Tag: thoughts

#0025: Modifying a pair of Game Boy Advance SP earphones into an auxiliary audio dongle

Otto

#0025: Modifying a pair of Game Boy Advance SP earphones into an auxiliary audio dongle

Preamble

This article will consist of a basic tutorial on how to create a Nintendo Game Boy Advance SP (GBA-SP) audio dongle using a broken third party pair of GBA-SP earphones. Additionally I will also provide some related commentary (ramblings) on the similarities between Apple and Nintendo; particularly the way they design their products, and the way that their fanbases receive them. So if you have any old earphones you got as a child and broke yet kept, or maybe even recently purchased as spares and repair? Or if you are inclined to hear me bemoan tribal consumers and corporate avarice. Well here you are.

Creating an audio dongle

The actual conversion is rather simple. You just need to first cut the earphones off; then connect the wires as shown in the pinout and wiring diagram below.

Pinout

Audio jack
1: left speaker positive
2: right speaker positive
3: common ground

GBA-SP port
1: right speaker positive (red wire)
2: closed loop switch
3: (pin absent)
4: left speaker positive (blue wire)
5: common ground
6: closed loop switch

Now that we have the broad methodology of what to do to create an audio dongle, I’d like to talk about a few specifics.

Closed loop switch

In the pinout diagram I labelled pins 2 and 6 as “closed loop switch”. What I mean by this is that there is continuity between these two pins. This means that they are electrically connected to each other. I believe they are configured in this way in order to act as a switch when the plug is inserted into the device.

The electrical connection between the two pins effectively closes an open loop within the device. One that terminates with these pins’ respective sockets. This loop is probably used so that the device can know when an audio peripheral has been connected. This is so that it can act accordingly, by for example switching off it’s built in speaker.

Where to cut the donor earphones cord?

This might seem like a rather simple question at first. However in order to answer it, I needed to answer a few other questions before knowing where exactly I wanted to make the cut. The most important question that needed answering is does the pair of earphones actually work properly, or are they broken somewhere.

Assuming that they have at least one fault somewhere within them, where is the fault? If you can not easily identify it, yet the earphones are still not outputting sound. Then perhaps the fault is hidden. In this case, it will mostly likely be either at the earphones themselves due to snag damage; or if you are unfortunate, it’ll be located near the plug due to something akin to repeated flex damage. Please note that I am just speculating from my experience with repairing headphones.

Once the fault is found, then you must make a decision. Repair the fault, or cut if off (if applicable). In my case the fault was at the left earphone itself. I didn’t probe further than identifying roughly where it was, since I had no intention of repairing something that far down stream. I did however consider whether or not I wanted to retain the inline volume dial. After some consideration I decided to remove it. The reason for this is that I feared that the relatively low quality of the componentry involved; such as the potentiometer, or the PCB and it’s solder joints may actually negatively affect sound quality. So I just snipped it off. Didn’t like it much anyway. It didn’t feel nice to use.

What type of plug or socket to terminate the cord with?

This question was primarily answered by the materials I had available at the time. I did not have an appropriate female 3.5mm audio socket available. However I did have plenty of male 3.5mm jacks on hand; including ones that were corded. In the end I went with a jack that was colour matched (black) and that had the smallest profile.

This male jack enabled me to plug the GBA-SP into an auxiliary port on a sound system should I wish to do so. Additionally when coupled with a female-to-female 3.5mm audio adapter, it enabled me to use headphones or speakers with the dongle. This setup basically gave me the same functionality as having an adapter that terminated in a female 3.5mm socket, paired with a typical male-to-male auxiliary cord.

Soldering the jack

When it comes to soldering audio jacks like these: the first actual thing I did was prepare the heat-shrink tubing for it. Selecting the right sizes and cutting them to length. I prepared two pieces, which I thought was sufficient at the time; however in hindsight I should have prepared three distinct pieces. One to isolate each line.

As it is, it has one to insulate the central shaft from the surrounding ground pad, and one to act as an outer cover; protecting all three wires and acting as a general guard against flex damage for the entire cord. It’s good enough, but it would be better in my opinion if the inner two wires were separated by more than just the enamel coating of the wire strands themselves, as I have left them. A smaller gauge piece of heat-shrink tubing on the inner terminal to cover it’s solder joint would’ve been better.

As for the soldering itself: audio jack terminals like the one pictured can be rather tricky to wire up and solder properly. The reason for this is due to a range of factors. Factors such as: the general fiddliness and fragility of the enamel wires themselves. Although more-so the close proximity of the jack’s terminals to each other, coupled with the convex curve and orientation of their soldering pads, is what adds difficulty; as the awkward angles involved can diminish dexterity.

Additionally, the presence of structural plastic insulation between the terminals, meant that a lower heat and a shorter soldering dwell time was needed. This in order not to damage the jack’s plastics with radiant heat from the work area. Otherwise the plastic will melt and warp the plug’s general shape and structure. All these various factors can make it difficult to solder in a reliable and repeatable manner. However practice and work flow optimisations will mitigate these type of annoyances as one gains experience in this task.

An example in which I optimised the process: was by preparing the wires for soldering by removing their enamel insulation. This is because prior to this: during soldering, the enamel coating on the wires sometimes wouldn’t burn off within the liquid solder blob itself; especially with the necessary (relatively) low heat and short dwell time. When this happened, it resulted in the wire not forming a good electrical connection and/or not bonding physically with it’s solder pad.

I chose to prep the wires by burning off a segment of their enamel coating using a lighter. This had to be done in very quick manner in order to not oxidise the underlying copper strands too much. Burning off the insulation in this manner allows me to quickly solder the wires into place without worrying about any complications from the insulation.

After removing a segment of insulation in this manner, I chose to attach the wires in a way that limited any exposed segments of wire present outside of the solder joint. This is to limit any exposed conductors. Consequently, the solder joints were close to their respective wires’ insulated ends, and only used the exposed segments to get a good electrical connection within the solder joint itself. After-which I’d snip off any excess exposed wire that preceded the joint.

Testing the cable

The attentive readers amongst you probably have noticed that my repair notes contain several resistance tests of the various lines. Most I ran while working on the device, those are the numbers closer to the hand-drawn diagram. Some of which have been struck out. Discount those. The ones of interest are at the bottom of the notes. Those are the results from the post repair test.

The reason for the final test was because I was dubious of the quality of the cables that I was working with. As well as generally dubious of audio cables of this calibre. Specifically, cables that consist of a small collection of loose strands dipped in (I believe) enamel for insulation; then interwoven with additional plastic or nylon strands for strength. They all look and feel fragile and cheap. Having said that however, I should say that a post repair test is a good general practice. Even when confidence in the repair is high.

As you can see the left speaker line has a end-to-end resistance of 10 ohms. Five times that of the right speaker line, and ten times that of the common return (or ground) line. The right and return lines have acceptable resistances in general, and accurate relative resistances to each other. I expected the return common line to have half the resistance due to the doubling of the lines. However, what was unexpected was that the left line was clearly an outlier in line resistance. This in my opinion is due to either the low quality of the cable in general, or a hidden defect I did not find.

It’s not ideal, but upon testing with actual sound, the loss of volume on the left line speaker due to it’s higher line resistance was not noticeable at all. So I just left it be. The effort necessary to track the fault that is adding the 8 ohms to the line, is not worth the reward of having perfectly balanced lines for a GBA-SP’s audio. I used to call it laziness not ploughing down these types of rabbit holes. However as I have aged, I have come to understand the diminishing returns on investments that this type of perfectionism offers.

  • testing during repair
  • post repair test

Completed mod demonstration

Related thoughts on Nintendo and their Game Boy Advance SP console

Now that we have created our own DIY audio dongle, let’s talk about why we needed to do this in the first place. In other words, why the Game Boy Advance SP doesn’t have a built-in 3.5mm audio port to begin with. In order to get at this answer, let’s first discuss a completely different technology company and it’s products. As to why, I’ll let you join the dots.

Many people today (2021) credit Apple as one of the most anti-consumer consumer technology companies, specifically with regards to their product design. Although there are numerous examples I could pick out, the one relevant instance here: is the removal of the generic 3.5mm audio jack from their 2016 iPhone 7 models. Anyone who pays any critical attention to this company probably came to a similar conclusion to my own. (Proceeds to pat self on back.) This naturally being that they did so in a bid to to sell first party audio peripherals at a premium. This being to their captive audience of fruity cultists. Cultists that would happily eat that up.

Why am I mentioning this in a Nintendo article? Well it’s because peoples’ memory is generally fickle and often mired with nostalgia; and the residual emotional attachments that it incurs. This leads them to holding double-standards when it comes specifically to childhood brands like Nintendo, often holding them to a lower standard of conduct than brands like Apple. These same people forget that their friend Nintendo did the same thing 13 years prior in 2003 with the incremental release of the Nintendo Game Boy Advance Special (GBA-SP) portable games console.

A games console that had no tangible advantages over it’s Game Boy Advance (GBA) predecessor other than a few quality of life (QoL) improvements. Both consoles played exactly the same games, however the SP boasted: an internal rechargeable lithium-ion battery, and an LCD backlight. For consumers tired of repeatedly buying new AA batteries for their GBA, or always awkwardly angling the unlit LCD towards a light-source whilst avoiding glare; these were improvements worth investment. Those of you who can read between the lines, might’ve guessed that this internal battery naturally required a specific Nintendo battery charger. A theme that they continued in later products such as with the Nintendo Dual Screen portable console (NDS).

However, a more apt feature of criticism in the iteration from the GBA to the GBA-SP, is the removal of the 3.5mm audio jack. Why did they do this you may ask? Well, now I could be wrong, but the cynic in me says that it was to facilitate Nintendo selling official audio peripherals at a premium, to their captive audience of pedantic neck-beards in waiting. That’s us mate.

Laughably, Nintendo’s official response against their audience’s pushback in 2003 was basically the same as Apple’s in 2016. They both said something to the tune of: that the new device simply didn’t have the space for a 3.5mm audio jack. Apple added some device waterproofing claims to this as well. But the core reason was the same: that there’s simply no space for it. Now shut up and buy our official peripherals. Peripherals that use the same port for both audio output and power delivery. So good luck using wired headphones and charging the device at the same time. Enjoy.

To cut it short. My point is that Nintendo has proven themselves to be as anti-consumer as Apple when the mood takes them. However it saddens me that their customers are prone to look at this company through rose tinted spectacles. Often even shouting down valid criticism, yet many within the community still consider themselves distinctly different from the stock of Apple enthusiasts.

That’s what happens when one thinks with their feelings. It’s tribal fanboy-ism at it’s finest. People for whatever reason forget that an individual’s relationship with a company or business like Apple or Nintendo, is strictly transactional. Nothing more. They are not your friends. A corporation does not have the capacity for camaraderie, or loyalty. Only the capacity to take advantage of such feelings in order to sell more to the same people.

Obviously, I am not talking about the entire consumer base here, just the vocal fanatics that seem to dominate public discourse. If anything a logical or reasonable person who likes the products of a particular brand to the point of becoming brand loyal; should ideally, be even more critical (than the average Joe) of their chosen company when it strays into anti-consumer practices. Due to their investment within the brand and it’s products. They likely would wish for them to stay good, more than a person who isn’t all that invested. But that’s not the world we live in. Instead the more invested a person is in a brand, it seems the more likely they are to tribally defend them regardless of circumstance. It’s sad really.

Closing thoughts

I know what you might be thinking, this article is nice and all, but it’s also almost twenty years too late. I mean in previous years getting a hold of an audio dongle for the GBA-SP might have been troublesome or expensive. Back when (the famously litigious) Nintendo were still protective of the console. However in 2021, one could easily purchase a NEW Game Boy Advance SP audio dongle from Ebay for less than a fiver. Since Nintendo doesn’t care much about protecting the rights to peripherals for a console that old (read unprofitable). Sure, the item that you buy won’t be an official Nintendo product, or even a notable third party contemporary brand peripheral, like Competition Pro. But it’ll work. Probably.

example of an unbranded Ebay adapter

To answer that question: Yes, yes you could. You could purchase an unbranded china special peripheral for your almost twenty year old console. Alternatively you could also make use of any old and/or broken first and third party peripherals that you may already have lying around, or even purchased in a mixed joblot or bundle. Essentially converting (basically) e-waste like that into a useful cable. One made to your exact use case and specification no less. Chances are your convert will also be better quality than a bought cable depending on what materials you use to make it.

Mine isn’t, I made mine from a pair of Competition Pro earphones. But still you get my point; I bet if you made yours from a pair of official Nintendo earphones (should you happen to have them), they might be better quality. As for making something for a specific use case: I totally use mine to blast Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow’s soundtrack, via my home sound system. I do it for maximum “immersion” during my midnight gaming sessions. I also want my neighbours to know that I am cool. The banging on the wall seems to indicate that they do.

Thank you for reading.

Links, references, and further reading

https://docpop.org/2016/09/apple-learn-nintendos-headphone-mistake/
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2016/09/no-headphone-jack-nintendo-did-it-first/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPhone_7#Headphone_plug_removal
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Boy_Advance_SP#Headphone_jack

#0016: Software recommendation: Firefox Monitor and haveibeenpwned?

Otto

#0016: Software recommendation: Firefox Monitor and haveibeenpwned?

https://monitor.firefox.com/

https://haveibeenpwned.com/

Preamble

In a bid to make more immediately useful content, I’d like to start recommending some of the various tools that I use. In this case it is an online service. Namely Mozilla’s Firefox Monitor; or more to the point, it is actually the website: haveibeenpwned.com (HIBP), which Firefox Monitor uses to enable it’s service.

What do they do?

In essence Firefox Monitor and HIBP are used to check whether or not an email address is associated with a recorded data-breach. Keyword: “recorded”. It does this by using a database of known breaches provided by haveibeenpwned.com.

The purpose of this service is to allow people to ascertain whether or not, an online account (and the user information there in) associated with the email address: has been compromised in a known data breach; and thus in need of immediate remedy. Things like: changing passwords, recovery phrases, and generally being aware that any potentially sensitive information associated with that account, such as: full name, mother’s maiden name, GPS location, education, birth date, telephone, city, school, or business information has now circulated within the hacker community.

Additionally, it helps to know which company is to blame for the spike in volume of spam and phishing emails, that will most certainly accompany said breach. I don’t know about yourself, but that’s something I’d certainly like to know.

Why is this service important?

It is my belief that every solution begins with awareness, the awareness of the problem. Only then can we move to better the situation. This tool gives you exactly that.

In my opinion, the main reason why I think this tool is important is because the companies involved in the data breaches themselves are loath to make their customers aware of them. Even though it is in their user’s best interests; it is not in the businesses best interests to advertise any breaches beyond the legally mandated/enforced minimum. Furthermore, who knows what that actually even is when dealing with global or multinational companies that operate over many legal jurisdictions. This is especially true when dealing with larger companies with entire legal teams at their disposal.

This service is important because (still just my opinion): companies in general tend to quietly patch any security vulnerabilities as they find them, and move on hoping no-one has noticed. This is especially true when there is no internally confirmed security breach.

Whenever a confirmed breach does happen, the first thing that the company responsible does is downplay the scope and severity of it. This may (and probably does) include: not even publicly reporting the breach until it is already made public elsewhere, often at a much later time. In many cases there is even resistance to acknowledge fault after the breach is made public. This is most likely a bid to exonerate themselves of any potential legal liabilities involved.

At the very least acknowledgement of fault could be seen as weakness. Weakness that will shake public confidence in the company and/or service. Therefore it is in their best interest to maintain the general illusion of control and/or competence. It’s corporate PR 101. It’s just a shame that the company and it’s users’ interests don’t align within this circumstance.

Why should people use these tools?

Both Mozilla Firefox Monitor and HIBP are free to use publicly available tools. Both tools come from reasonably trusted sources. Firefox Monitor is the product of an open-source community driven effort, giving it a certain level of transparency. And HIBP was developed by Troy Hunt, an authority on the topic of digital security. Even if you don’t know who Mr Hunt is (and I didn’t prior to this post), the fact that the Mozilla team decided to use his HIBP database for Firefox Monitor means that they are vouching for it.

More importantly, the tools themselves can assist an individual with regards to protecting their personal information online. They do this by allowing the individual that exact thing that I mentioned earlier: awareness. Awareness of whether or not that person’s email associated account information has been circulated, and which company is at fault for it.

For example: if you used the tool and because of it now know that, an account associated with your email with company X has been breached; and along with that breach your “security questions” were revealed. Then now you know to both remove, and not to use those particular security questions, with any future account … ever. As they are basically permanently compromised. Forewarned is forearmed.

taken from https://github.com/mozilla/blurts-server

Difference between Firefox Monitor and haveibeenpwned?

Firefox monitor is a very slimlined version of the HIBP tool that gives the lay user just what they need, without overwhelming or putting off said lay user. It is rather idiot proof; merely requiring user’s to input their emails and press enter. That’s it. Firefox monitor also has been bundled in with a few basic articles on good security protocol, that may be helpful to the average user. Common sense stuff a lot of it, but you know what they say about common sense.

Although Firefox is the simpler tool to use, it must be said that HIBP is a far more robust tool. And the one that I recommend. This is because in addition to searching email addresses, it allows searching via: passwords, and domain names. The website also allows users to browse a catalogue of breached websites without running a search. Extracts below.

Ever wondered how many accounts have been breached because they used the password “love”? Wonder no more. According to HIBP, its 356006 times.

I have also perused a nice little selection of companies from HIBP’s catalogue of known breaches that you may find interesting.

Personal experience with a data breach.

Just an aside if anyone is interested. From reading the above “Why is this service important?” section, you might have gotten the idea that I may be ever so slightly cynical about the companies involved in security breaches like these.

Frankly speaking, whenever data breaches do happen, I do not consider the corporations involved to be “victims” of cybercrime, as many others seem to do. It is a nauseating sentiment. One that condones bad behaviour. This is because it is my personal belief that the vase majority of the cases are due to one core thing: a dereliction of duty. Them failing in their duty to protect the data that they collected. Little more.

In addition to consuming the various news articles about data breaches over the years. Ones that had the general themes of corporate incompetence. Like for example: employees carrying around sensitive data on unencrypted thumb-drives, only to lose them on the train. I also have a few examples of companies that leaked my very own personal information. All of this has coloured my opinions thus.

The most memorable is the online virtual tabletop gaming website roll20.net. The thing that rubbed me the wrong way about them is that at no point during the process did they ever take any accountability for allowing it to happen. They did eventually outline what information was taken, but they never offered an apology for their lax in security. Instead they covered it up with boiler plate (legal friendly) corporate speak.

Example: “The investigation identified several possible vectors of attack that have since been remedied. Best practices at Roll20 for communications and credential cycling have been updated, with several code library updates completed and more in development.” Assuming that is indeed true, the same could literally be said by any company involved in a similar data breach – just change the names.

Although from what I understand by reading the article that they linked in their post, technically (purely technically) this appears as though it’s not their fault. But rather it was due to the underlying technology that they used. At least that is the implication presented. I’d argue that they still made the decision to use said tech, and thus vouched for it by doing so. Making them responsible, at least tangentially. At least enough for a simple sorry. The closest their customers got to an apology was a “Frankly, this sucks.” Writing it in an official company blog post that they passed for a conclusive public report; authored by Jeffrey Lamb, the Data Protection Officer.

I remember thinking at the time that whoever was writing this was good at the bland formalities of corporate speak, but otherwise is (and excuse my French): a fucking dickhead. You have to keep in mind reader, that they only knew of their own data breach because of a third party report. One that was published months after the fact. The report was published in February of 2019, and the breach happened (according to Mr Lamb) sometime late 2018. No apology warranted, not even for missing the hack, until a third party told you about it months after the fact. They then go on write their conclusive report in august of 2019. So nearly a year, between data breach and the final public debrief, where they outline exactly what data was exposed. I call that incompetence. “Data Protection Officer” more like resident salary sucker.

The ultimate lack of accountability is what really rubbed me up the wrong way here. And why would they be accountable, there is little in the way of consequence it seems for these messes. There are even examples of customers defending roll20 in the comments, referring to them as “victims” of cybercrime. They aren’t the victims here idiot, you are! I’ll include some choice examples of this for your entertainment. Its customers like that, that make businesses feels like they don’t have to be accountable either for their actions, or in this case general inaction with regards to proactively protecting customer data. Please read through the example comment thread.

You really can’t reason with people like that. They have too much emotional stock in a corporation to admit to themselves that they got screwed by it. There were even people actually praising roll20 for it’s meagre efforts. A sum total of 2 blog posts, some notice tweets/emails, and for patching a hole in their own boat. Thanks roll20, stellar job. Shame about all my cargo sinking to the seafloor for the bottom feeders to enjoy. I mean you only lost my full name, my IP address (so my physical location), my password, oh and some of my credit card data. Don’t worry about that roll20 (not like you would), that’s my problem. Fuck those types of customers. Wankers.

Moving on. Another example of a gormless entity losing my data is ffshrine.org. A final fantasy fan site that I registered with in 2010 I believe; and haven’t used that account since 2010. Ideally, they would have flagged the account as non-active and deleted it after a couple of years. But alas, instead they just kept whatever details I gave them for the five years until their 2015 data breach. Where they lost subscriber passwords and email addresses. No warning email post event, nothing. Radio silent. I had a similar experience with tumblr back in the day. Radio silent. No accountability. Are you sensing a theme here, dear reader?

Closing thoughts.

I have written far more here then I initially wanted to, so I will keep this summary short. Tools like haveibeenpwned and Firefox Monitor are things that you as an individual can use to help protect yourself in cyberspace. They can help you take proactive measures to safeguard your own data. They can also show you evidence that the large corporations really aren’t as professional or as infallible as they like to appear.

And that when, they make mistakes; mistakes such as losing your data. It is often you that has to bare the brunt of the repercussions, with little if any repercussions to them. Maybe they incur a temporary stock dip. But the fact of the matter is, they’ll recover from it. However whatever data you provided them for safe keeping, well that’s now permanently out there. Enjoy.

For example. To this day I still get phishing emails that say something like: “hey MY_FULL_NAME, YOUR_BANK has detected multiple login attempts using PASSWORD_FROM_FFSHRINE.ORG to login. We have frozen your account because we suspect fraudulent activity. Follow the obviously dodgy link provided and give us your security questions to fix this.” Although I can recognise a phishing scam when I see one, many technology illiterate users can not.

And make no mistake, the companies that were lax in their security. The one’s that have the attitude that breaches happen; are the exact ones to blame for the perpetuation of the black market information economy. An economy that preys on people; the real victims. The people who trusted these corporations with their data, thinking it in safe hands. Not the corporations themselves whose lack of diligence and general incompetence allowed for the data that they were trusted with to be exposed.

Jeez… that got a bit preachy towards the end. Didn’t it? Sorry about that. It’s just seeing companies fobbing off their responsibilities, and then seeing customers with Stockholm syndrome defending these same companies against criticism – really ruffles my feathers.

Anyway, thanks for reading.

References, links, further reading.

https://github.com/mozilla/blurts-server

https://monitor.firefox.com/

https://monitor.firefox.com/breaches

https://monitor.firefox.com/security-tips

https://haveibeenpwned.com/

https://haveibeenpwned.com/About

https://feeds.feedburner.com/HaveIBeenPwnedLatestBreaches

https://blog.roll20.net/post/182811484420/roll20-security-breach

https://blog.roll20.net/post/186963124325/conclusion-of-2018-data-breach-investigation

Hacker who stole 620 million records strikes again, stealing 127 million more