I don’t know which is more incredible. People are still tinkering with the Game Boy Advance after almost 25 years since it was first launched, or the fact that this GBA SP is kitted out with a mind-blowing 162,000 mWh replaceable battery. That is one hundred sixty-two thousand milliwatt-hours. That kinda makes the original 3.7V 600 mAh built-in rechargeable lithium-ion battery seem paltry. Mind you, that original battery already offers a pretty impressive 10–18 hours of play.
Clearly, Redditor Bangooh thinks the battery life should be in days, not hours, or possibly over 100 days, theoretically. Recently, the Game Boy enthusiast took to Reddit to show off his GBA SP battery mod. Bangooh did not just mod it to accept a ridiculous-sized battery—in terms of both capacity and physical dimension—which in this case is a DeWalt power drill battery. Bangooh created an entire case, DeWalt-themed, no less.
The best part is that the battery is replaceable. So when you manage to finish all 162,000 mWh of juice, you can simply swap it out for a freshly charged one. The custom case changes the GBA SP to the yellow-and-black DeWalt colorway, complete with a huge DeWalt branding slapped across the top cover, and a bottom case modded to accept a swappable DeWalt power drill battery.
Obviously, making a higher-voltage battery work with a GBA SP’s 3.7V system requires tinkering with the circuit, i.e., stepping the voltage down. According to Bangooh, he used a buck converter in the space where the original battery once sat before hooking it up to the battery holder. A dummy battery was required for the contact points.
Never mind that the GBA SP probably weighs a ton now, for this is still a brilliant mod.
Images: reddit (u/bangooh).
Story via YouTube (@UFDTech).
