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Reccommendations for an ips screen?

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Hello, I have a gba that I want to give to my niece for christmas, and i'm getting a friend to mod it as well. I was planning to get a battery pack from funnyplaying here ( https://funnyplaying.com/products/g...e-battery-typec-module?variant=40990145871933 ), but wasn't sure what ips screen to get as well. What do you reccommend I should buy?

Also the gba is an 02 motherboard which i've heard has power problems, but would it be fine to mod if it was just playing retail games?
 
Josh4u said:
Hello, I have a gba that I want to give to my niece for christmas, and i'm getting a friend to mod it as well. I was planning to get a battery pack from funnyplaying here ( https://funnyplaying.com/products/g...e-battery-typec-module?variant=40990145871933 ), but wasn't sure what ips screen to get as well. What do you reccommend I should buy?

Also the gba is an 02 motherboard which i've heard has power problems, but would it be fine to mod if it was just playing retail games?
Click to expand...
Probably this https://funnyplaying.com/products/agb-ips-max-display-kit

This if you want a more stock look (but it is an inferior screen) https://funnyplaying.com/products/ita-agb-tft-backlight-laminated-kit
 
Last edited by The Real Jdbye,
The Real Jdbye said:
Probably this https://funnyplaying.com/products/agb-ips-max-display-kit

This if you want a more stock look (but it is an inferior screen) https://funnyplaying.com/products/ita-agb-tft-backlight-laminated-kit
Click to expand...
it looks like I'd have to buy a shell either way, though it seems like the first one you linked might work better with a rechargeable battery. I'm open to either one to be honest, but I might lean towards the one that's easier for a kid to not mess up- I doubt she'll need all the extra bells and whistles. Do you know if it'd be feasible to install a battery mod for the more stock screen?
 
Josh4u said:
it looks like I'd have to buy a shell either way, though it seems like the first one you linked might work better with a rechargeable battery. I'm open to either one to be honest, but I might lean towards the one that's easier for a kid to not mess up- I doubt she'll need all the extra bells and whistles. Do you know if it'd be feasible to install a battery mod for the more stock screen?
Click to expand...
You can probably trim the OEM shell to fit, that being said it is a good opportunity to customize the GBA a little bit, replacement shells are not expensive so unless you have a particular reason you want to use the OEM shell such as nostalgia, may as well replace it.
You can even replace the buttons and membranes too to make a one of a kind GBA. Personally I suggest keeping the OEM membranes unless they're really worn as the aftermarket ones don't have the same feel. But I'd absolutely replace the buttons with something that goes well with whatever shell color you pick.

I don't think any screen mod will interfere with rechargeable batteries, they should all work just the same. The battery bay looks the same between both shells (the shells for IPS MAX and the shells for 3 inch laminated screens) and has the divider removed so you don't have to do any cutting to fit a lipo battery.

Edit: Looks like for the IPS MAX there is an extra plastic piece that holds the screen, so maybe trimming an OEM housing is no good for this kit. For the other one though, it looks like just a stock housing with some bits missing, so trimming should be possible. I wouldn't permanently modify the OEM housing when there are alternatives though.
 
Last edited by The Real Jdbye,
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Did some thinking on it, i'll probably get the laminated kit with the battery pack and a shell to put it in. I'll take your word on keeping the OEM membranes too. :D

Thanks for the help!
 
Josh4u said:
Did some thinking on it, i'll probably get the laminated kit with the battery pack and a shell to put it in. I'll take your word on keeping the OEM membranes too. :D

Thanks for the help!
Click to expand...
Which one? They're both laminated.

There is a third option I didn't mention because it's out of stock. It might be the best of both worlds (stock look with superior IPS screen), I'm not sure they make it anymore.
https://funnyplaying.com/products/3-0-inch-ips-agb-laminated-kit
(They technically have one version of it in stock but it's the SFC design that doesn't exactly look stock anyways)
 
I kinda don't trust funnyplaying since they have a bit of a monopoly on the GBA IPS market. Their main issue is that their screens draw a lot of power (then again, all of them do...).

The alternative is a company called Hispeedido. Here's a great comparison:

Skip to 10 minutes for the one above for a battery life comparison
 
Last edited by morelikejonarbuckle0,
morelikejonarbuckle0 said:
The alternative is a company called Hispeedido. Here's a great comparison:
Click to expand...
I checked out all three videos and i'm glad I held off for a bit on buying something; It's dissuaded me enough from buying a funnyplaying screen for now, at least the ips max. That being said i'm unsure between the V2 and the V5 that Hispeedido offers, and i'd still have to consider a shell that'd fit the mod as well unless one of the ones in the second video's link would work.

The cheapest V5 I saw was for $51 at this link, which might be their aliexpress store?
https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256811970677179.html
I found some V2 screens for around $60-65 just by looking around a bit
https://www.zedlabz.com/products/ip...tional-soldering-gba-agb-001-black-hispeedido
https://handheldlegend.com/products/game-boy-advance-ips-backlight

If the first link's legit I might pick it up from aliexpress alongside an ips ready shell. Still have to decide if/what kind of battery mod would be a good idea.
Citizen_404 said:
I'm with the guy on the video, I'd rather have a bunch of rechargeable batteries than using a lithium ion battery.
Click to expand...
My thought was that it might be better for my sister to deal with a charging cable instead of needing to charge batteries, or that it might be safer for the kid, but I wouldn't be opposed to saving a bit of money by buying batteries instead :P
 
I prefer the laminated ITA kit but that's just me. I want that pixel grid look.

I also don't recommend the battery mod. Again, just preference but I'd rather use rechargeable AA's. Using high capacity AA's I get about 8-10 hours of gameplay and when one set dies, I can swap in another pre-charged pair in about 10 seconds. Also, when I temporarily lose interest in GBA because I get sunk into a game on some other platform, I can take the batteries out and leave the thing for a week or 5 years with no worries.

Another thing about funnyplaying screens, afaik whether it's IPS or ITA the board and ribbon cable come equipped with a "touch" control that involves tapping the top of the console. No thanks. Plenty of complaints in online reviews about phantom inputs from the touch control. I found instructions for deleting that function entirely and I access the screen settings menu (which, how often do you really need it after initial setup??) by holding Select for several seconds. Easy and simple like it should be. You can search my old posts (search for me saying "funnyplaying") - somewhere in there is one where I link to those instructions. Or you can pm me if interested.

This is one of three GBA's I've 'built' using the FP ITA laminated kit. If you blow the pic up to full size you can see the screen pixels.
1000779526.jpg
 
Last edited by Hanafuda,
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Josh4u said:
I think the second one you linked, https://funnyplaying.com/products/ita-agb-tft-backlight-laminated-kit
Though I checked the last link you posted and it looks nice as well, i'm a little stuck on choice @~@'

do you think the agb ips max would be worth the extra few bucks? I just dont want to overcomplicate it for the guy installing it/my niece
Click to expand...
IPS is worth it, in general. I just don't love how it doesn't have the GBA logo.
Hanafuda said:
I prefer the laminated ITA kit but that's just me. I want that pixel grid look.

I also don't recommend the battery mod. Again, just preference but I'd rather use rechargeable AA's. Using high capacity AA's I get about 8-10 hours of gameplay and when one set dies, I can swap in another pre-charged pair in about 10 seconds. Also, when I temporarily lose interest in GBA because I get sunk into a game on some other platform, I can take the batteries out and leave the thing for a week or 5 years with no worries.

Another thing about funnyplaying screens, afaik whether it's IPS or ITA the board and ribbon cable come equipped with a "touch" control that involves tapping the top of the console. No thanks. Plenty of complaints in online reviews about phantom inputs from the touch control. I found instructions for deleting that function entirely and I access the screen settings menu (which, how often do you really need it after initial setup??) by holding Select for several seconds. Easy and simple like it should be. You can search my old posts (search for me saying "funnyplaying") - somewhere in there is one where I link to those instructions. Or you can pm me if interested.

This is one of three GBA's I've 'built' using the FP ITA laminated kit. If you blow the pic up to full size you can see the screen pixels.
View attachment 570511
Click to expand...
You can enable a filter to get the grid look. I think it works pretty well on my DMG game boy. Might not be to everybody's tastes though.
morelikejonarbuckle0 said:
I kinda don't trust funnyplaying since they have a bit of a monopoly on the GBA IPS market. Their main issue is that their screens draw a lot of power (then again, all of them do...).

The alternative is a company called Hispeedido. Here's a great comparison:

Skip to 10 minutes for the one above for a battery life comparison
Click to expand...

It's kinda unavoidable, backlit screens are power hungry. I wish I could get a backlit screen that drew the same power as the stock screen, lol. The battery life on especially the DMG was so good with the stock screen. But with a screen mod it's just OK.
 
morelikejonarbuckle0 said:
I kinda don't trust funnyplaying since they have a bit of a monopoly on the GBA IPS market. Their main issue is that their screens draw a lot of power (then again, all of them do...).

The alternative is a company called Hispeedido. Here's a great comparison:

Skip to 10 minutes for the one above for a battery life comparison
Click to expand...


I’d take Jake Simmons’ videos on GBA IPS screens with a bit of caution. He clearly isn’t a fan of FunnyPlaying, and that colours the way he presents things. Some pros and cons don’t get mentioned that matter for choosing between FunnyPlaying and Hispeedido (the two popular IPS producers).

For instance, the Hispeedido v5 screen has noticeably colder, less accurate colours, whilst the FunnyPlaying ITA, M2 and Max tend to match the original GBA palette much more faithfully. He also says FunnyPlaying shells are low‑quality because he broke one, but it's generally agreed FunnyPlaying shells are among the better aftermarket options, noticably better than the Hispeedido shells that he recommends.

There are also some practical differences he fails to mention. The Hispeedido v5 needs to be adhered directly to the shell, which means if the shell cracks you may end up replacing the screen too (the foil behind the GBA logo easily gets damaged when you remove the screen). FunnyPlaying’s mounting system avoids that problem entirely and makes shell swaps much easier. And his criticism of the FunnyPlaying touchpads comes down to an installation mistake; they’re meant to sit against the front of the shell, not the top. On top of that, he mocks people who prefer the ITA, even though a lot of people like it specifically because it preserves the original game artwork.

So if you’re researching which kit to buy, I’d look for a reviewer who compares the options a bit more evenly, and doesn't have a financial incentive to push a certain product (he mostly sells GBAs with the Hispeedido V5 kit).

*This reads a bit like a hit piece, that wasn’t my intention, just trying to inform.
 
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I personally have the FunnyPlaying laminated ITA TFT kit on my GBA. I'm overall very pleased with it.

I've never been able to get the touch sensor to work, but I did the soldering to use the buttons to control the screen, so it's not actually an issue. My screen did come a bit misaligned out of the box, but that was easily fixed using the screen settings. Those are really the only problems I've had with it.

I recommend makho's YouTube channel for in depth reviews of different kits. He's probably tried almost every known kit at some point. GBwiki.org is also a good resource on the subject.
 
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Hanafuda said:
sing high capacity AA's I get about 8-10 hours of gameplay and when one set dies, I can swap in another pre-charged pair in about 10 seconds.
Click to expand...
this (besides the extra price) kinda convinced me enough to skip out on the battery mod. I'll look into some good batteries instead
Hanafuda said:
You can search my old posts (search for me saying "funnyplaying") - somewhere in there is one where I link to those instructions.
Click to expand...
Found it!
The Real Jdbye said:
I wish I could get a backlit screen that drew the same power as the stock screen, lol.
Click to expand...
Makes me wonder how much a thing like this draws lol (picture taken from an ebay listing)
1778519401677.png

ClipperDefiance said:
GBwiki.org is also a good resource on the subject.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the resource, i'll look into the options there.
 
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I can't comment on screens as i bought mine pre-modded (despite things going well i feel like it's more beneficial to learn how to install yourself and cheaper)
as for the battery, i have the exact same one and it works fine as long as your daughter is good about playing off the charger and letting it charge when need be
you should be fine, that pack is great and makes the GBA (imo) better than the SP if you have big hands.
 

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