Game Boy Pi Advice

[dreamscape440]

Hello all

I've started a game boy pi project as I had a spare old Pi 1 sitting around doing nothing. I'm aware these old machines won't be able to run more power hungry emulators like ps1 etc but I'm actually more interested in using NES, Game Boy and that sort of thing so it's ideal for what i want.

Here is where I'm at so far... I've ordered a new shell to avoid killing an original unit.



and I've ordered a game cart case and obviously i have my Pi sat here waiting.



I've removed many ports to make it more slim. Even though it's going into a DMG case i still want to save as much space as i can.



I need advice on the screen. now I've seen many of you use the reversing cameras and I'm aware of the mods for them but personally I want to keep the face of my DMG looking original and use the original screen cover so I was curious if there were any other options out there for my Pi that will keep it looking original instead of just hacking away at the frame and making it look the way most have done. I aim to keep it looking like a game boy not a portable Pi.

[ICMF]

Well the DMG's screen is 2.6", so any 2.6" LCD *should* be okay. Looks like you might have to settle for 320 x 240 though - I couldn't see any higher res screens in a cursory search. This one uses the same driver board that Wermy recommends for the Minty Pi, which might save some headache: https://goo.gl/LEqtfE But basically, searching for 2.6".

One caveat: the DMG's aspect ratio is 10 x 9, whereas most LCDs will be 4 x 3. The visual area (the clear part of the screen protector) is 43 x 47mm. The specs on this 2.6" TFT (I'd assume they're all the same) say the visual area is 41 x 58, and the active area is 40 x 53. So you would see a couple of mm of the frame along the top and bottom of the cutout.

If you want to eliminate that, you could jump up to a 2.8" LCD and then adjust your display settings in Raspbian, so it only displays to the edges of your cutout

[dreamscape440]

Hi thanks for the feedback.

Yeah the 2.8" would be the better option for sure. I want it to look clean and original. I noticed most of these use the GPIO on the Pi, won't i need these for the controls? Or does the PCB most people use work on USB?

I plan to use one of these:

[rodocop]

You should be able to wire it so the GPIO controls do not interfere with the GPIO screen connections, have a look at these threads:

viewtopic.php?t=57

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=2312