USB Interface for Nintendo GameBoy Advance

Adding modern connectivity to the GBA system is illustrated in this project by creating an interface between a PC and a Nintendo GameBoy Advance (GBA) system.

This project enables the GameBoy to function as a Personal Digital Assistance (PDA) while producing a software that will demonstrate the use of this interface to communicate between the two without requiring any hardware-specific drivers or user configuration. The chosen interface was USB because it is widely supported by different operating systems such as Windows, Linux, Mac OS, and others that have support for the standard. Also, it was easy to use and once it has been attached, it will be a simple plug and play.

A Microchip PIC16F877 microcontroller is used to implement USB V1.1 with the aid of CCS compiler add-on as well as a Philips Semiconductor PDIUSB12 low level USB chip where the interactions with the USB bus are being handled. Through UART, an interface with GBA can be achieved. The user data is transferred using the USB implementation by means of the USB-IF defined Human Interface Device (HID) class. The USB section of the project links to code snapshots at various milestones.

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