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[Granulated]

My favorite part of my nintendo is the paint...it's so flawless...but yes, it did turn out nicely.

And as far as I can tell, i'm the only person in the world to put a front window and relocate the Power button

But yeah, just paint over the NES logo.

I used fiberglass, and it's mounted underneath.

As for multimeters, you can pick them up at radioshack for pretty cheap.  Lots and lots of tutorials about how to use them...Once you have one, I can't imagine being without it...it's such a vital part of any modder's toolbox.  

The two features I use the most...touch one probe to ground and one to a power source, and it tells you how many volts...very useful.

The other one - Touch probes to two points and the multimeter will tell you if they're touching.  Whenever I install LED's, I always make sure they're not shorting anywhere...it's saved me a number of times!!!

Anyways, Yes, I can tell you where to connect the LED's to!  I can draw a paint diagram if this doesn't help...and it might not be right, but it's very close.  

Do you see the last picture you posted?  Underneath the largest capacitor, there's 5 solder joints in a vertical row.  

The shielding and the top point are GROUND.
The second point is 3v?
The third point is  7v?
The fourth point is 12v
The fifth point is 12v

One of the 12v is always on, one is only on when the system is on.  If I had to guess, I would say the 4th is switched, and the 5th is always on.  

If you had a multimeter, you would turn the system on, put the black probe on ground, and touch each of those points with the positive end, and it would tell you EXACTLY the voltage it's putting out.

10 LED's is going to be tight...those PSU's don't have alot of juice in them.  I put 4 in mine, and each one I added dimmed the chain a little more  Thinking back, though, I didn't wire the resistors right, so I'll go back someday and fix it...

[p2y2r7o]

Wow, thank you so much!  I tried to test it with the meter i got, and it seems like i'm getting about the same thing, except backwards.  Like, the top two have 12(actually about 11.2), and then it goes down that way.  I'm not too sure if i'm using the meter right, though.

are these the points you meant?

[Granulated]

Yes, that is what I am referring to!

I'm fairly confident they're not backwards.  However, if you reverse the probes, it will still say 11.2, but it will give you a negative reading.  All of my readings were less than expected as well, due to a 20 year old PSU

[p2y2r7o]

Thanks for all your help!  I just need to ask one more thing if you don't mind!  Do I need to connect the ground wire from the LEDs to that ground point?  Or can I connect it to something like the metal shielding?

[Granulated]

QUOTE(p2y2r7o @ Dec 8 2005, 05:05 PM)

Thanks for all your help!  I just need to ask one more thing if you don't mind!  Do I need to connect the ground wire from the LEDs to that ground point?  Or can I connect it to something like the metal shielding?

I'm not sure if the shielding is grounded.  I know the metal strips around the ground point are.   Here's an easy way to check.


1.  Set your multimeter to ohms
2.  Touch the two probes together.  Notice the reading you get.  
3.  Touch one probe to the ground point, and the other to the shielding.  If you get the same reading, they are in direct contact.  If you don't, they're not connected, and you must use the ground point.

I would use the soldered point, just because the shielding is kinda dirty and oxidized, and may not carry a current as well as a wire to the ground point would...

[p2y2r7o]

Ok, thanks for all the help.  Hopefully I can get this working now!  If not I may have to bug you again with some more questions, haha.

[Alkane]

If you want to make sure the diagram isn't backwards, set your multimeter to continuity testing (set to OHM 20K for instance).  Touch one probe to the ground shielding and one to the point you think is ground.  This is done when no power is running through the system.  If your multimeter reads 1 then it isn't connected to the point your testing.  If it is zero or close to zero, that's your ground point.

-alkane