May 2014 Lab Journal

A couple of months ago I started working on a project which has its origins on an SMSPower.org thread. Basically, some homebrew developers were asking how hard it would be to produce blank Sega Master Games which could be burned by the homebrewer and distributed as a real game. I jumped on the occasion to develop this! To the right is a picture of a 3D printed SMS case I made. I will use this to make small runs of moulded cases using casting products from Smooth-On. This is by no means a large scale solution, it can allow small runs of games to be at a reasonable price.

On the electronics side, I've already completed the PCB design for blank games and am currently working on the game writer.

 

Today I finally managed to finish routing the second revision of the FM Power Base Converter. I will order these boards today and hopefully I'll be receiving them within 3 weeks. This second revision addresses several shortcomings of the first revision such as the lack of a reset generator and provided better isolation between digital and analog circuits.