Babe! grab the the official Gravis 34oz Water/Liquid Jug and the Gravis Microwave Pizza Rolls ( 24-Pack ) and Gravis Diet Cola 2-Litre Hydration Drink Soda / Soft Drink 70oz Sugar-Free. I'll grab the Replacement Remote Control Only for Roku TV, Compatible for TCL Roku (Not for Stick and Box) and load up his new video!
On the use of Windows icons; most of the icons in Windows/Office/etc. are included in the "Visual Studio Image Library" which is pretty liberally licenced (basically, as long a someone uses Visual Studio for something during development, you're probably ok), so it's not exactly "ripped off", Microsoft actually allows it.
3:03 Hey, I used to watch an episode of a TV show on my 6th gen iPod Classic during my lunch break at the Cingular store. The screen on those was 2.5 inches and 320x420. The perfect size for a laptop. I also loaned it to a friend who was in the hospital for a week and loaded it up with her favorite movies and TV shows. She used it so much that week, the click wheel stopped working by the last day. So, by those standards and that time period, a portable 4 inch screen that plays DVDs was huge.
hahaha okay that's fair. idk, like, it's easier to picture it as a toss-in feature on a device purchased for other purposes ; the idea of spending several hundred bucks on something whose sole purpose is to play video on a tiny screen seems more absurd than it probably should.
A few times I loaded movies / TV shows onto my Zune and I'd watch them at the gym or when on lunch at work... For both devices the process of converting and loading a video wasn't super convenient, so it wasn't exactly popular.
The cohesiveness of your patchwork narrative here is still better than most people's fully scripted stuff, man. You very much have a natural knack for spinning a yarn. That's why I totally enjoy listening to you go off for 45 minutes on a topic that I wouldn't give most other creators more than 10 minutes with.
The MT1389 is still for sale I believe, it's still listed on MediaTek's site and they are usually pretty good at removing discontinued products. The MT1389 firmware source code for many different chip variants has leaked online, and those leaks do have code related to the NES functionality, so I believe that it came with the firmware, just not advertised on the datasheet for some reason.
This pen drive has Quake, Unreal Tournament, movies and a furry saying "Trans rights". How many LAN parties have this pen drive been in without getting wiped?
The test ports on the board -- I think you touched on the reality earlier in the video, when someone recognized that order of ports from a bunch of these devices. Someone (organization) at some point must have designed this board with the intent of selling them to tons of product integrators like whoever made this 6-letter product. Because the board designer in turn would then need to support their customers (the people making/integrating the products), it makes sense that they would want test points designed in because they would want to reproduce and investigate any weird symptoms that the integrators run into when designing/QAing their own derivative product. That's my theory at least. Also this theory potentially unifies the silkscreened screw logos on the board that seem odd in the context of this rock-bottom product -- those input/control modules are most likely procured from a different OEM, then integrated with this product at the time of its own engineering. Again.. just a theory, but it would unify/explain why there are 2-3 different styles of PCB and component/design approach in the one product, the producers of this device were just lego-kitting it together, with most of their engineering probably being in the design of the clamshell and related engineering for assembly
When you demonstrated the proper way to fold back the screen and hold the thing in the crook of your arm, I felt a terrible buzzing in mind as it filled with giant anime question marks...
Regarding that MediaTek chip's CPU architecture: in certain areas, MediaTek is sort of infamous for rolling a ton of chips with different custom instruction sets tuned for the purpose (presumably generated in some sense). Considering the era and application, I wouldn't rule out that this chip runs a custom-but-uninteresting generic 32-bit RISC instruction set. Would perhaps also explain why the NES core is so slow, as it wouldn't benefit much from architecture-specific optimizations. Also, that unknown chip looks like a type II TSOP package, which gives it a high probability of being DRAM indeed. Makes sense since that's definitely not in the chip itself. Isn't there some silkscreen marking right below it that could give a clue?
From what I read on the internet, MT1389 has a built in ARM7 chip (100Mhz ???). Cannot find any confirmation. Theorically it should be capable of emulating Nes fine (GBA can with an ARM7 16Mhz), but I guess they just tossed in an early emulator and called it a day.
@@indask8 yeah that emulator maybe 'compatible' ie ARM7 but maybe frequency dependent for operation, so it runs slowly at the first sign of resistance because it cant throw more power at it, maybe? and agreed, a less powerful chip can run all of those so Lord Gaben knows whats going on under the hood for it as it maybe so barebones it may not have anything to help dynamic things like increasing processing power dedicated to it, or memory management.
Man I loved watching connections. There was another show called "The Secret Life of Machines." I would watch that all the time. Tim Hunkin had been restoring TSLOM and putting the videos on RUclips. It's a great watch if you enjoy connections.
Someone had a good set of PAL recordings but unfortunately the episode "The Car" still has a ton of problems. It also does on the NTSC and PAL DVD releases, but far worse. The other online releases also have the same issues. If the PAL source for the remastered RUclips release was recorded off broadcast then apparently the master tape for that episode was damaged. I'm pretty certain that when I saw the series during its original run in the USA that "The Car" episode didn't have the glitches. If anyone has a first run off-air, cable, or satellite home recording of "The Car", that doesn't have the synch and field order glitches, I bet Tim Hunkin would be very interested in getting it, especially if it's PAL format. Even a good NTSC recording could be used by cutting the bits that are glitchy in the PAL source then doing some fancy upscaling and frames per second changing to patch over the glitchy bits.
The DVD spec does indeed allow for auto switching of aspect ratios, at least in Europe where it sends a signal via the scart output on pin 8 I believe. However most home DVD recorders don't seem to bother recording the aspect ratio switching signal when recording, so on playback you have to set the ratio manually as you had to. Some Pioneer and Sony models would record the aspect ratio switching signal if recording from their internal tuners but most didn't instead relying on you to manually set things up.
I love to see weird AliExpress e-waste exploration like this, my mind is racing thinking about what, how, and *why* this thing is. 18:16 XENIA CAMEO!!!
The aspect ratio/screen type settings are totally normal (for a separate DVD player/TV setup) but rather unusual for an all-in-one device. I kinda like the flexibility though! Since it does more than just DVD playback, it does kinda need this flexibility. As for DVDs being "hard coded with the aspect ratio", yes, they are. Widescreen (true widescreen, not Letterbox) DVDs are anamorphic, and the DVD player has the ability to letterbox or crop (Pan/Scan) to fit the 16:9 video onto 4:3 screens. The Pan/Scan flag is very rarely used (aside from Legal Warnings, disclaimers, menus, etc.) Typically these are flagged P/S to give a full 4:3 image on a 4:3 screen, rather than LBX. The graphics for these are created with excess real estate at the sides (text all within central portion of screen). 99.9999 of video content is flagged to display as LBX on 4:3 screens. To save money on early DVD players, only one scaling chip was designed into the specs. Scaling of overlays (menu highlights and subtitles) is not possible in any DVD player. For menu highlights to appear correct in both 16:9 and 4:3, two separate button highlights have to be created for every menu page. Super annoying. For subtitles, 99% of DVDs share the same stream across both aspect ratios, with the result that they look a bit stretched or squashed, depending what mode you're viewing in. Japanese subtitles were typically the only language where a separate 4:3 and 16:9 stream were supplied by the subtitle vendor. The Japanese are very picky about the characters being displayed in the right shape. Other countries have to suck it up! In my experience, almost every subtitle vendor I ever dealt with (in 20-odd years of DVD authoring) was CLUELESS about the technical aspects of subtitles and had absolutely no comprehension of dedicated 16:9 and LBX subtitle streams. Only those making the Japanese subs understood how to do it 😭 Because of the way menu highlights and subtitles work, it's not possible to just batch process subtitles in Photoshop to resize them. You could, but they'd look horrible. Resizing has to be done in grayscale mode, and only after that can you remap the 255 levels of black-to-white as three pure colors (typically white background with black, red, and blue used for text body, outline, and a very crude dither). Each of these colors get re-mapped as a specific display color and opacity percentage by the DVD player. Wow, that ended up being a very long and nerdy message, but I'm sure some of your viewers will enjoying nerding out reading about obsolete tech 🤷♂️ 😂
For clarity, DVD authoring packages for "regular people" and semi-pro people were heavily "abstraction layer" based, and did a ton of the fiddly stuff internally. The pro systems, such as Scenarist, did NOTHING to help the author. Absolutely everything had to be done "by hand".
That port is actually for an NES controller, it uses 4 pins and port's metal case as separate contacts to get 5 wires. I have a NES on a chip from aliexpress that uses a controller like that.
Letterbox and aspect ratio settings of this boi are absurd. I seriously doubt anyone ever watched a movie in proper fullscreen with correct aspect on this thing.
The software in that player is also just like what would be in a digital picture frame.... Similar menus and such too.... I think the reason why the pictures are so slow to load is because it was expecting to be more of a slideshow or flipping through images.... And the battery life also designed to be used in a picture frame item... Most of those could play videos just fine if you loaded a few on there. 😊
I have an old 2010 RCA DVD player that I'm pretty sure uses basically the same software, just without the USB or NES stuff in it, and I think it's also missing that on screen settings menu. Not sure what files it will play off of DVD, but I know when playing an audio CD it showed almost the same menu as the file browser in the boifun player. When playing DVDs the on screen symbols were also the same, I'm tempted to take mine apart and see what chip it has, and maybe make a DVD with a bunch of files to test with.
Man, your videos are really high on my list of "immediate watch" content and I love to avoid reading the title, because I know it's going to be a fun ride and usually on the longer side of things.... I need more! 😁 Your humor usually has me laughing at the most random stuff and that's never a bad thing! Fantastic video as always. Have a wonderful day! 😊🌎❤️🕺🏻🐶💻
12:10 TRRS cables, as an idea, should be really helpful… but because of a lack of standardization, we end up with irritating things like this. I was just dealing with something like this myself when building a crossover cable that lets me interface my sound card with my phone to send/receive data with minimodem.
They actually ARE pretty standard. There are variants, because each is optimized for something different. Is it an audio device with video capability? Then you want tip and ring to be L & R audio, with the third signal, video, being something that you need a special cable to access. This ensures backward compatibility with audio cables and headphones. If you’re making a camcorder, then you can live without stereo audio, as long as you get one audio channel and video. That puts R audio on the optional conductor. “But why the difference between shield and the additional ring?” Well, that depends on the jacks that cable will be used with. Many jacks use a shield contact that is higher up on the plug. Those? You need the second ring to be ground. Other jacks contact the shield at the base of the plug. For those, you want shield to be ground. None of that matters when you’re just using TRS, so decades of COTS jacks never had to care. But with TRRS, it does. See? There’s a reason for all the madness, as long as the manufacturer chose the most applicable wiring for their specific device’s primary function and the ecosystem of things that are usually going to plug into it.
8:25 If the processor was scanning the buttons that slowly I would expect it to work ~sometimes~ if you pressed it fast. Or if it's multiplexed, to actually activate a different button. I think it's probably just overly-aggressive de-bounce. 22:45 That text editor makes me think you could get it running arbitrary code with a poisoned text file haha. Shame the screen is so shiny. Would otherwise have been nice for a homebrew laptop.
18:16 I appreciate the subliminal dissemination of propaganda for our cause. Seriously though, I love that you tell stories with old tech, an upload is always wonderful Edit: WAIT THAT'S WHAT THE GAME PORT IS FOR!?
Lots of fun to be had here, but it's the NES that got me saying "Gravis, no!" out loud. I enjoyed the video, no worries about the editing. Hope your new BOIFUN proves useful in future productions!
I would suspect that the main PCB and the two button PCB's are part of an off the shelf type kit. They are heavily labelled to let you know where to attach your own cables. You can build it into any shape and size product you like. The screw holes are probably silk screened to show you that you can put a screw there without shorting traces to ground.
Apparently you can get the firmware version & de-zone MT1389 devices. FW: - Push "Home Menu" on the remote - Go to "Initial Settings" - Highlight "Options" (Do not enter) - Push "Display" on the remote Zone: - Push "Setup" - Enter "1379"
It's fascinating to imagine, perhaps, some poorly paid employee of some company in China whose job is to develop the cheapest PCB designs possible for things like this - and that either by their own will or perhaps by decree of their manager that even though they're making cheap crap, everything should be properly labeled and silk-screened, just in case. Maybe it's because they were developing the board to sell to other companies - so you need things labeled for the buyer to be able to assemble it properly. I need an hour long documentary about how stuff like this gets made from beginning to end.
The AV input back in the day was awesome. I had a Panasonic portable DVD player back in the early to mid 2000s, when you wanted to play games on a road trip, this was awesome. The problem was, the only TVs that most people could both afford, and afford one just for travel was a CRT. No one was trying to put a Plasma or LCD in their car or van. Not to mention, you'd still need an inverter to take 12V to 120V, and the ones you could buy easily were rather small and wouldn't power either of those. Sure you could get 12V CRT displays, conversion vans used them a lot, so did a lot of campers of the era but they were still big and heavy and really weren't great options. However, these things solved all those problems. You bought a portable DVD player that had a 12V adapter, you bought a cheap 60W inverter. And you could now play games anywhere you had 12V. I played a lot of GameCube games on the road using a setup like this. You plugged the game cube into the inverter, and the DVD player ran off its internal battery for a couple hours, it was actually pretty good battery life without the DVD player running. The only other thing you needed was an RCA female-female adapter so you could plug the two cords together. Thinking back, this was actually a pretty similar layout to those devices, just in a larger package. It was awesome.
I think that game port could be like the RCA ones that feed video and controller signals into a secondary screen that has a plug-in for a game controller and can be played while the dvd player is playing a movie at the same time.
I see a bunch of these "six letter" devices at my Amazon Return / Dumpster store and my flea market all the time. I actually bought a couple of external DVD drives (with hilarious names like Rieddas) and I've noticed that a lot of them just reuse the same components. My latest purchase - an external USB DVD Drive that's got a Toshiba TS-L633M drive on it - also had an SD card reader AND three extra USB ports. For two bucks. I mean, sure, why not, I can use that on one of my tiny computers or the Pi. How does this device handle interlacing in the video input? I'd grab one of these to use as a secondary monitor for analog video capturing.
It's interesting actually, it handles interlaced video really well. Like, that has to be what's coming out of the camcorder, and it looks terrific on the screen, so it seems to be bob deinterlacing it and producing really clean results
Been obsessed with that Xenia trans rights image for the last few days and to see it slowly scan in unexpectedly flashbanged my soul with joy. Great video, thank you for sharing~!
I have now sat through an entire video on a portable DVD player in the year of our lord 2024, and I'm somehow more than ok with that. Cheers on the ever-interesting content.
The inclusion of the adjustments for color is nice. Some people like to adjust the way their screens look to get an image that appeals to them more. For example. I like to make the screen a bit of warmer color.
I think I was mostly thinking of the hue slider, since the hue can't possibly be incorrect given that the source is digital - but I suppose the analog input could be maladjusted at the far end somehow.
@@CathodeRayDude I’ve seen lots of these actually using composite video internally to connect the display to the dvd player. So that’s one reason the chip and firmware would have the functionality included. And why disable it if it’s already there. Somebody might want it for some reason. It’s also possible that it’s there to account for variances between the (obviously low quality) displays integrated into these things
@@FennecTECHyeah, the displays probably come from various vendors with varying quality based on lowest price. LCD quality and backlight color temp / CRI will vary.
I wouldn't be surprised if someone made a super rough NES emulator just for evaluation or to learn coding on this board and then other people kept on copying it as a feature
Oh dear lord, finding the correct trrs composite av cable for my viofo dashcam was a pita! Took me an hour on Amazon scouring individual listings to find ones that matched the exact output, mostly since the viofo used a weird ground, so I couldn't just switch a jack. And it didn't even work! When I tried plugging it into my car's av inputs, it would scroll almost like it was outputting a pal signal, especially since it was also black and white.
I'm glad the bois are having fun, but if they're doing it with a DVD player that only one person can view at a time . . . exactly what kind of fun are they having with it? 😄
Might need some b-roll where you have the camera zoomed into the full display without any other elements in frame and let it auto whitebalance to that or configure it manually. Same with contrast. Just a suggestion to try and get as close to a correct image of the screen as you can! Awesome video as always! Seen some wild stuff I never knew existed show up on your channel!
With how deep & mature your voice is I didn't expect you to look so young. Anyways this is the coolest DVD player I have ever seen with the swivle hinge alone.
3:03 Y'know, I'm not all that surprised that people would watch a DVD on a 4-inch screen. I mean, the resolution of oldschool DVD video is pretty low, so you wouldn't be missing much. Also, the place where I most frequently saw portable DVD players being sold was airport terminal kiosks, and that's a dang good match right there. Before the days of smartphones and cheap flash storage, you could slip a few DVDs in your carry-on luggage, get a cheap-and-cheerful portable DVD player at your local electronics store or the airport terminal, plop it down on your seat-back tray table, and watch something entirely of your own choice rather than whatever's available on the in-flight entertainment system.
No but real question tho : how did you make that quickstart DVD. I've been looking around to make my own DVDs but it seems that DVD authoring software has become an endangered species.
Very nice video, really enjoyed going down the rabbit hole of a cheap weird branded device, always wondered what was in them and how it was all done through the hardwere and softwere. I also really like the modern Mediatek CPUs in the phones, they have gone a long way from what they used to do in the past.
Love your vids, first time commenting... I think the reason the screen only rotates 180 degrees is so that they don't have to worry about the connector getting twisted too much and breaking off. If it rotated all 360 degrees (plus) then there would have to be connectors in the hinge and they would wear out and loose contact over time.
I can help a little with the market for these: a lot of truckers actually use something like this to watch some movies while stopped for rest (at least in Europe), so the viewing angle or the glossy screen won't bother them as much.
There are like knockoff game consoles that use what look like a USB port on the front for controllers, but it is wired to take a SNES or NES controller adapted into USB pins basically. It's an analogue input. I wish I could remember an example but all I remember was a youtube video taking apart a fake looking tiny PS5 that plays nes roms (poorly)
For the chip manufacture date, looking at 30:42 shows 2106 which could be a date code showing the manufacture date (21st week, 2006) implying the unit itself is old or the chip is new old stock. you can confirm this by checking other components for date codes.
I saw your original BOIFUN post on Cohost and somehow immediately knew something with a SIXLTR name like that was destined to be a video of some sort. Truly one of the names of all time.
I actually one time, used a portable DVD player like this with the screen rotated 90°. My family was on a roadtrip kinda holiday, but being a weird nerd, I brought a PSOne. Because of parents using the main tv, I had to hook into one of these in the bedroom. Because there was no desks, I put it on the bedside table, rotated the screen towards the bed, and played like that.
Interestingly, I came across BOIFUN today when looking at a new battery for our cheap chinese baby monitor. Apparently the VB603 is sold under the brands BOIFUN, Sinmos, Infanti, Floureon, Orretti, Tak Tark, GHB (yes, really), and probably more I havent found. Quite a fascinating world, the ultra cheap rebrands.
For the camera not being able to capture the color of the screen, try doing a manual white balance setting of 5600K or Daylight balance when filming LCDs (or even CRTs). Love CRD!
im 99% sure that display is your run of the mill cheap 15inch laptop display i bet its 1366x768 too and that you could swap with any cheap laptop from 2010-even today tbh. Also this firmware ui is THE SAME as a dvd player i had in the late 2000s/early 2010s from a company named Denver (which is a legit european company) no idea of the model number rn but it was white and black, literally new memory unlocked. I wish i had it rn, my mom had me give it to a cousin of mine even tho i removed the battery bc it was completely bloated like fire hazard and it lasted like 5 secs so it could only run on DC in (also yeah when the battery runs out it just turns off nothing fancy lol, you can even power cycle it until it can only stay on for a milisecond). Mine did not have the game port tho, at least i dont think it did? wonder if it could run nes games anyway, or open text files, or if it has the same chip, i think i should have pics of when i opened it up to remove the batery but that was potentially 5+ years ago lol if i find any i'll update this comment
When I was in robotics in HS I got to see a little bit about how some of the really cheap boards like that are made. As for the screening you saw, they put the info into the design file from the very start and just never ever take them out. My guess is so that a tech can test in the factory really quick to validate and once it is good enough to get approved it's set in stone and they won't do anything more to change it.
The silk screened images screws are there because those button assemblies were clearly made for another device. Boifun just bought them and integrated them. Poorly.
DivX.....now that's a name I've not heard in a _long_ time.... I remember when most videos on the internet had that logo watermarked into them... Also, I never would have known that everything in the video wasn't planned out ahead of time if you hadn't said anything about the constant additions. So it seems you do better work than you give yourself credit for.
Very interesting video! I always wonder what could be done if the firmware was opensource??? That would be so cool to pump new functions in these devices! The Text icon is probably inverted "BGR" instead of "RGB", so two channels are swapped. BMP used this order...
I really like things like this. Not because there good but cuz they come from the idea of trying make multiple things from the same components (like taco bell) grabbing old new stock and absolute forgotten inventory to spit out whatever for profit. Pretty creative even if there bad lol.
When it comes to portable DVD players, I always thought the interesting ones were the ones that were the size of CD players with a tiny screen or the Android tablet DVD players~
Those late 90s/early aughts 3-5" screen devices were intended to hand to kids during long car or plane trips. They weren't supposed to be a particularly good viewing experience, just enough for kids to watch Monsters Inc or episodes 4-6 of Fairly OddParents on repeat.
My niece has something similar if not identical under another name for in the car (the controls are very familiar as is the LED window although I don’t recall the game port) and we have tried to use it with big TVs while on holiday and super annoyingly you can’t defeat the internal speaker; if you mute or turn it down, it turns down the external audio also.
30:30 on my dvd player you get a low batt screen indication in the center of the screen, the screen starts turning on and off while the audio stays and then shuts off completely, mine also has digital tv (dvb-t) but no av in and game function, came out in 2008
![Little Guys: Episode 1 [Logic AU912]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/GQmj1P-DSoY/mqdefault.jpg)
Babe! grab the the official Gravis 34oz Water/Liquid Jug and the Gravis Microwave Pizza Rolls ( 24-Pack ) and Gravis Diet Cola 2-Litre Hydration Drink Soda / Soft Drink 70oz Sugar-Free. I'll grab the Replacement Remote Control Only for Roku TV, Compatible for TCL Roku (Not for Stick and Box) and load up his new video!
this is one of the funniest comments I've ever received
Spoken like a true Amazon page.
@@CathodeRayDude you should 100% make the official gravis 34oz water/liquid jug
IT IS TIME
TIME FOR BOIFUN
I'm afraid I don't have Gravis jug, Gravis pizza or Gravis soda. I only got Gravis Ultrasound MAX 2.1, would that do?
On the use of Windows icons; most of the icons in Windows/Office/etc. are included in the "Visual Studio Image Library" which is pretty liberally licenced (basically, as long a someone uses Visual Studio for something during development, you're probably ok), so it's not exactly "ripped off", Microsoft actually allows it.
wow, those have everything!!!
"Set it to 'wide', which makes it tall…"
Spot on dry delivery, man.
10:13
"While doing something with your other hand" And thats why they called it Boifun
21:14 hey bro here isnt your controller
The marketing possibilities are endless: "The whole family can enjoy the 15 inch boifun"
That would be uncomfortable to put away.
15inches ? I don't think the whole family can enjoy that. Maybe mom.
@@Gatorade69And Grandma
How to get on a list just for buying a dvd player.
15 inches of boyfun. Wow.
3:03 Hey, I used to watch an episode of a TV show on my 6th gen iPod Classic during my lunch break at the Cingular store. The screen on those was 2.5 inches and 320x420. The perfect size for a laptop.
I also loaned it to a friend who was in the hospital for a week and loaded it up with her favorite movies and TV shows. She used it so much that week, the click wheel stopped working by the last day. So, by those standards and that time period, a portable 4 inch screen that plays DVDs was huge.
hahaha okay that's fair. idk, like, it's easier to picture it as a toss-in feature on a device purchased for other purposes ; the idea of spending several hundred bucks on something whose sole purpose is to play video on a tiny screen seems more absurd than it probably should.
@@CathodeRayDudeOh, yeah, you're right. I see what you mean. The iPod wasn't designed just for video. I see your point.
Oh... 12:29 mentions the video iPod. That's another lesson in "finish the video before commenting."
A few times I loaded movies / TV shows onto my Zune and I'd watch them at the gym or when on lunch at work...
For both devices the process of converting and loading a video wasn't super convenient, so it wasn't exactly popular.
I'll do you one better: Nintendo DS. 256x192
This was awesome. The whole beginning and Puredick... 😂
The cohesiveness of your patchwork narrative here is still better than most people's fully scripted stuff, man. You very much have a natural knack for spinning a yarn. That's why I totally enjoy listening to you go off for 45 minutes on a topic that I wouldn't give most other creators more than 10 minutes with.
The MT1389 is still for sale I believe, it's still listed on MediaTek's site and they are usually pretty good at removing discontinued products. The MT1389 firmware source code for many different chip variants has leaked online, and those leaks do have code related to the NES functionality, so I believe that it came with the firmware, just not advertised on the datasheet for some reason.
That reason being Nintendo probably
@@gluttonousmaximus9048Only one I found are dead. Or are some site that wants you to sign up/pay.
@@xmlthegreat Another point, V.R. Technology and their VTxx systems have made Nintendo clone production trivial.
Random feature that may not have been noticed: There are keyhole screw points on the bottom so you can wall mount this thing in tablet mode.
This pen drive has Quake, Unreal Tournament, movies and a furry saying "Trans rights".
How many LAN parties have this pen drive been in without getting wiped?
From reading the comments i found their name is Xenia, a Linux mascot lol
@@juanmacias5922so, like every party, then? 😅
Underrated comment
Yes, Aging Wheels has referenced the made-up brand names, but sludge describes it a bit further. :)
My favorite six-letter I owned was "Assletes" on an HDMI capture card. Surprisingly accurate for a gaming peripheral lmao
i was about to say “That’s 8 letters!” but then i got the joke 😂😂
The test ports on the board -- I think you touched on the reality earlier in the video, when someone recognized that order of ports from a bunch of these devices. Someone (organization) at some point must have designed this board with the intent of selling them to tons of product integrators like whoever made this 6-letter product. Because the board designer in turn would then need to support their customers (the people making/integrating the products), it makes sense that they would want test points designed in because they would want to reproduce and investigate any weird symptoms that the integrators run into when designing/QAing their own derivative product. That's my theory at least. Also this theory potentially unifies the silkscreened screw logos on the board that seem odd in the context of this rock-bottom product -- those input/control modules are most likely procured from a different OEM, then integrated with this product at the time of its own engineering.
Again.. just a theory, but it would unify/explain why there are 2-3 different styles of PCB and component/design approach in the one product, the producers of this device were just lego-kitting it together, with most of their engineering probably being in the design of the clamshell and related engineering for assembly
boifun is quite possibly one of the best names ive seen from these things by far
When you demonstrated the proper way to fold back the screen and hold the thing in the crook of your arm, I felt a terrible buzzing in mind as it filled with giant anime question marks...
Regarding that MediaTek chip's CPU architecture: in certain areas, MediaTek is sort of infamous for rolling a ton of chips with different custom instruction sets tuned for the purpose (presumably generated in some sense). Considering the era and application, I wouldn't rule out that this chip runs a custom-but-uninteresting generic 32-bit RISC instruction set. Would perhaps also explain why the NES core is so slow, as it wouldn't benefit much from architecture-specific optimizations.
Also, that unknown chip looks like a type II TSOP package, which gives it a high probability of being DRAM indeed. Makes sense since that's definitely not in the chip itself. Isn't there some silkscreen marking right below it that could give a clue?
It's an 8051.
@@Rib_An 8051 is hardly the "32-bit RISC microcontroller" they claim it to be, would be very interested where you got that information from!
From what I read on the internet, MT1389 has a built in ARM7 chip (100Mhz ???).
Cannot find any confirmation.
Theorically it should be capable of emulating Nes fine (GBA can with an ARM7 16Mhz), but I guess they just tossed in an early emulator and called it a day.
My uncle has this exact same DVD player (though branded as something different), I couldn't get it to run NES roms though.
@@indask8 yeah that emulator maybe 'compatible' ie ARM7 but maybe frequency dependent for operation, so it runs slowly at the first sign of resistance because it cant throw more power at it, maybe? and agreed, a less powerful chip can run all of those so Lord Gaben knows whats going on under the hood for it as it maybe so barebones it may not have anything to help dynamic things like increasing processing power dedicated to it, or memory management.
Man I loved watching connections. There was another show called "The Secret Life of Machines." I would watch that all the time. Tim Hunkin had been restoring TSLOM and putting the videos on RUclips. It's a great watch if you enjoy connections.
Someone had a good set of PAL recordings but unfortunately the episode "The Car" still has a ton of problems. It also does on the NTSC and PAL DVD releases, but far worse. The other online releases also have the same issues. If the PAL source for the remastered RUclips release was recorded off broadcast then apparently the master tape for that episode was damaged. I'm pretty certain that when I saw the series during its original run in the USA that "The Car" episode didn't have the glitches.
If anyone has a first run off-air, cable, or satellite home recording of "The Car", that doesn't have the synch and field order glitches, I bet Tim Hunkin would be very interested in getting it, especially if it's PAL format.
Even a good NTSC recording could be used by cutting the bits that are glitchy in the PAL source then doing some fancy upscaling and frames per second changing to patch over the glitchy bits.
The DVD spec does indeed allow for auto switching of aspect ratios, at least in Europe where it sends a signal via the scart output on pin 8 I believe. However most home DVD recorders don't seem to bother recording the aspect ratio switching signal when recording, so on playback you have to set the ratio manually as you had to. Some Pioneer and Sony models would record the aspect ratio switching signal if recording from their internal tuners but most didn't instead relying on you to manually set things up.
So you’re saying BOIFUN is 15 inches? You’re damn right
Of course, the infamous SouljaGame port!!
I love to see weird AliExpress e-waste exploration like this, my mind is racing thinking about what, how, and *why* this thing is.
18:16 XENIA CAMEO!!!
The aspect ratio/screen type settings are totally normal (for a separate DVD player/TV setup) but rather unusual for an all-in-one device. I kinda like the flexibility though! Since it does more than just DVD playback, it does kinda need this flexibility.
As for DVDs being "hard coded with the aspect ratio", yes, they are. Widescreen (true widescreen, not Letterbox) DVDs are anamorphic, and the DVD player has the ability to letterbox or crop (Pan/Scan) to fit the 16:9 video onto 4:3 screens. The Pan/Scan flag is very rarely used (aside from Legal Warnings, disclaimers, menus, etc.) Typically these are flagged P/S to give a full 4:3 image on a 4:3 screen, rather than LBX. The graphics for these are created with excess real estate at the sides (text all within central portion of screen). 99.9999 of video content is flagged to display as LBX on 4:3 screens. To save money on early DVD players, only one scaling chip was designed into the specs. Scaling of overlays (menu highlights and subtitles) is not possible in any DVD player. For menu highlights to appear correct in both 16:9 and 4:3, two separate button highlights have to be created for every menu page. Super annoying. For subtitles, 99% of DVDs share the same stream across both aspect ratios, with the result that they look a bit stretched or squashed, depending what mode you're viewing in. Japanese subtitles were typically the only language where a separate 4:3 and 16:9 stream were supplied by the subtitle vendor. The Japanese are very picky about the characters being displayed in the right shape. Other countries have to suck it up! In my experience, almost every subtitle vendor I ever dealt with (in 20-odd years of DVD authoring) was CLUELESS about the technical aspects of subtitles and had absolutely no comprehension of dedicated 16:9 and LBX subtitle streams. Only those making the Japanese subs understood how to do it 😭 Because of the way menu highlights and subtitles work, it's not possible to just batch process subtitles in Photoshop to resize them. You could, but they'd look horrible. Resizing has to be done in grayscale mode, and only after that can you remap the 255 levels of black-to-white as three pure colors (typically white background with black, red, and blue used for text body, outline, and a very crude dither). Each of these colors get re-mapped as a specific display color and opacity percentage by the DVD player.
Wow, that ended up being a very long and nerdy message, but I'm sure some of your viewers will enjoying nerding out reading about obsolete tech 🤷♂️ 😂
absolutely fascinating stuff though, thank you for the comment!
For clarity, DVD authoring packages for "regular people" and semi-pro people were heavily "abstraction layer" based, and did a ton of the fiddly stuff internally. The pro systems, such as Scenarist, did NOTHING to help the author. Absolutely everything had to be done "by hand".
That port is actually for an NES controller, it uses 4 pins and port's metal case as separate contacts to get 5 wires. I have a NES on a chip from aliexpress that uses a controller like that.
Loved "Connections", thank you, James Burke, and "Ray"!
There's a new/fourth season on Curiosity Stream.
Letterbox and aspect ratio settings of this boi are absurd. I seriously doubt anyone ever watched a movie in proper fullscreen with correct aspect on this thing.
I appreciate Xenia showing up 💕
yasss i love it
I always enjoy the well executed humor on this channel.
The software in that player is also just like what would be in a digital picture frame.... Similar menus and such too.... I think the reason why the pictures are so slow to load is because it was expecting to be more of a slideshow or flipping through images.... And the battery life also designed to be used in a picture frame item... Most of those could play videos just fine if you loaded a few on there. 😊
I forgot about those cheap digital picture frames...
I have an old 2010 RCA DVD player that I'm pretty sure uses basically the same software, just without the USB or NES stuff in it, and I think it's also missing that on screen settings menu. Not sure what files it will play off of DVD, but I know when playing an audio CD it showed almost the same menu as the file browser in the boifun player. When playing DVDs the on screen symbols were also the same, I'm tempted to take mine apart and see what chip it has, and maybe make a DVD with a bunch of files to test with.
The hotwire audio file is someone tricking chat gpt into getting criminal instructions. It was a meme to do that a year ago or so.
Super awesome meeting you the other day while you were working on this video, it turned out amazing!
Likewise!
Re: The VDU suffix on the main chip - perhaps it means it supports a display (i.e VDU) output via LVDS which isn't required in other applications.
Man, your videos are really high on my list of "immediate watch" content and I love to avoid reading the title, because I know it's going to be a fun ride and usually on the longer side of things.... I need more! 😁 Your humor usually has me laughing at the most random stuff and that's never a bad thing! Fantastic video as always. Have a wonderful day! 😊🌎❤️🕺🏻🐶💻
Seriously, he made an interesting and informative video about a portable DVD player, which I've always viewed exactly as he does.
12:10 TRRS cables, as an idea, should be really helpful… but because of a lack of standardization, we end up with irritating things like this. I was just dealing with something like this myself when building a crossover cable that lets me interface my sound card with my phone to send/receive data with minimodem.
They actually ARE pretty standard. There are variants, because each is optimized for something different.
Is it an audio device with video capability? Then you want tip and ring to be L & R audio, with the third signal, video, being something that you need a special cable to access. This ensures backward compatibility with audio cables and headphones.
If you’re making a camcorder, then you can live without stereo audio, as long as you get one audio channel and video. That puts R audio on the optional conductor.
“But why the difference between shield and the additional ring?”
Well, that depends on the jacks that cable will be used with. Many jacks use a shield contact that is higher up on the plug. Those? You need the second ring to be ground. Other jacks contact the shield at the base of the plug. For those, you want shield to be ground. None of that matters when you’re just using TRS, so decades of COTS jacks never had to care. But with TRRS, it does.
See? There’s a reason for all the madness, as long as the manufacturer chose the most applicable wiring for their specific device’s primary function and the ecosystem of things that are usually going to plug into it.
It should be possible to make a universal TRRS to RCA cable with a switch for the different arrangements.
8:25 If the processor was scanning the buttons that slowly I would expect it to work ~sometimes~ if you pressed it fast. Or if it's multiplexed, to actually activate a different button. I think it's probably just overly-aggressive de-bounce.
22:45 That text editor makes me think you could get it running arbitrary code with a poisoned text file haha.
Shame the screen is so shiny. Would otherwise have been nice for a homebrew laptop.
I love these silly videos where you pick something up and it’s suddenly more interesting than you could ever account for.
18:16 I appreciate the subliminal dissemination of propaganda for our cause.
Seriously though, I love that you tell stories with old tech, an upload is always wonderful
Edit: WAIT THAT'S WHAT THE GAME PORT IS FOR!?
Lots of fun to be had here, but it's the NES that got me saying "Gravis, no!" out loud. I enjoyed the video, no worries about the editing.
Hope your new BOIFUN proves useful in future productions!
MY BOY
MY BOY
MY BOY
MY BOY
... Fun ?
I would suspect that the main PCB and the two button PCB's are part of an off the shelf type kit. They are heavily labelled to let you know where to attach your own cables. You can build it into any shape and size product you like. The screw holes are probably silk screened to show you that you can put a screw there without shorting traces to ground.
Apparently you can get the firmware version & de-zone MT1389 devices.
FW:
- Push "Home Menu" on the remote
- Go to "Initial Settings"
- Highlight "Options" (Do not enter)
- Push "Display" on the remote
Zone:
- Push "Setup"
- Enter "1379"
1. Buy a BOIFUN brand portable DVD player.
2. Place gay porn DVD in the disc tray.
3. Epoxy the door shut.
4. Why?
It's fascinating to imagine, perhaps, some poorly paid employee of some company in China whose job is to develop the cheapest PCB designs possible for things like this - and that either by their own will or perhaps by decree of their manager that even though they're making cheap crap, everything should be properly labeled and silk-screened, just in case.
Maybe it's because they were developing the board to sell to other companies - so you need things labeled for the buyer to be able to assemble it properly. I need an hour long documentary about how stuff like this gets made from beginning to end.
"Registered" has a soft G.
It has whatever G I want it to have.
@@CathodeRayDude "Which do you choose, a hard or soft option?"
The AV input back in the day was awesome. I had a Panasonic portable DVD player back in the early to mid 2000s, when you wanted to play games on a road trip, this was awesome. The problem was, the only TVs that most people could both afford, and afford one just for travel was a CRT. No one was trying to put a Plasma or LCD in their car or van. Not to mention, you'd still need an inverter to take 12V to 120V, and the ones you could buy easily were rather small and wouldn't power either of those. Sure you could get 12V CRT displays, conversion vans used them a lot, so did a lot of campers of the era but they were still big and heavy and really weren't great options.
However, these things solved all those problems. You bought a portable DVD player that had a 12V adapter, you bought a cheap 60W inverter. And you could now play games anywhere you had 12V. I played a lot of GameCube games on the road using a setup like this. You plugged the game cube into the inverter, and the DVD player ran off its internal battery for a couple hours, it was actually pretty good battery life without the DVD player running. The only other thing you needed was an RCA female-female adapter so you could plug the two cords together. Thinking back, this was actually a pretty similar layout to those devices, just in a larger package.
It was awesome.
I think that game port could be like the RCA ones that feed video and controller signals into a secondary screen that has a plug-in for a game controller and can be played while the dvd player is playing a movie at the same time.
I see a bunch of these "six letter" devices at my Amazon Return / Dumpster store and my flea market all the time. I actually bought a couple of external DVD drives (with hilarious names like Rieddas) and I've noticed that a lot of them just reuse the same components.
My latest purchase - an external USB DVD Drive that's got a Toshiba TS-L633M drive on it - also had an SD card reader AND three extra USB ports. For two bucks. I mean, sure, why not, I can use that on one of my tiny computers or the Pi.
How does this device handle interlacing in the video input? I'd grab one of these to use as a secondary monitor for analog video capturing.
It's interesting actually, it handles interlaced video really well. Like, that has to be what's coming out of the camcorder, and it looks terrific on the screen, so it seems to be bob deinterlacing it and producing really clean results
i really didnt expect so much lore this is crazy
Oh how I loved to watch James Burke on Connections!
Been obsessed with that Xenia trans rights image for the last few days and to see it slowly scan in unexpectedly flashbanged my soul with joy. Great video, thank you for sharing~!
Xenia is the Linux mascot we need. Tux is...and perhaps this may be a bit rude, plain and uncanny.
I have now sat through an entire video on a portable DVD player in the year of our lord 2024, and I'm somehow more than ok with that.
Cheers on the ever-interesting content.
The inclusion of the adjustments for color is nice. Some people like to adjust the way their screens look to get an image that appeals to them more. For example. I like to make the screen a bit of warmer color.
I think I was mostly thinking of the hue slider, since the hue can't possibly be incorrect given that the source is digital - but I suppose the analog input could be maladjusted at the far end somehow.
@@CathodeRayDude I’ve seen lots of these actually using composite video internally to connect the display to the dvd player. So that’s one reason the chip and firmware would have the functionality included. And why disable it if it’s already there. Somebody might want it for some reason. It’s also possible that it’s there to account for variances between the (obviously low quality) displays integrated into these things
@@FennecTECH aw geez you're right. Man no matter how much I look at this stuff I never fully internalize just how lego it all is.
@@FennecTECHyeah, the displays probably come from various vendors with varying quality based on lowest price. LCD quality and backlight color temp / CRI will vary.
@@CathodeRayDudeeverything built down to a price is all lego slapped onto a PCB and autorouted.
I wouldn't be surprised if someone made a super rough NES emulator just for evaluation or to learn coding on this board and then other people kept on copying it as a feature
Oh dear lord, finding the correct trrs composite av cable for my viofo dashcam was a pita! Took me an hour on Amazon scouring individual listings to find ones that matched the exact output, mostly since the viofo used a weird ground, so I couldn't just switch a jack. And it didn't even work! When I tried plugging it into my car's av inputs, it would scroll almost like it was outputting a pal signal, especially since it was also black and white.
I'm glad the bois are having fun, but if they're doing it with a DVD player that only one person can view at a time . . . exactly what kind of fun are they having with it? 😄
only one has to watch the video with 'instructions'
lol that's a sus name
I'm watching this video on a screen smaller than a 1998 dvd player. ;)
Trans Rights🏳⚧
Ayyy trans rights
Might need some b-roll where you have the camera zoomed into the full display without any other elements in frame and let it auto whitebalance to that or configure it manually. Same with contrast. Just a suggestion to try and get as close to a correct image of the screen as you can! Awesome video as always! Seen some wild stuff I never knew existed show up on your channel!
Also the low latency for using the player as composite video monitor is so cool. There's little to no visible delay which is awesome
With how deep & mature your voice is I didn't expect you to look so young. Anyways this is the coolest DVD player I have ever seen with the swivle hinge alone.
3:03 Y'know, I'm not all that surprised that people would watch a DVD on a 4-inch screen. I mean, the resolution of oldschool DVD video is pretty low, so you wouldn't be missing much. Also, the place where I most frequently saw portable DVD players being sold was airport terminal kiosks, and that's a dang good match right there. Before the days of smartphones and cheap flash storage, you could slip a few DVDs in your carry-on luggage, get a cheap-and-cheerful portable DVD player at your local electronics store or the airport terminal, plop it down on your seat-back tray table, and watch something entirely of your own choice rather than whatever's available on the in-flight entertainment system.
No but real question tho : how did you make that quickstart DVD. I've been looking around to make my own DVDs but it seems that DVD authoring software has become an endangered species.
oh it was actually really easy! Dvdstyler is the program, runs on Windows, open source, uses ffmpeg to do transcoding, very straightforward
@@CathodeRayDude Well thanks, I didn't know about that one.
I enjoy these kinds of videos. Keep it up man
ty, will do!
Very nice video, really enjoyed going down the rabbit hole of a cheap weird branded device, always wondered what was in them and how it was all done through the hardwere and softwere.
I also really like the modern Mediatek CPUs in the phones, they have gone a long way from what they used to do in the past.
Love your vids, first time commenting... I think the reason the screen only rotates 180 degrees is so that they don't have to worry about the connector getting twisted too much and breaking off. If it rotated all 360 degrees (plus) then there would have to be connectors in the hinge and they would wear out and loose contact over time.
I can help a little with the market for these: a lot of truckers actually use something like this to watch some movies while stopped for rest (at least in Europe), so the viewing angle or the glossy screen won't bother them as much.
There are like knockoff game consoles that use what look like a USB port on the front for controllers, but it is wired to take a SNES or NES controller adapted into USB pins basically. It's an analogue input. I wish I could remember an example but all I remember was a youtube video taking apart a fake looking tiny PS5 that plays nes roms (poorly)
For the chip manufacture date, looking at 30:42 shows 2106 which could be a date code showing the manufacture date (21st week, 2006) implying the unit itself is old or the chip is new old stock. you can confirm this by checking other components for date codes.
30:42 that appears to be a manufacturing date code of the 21st week of 2006 which lines right up with that data sheet date.
I saw your original BOIFUN post on Cohost and somehow immediately knew something with a SIXLTR name like that was destined to be a video of some sort. Truly one of the names of all time.
I actually one time, used a portable DVD player like this with the screen rotated 90°. My family was on a roadtrip kinda holiday, but being a weird nerd, I brought a PSOne. Because of parents using the main tv, I had to hook into one of these in the bedroom. Because there was no desks, I put it on the bedside table, rotated the screen towards the bed, and played like that.
Interestingly, I came across BOIFUN today when looking at a new battery for our cheap chinese baby monitor. Apparently the VB603 is sold under the brands BOIFUN, Sinmos, Infanti, Floureon, Orretti, Tak Tark, GHB (yes, really), and probably more I havent found. Quite a fascinating world, the ultra cheap rebrands.
What thing when you fold it flat you can put it on the backside of a carseat for the kids. There is often a pouch to slide it in.
For the camera not being able to capture the color of the screen, try doing a manual white balance setting of 5600K or Daylight balance when filming LCDs (or even CRTs).
Love CRD!
I keep reading the brand as “biofun” which is a MUCH scarier name tbh
4:34 The ^_^ in the warranty reminder makes me think that maybe the "boifun" name was picked intentionally.
What a pleasant surprise that the cheap junk turned out to have a use-case for you. An interesting watch, too.
Dang, fifteen inches! That's gotta be the perfect size for a portable DVD player, I don't know why they make em any other way
im 99% sure that display is your run of the mill cheap 15inch laptop display i bet its 1366x768 too and that you could swap with any cheap laptop from 2010-even today tbh.
Also this firmware ui is THE SAME as a dvd player i had in the late 2000s/early 2010s from a company named Denver (which is a legit european company) no idea of the model number rn but it was white and black, literally new memory unlocked.
I wish i had it rn, my mom had me give it to a cousin of mine even tho i removed the battery bc it was completely bloated like fire hazard and it lasted like 5 secs so it could only run on DC in (also yeah when the battery runs out it just turns off nothing fancy lol, you can even power cycle it until it can only stay on for a milisecond).
Mine did not have the game port tho, at least i dont think it did? wonder if it could run nes games anyway, or open text files, or if it has the same chip, i think i should have pics of when i opened it up to remove the batery but that was potentially 5+ years ago lol if i find any i'll update this comment
I take exception to your comments re DIVX - back then it was awesome - and branded on everything!
You seem extra meme-y today. Got a few extra laughs out of me.
also, loved the furry trans rights image, that made me smile.
From reading the comments i found their name is Xenia, a Linux mascot lol
When I was in robotics in HS I got to see a little bit about how some of the really cheap boards like that are made. As for the screening you saw, they put the info into the design file from the very start and just never ever take them out. My guess is so that a tech can test in the factory really quick to validate and once it is good enough to get approved it's set in stone and they won't do anything more to change it.
There are DVB TVs, also on battery and with AV input. However I don't remember I've seen this large, they are about 7"-10" usually.
its so weird, they should have used the same standard as normal 3.5mm audio cables and just used the 4th pole used for the mic for the video line.
The silk screened images screws are there because those button assemblies were clearly made for another device. Boifun just bought them and integrated them. Poorly.
DivX.....now that's a name I've not heard in a _long_ time....
I remember when most videos on the internet had that logo watermarked into them...
Also, I never would have known that everything in the video wasn't planned out ahead of time if you hadn't said anything about the constant additions.
So it seems you do better work than you give yourself credit for.
Very interesting video!
I always wonder what could be done if the firmware was opensource???
That would be so cool to pump new functions in these devices!
The Text icon is probably inverted "BGR" instead of "RGB", so two channels are swapped.
BMP used this order...
i wonder if it uses the same 15.6" 1366x768 screen that was in every sub $200 laptop of the last decade and half.
almost definitely
I really like things like this. Not because there good but cuz they come from the idea of trying make multiple things from the same components (like taco bell) grabbing old new stock and absolute forgotten inventory to spit out whatever for profit. Pretty creative even if there bad lol.
"Trigger Effect" at 15:05, an excellent choice.
When it comes to portable DVD players, I always thought the interesting ones were the ones that were the size of CD players with a tiny screen or the Android tablet DVD players~
The way you say "registered" is really interesting
Those late 90s/early aughts 3-5" screen devices were intended to hand to kids during long car or plane trips. They weren't supposed to be a particularly good viewing experience, just enough for kids to watch Monsters Inc or episodes 4-6 of Fairly OddParents on repeat.
My niece has something similar if not identical under another name for in the car (the controls are very familiar as is the LED window although I don’t recall the game port) and we have tried to use it with big TVs while on holiday and super annoyingly you can’t defeat the internal speaker; if you mute or turn it down, it turns down the external audio also.
For some reason the fact that it has screw holes on the back so you can mount it to a wall is hilarious to me.
15:00 aww I miss that show... The good old days of the Discovery Channel here in Canada.
I knew the lord would answer my prayers ! Been having fun at the live streams.
30:30 on my dvd player you get a low batt screen indication in the center of the screen, the screen starts turning on and off while the audio stays and then shuts off completely, mine also has digital tv (dvb-t) but no av in and game function, came out in 2008