Orange FM DIY boards are currently available from insideGadgets - order yours today!
| Mono Audio Output Through Console Speaker | Stereo Audio Through On-Cart Headphone Amp | |
|---|---|---|
| Original Game Boy (DMG) | Yes* | Yes |
| Game Boy Pocket (MGB) | Yes* | Yes |
| Game Boy Light (MGL) | Yes* | Yes |
| Game Boy Color (CGB) | Yes** | Yes |
| Game Boy Advance (AGB) | No | Yes |
| Game Boy Advance SP (AGS) | No | Yes |
| Super Game Boy | Yes (Through TV) | Yes |
| Game Boy Player | No | Yes |
| Analogue Pocket | Yes*** | Yes |
| FunnyPlaying GBC | No | Yes |
| ModRetro Chromatic | No | Yes |
All Game Boy models until the GBA have an audio input capability on the cartridge connector. This makes it fairly easy to send mono audio into the Game Boy, where it is mixed with the internal sound hardware. The input volume depends on the model, with the Game Boy Color performing the best.
This feature was never officially (to my knowledge) used by Nintendo, although some other projects like the Nanoloop Mono make use of it.
Building your own Orange FM cart from scratch requires experience with fine-pitch SMD soldering. Additionally, there is one QFN package chip you'll need to solder with hot air, hot plate, etc. So this is not a soldering project for beginners!
Orange FM supports both a built-in antenna (which requires nothing to be attached to the cart), as well as an external antenna connected to the cart's 3.5mm antenna/headphone jack.
The built-in antenna offers fairly weak, but often usable reception. The station strength may be a bit positional, and you're likely to only receive the strongest local stations. This is great if you just want to casually blast some tunes from the Game Boy speaker, as you don't need to attach anything extra to the cart.
To improve the reception, you can attach an external antenna to the cart through the 3.5mm antenna/headphone jack. This can be a pair of headphones, a telescopic antenna, a 3.5mm aux cord, or a purpose-made antenna cord. It's easy to make your own antennas, so you can experiment if you like! The external antenna interface will offer stronger, more reliable reception, depending on the length of your antenna. The best performing antenna is typically a 1 meter long cable, about the same length as the average headphone cord.
Probably. Orange FM supports 87.5 - 108 MHz for most of the world, and 76 - 95 MHz for Japan. There is also a full range mode that will give you 64 - 108 Mhz. You can choose between 200 kHz (e.g. 88.5, 88.7, 88.9, etc) and 100 kHz (e.g. 88.5, 88.6, 88.7, etc) spacing options. You can also select the de-emphasis (50us or 75us) which varies depending on where in the world you are.
Italy may use 50 kHz spacing (e.g. 88.75) for some stations - unfortunately Orange FM can't tune to these stations at present.
Not happening for Orange FM, as I've already committed to the current radio chip I'm using.
In a standard GBA-cart shell - no. Similar to Boktai or other "larger" GBA games - maybe. But don't expect one!