Gaming how feasible is this? getting IPS and slot 2 on one device

[actualkoifish]

I was thinking the other day that DSi and especially XL were unfortunate in that they were missing a Slot 2, specifically for the few add-ons out there. I'm playing such a game now (slide adventure magkid) and finding that the add-on is great, but the screen bugs me. Call me a complainer, but I recently got a DSi XL, and I am spoiled by the quality of those IPS screens. I wish that I could play that game on the XL.

I guess my curiosity is to see my idea proven that it can't work, so that I can accept it and move on, but basically, is there any way to put a slot 2 on a DSi? Does it have any vestigal elements capable of accepting the same signals, or would it be a lost cause?

The only other thought I had was, if you can't put a slot 2 on a DSi, maybe you could either
A) put a DS Lite's internals into a DSi, hook it up to the IPS screens, and dig out a hole in the case for slot 2
B) probably simpler, put IPS screens in a DS Lite (maybe DSi (not XL) screens would fit okay?)

So what does it be, just an idle fantasy or something more? That being, either improving the DS lite's screens, or adding a slot 2 to a DSi, or moving a DS Lite's internals into a DSi.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

I was thinking the other day that DSi and especially XL were unfortunate in that they were missing a Slot 2, specifically for the few add-ons out there. I'm playing such a game now (slide adventure magkid) and finding that the add-on is great, but the screen bugs me. Call me a complainer, but I recently got a DSi XL, and I am spoiled by the quality of those IPS screens. I wish that I could play that game on the XL.

I guess my curiosity is to see my idea proven that it can't work, so that I can accept it and move on, but basically, is there any way to put a slot 2 on a DSi? Does it have any vestigal elements capable of accepting the same signals, or would it be a lost cause?

The only other thought I had was, if you can't put a slot 2 on a DSi, maybe you could either
A) put a DS Lite's internals into a DSi, hook it up to the IPS screens, and dig out a hole in the case for slot 2
B) probably simpler, put IPS screens in a DS Lite (maybe DSi (not XL) screens would fit okay?)

So what does it be, just an idle fantasy or something more? That being, either improving the DS lite's screens, or adding a slot 2 to a DSi, or moving a DS Lite's internals into a DSi.

It would probably be easiest to put IPS screens in a DS. But probably requires designing an interface board to convert the DS' screen interface to whatever your chosen screen uses. Also, I doubt 256x192 IPS screens exist, so might have to use a say 640x480 IPS screen and upscale 256x192 to 512x384.

 

[WDeranged]

Apparently the dsi xl still has the arm CPU and there is an 'emulator' that takes advantage of this. Off the top of my head i can't remember the name of it but you'd have to jailbreak your DS to use it.

 

[Xalusc]

Well, I've been looking for a way to use better screens (not necessarily IPS) on a DS Fat for years now, and I've come across nothing of interest... But if you find something, let me know.

 

[Zense]

Apparently the dsi xl still has the arm CPU and there is an 'emulator' that takes advantage of this. Off the top of my head i can't remember the name of it but you'd have to jailbreak your DS to use it.

GBArunner2 is the "hypervisor" you're thinking of probably. It let's you play gba roms with around 87% playing well on your DSi and 3DS. You technically only need a flash card to run it which you wouldn't need to jailbreak it for but you lose compatibility and performance that you would gain from running homebrew through an exploit on your DSi.

The only solution I could see to this issue would be to have a DS slot 1 cartiridge with a gyro inside, which afaik does not exist. Another would be to patch the game to use dpad controls instead of gyro but that sort of ruins the point of the game.

 

[FAST6191]

Those would be the two obvious approaches.

As far as adding a GBA slot goes there is no unpopulated header or anything you can add it to (don't think there is even an option for pins) and in turn twiddle the firmware to take it so it would be a hardcore project the likes of which we rarely see. Might even amount to a secondary device.

Screens wise.
We have seen capture devices for the DSi and the DS had the jumbotron DS which intercepted the screen feed and kicked it somewhere else. Neither are open source as far as I know but as a proof of concept then yeah there you have it.
It should then be possible to intercept, twiddle whatever is needed on the protocol front and do what needs doing there on the voltage front (assuming it is different).
This is a pretty serious project but not like we have not seen screen/video adapters and fiddling with such things before.

Crazy third way.
For the pokemon teaches typing game they stuffed a bluetooth controller in the DS slot cart and paired a keyboard with it. We have however seen a hack kick controls to network instead
https://gbatemp.net/threads/release-game-hacking-for-learn-with-pokemon-typing-adventure.480825/
and plenty of homebrew function as a PC controller via network.

Get a sacrificial DS/DS lite (could probably do GBA and some kind of serial cable but eh) and make some homebrew to fire things across network (don't know whether some kind of nifi would be possible or if you would need a nice old router to play with -- DS/DS lite is no security or WEP only) to your hacked version of this game. Latency should be well within reason but it would be a concern of mine.

4th way is more of a maybe just while ideas are happening.
Those nice blaze multi cart things. Stick your flash cart with hacked ROM in one, dummy cart using the save RAM in another and wire things around to intercept. Hack the ROM to read the save bus instead (the pokewalker did such a thing) and fire controls to that somehow.

 

[WDeranged]

This video shows a guy hooking up a DSi screen to a DSi XL. Should be possible in reverse no?

 

[FAST6191]

The DSi and DSi XL likely share a fairly similar lineage in terms of hardware design -- they are functionally the same device and less than a year apart. The DS and DS lite are probably quite far removed by comparison.

Still within reason (same resolution, probably similar timings) but the more changes you get the more you then have to start looking at custom ribbons and custom made connectors (or cannibalising things to make an adapter or spending hours throwing the many wires the average screen ribbon has around) in addition to any backlight differences. Depending upon how different the protocol is then you might have to put some kind of active adapter in there which will probably also want powering and a place to sit.

People do worse every day when playing electronics for real (all those nice high res high frequency screens that phones and VR googles use -- people in electronics companies buy such gear just to trash it for the screens to use in projects) but for some kind of end user project/product for the DS... that is a harder sell, especially as before long someone will probably come out with a nice high res emulator or maybe even clone in handheld form and make it all for naught.

 

[WDeranged]

Ahh I was mistaken in thinking that the standard DSi had a slot 2. It's such a shame that Nintendo removed that.

 

[Jayro]

My biggest complaint is that the gameboys, gamegear, sega nomad, wonderswan color, neogeo pocket color, etc all have IPS screen mods, but the DS Lite/GB Macro doesn't. Hopefully it's next, because aftermarket DS Lite screens are all over the internet, so it shouldn't be difficult.

I could always throw the idea to BennVenn, and hope it sticks.