Seriously, the drawer pull on this Atari 2600 is not stock. Don’t they know this voids the warranty? The thing is, you won’t actually find any of the original internals anyway. When building this portable emulator housed in a 2600 case [Linear Nova] was careful to ensure that everything could be restored to its original condition (except for two hinges mounted on the back) sometime down the road. That’s a good goal to set for yourself. We think the build is the fun part of most projects and often wonder what to do with them when they’re done and our interest has waned.
A seven-inch LCD screen was attached to the underside of the lid using Velcro. When tilted up it’s at a nice viewing angle for the player. [Linear] prefers to use a Wii remote as the control this portable video game emulator. It connects to the Raspberry Pi over Bluetooth using a USB dongle. The advantage of this is that you just throw the remote inside the case too. For now there are two power cords, one for the RPi and the other for the LCD screen but he plans to add a power hub in the future to narrow this down to one. We wonder it that would also be a good time to add his own rechargeable battery pack option? There should be enough room for an RC style pack.
Where is joystick???
Each to their own but that was a pretty nice case butchered for a weak mod..
Read the description again.
There are permanent mods (hinges, and not mentioned in the description, but in the article, the drawer knob). I agree with Funkdat.
I concur, I would expect to see this in sunday links. However he did provide a good cost breakdown even if it his fit and finish is weak. The overall amount of content provides a decent amount of background, cost analysis, links to how it was all made to work together. Cutesy.
I have to agree to an extent. The hinges and knob improve the serviceability of the unit if the original hardware is replaced. However mounting the hinges on the outside and using a knob that doesn’t even match the wood finish looks cheap. On top of that those hinges mounted in a vicarious manner that’s probably going to crack the casing at some point in the near future.
Why do people insist on destroying vintage electronics and throwing away parts of it for the sake of putting Raspberry Pi’s and similar things into their cases?
I don’t get it either.
Strongly agree. It’s a waste.
If the original electronics didn’t work and someone spent weeks testing what’s borken and reverse-engineering a part in a smart and novel way, then, great, very cool. Worthy of HaD.
But destroying a classic for the sake of sticking the tech-du-jour in the same box? meh.
…sort of like making a ferris wheel with a vintage erector set, and saying you “hacked” it with K’nex parts.
Because they own them, and they can do whatever they want. It’s not like thats the last Atari 2600 on Earth.
A working atari 2600 is around $200. A completely non-functional atari 2600 is about $30
Repairing the original is really not an option.
“A working atari 2600 is around $200”
in what twisted universe is that?
To all those that are are sad about this hack here go save this 2600 http://www.ebay.com/itm/Atari-2600-Black-Vader-Console-NTSC-CONSOLE-ONLY-AS-IS-UNTESTED-/151071802385?pt=Video_Games&hash=item232c94c411
2600s are not rare. Someday the maybe but they made millions of them. If this was even something like a SuperPet, Altair, SOL, or some other rare old machine I can see it but 2600s are not rare.
Time to buy all the cheap ones, turn them into handbags, and flip them on etsy.
Handbag with adressable pixel matrix plz
This genre of hack is becoming so common, I think it deserves a nickname. I hereby dub it the Shyamalan. Example usage:
“I Shyamalaned a Raspberry Pi into an Atari 2600… What a twist!”
Simpson’s did it already. It’s called “pulling a Homer”. ;)
to pie; I pied an Atari 2600.