StoneAgeGamer Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 I have it pre-ordered through Amazon. SAG's shipping costs to Canada are really high. I believe shipping was going to be ~$45 from his store. Just to be clear they are not our shipping costs, they are USPS' shipping costs. The only thing we add to shipping is insurance for international orders, we do not mark them up with any secret handling fees or anything. There is no way we would ever compete with Amazon on shipping, they are a huge company and amazing shipping contracts. I don't blame you for going with the cheaper shipping, but I just don't want people to get the idea that we artificially inflate shipping costs. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 One thing we do offer with the RetroN5 that no one else does is for an extra $18.00 (during pre-order only) you get our new PowerBase Mini product: 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atariboy Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 How come you're able to produce SMS cartridge slots but Hyperkin couldn't? Looks far handier than a Power Base Converter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goldenegg Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 Just to be clear they are not our shipping costs, they are USPS' shipping costs. The only thing we add to shipping is insurance for international orders, we do not mark them up with any secret handling fees or anything. There is no way we would ever compete with Amazon on shipping, they are a huge company and amazing shipping contracts. I don't blame you for going with the cheaper shipping, but I just don't want people to get the idea that we artificially inflate shipping costs. What makes the shipping cost worse is that the only option is priority. Have you considered providing a USPS First Class option (their basic air shipping service)? There would be a considerable price difference. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goldenegg Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 How come you're able to produce SMS cartridge slots but Hyperkin couldn't? Looks far handier than a Power Base Converter. I'm guessing their decision to include SMS support came late in the development process. It's easier to move slots around on a board design, to accommodate the Power Base Converter, than adding a new one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 What makes the shipping cost worse is that the only option is priority. Have you considered providing a USPS First Class option (their basic air shipping service)? There would be a considerable price difference. First Class International only goes up to 4 pounds. If the package exceeds 4 pounds then it must be Priority or Express. This item weighs more than 4lbls, at least we are lead to believe that based on rough estimates at this time. If it was under 4lbls you would have saw a First Class option. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 How come you're able to produce SMS cartridge slots but Hyperkin couldn't? Looks far handier than a Power Base Converter. Who knows? They may eventually make a similar product. I hope not obviously for my own business reasons. My guess is that their budget on the R5 is already stretched to the max. They were probably making changes to the shell anyways and decided to allow it to accommodate the original PBC so they could advertise (with an * of course) that it does support SMS games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 I'm getting ready to place my preorder at StoneAgeGamer. What do you guys think looks better? Two toned gray or black? I'm leaning towards black, but I heard from somewhere there might be a purple option. That would be awesome, but I'm not seeing it anywhere. Or was it just a rumour? If anyone has renders or photos of the final design, that would help. @StoneAgeGamer, will the mini power base converters also work on a model 1 Genesis or is it for clone systems only? Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atariboy Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 (edited) Out of curiosity as someone that only owns a SMS Everdrive (And thus isn't too terribly familiar with what games were on which format), about what percentage of the library works with this? I assume that the cartridge format dominated the platform otherwise this would be of rather limited utility thanks to not being able to play card games? @StoneAgeGamer, will the mini power base converters also work on a model 1 Genesis or is it for clone systems only? Thanks! His product page says it will. And that makes perfect sense considering that the Retron 5 works with the Power Base Converter from back in the day and that this is doing the same thing. Edited October 17, 2013 by Atariboy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goldenegg Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 Out of curiosity as someone that only owns a SMS Everdrive (And thus isn't too terribly familiar with what games were on which format), about what percentage of the library works with this? I assume that the cartridge format dominated the platform otherwise this would be of rather limited utility thanks to not being able to play card games? I believe there are only 14 card games. You can play those games on the Everdrive, but it's still not known if the Everdrives will work with the Retron 5. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atariboy Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 (edited) Doesn't sound like the lack of a card slot will be any sort of a problem for this adapter then. I figured it was a small amount like that. I'm not expecting any of my multicarts to work but would love to be surprised. I already figured that the SMS aspect of this wouldn't be of any use for me without any original cartridges. Edited October 17, 2013 by Atariboy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 SMS carts currently in my collection: zero. But I ordered the SMS mini adapter anyway! +1 retro systems in my library, and I will still have the option to use original hardware (genesis model 1) Now, if only they could add 2600/7800, TG-16, and N64 slots... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted October 17, 2013 Share Posted October 17, 2013 I'm getting ready to place my preorder at StoneAgeGamer. What do you guys think looks better? Two toned gray or black? I'm leaning towards black, but I heard from somewhere there might be a purple option. That would be awesome, but I'm not seeing it anywhere. Or was it just a rumour? If anyone has renders or photos of the final design, that would help. @StoneAgeGamer, will the mini power base converters also work on a model 1 Genesis or is it for clone systems only? Thanks! Its actually for original Genesis products as well. Actually that's mainly what it is for. It operates the exact same way as the original PBC. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted October 18, 2013 Share Posted October 18, 2013 Its actually for original Genesis products as well. Actually that's mainly what it is for. It operates the exact same way as the original PBC. Are there fancy electronics inside or just traces on a PCB like a Famicom converter? Either way, I'm glad you are producing the product. Have you also considered Famicom adapters for the NES? There's tons of adapters that put NES games in a Famicom, but ones to play Famicom on an NES are very rare indeed. I think only the official ones ever worked without disabling the lockout chip. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted October 18, 2013 Share Posted October 18, 2013 Are there fancy electronics inside or just traces on a PCB like a Famicom converter? Either way, I'm glad you are producing the product. Have you also considered Famicom adapters for the NES? There's tons of adapters that put NES games in a Famicom, but ones to play Famicom on an NES are very rare indeed. I think only the official ones ever worked without disabling the lockout chip. Nothing fancy, basically just a pass through with a pause button. Yes we are looking into a Famicom to NES converter as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Falconhood Posted December 14, 2013 Share Posted December 14, 2013 It's still not available? I am guessing Santa will NOT be bringing this down my chimney! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goldenegg Posted December 14, 2013 Share Posted December 14, 2013 It's still not available? I am guessing Santa will NOT be bringing this down my chimney! It was delayed until some time next year, due to manufacturing issues. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted December 14, 2013 Share Posted December 14, 2013 Exactly. It's not that hard to keep track of the news in this regard. It stinks on one level, but on another, it's critical they get everything right. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MaximRecoil Posted December 14, 2013 Share Posted December 14, 2013 (edited) Apparently now it's the "RetroN5". Article When [the games] were programmed originally, there was a space in between each pixel, Lee explained. But a modern television does not recognize that space and will attempt to fill it in with surrounding colors, which is why its actually blurry compared to playing it on an old-school CRT [Cathode ray tube]. What weve done is weve gone back and weve put that space back into it. You can actually identify each and every pixelit comes out looking like high definition. I kind of like where they're going with this. "A space in between each pixel"? What does that even mean? There was no "space in between each pixel" in the actual programming. This is the raw output: So they are imagining that e.g. the Mario sprite is programmed to look like this? And that a CRT would magically piece it back together together correctly whereas a "modern television will attempt to fill it in with surrounding colors"? That's random nonsense, all of it. Maybe they are thinking of the interlacing process, which has nothing to do with the programming of the game (the video output hardware does it), and is not a case of a "space in between each pixel" ("pixels" don't even exist in the analog video output stage, nor is a CRT "pixel aware" in the first place); it is a case of a space between each scan line. Interlacing is also not the reason "why its actually blurry compared to playing it on an old-school CRT". Video consoles that output interlaced analog video only do so for compatibility with TV broadcast standards such as NTSC. They could just as easily output progressive video (non-interlaced, roughly 240p) and it would look even better. Some (maybe most?) classic consoles did output roughly 240p. Nearly all classic arcade hardware outputted roughly 240p via RGB, including Nintendo Vs. Unisystem and PlayChoice-10, both of which ran NES game code. The real reason "why its actually blurry compared to playing it on an old-school CRT" is because "modern TVs" are fixed resolution digital displays which rely on 1:1 data-pixel-to-display-pixel mapping (or close to it) for good image quality. So when you feed an e.g. 1920x1080 fixed-resolution digital display 256x224 video, it has 2 options, neither which are very good: 1. Map it 1:1, which results in a tiny 256x224 picture in the middle of the modern TV surrounded by a huge sea of black empty space. 2. Make it fit, which requires scaling/filtering hardware/software (built into the TV, though you could use external options, for possibly better quality), which inevitably results in artifacts (such as blurriness), except in the case of mere pixel-multiplication/duplication, but this simple technique isn't used by any modern TVs that I know of, probably because the math would rarely work out to an exact full-screen fit that way, and because it is only a good choice for simplistic video game graphics; it is the worst choice for photographs / live-action video. Also, while mere pixel-multiplication/duplication doesn't make the video blurry, it really exaggerates the pixel structure of simplistic graphics. For example: That is mere pixel-multiplication/duplication (double in this case) and nothing else; so no artifacts such as blurriness. On the other hand, modern TVs scale low-resolution material more like the following image, which was resized with a Lanczos3 filter: As you can see, there are now artifacts such as blurriness. Also note that even though they are both PNGs and the same resolution, the Lanczos filtered one is 130 KB in size, while the merely doubled one is 5 KB; that's because so many extra shades of colors were added during the Lanczos filtering process (for anti-aliasing). Lanczos-type filtering is actually far preferable for resizing photographs and live-action video type content, which is why modern TVs use that method, but it is horrible when applied to simple graphics which consist of a small number of colors arranged into distinct, relatively large blocks. Edited December 14, 2013 by MaximRecoil Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Falconhood Posted December 14, 2013 Share Posted December 14, 2013 Next year? as in January 1st, 2014? That's not long to wait. But it's just ruining the excitement for it, when the carrot stays out of reach Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goldenegg Posted December 14, 2013 Share Posted December 14, 2013 Next year? as in January 1st, 2014? That's not long to wait. But it's just ruining the excitement for it, when the carrot stays out of reach Next year, as in any time during 2014. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtariLeaf Posted December 15, 2013 Share Posted December 15, 2013 First quarter is what the press release said, I believe. Which would be anywhere from January 1st to March 31st Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted December 16, 2013 Share Posted December 16, 2013 First quarter is what the press release said, I believe. Which would be anywhere from January 1st to March 31st Q3 2013 became Q4, and now the Christmas window has passed, and the ETA is now Q1 2014. They can rotate the ETA forever if they want. Preorder cancelled (again). It'll come when it comes. I'm just going to wait until it comes out and has some reviews posted online. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
godslabrat Posted December 16, 2013 Share Posted December 16, 2013 Good show. This thing is worth being excited over, but I can't imagine ordering one before some reviews are out. There are just too many ways it can fail hard. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atariboy Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Sounds like they're saying April now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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