Got the confirmation from Japan today.

ENGINEER DTC-27 \1,274.-
Carriage charge \420.-
Tatal \1,694.-

So not bad, about $21 including shipping.
In Swedish currency 132,89 has been withdrawn from my bank account.

Seems like anyone with a credit card can shop there.

Seems like a proper one, a little expensive though – looks like the one I linked to last. I haven’t gotten the total yet, but I ordered one…
It’s US$15.54 at rakuten.com, I imagine that with shipping it will be about the price (without shipping) of the one you linked to. But who knows how much shipping costs on a single driver shipped internationally from Japan is…

Found another proper model:
http://en.item.rakuten.com/monju/800-dtc-27/

I bought it too, for the same reasons, but sent it back for a full refund (including shipping costs).

I have asked rs-online but as they want company-customers I’m not sure I’ll even get an answer.

I think Krisse should buy a few and sell here in a PlanetVB-shop.

BTW, I bought four of these to build a connector myself:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=280541800459

Feels good not having to use or modify the one in my spare VB “head”.

Yes I have a male connector that can interface between VB cartridges.
(…)
I do like the name “VBSD”, that’s a great idea. I can’t use the word “flash” anywhere though because there is no actual flash memory on the board (other than the micro).

Do you mean that you have ONE connector for yourself currently or do you mean that you also know where to buy more connectors that fits with no modification?

The male connector that fit’s the 2/2mm female connector won’t fit in a cart, pins are too thick and also square.

Nice solution with the PCMCIA-pins and the 2.5″ hard drive adapters. I had been looking at PCMCIA connectors before but haven’t tried it, actually have a broken laptop I was planning to steal the connector/s from.

As all carts are already dumped (unless there are variations) I guess the only use for one would be to dump SRAM from the FlashBoy Plus and my original Galactic Pinball cart.

As you plan to load from SD to a ram chip, will it be possible to write to that ram from the VB as well?

Hörru… har du fått tag på någon mejsel än, den på Tradera var ju för kort…

I bought one of these:
http://www.tradera.com/Gamebit-4-5mm-med-handtag-oppna-N64-Gamecube-Sega-Master—auktion_301509_127860359

… and it didn’t fit in the two hard ones, the handle touches the middle part before it gets to the bottom. There’s only about 55mm until the handle starts, to be on the safe side you need 74mm… It works but it’s a bad fit over the screws, it should have been a little bit smaller.

So maybe that one at rs-online is the next bet, that one also looked good.

Order from Sweden:
http://se.rs-online.com/web/search/searchBrowseAction.html?method=searchProducts&searchTerm=4447891&x=0&y=0
Costs 100 SEK, I’m guessing tax and shipping costs as well…

So, don’t buy this, it won’t fit the last two screws, it can possibly be modified but the nudges on the metal that grips the inside of the handle are very close to the bottom part of the handle:

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My thought was that there might be some space left if you extended the board so you had something to grab hold of if you wanted to unplug the board from the VB.

Every time I see the name VBOOT I can’t help thinking of a boot.

That button is perhaps why he unscrew the bottom piece.

Great link there, very neat idea letting several people fill up a panel together. Then you can make just a few boards very cheap.

I actually work at a PCB manufacturer, I guess I should ask how much cheaper I can get it…

About that offer of a graphic design, perhaps you can put something on the copper of the PCB, or as silkscreen – or a combination? If you use standard green you can combine silver (pad), light green, darker green and white silk screen. Could perhaps be possible to work out something neat in those four colors.

Yes, that’s possible…

I’m an active member in seven or eight forums and this is the only one that doesn’t have such a setting in the “profile settings”.

I see no reason why it couldn’t work exactly like the “Attach Signature” to enable it globally in all posts via the user settings. So it feels more like it’s a choice not to have it, maybe it reduces traffic?

I guess I can just try and remember to click that every time.

Here’s the link again:
http://www.tradera.com/Gamebit-4-5mm-med-handtag-oppna-N64-Gamecube-Sega-Master—auktion_301509_127860359

This will fit with no modification.

Sure, I’ll help.

If you have plans to swap batteries before they quit on you (could be time to do that on all of them actually) and you want to keep the saved games you could hook up a pair of AA batteries in a holder to the + and – poles while swapping.

This is how the batteries look:

Digikey seems to have something appropriate:
http://parts.digikey.com/1/parts/1274-battery-lithium-coin-3v-w-tab-cr-1616-f2n.html

Panasonic also call them “CR1616/F2N”
http://www.panasonic.com/industrial/batteries-oem/oem/primary-coin-cylindrical/br-cr.aspx
http://www.panasonic.com/industrial/includes/pdf/CR-1616-F2N%28CR1616-1F2%29.pdf

If you buy at least 1200 you can also buy them here:
http://02d3f5d.netsolstores.com/crcoin.aspx

mouser.com had something that could be modified as well, just need to bend the welded holders out.
http://www2.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Renata/CR1616FH-LF/?qs=sGAEpiMZZMtz8P%2feuiupSXYzgQGThVtD6F9mua1fEEo%3d
http://www.renata.com/pdf/tabbed%20lithium/2pins_horizontal/CR1616FH-LF.pdf

So digikey is probably the best option unless you want to solder the two pieces from the old battery. I recommend scraping the surface of the battery with a dremel disc or similar and apply solder to the battery first if you choose that method. Heating for too long may wreck the battery so be careful.

How will you prevent wobbling up and down if it’s a “naked” cart?

If you would add some more length, enough for it to peek out of the opening you could add a semi-circle grip cut in, like the profile of this cart:

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Here’s the one for you akumie, on Swedish Tradera:
http://www.tradera.com/Gamebit-4-5mm-med-handtag-oppna-N64-Gamecube-Sega-Master—auktion_301509_127860359

If HonkeyKong would look at my first link he’d see that they do the same thing, just with a shorter gamebit.

Here’s one:
http://uk.rs-online.com/web/search/searchBrowseAction.html?method=getProduct&R=4447891#header

Googled it from here:
http://assemblergames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27327&page=2

Where you can also see these wonderful pictures of what was delivered:

More information:
http://www.bas-components.co.uk/UK/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=18&Itemid=43

Looks like it could be prefect for a Virtual Boy.

£8.15

Apparently the same driver has been used here:
http://www.planetvb.com/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?post_id=10459&topic_id=3446

It will fit over the screw but you’ll need to grind it round to be able to fit it in the deep holes and then cut a trace in the end so you can turn it with a plain screwdriver.
http://www.projectvb.com/tech/securitybit.html

Modifying a flat screwdriver will be quicker, both will probably be a good solution, you could use the proper bit for the screws you can reach and the modded screwdriver for the deeper ones. It will save some wear on that.

http://www.projectvb.com/dissect.html

There are plain looking screwdrivers with a gamebit head but it was a ling time since I saw one of those for sale.

I agree, when you have a working prototype and when you’re going to make the final board there needs to be some part to grip to get it out of the VB.

Bigger board doesn’t seem like a big problem if you weren’t planning on having a shell anyway.