason I went with two ports was because @Shank mentioned being able to use the wii u gamecube adapter with it. If that works out, I'd be able to do 4p gc games through one usb port. If not, I can use it for something else I'm sure.

 

[Ikeprodigy]

Today is USB attachment day.
View attachment 1926 View attachment 1927 View attachment 1928
I cut out a double decker usb port from a broken wii (the one from this one was a little bent) and 3d printed a faceplate for it, since the one from the wii allows the usb plug to fall through it. I'll add this design to the thread with the double tact brackets later on when I update the brackets.

View attachment 1929
I've decided to put the usb next to the L and Start buttons because that still gives the fan room to blow out without making me move anything else.

View attachment 1930
I went ahead and used 28 gauge magnet wire to solder to the cm1 and 2 components. They are so tiny that if I tried to test them out with the ports, they'd break right off. I was afraid soldering to the tiny components repeatedly ran a risk of damaging them with either heat or clumsiness, so I connected the wires, made sure the connections were good and not bridged with my multimeter, and put epoxy on them. It's a bit risky epoxying over connections you haven't tested yet, but I thought it was slightly safer than testing them so fingers crossed! Worst case scenario is I skip those components and solder to the larger points, which is what would happen if I burned one out anyways.

The reason I went with two ports was because @Shank mentioned being able to use the wii u gamecube adapter with it. If that works out, I'd be able to do 4p gc games through one usb port. If not, I can use it for something else I'm sure.

Sooo much progress! Your 3D printed brackets and things make me wish I had a 3D printer. I just can't wait for the outcome!

 

[Madmorda]

Sooo much progress! Your 3D printed brackets and things make me wish I had a 3D printer. I just can't wait for the outcome!

Lol they're actually pretty hard to live without once you start printing things. I got mine from Monoprice for I believe $300 shipped and fully assembled. It gets really good prints and requires very little upkeep. They have one for like $200, but I went one up for the larger print bed.


In other news, I tested out my charge and play feature of the batteries on the wiip. Works like a charm


The usb / flash drive is also working great. I mean I can really only test one port with the flash drive, but I charged my phone off the other port and the connections look good so I'm going to say it works fine.


I finally got around to test painting a piece of the broken shell, and am glad to report that it sticks fine even without sanding or primer, so I won't have any problems. I'm going to use Tamiya brand paint because A) they have pretty colors and B) it's pretty near indestructible as paint goes and imo well worth the money. I am thinking I'll do the wiip metroid themed, but am open to other ideas.

PM is running fine on it, but I don't have the gc+ hooked up yet so I'm going to do Bluetooth next so I can navigate it.

 

[Madmorda]

Phew I've got a lot done in the last day and a half.


For starters, I wired up my Bluetooth. It wasn't as bad as I was afraid it would be, but I wasted a huge amount of time "fixing" it when the problem was wii remotes won't sync in the PM menu. So this means I can navigate the PM menu with the wiimote now. It is mounted on the board in its final place and the wires are epoxied in place. The sync button is connected up too, but not in its final place.


Speaking of wiimotes, I have my internal sensor bar all worked out. I 3d printed this little bracket to hold the LEDs inside the shoulder things. I drilled small holes in case they were a bit off, expecting to widen them later. But the wiimote can see them just fine as-is, so I'm leaving them that way for now. The plan is to have a little switch to turn them on and off so if you want to use a separate sensor bar they won't interfere.


I also got the MX chip working. I considered not doing it because it doesn't affect much except VC games apparently, but figured I'd regret it if I didn't include it. Paper Mario, I'm doing this for you. I connected a wire to the reset button as well before testing them epoxying over everything. You'll notice that the MX chip is wired messily unlike the Bluetooth and USB. I will fix that and mount it, but needed to get the tiny wires fixed and epoxied before messing with them. Waiting for it to dry atm.

Still waiting on my 5" screen's driver board before working on the audio and video. To be honest, I'm dreading doing the gc controller because I'm afraid of messing up the ribbon cables I have to solder to on the joysticks and dpads.

EDIT: As to the charge and play circuit, I tested a bit more today. With my battery I can charge using a micro usb charger while playing even if the battery was originally dead. However, when you plug the charger in or disconnect it, the battery temporarily disconnects from the wii making it either glitch out or reset. That still isn't a bad trade off for charge and play capabilities through a common cable, but could be irritating if not near a save point. I also realized that I could get another larger phone battery charger and charge/play the internal one. Like an extended battery pack. That will likely be my solution if the battery life isn't great. Since the portable is so small, I don't mind carrying around a phone battery with it since it has a dual purpose.

 

[Stitches]

Phew I've got a lot done in the last day and a half.

View attachment 1956
For starters, I wired up my Bluetooth. It wasn't as bad as I was afraid it would be, but I wasted a huge amount of time "fixing" it when the problem was wii remotes won't sync in the PM menu. So this means I can navigate the PM menu with the wiimote now. It is mounted on the board in its final place and the wires are epoxied in place. The sync button is connected up too, but not in its final place.

View attachment 1957 View attachment 1958 View attachment 1959
Speaking of wiimotes, I have my internal sensor bar all worked out. I 3d printed this little bracket to hold the LEDs inside the shoulder things. I drilled small holes in case they were a bit off, expecting to widen them later. But the wiimote can see them just fine as-is, so I'm leaving them that way for now. The plan is to have a little switch to turn them on and off so if you want to use a separate sensor bar they won't interfere.

View attachment 1960
I also got the MX chip working. I considered not doing it because it doesn't affect much except VC games apparently, but figured I'd regret it if I didn't include it. Paper Mario, I'm doing this for you. I connected a wire to the reset button as well before testing them epoxying over everything. You'll notice that the MX chip is wired messily unlike the Bluetooth and USB. I will fix that and mount it, but needed to get the tiny wires fixed and epoxied before messing with them. Waiting for it to dry atm.

Still waiting on my 5" screen's driver board before working on the audio and video. To be honest, I'm dreading doing the gc controller because I'm afraid of messing up the ribbon cables I have to solder to on the joysticks and dpads.

The circle pads should have solder points on the board just above the ribbon cables. For ABXY and the dpad, you could use some cheeky magnet wire soldered to the outside feet of the membrane tacts and stick them down with a micro dab of superglue.

 

[CommanderBrace]

Just to be sure, you guys are using a razor to expose the copper in the magnet wires right? I don't see any other method of stripping them aside from acetone dips.

 

[Madmorda]

Just to be sure, you guys are using a razor to expose the copper in the magnet wires right? I don't see any other method of stripping them aside from acetone dips.

I misread your question so edited this post. I use solder to expose the copper on magnet wires. If you hear up the end of the wire and tin it, the red coating comes right off. One of the best parts of using magnet wire is no more stripping wires.

 

[Shank]

Progress looks good so far. Keep at at! Can't wait to see it finished.
Just a tip: You don't need to run a wire to every point labeled ground on the Bluetooth Module, just one of them should be sufficient.

 

[Madmorda]

Progress looks good so far. Keep at at! Can't wait to see it finished.
Just a tip: You don't need to run a wire to every point labeled ground on the Bluetooth Module, just one of them should be sufficient.

Lmao I know I'll remove them. I couldn't get the remote to sync so I thought maybe the wires were too thin on power and ground, and kept trying everything. Turned out the remote won't sync in the PM menu, so I can take the extra wires off. Just figured I'd do it when I redo the regs. (The reg setup has to be rewired to fit in my case, but I'm saving it for last since I need them for testing atm.)