I spent the weekend in Iowa City and did a little shopping with my brother in law. While we were at a store that buys and sells used video games, I saw a few old Atari 2600 cartridges behind the counter. I always get a little nostalgic when I see those, but most stores sell them for around five dollars. This shop had them for the low low price of $0.94. I stood there staring at the cartridge and realized that I could probably cram a couple of AA batteries along with a couple of 9 volt batteries. I had a feeling I was looking at my next iPod battery pack! I bought one and within minutes of arriving home in Chicago I was cracking that cartridge open.
Atari cartridges are closed by plastic pieces that snap together along the sides and a screw underneath the sticker rigth in the middle. I thought about trying to peel the entire sticker off to get to the sticker, but I wasn’t sure if I could do it without tearing it. Instead, I decided to make a small cut and lift the smallest part of the sticker that I could to get to the screw. Once the screw is out, the key to popping it open is simply to push in on the sides with the plastic tabs. Squeeze those sides together and it’ll pop right open. Inside you’ll find a spring, the data card and the plastic top that would slide up to reveal the card when the cartridge was plugged in.
In order to fit the batteries inside the cartridge, you’ll need to do a bit of dremel work. I wound grinding down every piece of plastic inside of there except for one tab and the column that the screw goes into. I kept one tab in there to help seperate the batteries. To be honest, I’m not sure it was too useful to keep that tab in there and next time I might grind it down as well. Once the inside has been cleaned out, you can create the hole for the firewire port. Trace it out and then cut it out slowly. The last thing you want to do is create too large of a hole. I stopped pretty often to check it for fit. Once I got the hole just right, I set the firewire port in it and hot glued it in there.
That’s when I made my first mistake. I filled in one of the plastic slots with hot glue that another piece snaps into when you try to close the cartridge. I wound up having to scrape it out later, so be careful when you’re doing this part. At this point, I basically followed the same directions that people have been using to make altoid battery packs. I soldered everything together and then used a little more hot glue to make sure that the wires on the firewire port won’t come loose. It was pretty tough to get it all closed as things are pretty tight. I wound up having to rearrange the batteries several times before I could get it closed with minimal seperation on the sides. I think part of the problem had to do with the issues I had with the hot glue. I did wind up getting it closed well enough that it feels quite durable now. I put the screw back in and tried to arrange the sticker back just right. You could see the silver of the screw a little so I blacked it out with permanent marker. The final step is to grind down the top so that it’s just a thin little flat piece. Once it’s flat, you can snap it back into place. Once it’s all done, it should look just like the original cartridge!
I have to admit, it isn’t quite as easy to open and replace the batteries as the Altoids battery pack, but this definitely gets serious style points. The next time I create one, I’m going to try to figure out a way to get the screw out without damaging the sticker. It would also be helpful to be able to simply snap it open and closed without using a screwdriver at all.
The diagram below was created by Drew Perry who may have been the first to create a DIY battery pack. He used the box from a deck of cards to make his. Both Chris Diclerico and Unixmonkey both took the same design and stuck it into an altoid’s tin. I’ve made a few of those and they work great! Unixmonkey also has a nice new diagram of how things should be wired together, just to clear up any confusion that could arise.
Materials:
You can buy the firewire sockets from any major electronics site. For example, you can buy them here, here, or here.
The battery connections all came from Radio Shack. You’ll need three 9 volt snap connectors and one battery holder for the two AA batteries. It looks just like this but I couldn’t find the right part online (the one I have linked seems to be for “D” batteries).
As for the Atari 2600 cartridge, you can’t go wrong with eBay!
Photos (click for high resolution):
Would you believe that this is all an Atari 2600 catridge actually is?
Wow…. coolio, can you fit an ipod in that case…. now that would be totally retro… oh and by the way you got engadgeted….
3/29/2005
Very cool. I love it when guys do things like this!
Keep it up!
3/29/2005
I love this idea. I’m going to do this for my iPod 
The only thing I can add is that using a space heater or a blow dryer to get the label(s) off of the card is a bit cleaner and nicer looking than cutting the label to get the screw down.
3/30/2005
Awesome! Best I’ve seen yet!
*goes ebaying for a Pac-man cartrige*
4/1/2005
I’ve read about a couple of other people who have put together battery packs for their iPods. Apparently they like to use things like Altoids tins - and things like that.
My only question is - one of the sites I read said that you run the possibility of frying (or screwing up) your iPod because there isn’t any sort of regulator to even out the power - and that it’s not really smart to wire batteries of two different voltages (i.e. 9 volt and AA) in series (or something like that - I’m not an electrician).
Have you had any problems with yours?
I’ve read that as well, but I’ve been using the Altoids one for about a month now with no problems, and so has a friend of mine. The only time I noticed a problem was when the batteries were low, it show it as charging, then not charging, charging then not charging. It was pretty obvious when the juice had run dry. Other than that, I’ve had no problems whatsoever. I’m no electrician, so I can’t and won’t say it’s 100% safe, but it seems to do the job!
[…] ia una brutta riproduzione, poi ti accorgi che è solo uno specchio. I neurotici amici di Teach42.com spiegano al popolo della Rete come confezionare una batteria per iPod […]
Man. Combat frickin’ rules.
I love that game.
Oh, and nice battery mod by the way. 
don’t you just love comment board spam ^ I get that on my site too. Anyway, this is a really awesome case for an ipod charger. I am just now building one out of an altoids tin.
Brilliant innovation.I am on my second ipod battery. There is a good video at ipodstop.co.uk to show you how to fit them.www.ipodstop.co.ukhttp://www.ipodstop.co.uk
8/21/2006
Got my iPod replacement battery at http://www.laptopsforless.com/mp3playerbattery/apple-ipod-Battery and it works great. Great site for iPod batteries.
if you are into Pacman you shall check out this online pacman website where you can play pacman, ms.pacman and more
[…] Teach42 The Atari 2600 iPod battery pack Education and Technology by Steve Dembo … I had a feeling I was looking at my next iPod battery pack! … 2005/03/28/the-combat-ipod-battery-pack/trackback … […]
How do you charge the batteries? Can you charge via usb/firewire or do you have to pop the cartridge open and take the batteries out?
[…] Avariando… - Libero Community - Blog wrote an interesting post today on Comment on The Atari 2600 iPod battery pack by raymond doweHere’s a quick excerptHow do you charge the batteries? Can you charge via usb/firewire or do you have to pop the cartridge open and take the batteries out? […]
[…] TechFresh Gadgets wrote an interesting post today on Comment on The Atari 2600 iPod battery pack by Ipod » Comment onHere’s a quick excerpt[…] Avariando… - Libero Community - Blog wrote an interesting post today on Comment on The Atari 2600 iPod battery pack by raymond doweHere’s a… […]
If you need a new battery, I suggest you could purchase one from here , which would shipping to you fast and the quality is satisfy satisfied.:)
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How do you charge the batteries? Can you charge via usb/firewire or do you have to pop the cartridge open and take the batteries out?
I have checked up-it does not work! If your battery is still alive, do not do it! Well certainly if it does not breathe at all then experiment - all the same to lose there is nothing
very good,many customers ask me how to extend your laptop battery life,then I can interview they to here now。
[…] Anime News Updated wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerpt […]
[…] Anime News Updated wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerpt […]
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