Flashback hardware teardown?

[the antithesis]

I'm trying to teach myself electronics (yeah I know) and was wondering if anyone had done a teardown of the hardware in the flashback consoles, with the possible exception of the FB 2 since many have modded that one to accept cartridges.

 

I'm working with a FB4 and find the PCB laughably tiny. So much space... I'm not having much luck finding out what some of the components are. There's tons of surface mount resisters, capacitors, a few inductors, transistors, etc. But I'm more interested in the main chip. I looked up the numbers and think I've identified the SDRAM and Flash memory chips. I assume the games/menu software are stored in the flash, which might be bad as I've heard somewhere that flash degrades over time. I've had no luck finding out what's under the black blob, but that did give me a chance to learn about chip on board manufacturing.

 

Has anyone done a breakdown of the hardware specs? I am curious what's in there.

[jaybird3rd]

It's difficult to study the hardware of modern devices like the Flashbacks because they mostly consist of highly integrated chips that are hidden underneath globs of epoxy. I don't happen to know exactly what hardware AtGames is using in the new Flashback systems; it's some sort of proprietary emulation platform. I'm sure that's a lot cheaper than a clone of the original hardware would have been, but it also makes it harder to hack in a cartridge port, as you could with the Flashback 2.

 

When it comes to learning about electronics, you might have better luck starting with an inexpensive home computer from the 1980s: they're sophisticated enough to teach you something about electronics, yet simple enough for a novice to explore, and it's usually possible to identify the major components and design your own modifications and upgrades. I learned a lot about electronics tinkering with the Mattel Aquarius, which (at the time) was a computer that wasn't much in demand among collectors and could be found relatively cheaply. If schematics are available for the system that you choose, that makes things even easier.

[Keatah]

Agree.

[Kokovec69]

In my opinion the best way to learn about electronics is to learn how to program and interface microcontrollers.

My favorite is the PSOC but the Microchip PICs are very popular as well.

Of course you can always pick up one of the many Arduino boards that are available.

Many websites sell development boards and kits to help you get started.

[Keatah]

That would be the best way to learn about interfacing and microcontrollers.

 

For electronics the best way is to play with the discrete components like transistors, resistors, capacitors, switches, wires, batteries, and coils and diodes and tubes. That's electronics.

[Kokovec69]

Ah, yes, for analog circuits there's no better way than to get down to the component level.

[Keatah]

For digital electronics you'll want to play with switches and light bulbs. And quickly advancing into basic circuitry like AND, OR, NAND, NOR, and INVERTER gates. And then perhaps some combinations of them to make adders and flip-flops and memory cells, counters.