I got an EL panel from Kitsch-bent.com to test out and show people what it's all about.
Here's what it comes with:
The panel with pre-soldered wires and shrink wrapping to prevent shock(the panel is as thin as light weight card-stock!).
The inverter board.
A lead to solder to your Game Boy.
And of course the polarizer and diffusion film.
It is the easiest thing I've ever used for backlighting.
The two leads on the left that are the same length hook up to the panel. It doesn't matter which wire goes to which lead as it is AC.
On the right side the long lead is to hook up to the 5v and the short lead is ground. The wires literally just plug into the board. SO easy.
Just a general idea of how perfectly even the light looks even behind the LCD:
Quick little walkthrough on how I installed it:
Started with the basic prepping of the LCD, pealing off the films and cleaning it. The biggest difference is that you would want to leave those 2 little foam pieces behind the LCD to hold them in place. Just stick them to the back of the sheet.
I cut the bottom of the plastic frame to make room for the wires. It was a little tight.
I lead the wires from the panel through the capacitor hole:
I soldered it to the the cap on the front board but it was very noisy when no music was playing. Kitsch informed me that it should sound fine when hooking up right to the power board points on the bottom left corner of the main PCB:
I tucked the board in the bottom right corner:
A couple notes:
There is risk of electrical shock but it's not very strong. I have yet to shock myself but I'll probably do it on purpose so I can warn people how bad or mild it will be.
Also powering up the board without the EL panel plugged in can ruin the IC. I did this a few times and had absolutely no problems. But I still wouldn't recommend it.
I believe these should be out soon but I don't have the time frame right now. I'll get back to you all on that!
Now check these shots..
INCREDIBLE:
Last edited by thursdaycustoms (Mar 5, 2012 3:45 am)