The ribbon cable, is it a standard type? I'm going to permanently mount the face in my car. I'm going to extend that cable (maybe < 24") so that I can remotely mount the MKII chassis elsewhere, hidden. If anyone can let me in on this information, I can get to work this weekend.

As an aside, does anyone have busted MKII that they'd like to sell the display from? Maybe the tech dept?

It's not standard, no, it's a custom cable. You could extend it by cutting it and wiring it to more ribbon cable (this would also mean you wouldn't have to try getting hold of 1mm pitch ribbon, which is harder to find than the normal 1.27mm stuff) but as I have said before, this is NOT recommended as the signals are 3.3v unbuffered.

You may damage the player or display, or it may work fine. I've not tried it.

Hugo

read this

Please keep in mind that most of the lines on that cable go unbuffered into the StrongARM - you might want to take care routing them near anything that could induce an EMF.

Display boards are like gold dust. When we need one for warranty service we usually have to pull apart a spare player.

Rob

Who was that intrepid user who developed the extension buffer circuitry?

How are you going to upload new music? Even if you do 802.11b, you are stuck doing uploads when at home or near another wireless LAN...

Patrick did something like that for a private customer. I believe it isn't a cheap solution.

Rob

Who was that intrepid user who developed the extension buffer circuitry?

Mark Malleck. Thread here, photos here.

Thanks. Cool mod, for those with the time, money, expertise and need to do it....I think I'll leave mine alone..(for now)

Sorry to bring up an old topic, but has anyone tried this just to see how far they can go with an unbuffered signal?

There's a recent short one for someone's home docking station. In general, "trying it out" is a Bad Idea because, as Rob pointed out, the lines go strait into the CPU. Once you find "the limit" you might have a problem on our hands.

Matthew

Yeah, I saw that..very well done, but it was kept very short. Now another question. I have a local installer thats very good. He has done many display extentions for standard faceplates on detachable faceplate stereos. Are those typically already buffered so you'd just need to make a custom cable?