The Blog

Drag Soldering a 29F032 TSOP Chip

Nix McRetro // 5th March 2016 // Guides, Repairs, YouTube

Have a fear of drag soldering or just want to see how it is done? Look no further! This educational video gives some pointers on how to get the job done properly. Would you just look at the size of the TSOP40 pin pitch, 0.5 mm, that’s tiny! The legs... Continue reading

Mayumi 4 | PIC12C508A | SCPH-5502 | PU-18

Nix McRetro // 5th March 2016 // Guides, Sony

Mayumi 4 | PIC12C508A | SCPH-5502 | PU-18

[caption id=”attachment_963” align=”alignnone” width=”565”] There are eight points to solder in total.[/caption] [caption id=”attachment_971” align=”alignnone” width=”560”] Above is the pinout, from pin 1 through to pin 8.[/caption] Mayumi 4 supports four different modes on the SCPH-550x model / PU-18 board. To change modes, press and hold reset for two seconds.... Continue reading

ZeroNet, BitTorrent and Another Darknet

Nix McRetro // 4th March 2016 // News, Raspberry Pi

Just a few days ago I managed to get WordPress to play nice with my darknet (Tor) website, meaning McRetro.net is now mirrored 100% to the mcretro35qepy5cy.onion address. Magnificent! That got me thinking though, what other darknets could I get my website onto? Well as the image above might hint... Continue reading

Sega TeraDrive Model 3 Power Supply Failure

Nix McRetro // 2nd March 2016 // IBM PC, Repairs, Sega

Sega TeraDrive Model 3 Power Supply Failure

Oh dear! My Sega TeraDrive (Model 3) power supply gave out today. It’s probably been dead for a while but I just never noticed since it was sitting on a shelf looking tidy. The model 2 still works well though so I did some module swapping and minimal configurations (Aren’t... Continue reading

Cloning CompactFlash Cards with HDD Raw Copy Tool

Nix McRetro // 2nd March 2016 // IBM PC, Microsoft

Cloning CompactFlash Cards with HDD Raw Copy Tool

While dealing with XTIDE and CompactFlash (CF) cards I have been using HDD Raw Copy Tool in Windows XP. While I could have done this with dd in linux or Mac OS, I chose Windows XP in a virtual machine. Watch the animated gif above to see the steps involved.... Continue reading