VIC-20 Final Expansion 3 Rev. 10

[SkydivinGirl]

I know I’m making a bunch of posts, but I used the holiday break at the beginning of the year to finish up a bunch of projects that I haven’t posted about until now.

This post is about the VIC-20 Final Expansion 3 Rev. 10 board. I previously made a post about the Final Expansion 3 Rev. 9 board that I assembled and I thought it would be nice to compare the two.

The first thing to realize about the Rev. 10 board is that it has the exact same functionality as the Rev. 9 board. The Rev. 10 was a re-design by Retro-Donald of the Rev. 9 board. Here’s a list of the major changes:

• Board size was increased to fit better in the case.
• The LEDs are mounted directly on the board.
• The Battery is mounted directly on the board.
• Most Jumpers have been replaced by DIP switches.
• The Voltage Jumper is optional (Defaults to 3.3V).
• The IEC Cable connects to a board-mounted terminal and strain relief holes are built into the board.
• A new label with the Rev. 10 model number, VIC-2011.

All-in-all, the Rev. 10 changes make it easier to assemble and mount in the case. You can even order the cartridge case with all the holes pre-cut, which is what I did. The only down-side is that the new label is thinner than the Rev. 9 label so it sinks into the openings on the top side of the case where the label is mounted.

Thanks!

Heather





Sorry about the horrible screenshot from the VIC-20.

 

[johnim]

Heather that's the whole point of photo booth to show us all the great kit

i used to love my vic-20 but it got sold at a car boot by my mother

Great bit of hardware enjoy

 

[apa]

Do you know where these can be bought today? Been googling, but only found a shop in Germany that didn't seem to have any in store.

 

[SkydivinGirl]

Hi apa,

Retro Donald's Store (http://www.sinchai.de) is currently the only location where you can buy the Final Expansion. The Rev. 9 was the last version released by the creator of the device and the Rev. 10 version of the board was designed by Retro Donald. They are great devices so I hope you are able to find one.

Good luck,

Heather

 

[apa]

Thanks for your reply. Turned out he doesn't sell them anymore.
I'll try to find someone selling the VIC-20 and a cartridge together as I guess they are impossible to buy second-hand loose.

 

[SkydivinGirl]

It's sad to hear that nobody is selling this board anymore. Hopefully one of the developers will release the board files so someone else can offer the kits.

Good luck in your search.

Heather

 

[cgugl]

Try here:
http://www.sinchai.de/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=77

 

[SkydivinGirl]

That's a link to the same site I mentioned. Apa says that they don't sell them any more, even though they are listed on the site. If you look at the bottom of the page you linked to, it says they are currently out of print.



Heather

 

[uccio69]

...they sell it now!... I have bought it one week ago... But they have no cartridge to put it in....
so in another thread i'm looking for the cartridge.
..i have also bought the label.

 

[TheCorfiot]

Can you buy this in kit form?

 

[SkydivinGirl]

Bas, both of mine were available only in kit form. Unfortunately, the web site for the project has been down for quite some time. I'm still hoping Diddl will but it back online soon.

 

[uccio69]

Only in kit form... They have also the label... But they don't have the cartridge.

 

[fatbob_gb]

http://www.sinchai.de/ have kits of these available.

 

[TheCorfiot]

Can someone be a darling and put a link directly to the kit please, my german is non existant.

Thx.

 

[fatbob_gb]

@TC

http://www.sinchai.de/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=77

and the instructions are here:

http://www.sinchai.de/index.php?main_page=page&id=10

 

[e5frog]

Nice to see changes were made, seems the sinchai shop is down at the moment - because of illness. :-(
If "Retro-Donald" redesigned it I guess the files were available to him from somewhere.

It would have been nice to have buttons with built-in leds...

I built one of these once for a forum friend, I recall it was a lot of work, I usually scan empty PCB:s like that but I can't seem to find this one... :-(
Seems there was some good changes made in this Revision 10 but I don't understand the terminal for the IEC cable, is it easier than soldering it to the board? Possibly you can get away with smaller holes...

Well, I guess I saved some money - now that I can't buy one of these for myself.

 

[SkydivinGirl]

His stock on his kits fluctuates so he'll probably have it available again sometime. I hadn't thought about scanning my PCBs, but that would definitely be a great idea for projects that don't offer the layouts. I'm not certain if he did his redesign by looking at the old board or if he got the original files from Diddl.

The only downside of getting one of these now is that all the original content is no longer available since Diddl's site has been down for years. I've got a bunch of it, but certainly not everything.

Heather

 

[sir_beaker]

When I bought some a few months back with BluesBrothers and TC it was showing as limited stock and would only let me buy 2 at a time. From memory it was delivered to Bas pretty quickly.

Can't tell you any more than that though as mine's still on my pallet along with a Vic20 which I'll hopefully receive early next month... fingers crossed

 

[rgrocha]

I've one of those since a a few weeks ago (bought them couple of months ago but had no time to assemble and test), and for the little I'm played with it I can only to say it's awesome!!!
A friend of mine much more versed in C64/VIC20/IEC tested some "multi-volume" demos and they didn't work, but I think it's not a fault of this versión but the disk emulation itself.

 

[corpsicle]

Sorry to resurrect such an old thread, but i just ordered one of these, and i have some questions.

What is this "all the original content" that youre talking about SkydivinGirl ?
And, there are multi-volume demos for vic20 ??