Nintendo 64 RGB Blur fixing

[borti4938]

Thank you for the short feedback. GitHub source is updated https://github.com/borti4938/n64rgb
I also changed the controller sampling for IGR functions. Now it should work better. I also changed the button combinations slightly (see readme).

By the way: For me Star Fox 64 looks better to me in the 15bit mode rather than in the full color mode.

I also discovered the damn strangest thing while poking around just now. If the deblur is set to on, and I hold my thumb across the board between the Altera chip and the ribbon cable the interference goes away and everything looks crisp. Move my thumb and it comes right back. I discovered this by accident as I was trying to hold a wire to bridge bad A and G. This just seems really strange. :0 :/

Could you make a sketch where you have to press your finger onto the PCB?

[that1crzywhtguy]

Could you make a sketch where you have to press your finger onto the PCB?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-QiXc ... p=drivesdk

It seems if I hold my finger on either of the spots marekd by the blue circles, the issue goes away.

[leonk]

image broken

[that1crzywhtguy]

image broken

Switched to link.

[borti4938]

Could you also take a picture of your installation?

[that1crzywhtguy]

Could you also take a picture of your installation?

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-QiX ... GYtcjRSZ0U

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-QiX ... 1NWVmI3cjQ

There are a couple.

In the first you'll notice that I had to run a wire because of the flex cable being damaged, but the problem existed before the damage to the flex cable; I damaged the flex cable in poking around trying to find the source of the problem.

In the second photo you will see a little messy soldering at the switch pads, but again, I damaged a pad after screwing around hunting for the problem. Currently, I exposed a bit of the trace since the pad got torn off, and I have bridged it with the ground pad so the deblur is currently stuck on.

[borti4938]

In the first you'll notice that I had to run a wire because of the flex cable being damaged, but the problem existed before the damage to the flex cable; I damaged the flex cable in poking around trying to find the source of the problem.

Pin 1 of the AVDC-NUS is nothing else than GND. Have you soldered it to D0? If so, that's wrong; remove it in that case.
There is no need to 'repair' this pad on the flex cable. First there is another GND pin and second you can also wire another GND connection, e.g. to the MultiAV as you have done it.

Could you resolder pin 3 (D1) at the AVDC-NUS? Connection might be a bit loose; at least it looks like.

In the second photo you will see a little messy soldering at the switch pads, but again, I damaged a pad after screwing around hunting for the problem. Currently, I exposed a bit of the trace since the pad got torn off, and I have bridged it with the ground pad so the deblur is currently stuck on.

Be careful here. Seems like you have damaged the solder mask around the G pad.

Have you isolated your PCB a the bottom? I have no idea what else could cause your problem as you have to push either on two different positions on the PCB...
What you could also try is to reflow the input side of the CPLD. It might be tricky if you never have done it due to the fine pitch.

Deblur always on is not a good idea but this is another deal...

[that1crzywhtguy]

Pin 1 of the AVDC-NUS is nothing else than GND. Have you soldered it to D0?

No, that is actually soldered to pin 2. Hard to get a great image as I don't have a macro camera.
I have checked with a multimeter to be sure it isn't bridged to pin 1, and to make sure it is solidly connected to the mod.

Could you resolder pin 3 (D1) at the AVDC-NUS? Connection might be a bit loose; at least it looks like.

I thought it was pretty solid, but I did double check it and do it again.

Have you isolated your PCB a the bottom? I have no idea what else could cause your problem as you have to push either on two different positions on the PCB...

Pardon my ignorance, but what does this mean to isolate the pcb at the bottom?

What you could also try is to reflow the input side of the CPLD. It might be tricky if you never have done it due to the fine pitch.

Yeah, I've never done this before, but I've done some detailed stuff in the past. I'll give this a shot.

Deblur always on is not a good idea but this is another deal...

I don't mean to have it set that way permanently, just to simplify for testing instead of having the switch wires dangling around till I get this sorted (likely how I damaged the pad in the first place).

[that1crzywhtguy]

Okay, I tried the reflow, and no dice.

I'm thinking that either the mod is defective, or there is a gremlin in my n64 itself. It's just the oddest thing because of the hold-my-finger-on-it-and-it-works-great aspect.

I have yet to try and reflash, mostly because I haven't learned how to use the blaster yet and have been really slammed with homework and work. I may check it out. I just cracked open this other n64 I found at the thrift store for $10 to see what the insides look like. Same chip, so I'll likely need to order another of those ribbon cables as I don't really feel confident I can remove the other one without damaging it further. That should tell me if it's the the mod or the n64 to blame.

Will update.

[that1crzywhtguy]

Okay, problem solved!!!

I'd like to send out a BIG thank you to everyone who helped me troubleshoot this problem!

I flashed borti's firmware with igr, wired up the 2 extra necessary wires, and it works like a charm.

I'm mystified as to why this works now, but you know the whole gift horse bit!

Hurrrahh!!!!

[BuckoA51]

Regarding the switching between de-blur and non de-blur, could this be wired up to the reset switch and power LED in a similar way to the Saturn/Megadrive 50/60hz mods? Therefore giving us.. short press = reset, hold down = toggle between de-blur and no de-blur? Having the LED indicator to show if the effect was on or off would be useful I think.

[holaplaneta]

Okay, problem solved!!!

Nice, good to hear.

So you ended wiring two things at the end?

One cable from A to G and a switch from M to G on the N64RGB board or something like that? One for the deblur switch and the other for the 15 bit color?

[that1crzywhtguy]

So you ended wiring two things at the end?

One cable from A to G and a switch from M to G on the N64RGB board or something like that? One for the deblur switch and the other for the 15 bit color?

Actually, I flashed it with the IGR firmware that allows switching to happen from the controller. In order to do that, you wire one wire from the A pad to pin 16 of the PIF-NUS (on most n64 consoles) and another from pad M to pin 27 of the PIF-NUS.

This allows resetting, deblur, and 15-bit control to happen from the controller. Most importantly, however, for my particular case, was it got rid of that awful interference issue and I know have juicy RGB on my 25" PVM!

[borti4938]

Regarding the switching between de-blur and non de-blur, could this be wired up to the reset switch and power LED in a similar way to the Saturn/Megadrive 50/60hz mods? Therefore giving us.. short press = reset, hold down = toggle between de-blur and no de-blur? Having the LED indicator to show if the effect was on or off would be useful I think.

I don't know if you have recognised: I changed the button combinations in such a way that there is not a single button combination for toggling anymore. Now you have separate combination for switching debtor on and off. So, if you don't know where you are you can simply press one combination and then you know where you are

https://github.com/borti4938/n64rgb


However, if you want to have it with your idea, you either need (an) additional pad(s) or solder to pin(s) of the CPLD. You need 'reset in' 'reset out' and 'LED red' (flashing indicator) or 'LED red' and 'LED green' (bicolour LED). What you could use out of the box is using a micro controller for that, which sits in between of the reset, LED and CPLD. The following code just need a minor adaptation for that.

https://github.com/borti4938/Switchless ... rclock.asm

[LDigital]

I have now got a deblur installed n64 and noticed that compared to my normal rgb n64 with the same cables the picture is offset well to the left, to the point that I need to make quite a large adjustment on the bvm to re centre things. Is this normal or can this be adjusted?

[BuckoA51]

I don't know if you have recognised: I changed the button combinations in such a way that there is not a single button combination for toggling anymore. Now you have separate combination for switching debtor on and off. So, if you don't know where you are you can simply press one combination and then you know where you are

Ah that's good, has the switching by button combination proven reliable? I think I was reading your notes and you had some doubts...

[borti4938]

"Proven" to be reliable is a bit hard. I won't guarantee that as I can only make some small tests. At least on the oscilloscope it looks good to me and after my latest change of the sampling it more responsive to controller inputs.
At the moment I work on storing the current state inside the CPLD such that one has his setting with a new power cycle.

[leonk]

I have now got a deblur installed n64 and noticed that compared to my normal rgb n64 with the same cables the picture is offset well to the left, to the point that I need to make quite a large adjustment on the bvm to re centre things. Is this normal or can this be adjusted?

I think this is because of the SCART cable you use. Use CSYNC cable rather than sync on luma.

[LDigital]

Csync Dispatched today. I'll let you know how it goes

[BuckoA51]

So do the versions on Tim's store now have the firmware that can use the controller to toggle deblur?

[borti4938]

No, it's the one where debtor can be switched on / off using a switch at pad A.

[Ikaruga11]

When will we get deblur that's on by default and can be toggled on/off with controller inputs?

[that1crzywhtguy]

When will we get deblur that's on by default and can be toggled on/off with controller inputs?

See Borti's previous post:

Well, I kept the 15bit mode because I had the hope that somebody like that. And at least one user like it

Just want to clarify: there are basically two firmware versions available inside my GitHub repository.

• First, selecting deblur and 15bit mode with a toggle switch on pad A and M
  • deblur: on by default; off by pad A to GND
  • 15bit mode: off by default; on by pad M to GND
  • POF file: https://github.com/borti4938/n64rgb/blo ... n64rgb.pof
• Second the version with the Controller remote control:
  • deblur: on by default on every power cycle and reset; toggle on/off by Dr + L + R + Cr
  • 15bit mode: off by default on every power cycle and reset; toggle on/off by Dl + L + R + Cl
  • reset: by A + B + Dd + Dr + L + R
  • POF file: https://github.com/borti4938/n64rgb/blo ... th_igr.pof

I got a question if other defaults with the controller remote control are possible... Maybe it is suitable to let the user decide what he wants as default. I have to think about that how to realise that without having four different pof-files

[Ikaruga11]

Thanks

So no one ever explained what 15-bit mode was and what it does. If everyone says it makes games look worse then what is it's purpose?

[that1crzywhtguy]

Thanks

So no one ever explained what 15-bit mode was and what it does. If everyone says it makes games look worse then what is it's purpose?

Borti explained this too actually.

It removes the two LSBs of each color channel and outputs a zero instead. Hence, you just have 5 bits for each color left (15bit in total) instead of 7 bits.
As far as I know, the N64 uses these bits to introduce a bit of noise over the picture. This mode removes this noise.
(I'm not 100% sure as I cannot find the reference where I've read this anymore. So just try it out...)

Don't forget your search functions.

[borti4938]

Thanks for referencing, @that1crzywhtguy
It is also described in the read me of the GitHub repository: https://github.com/borti4938/n64rgb

Actually, I do use the 15bit mode while playing Star Fox 64 or Blast Corps (this are two of the games I played during the last week(s)) for example. Just try it out

[LDigital]

I have now got a deblur installed n64 and noticed that compared to my normal rgb n64 with the same cables the picture is offset well to the left, to the point that I need to make quite a large adjustment on the bvm to re centre things. Is this normal or can this be adjusted?

I think this is because of the SCART cable you use. Use CSYNC cable rather than sync on luma.

Csync cable was the cure. Don't use a Luma sync with this mod. Cheers, it looks so nice now

[that1crzywhtguy]

I have now got a deblur installed n64 and noticed that compared to my normal rgb n64 with the same cables the picture is offset well to the left, to the point that I need to make quite a large adjustment on the bvm to re centre things. Is this normal or can this be adjusted?

I think this is because of the SCART cable you use. Use CSYNC cable rather than sync on luma.

Csync cable was the cure. Don't use a Luma sync with this mod. Cheers, it looks so nice now

Sweet! Game on! Glad you got yours worked out too. It really is a fantastic mod once it's dialed in.

[BuckoA51]

No, it's the one where debtor can be switched on / off using a switch at pad A.

Ah ok, I'll advise my customers wait a few weeks for the boards to be updated before ordering then.

[Nintendude94]

I have now got a deblur installed n64 and noticed that compared to my normal rgb n64 with the same cables the picture is offset well to the left, to the point that I need to make quite a large adjustment on the bvm to re centre things. Is this normal or can this be adjusted?

I think this is because of the SCART cable you use. Use CSYNC cable rather than sync on luma.

Csync cable was the cure. Don't use a Luma sync with this mod. Cheers, it looks so nice now

How did you wire your sync connection? Which pad did you use (CS75 or CS#)? I plan on using a Csync cable myself and want to make sure I wire this correctly.