Jump to content
Unfortunately we had to take download section back offline temporarily. We should have it working normally soon.

Building a "Super Nintendo" with Dolphin Bar.


Honosuseri

Recommended Posts

A good friend of mine has taken on a very cool project, a "Super Nintendo". He's taken a dead old skool NES console, gutted it and intends to put the Shield TV, extra storage etc. hidden inside the old console. It's been painted Pearl White and he has no issue with the wiring wizardy required HOWEVER...

What's the deal with the Dolphin bar to use Wii remotes? If anyone uses one with their STV I'd love to hear from you. It's dimensions would be handy, I'm wondering if it could also fit internally and if line of sight is required..the flap could just be lifted on the console. Is it simply "plug and play" via USB? What's your opinions on it...is it worth it?

As far as software goes (Hyperspin, Kodi, Arc Browser, Emulators etc.) I've done that with him, the STV is fully functional. Setting up the Dolphin EMU is a PITA, binding the  Gamecube controls to the STV gamepad isn't difficult but the Wii controls would really benefit from using the genuine controllers.

Thanks in advance for any help provided
31180282_10155164338026331_6322414287478325248_o.jpg.d89707eef9dead4a8a319472cf58c3ea.jpg
 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, Grrrrallye said:

Dude. Your baby as well.

You know i can not cover the geek wizzardy side of it. Painting is easy

My baby? Nah, nothing to do with me...I ain't paying no child support! ;)

Don't sell yourself short dude! A few of the Forum members know I'm off, you should get plenty of help and guidance here when needed. Us Android users are a smaller part of the Hyperspin family but we try to stick together. I'm sure plenty of people will love to see how this progresses :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Grrrrallye said:

That will be cool.

I have not got a photo yet, but i have the LED working on the power button as well

Oh we do love build logs! You can never have too many pics, you can also copy and paste Youtube links here. I certainly can't wait to see it "finished" :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

30 minutes ago, Grrrrallye said:

Just having some issues with physics now.  I want to house the 2 power packs indide the nes but not sure its going to work with the worlds biggest HDD caddy

Yeah a bus powered USB caddy with a 2.5 inch HDD would have made more sense.

Good news is pretty much all the apps/emulators are actually installed to the internal storage. I'd suggest you backup the Hyperspin folder, I did move SPMC and Arc Browser to external storage too. If you want to change the drive...SPMC you can probably still move back to internal but you'd lose Arc Browser (it's library is quite large because of artwork) . You can copy the Hyperspin folder back to the new drive once formatted and there should be no issue at all.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Really nice to see something with more power than a Pi going in a retro case. :)

I have the dolphin bar and for the price tag its pretty awesome for wiimotes and dolphin emulator. (Going on 2 games of tennis I played) not a wii fan. Wanted it for lightguns but was a non starter really.

Wiimotes+dolphin 100% get it. Anything else android wise no point except for a testing project. 

I will get you dimemtions tomorrow as going to bed now

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, thatman84 said:

Really nice to see something with more power than a Pi going in a retro case. :)

I have the dolphin bar and for the price tag its pretty awesome for wiimotes and dolphin emulator. (Going on 2 games of tennis I played) not a wii fan. Wanted it for lightguns but was a non starter really.

Wiimotes+dolphin 100% get it. Anything else android wise no point except for a testing project. 

I will get you dimemtions tomorrow as going to bed now

LEGEND! Now you've seen this thread, I can "do a runner" and have a clear conscience ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

28 minutes ago, thatman84 said:

You drive a hard bargain lol

eta for dimensions 21:00 :) 

Honestly there is no real rush. I know the Dolphin Bar isn't a lot to buy and also works for the PC, which would actually be the better way of emulating the Wii. I am not a Nintendo fan at all BUT my buddy is, so I'd like the games that do run quite well to be enjoyable to play.

Uploads are already done, directly to you. Not all of the themes are mine (e.g Doom 3, Tomb Raider), I used some from the PC version of the games. You know the crack sometimes themes do need converting to work on Android, I did make the other themes though. They're a "rush job" but are good enough for me. I hope they're of use, you can distribute them as you see fit on here fella.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

From what I’ve heard, most GameCube and Wii games don’t run particularly well through dolphin on the shield tv. I may be wrong, but there really isn’t any android device with enough muscle to run dolphin at full speed. PC is still the way to go if you definitely have to have GameCube and Wii.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 minutes ago, Tribe Fan said:

From what I’ve heard, most GameCube and Wii games don’t run particularly well through dolphin on the shield tv. I may be wrong, but there really isn’t any android device with enough muscle to run dolphin at full speed. PC is still the way to go if you definitely have to have GameCube and Wii.

I hear what your saying and I'm new here so dont test me on the technical, but Hono has done a cracking job of getting the GC running on my STV. Some games run better than others sure but Mario Kart is now running at a playable speed although the sound does suffer at times.

Had a quick try of Metroid Prime the other day and mostly runs well unless you change form and the camera moves (1st person to 3rd person) and thats when it struggles.

For such a small device im massively impressed

Link to comment
Share on other sites

GC works well for alot of games although the one I played fkr a few hours ended up crapping ojt (Carmen Sandiego)

Wii is not to bad I have heard from others. Theres a guy on facebook putting a working set together for shield controller iirc.

I thought dolphin added better support for original wiimotes a while back. Not sure if that extended to Android. Side note theres new activity at reicast for DC emulation that sounds promosing.

Anyway dolphin bar just before my deadline lol!

240mm long

24mm wide

11mm high

Couldnt find the stand as house is diy messy :(

20180426_203523.jpg20180426_203552.jpg

20180426_203611.jpg

@Honosuseri i will take a look at the themes another day and up them here. Thanks and have a safe trip. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 minutes ago, thatman84 said:

@Honosuseri i will take a look at the themes another day and up them here. Thanks and have a safe trip. :)

No worries, thanks fella! Proper job on the measurements too! :)

Tribe fan is right the STV is not perfect for GC/Wii emulation BUT we have some games playable. I think it's cool to be able to see them included alongside the other Retro Nintendo systems. Yes as I said earlier, PC would be the better way to go (for everything really) BUT the STV is impressive for what it is and makes a great companion device if you have a PC with an Nvidia GPU.

My friend is actually being quite modest, he has a water cooled Xbox 360 in the Millenium Falcon Star Wars toy (he'll try giving me credit for that project too no doubt, as he's a nice guy). He has always wanted to do something with the NES case and spit balled the idea of a PC build in one BUT I talked him out of it.

I've seen these already done well BUT a half height GPU like a 750Ti would hamstring the PC gaming potential (even if it did cover the emulation needs well). Yeah sure we now have AMD's better APU's but again, these would require a GPU to play modern triple A titles really well. If you're gonna spend the money building a PC, you really should get the most out of it as Mini-ITX builds are hardly cost effective. Well that's my opinion anyway.


 

317612_10150370784995345_330041735_n.jpg

316703_10150370784835345_2058656602_n.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As per....sounds like pretty good advice and that xbox looks slick :)

 

Funny you memtion the 750ti low profile. Thats what i have in the boxed up PC. Built it for emulation but a drive failed and the house was about to kick off so shelved it for the Shield to keep life "simple" and keyboard free!

Nearly 2yrs on and the house is still a mess Shield emulation is nothing but simple and slend most of my evenings on a underpowered laptop keyboard for my needs. Need to make better choices lol.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, thatman84 said:

As per....sounds like pretty good advice and that xbox looks slick :)

Funny you memtion the 750ti low profile. Thats what i have in the boxed up PC. Built it for emulation but a drive failed and the house was about to kick off so shelved it for the Shield to keep life "simple" and keyboard free!

Nearly 2yrs on and the house is still a mess Shield emulation is nothing but simple and slend most of my evenings on a underpowered laptop keyboard for my needs. Need to make better choices lol.

Cheers! Choices are key mate. I have the GTX 960 4GB, told at the time it wasn't worth buying (I had my own opinion). Cost me £150 (on par with 2GB model) and got MGS: Phantom Pain with it. Fast forward 2 years, still as good as a 1050Ti. Playing the same games as current consoles, have the PC back catalogue and of course emulation more varied and impressive than the STV.

I've done a Mini-ITX HTPC system for my old dear. In the pic you can see it's actually sitting on my laptop. It's as small as I was willing to go...I know I could get my 960 GPU in there too. The Pentium G4560 is no slouch really, I got that before the prices rocketed because of demand for it.

Had the STV a couple of years too, it's used daily. Yes there was a learning curve but it's good out the box as is. The ultimate package I've ended up with is pretty slick. Wife approval rating is high when you can just use your voice to search for a movie to play (in Kodi) or say "Mario" and see the games spanning across the different systems (from Arc Browser). Geforce Now subscription adds PC quality graphics, if you buy a game you get the key for PC too. Once you have the gaming PC you can ditch G-NOW and do Gamestream from your PC. Hyperspin is just the icing on the cake, as a bit of showing off really ;)

 

Hono-one very neon.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As you can see on some of the pics, there is a little damage on the lid section where the clear has reacted with the paint below. I have had to leave that as is because my paint stills dont stretch far enough to do too much with that.

I'm going to have to get a new HDD as the 3.5" with the caddy means i cant quite get everything into one housing

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, thatman84 said:

Cool light do you hook it up to thr on off switch? Cant think of a way to liven up the shield with though being touch sensitive. Actually how do you do that when fully powered down, the shield is going in the NES case right?

Its a bit of a cheat. Like i said, its not functional. 

I have a USB Y cable inone of the ports. One side of the Y is for pad charging, the other side, i cut, stripped and soldered across the switch contacts and LED.

I dont know if i can make the USB ports switch off with the shield asleep maybe? That would then mean that the LED would only work when the STV is ON. 

The other option, would be to cut the incoming power from the power pack and run that through the switch to power the STV, then take my modified USB directly to the LED.

Only issue here is that woulf power the STV on and off all the time.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So shiny new 2.5 drive and caddy turned up yesterday.

I now have to backup my drive following Hono's notes that he left me.

I have decided to make the power switch functional and use this to power off the STV. I will not have to use it, but it will give me the option should the device crash or I want to shut off the drive from running 24/7.

Time to bust out the soldering iron again

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...