Flexible IDE mod pcb

Why all the hate? Hmm, maybe because of the know-it-all holier-than-thou attitude? The creator of USBGDRom is kind of a shady person. And sorry, most of us don't have $200+ for that device. Also, it isn't 100% compatible, in fact even GDEmu isn't totally 100% either, so just because you heard the guy tested 100 titles means nothing. 100 titles is not close to 100%.

I have always admired what SWAT and Megavolt85 are doing with Dreamshell. It is way more feature rich than the front ends that GDEmu and USB-GDRom have. I would prefer the Dreamcast to be more PC-like anyways. Plus, Dreamshell is always getting better support. Dreamcast has official mouse and keyboard, plus lots of PC game ports retail and homebrew, so adding a Hard-Drive to make it THAT much more PC-like is way better.

Also, I don't know if you have heard, but there is such a thing as IDE to SATA adapters. They absolutely work with it.

My ideal modded Dreamcast would look something like this with a modded karaoke case, and a HDD inside of it. Would swap out the internals and put them up for safe keeping.



Please excuse the low resolution.

This was a mod done by Spinksy over at Dreamcast-Talk forums around 2011 or so I reckon. I should have saved the original pictures but didn't. Anyways what he did here was swapped out the internals of the karaoke addon and installed an old standard PC Zip Drive, as well as modded in a USB connection to try and replicate the official prototype zip drive addon.

Now, if one could hook up a USB Y splitter cable, and connect it to the HDD with some kind of adapter, it might be possible to make adding and removing games more simple? Hell maybe wiring up a serial SD card internally and copying games from that to the HDD could be easily done as well.

This is the great thing about the Dreamcast community, there are multiple solutions for multiple types of people. It is great to have so many ODE options.

 

I enjoyed! Make more and offer for sale, I certainly gonna buy one.

 

It's the gdemu that isn't very good. It has a lot of issues. whether if he's a shady person or you can afford it or not. The fact still remains the usb gdrom is a great product. You seem a little bitter about it. mmmmm

 

sorry, but more silly I heard nothing
if ODE cannot emulate an image of a disk, it means not for 100% it is compatible

you have GDEMU?
as it is possible to claim that one product is better than another if you did not hold other product in hand


You try to justify the choice with ODE now, acquit him without us, to us all the same what you spent $200 for

In this branch it is not interestingly simple to audience to disassemble the console and to insert ODE, we like mod's, this our hobby which brings us pleasure

 

No I have the USB GDrom. Which every game I've played works perfect. gdemu has a lot more games that don't work. I glad you're happy with what's good for you. I wasn't happy with that, so for me the usb gdrom works great and I'm extremely happy with it.

Lifes to short to argue on which one is better. I know for me I'm happy with the usb gdrom. You enjoy yours.

 

My GDEMU work fine too and every game I've played works perfect too.

 

He was joking as he's involved in DreamShell development, and he isn't a weakling by any measure.

That said, GDEmu/USB-GDRom are much more expensive and hard to get than those IDE mods.

And what about the GDEmu hate? Very few games don't work on GDEmu, I think all retail games do. Plus there's GDMenu, which is cute. If you're basing your opinion on MNemo's "comparison" on his website, you're basing your opinion on strongly false and biased data. MNemo has oftentimes showed that he isn't as professional in his communication and portrayal of facts as a serious businessman should be. That said, IMO both devices are wonders of reverse engineering and their pros/cons make either one a fit for different people.

megavolt and SWAT are really doing a nice job of reverse engineering. Even if games would be unplayable, the amount of stuff they learn (and teach us in the way) is impressive. They also don't have anything to sell and share their work in an open-source software, which is amendable in itself.

On-topic: Good job on the Flex PCB, keep us updated!

 

I can afford it, but my wife wont let me lol.

 

Haha.

Mine as well. That’s why I told her nothing after I bought it

 

If you want to keep said wife, not the best idea Plavix hehe, but don't worry we won't tell her.

 

I don't know why you discriminate IDE drives users,just because you are rich？

 

I'd also be willing to buy one of these.

 

yes, gdemu compatibility is 100%, but please remember first released is used by development , so it with high price, it's more suitable used by developer do researches on gdom's reading behaviors not only flaunt

 

As promised! Installation pics





now all I need to do is remove the pesky bulky power supply so I can actually fit the hard drive in... Pico it is then I guess!

I probably could've done with giving a few extra mm since it's a pretty difficult fit being that I wasn't particularly smart and used my rough measure...

But overall I'm happy with the results, I now get to keep my drive and (when I move the psu) house a hard drive inside! (yeeey)

Somebody had mentioned that this is possibly unstable, so I'll be doing some testing with it to make sure it's not actually, and I plan on foam taping the header down so it's got no movement on it, since that was the problem with it being flexible I read(?)

 

I'm afraid with the pico psu, you don't win enough space for your hdd... But you can have a look for pico psu and his power supply and the ide to sata connector:
https://assemblergames.com/threads/need-some-help-to-connect-sata-hdd-to-40pin-dreamcast.68272/

But maybe you can plug your hdd outside the dreamcast ? I'm seeing now it will be difficult...

Anyway beautiful work

 

I did some measuring and it should fit there, though it won't be sitting flat, it'll be on a slant like / leaning against the gd rom drive.

Though if I can get my hands on a dreampsu that guy was making it'll save me a little bit of a hassle and worrying about space so much.

I'll figure it out either way definitely and thank you for that idea actually, I could solder one of those ide to sata connectors right onto the pcb and save some room using a sata cable instead - idk yet but I've got a few options to go through right now for sure!

 

Can you write to a USB-GDROM? No? You can write to an IDE hard drive.
There's at least one use case where having the IDE mod is superior.
You also have to give up your GD-ROM for USB-GDROM.
Let's say for example you want to dump GD-ROMs (yes, there are still plenty of undumped games, especially Japanese ones), but you don't want to spend $100+ on a BBA nor do you want the slow transfer speeds of serial devices.
IDE mod is extremely cheap and does the job.

All that aside, GDEmu doesn't have any issues, other than ordering one is a pain in the ass.

We get it, you like your USB-GDROM. You don't have to be an asshole about it.

I have like 10 Dreamcasts, and I have all of this shit, money is not always a factor here, so get off of your high horse and let people discuss what they want to discuss without injecting your rude shit.

 

I wonder.. if you can make it a little bit longer, would it be possible to fit a cf2ide reader and picu psu next to the gdrom drive?
Something like this: http://www.cf2ide.nl/product_info.php?cPath=22&products_id=33

EDIT or even better..
Get the smallest cf2ide adapter which requires a 44pin powerd ide-connector.
http://www.cf2ide.nl/product_info.php?cPath=22&products_id=34



Then solder this adapter onto your flex cable: https://www.ebay.com/i/172337684163?rt=nc

Then it should fit next to the gdrom drive together with the pico psu

 

The sister board flex cable is maneuverable, so I'm sure it'd work fine either way - else a female to female adapter to give it a little extra leeway, or just a straight ide cable.

Though if my testing usage of it over a week or two goes well and people would prefer a longer one, I could easily get more made if there's enough demand - I should note that the ide shrouded header I put on there I actually shortened the pins on the underside since they were pretty cumbersome and stuck it down on some foam tape so it doesn't move any

 

Alright mate.. well my goal is to have an internal CF-card and pico psu so I can keep the gdrom drive
So count me in