Woodmill's Run-of-the-Mill GBZ
Posted: Sun Nov 13, 2016 5:33 pm
Just spent the weekend working on my Version 2 Gameboy Zero. Got all the parts except for Day's Gorilla Screen, so I started building
Nothing too fancy, but I did do a few things different than normal, or what I've seen others do. So I figured I'd pass along my build
I was able to get a large speaker in the case with Helders AIO. It takes some finesse, and a lot of shaving of the speaker, but it will fit.
I also ran a few wires underneath the AIO to conceal them. I drilled out a notch between the power strip to run the cables to it.
I used a 2mm Fiber Optic strand to better see my charging light. I hot glued one end to the Charging light, and drilled a hole in the side of the case. I flush-cut the fiber optic with the case, and hot glued it from the inside. The charging light was the most important to me, to know when the battery is full. But you can also see other colored lights through it, just not as well. I should have gone with the 1mm strand. I didn't have a drill bit that was the exact size of this one.
Added a second USB port in the contract area. Just takes a tiny bit of cutting, but fits much better than the Ext port.
L+R Buttons are large shallow tactile buttons. Turns out they mount FLUSH with the battery case. In my measurements, I thought they would protrude just a fraction of a mm, but didn't account for it's own way they sealed up the case. The 4 tiny dots in the corners. It's really hard to find these buttons, so I may scuff them up or try to do something minimal to them to give them texture. But since games rarely use them, I'm not too worried.
But this thing feels nice and sturdy. I think the extra weight of the speaker really helps in that feeling. I also used a Sharpie to mark all the screw mount holes for the AIO. Was much quicker in my testing of fit when I did that. Oh, and I built this from start to finish without testing anything along the way because I'm gangster like that. LOL. I did test the screen first. And I did test everything along the way with my first build. But this one, I just got lazy. All it was.
Nothing too fancy, but I did do a few things different than normal, or what I've seen others do. So I figured I'd pass along my build
I was able to get a large speaker in the case with Helders AIO. It takes some finesse, and a lot of shaving of the speaker, but it will fit.
I also ran a few wires underneath the AIO to conceal them. I drilled out a notch between the power strip to run the cables to it.
I used a 2mm Fiber Optic strand to better see my charging light. I hot glued one end to the Charging light, and drilled a hole in the side of the case. I flush-cut the fiber optic with the case, and hot glued it from the inside. The charging light was the most important to me, to know when the battery is full. But you can also see other colored lights through it, just not as well. I should have gone with the 1mm strand. I didn't have a drill bit that was the exact size of this one.
Added a second USB port in the contract area. Just takes a tiny bit of cutting, but fits much better than the Ext port.
L+R Buttons are large shallow tactile buttons. Turns out they mount FLUSH with the battery case. In my measurements, I thought they would protrude just a fraction of a mm, but didn't account for it's own way they sealed up the case. The 4 tiny dots in the corners. It's really hard to find these buttons, so I may scuff them up or try to do something minimal to them to give them texture. But since games rarely use them, I'm not too worried.
But this thing feels nice and sturdy. I think the extra weight of the speaker really helps in that feeling. I also used a Sharpie to mark all the screw mount holes for the AIO. Was much quicker in my testing of fit when I did that. Oh, and I built this from start to finish without testing anything along the way because I'm gangster like that. LOL. I did test the screen first. And I did test everything along the way with my first build. But this one, I just got lazy. All it was.
- The mark in green shows where I put the notch to allow for the cables to pass from under the AIO.
- 2016-11-12-14.59.jpg (379.67 KiB) Viewed 7770 times
- Shows just a single set of cables where I routed them.
- 2016-11-12-15.42.jpg (529.39 KiB) Viewed 7770 times
- Progress
- 2016-11-12-19.17.jpg (247.61 KiB) Viewed 7770 times
- Finished, minus the fiber cable.
- 2016-11-13-12.16.jpg (391.17 KiB) Viewed 7770 times
- Flush mounted L+R Buttons
- 2016-11-13-18.36.jpg (602.23 KiB) Viewed 7770 times
- Fiber Optic
- 2016-11-13-18.37.jpg (320.87 KiB) Viewed 7770 times
- Fiber Optic while charging
- 2016-11-13-19.02.jpg (134.34 KiB) Viewed 7770 times
- Complete
- 2016-11-13-19.03.jpg (341 KiB) Viewed 7770 times