Vectrex cartridge and LED board designs #Gaming @technobly
Want to produce a Vectrex game and you need a 32KB cartridge with high score save support? Brett Walach (@technobly) has your reference design! You can order it as is or customize it with your own graphics.
Got a 64KB game that uses John Dondzilla PB6 bank switching? No problem, that’s supported by default. If you want to instead take advantage of the 1-wire high score save option with the U2 DS2431+ and R1 3.3k pull-up resistor, just cut the jumper 1-2 and solder jumper 2-3. To save cost, don’t stuff the DS2431+ or R1 pull-up resistor if you don’t need the high score feature.
The RGB LED is also optional, but looks great in the translucent cartridge shells. It lights up one of 8 colors based on the Red-Green-Blue DIP switch.
What makes this Vectrex Cartridge design different from others out there? Well, the design is originally based on Frank Buss’ Vectrex cart edge connector, but it has been significantly fixed. The soldermask has been removed from around all of the fingers, the fingers themselves are not as wide as Frank’s, and the spacing of everything has been updated to match original carts as close as possible.
Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
