Robot Archaeology Update: hacking the Nintendo R.O.B. #Robots #Gaming #History

Nintendo ROB

In a recent Robot Archaeology post, we discussed the history of the Nintendo R.O.B robot.

Adafruit has bought a couple of gently used R.O.B.s from eBay and we’re going to hack them using the new Adafruit Crickit robotics board and Circuit Playground Express.

Crickit + CPX

R.O.B has three motors to control his movements. He was instructed to move based on commands flashed onto a CRT (tube) television. Those commands are not documented and we don’t have an old TV to cart around so we’ll be looking to hack the circuit board or just hack the DC motors directly. The driver ICs are Sharp IR2C25 and the TV receiver is Nintendo RFC-CPU10.

R.O.B. circuit board

We’ll be scouring the Interwebs for information. Schematics seem elusive. There are some hacks but not alot of documentation – links to other R.O.B. hacks are in the previous post.

If you want to follow along, post in the comments!

And don’t spread the news too much, so the prices on eBay don’t skyrocket, shhhhh.


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3 Comments

  1. Battery – Red and Black
    Spin – Yellow and White
    Claws – Red and Brown
    Up/Down – Orange and Yellow
    this leaves blue and green for the optical sensor

  2. Oooops, blue/green on rainbow ribbon cable are probably a limit switch as there is a 4 conductor white ribbon cable from the board up through the center to the head. That cable: V=BAT, G=GND, S to RFC-CPU10 pin 1 (Guess light sensor), L through 1K ohm to RFC-CPU10 pin 4 (guess Red LED).

  3. Will follow this with great interest 😀

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