My cable arrived yesterday and I'm very certain that those are original Nintendo cables: They have triwing-screws, the soldering looks decent, there's the same IC in them and it even had the plastic bag tube. As cheap as that last one may sound, "lots and lots of transparent plastic bag tubes" is something fakes rarely do.
I don't know where this seller dug out the masses of cables he sells (maybe I should ask him) but I'm thinking of ordering some more - just to have a small reserve.
I'm not sure if I follow you. The plug that cascades (is that what you mean?), that should be the master? Does it matter which side is used for the GC connection?
English is not my native language so at points, my explanations may sound a bit "off".. Sorry about that.
Two-player-cables have a master and a slave side. In most games, it's the master that has to confirm the connection (press a when all players are ready); in single-cartrige-multiplayer, it's him sending out the game to the others. It's also called 1P on cables (because "master/slave" is a computer term that may sound strange to players). With the plug in the middle you can connect an additional cable so that a third player may join. Attach another cable to the plug in the middle of *that* cable and you can have four players.
Plugging stuff behind each other sometimes is also called "daisy-chaining" but I've learned the more technical term "cascading" for it.
But you can only fit another cable with one of the two ends - the other has the plastic to block. That's because an additional cable will only work in one "direction" (master->slave) and Nintendo has to make sure that stupid children don't connect the "slave"-side of such a cable to the connector plug. Just imaginge you cut the 4-player-wiring diagram after player2 but clone the two-player cable and have to attach it somewhere.
Both side should contain all necessary wires (I remember using one for a general-purpose-GBA adapter and the other one for a Gamecube link) so it shouldn't matter which side you use. The one with the additional plastic may seem more suited for a Gameboy Micro but if you use a hard plastic case while playing, it may block the way.
I do think I saw an image of an original cable, which had a cascading plug as well.
Yep. I have found one of those for the "big" connectors as well (but without IC). It makes quite some sense: You don't have two open ends if you only play with two players and if every Gameboy owner has one cable, you can connect all of them.
I'm still pondering how to continue now, together with the 'neue' gc-link cable. Should I just cut off one side and solder that?
I'd recommend de-soldering the wires on that side - it's just a lot cleaner.
First of all, you should double-check where the solder pads from the gamecube-cable go to. Best to note down the number and position on the board and the number and position on the GBA plug.
If it really is the same as the "Neue Version", the wire at Pad '1' should be red and connected to Pin6 at the GBA-Plug; wire at '3' should be brown at Pin2 on the GBA, '5' blue and Pin3 on GBA and '6' white and Pin1 at the GBA - but double-triple-check this.
Next, you should double-check which wire from the GBM-cable corresponds to the GBM plug.
Based on the theory that all Nintendo-cables are the same, this picture could help you:
http://www.mksmks.de/technical/gbm12.jpg
1: blue (unconnected in picture); 2: red; 3 orange (in yellow plug); 4: brown (in white plug) 5: green; 6: shield (in black plug). (note that the first row is 1,3,5 and not 123 - it got me confused for a moment)
but double-triple-check this. *anything* to shield (6) should never be less than zero V. Shield to power (Pin1, possibly blue) should be about 3.3V at all times.
I don't recommend just believing the info on the site and connecting the blue wire to the '6'-pad, orange wire to the '5'-pad, red wire to the '3'-pad and shield-wire to the '1'-pad.
wire 4 and 5 (maybe brown and green) cannot be connected to the Gamecube-board, so cut them off and maybe insulate them so they never accidently connect to anything or each other).
And what exactly do you mean with keeping the plug and building a breakout box for easy testing and soldering? (I'm trying to visualize, but I fail ^^ ).
I mean something like this:
http://www.mksmks.de/technical/gbm09.jpg
With this you can easily check which wires are connected to which pin on the GBM - so it helps with the double-triple-checking. I just used mine to verify the wire colors, again.
If you need me to check anything, just let me know. I'm no star in the IC department, so I can't really brainstorm with you there unfortunately.
The real nature of this IC is not important, anyway. It just puzzles me a little but I can live with not knowing..
hmm.. After having dug out this stuff, I really think I should catalog what I have left here and maybe build another cable while video-documenting it... I think I remember other people asking for them, too.. That page could use some updated about the link cables as well...
Regards,
TCC