List of Genesis titles compatible with Motorola 68010 CPU mod...

[Lynxpro]

Does anyone have a list of Genesis/MegaDrive games that are compatible/tested with a Motorola 68010 CPU mod?

 

The reason why I ask is because there is a list out there but the links to it on Sega-16 are broken.

 

From what I've seen on YouTube, Sonic and Sonic 2 greatly benefit from the 68010. And considering how cheap the CPUs go for on eBay - mainly because Atari ST and Amiga fans shun them - it would seem like a better avenue than overclocking the stock 68000 if the majority of titles actually are compatible. Food for thought...

[Austin]

How exactly would Sonic and Sonic 2 benefit? Still, if it, say, speeds up the average game with slowdown, that would be pretty cool. I'm curious to know if swapping out the chip provides better results than overclocking.

[Lynxpro]

How exactly would Sonic and Sonic 2 benefit? Still, if it, say, speeds up the average game with slowdown, that would be pretty cool. I'm curious to know if swapping out the chip provides better results than overclocking.

 

The 68010 is more powerful than the 68000 at the same clock speed. It prevents the games from slowing down and it appears you don't have to solder it but drop it in. I haven't seen much written about the clock speed but I've read it wasn't recommended over clocking the 68000 above 16Mhz so maybe a 12Mhz 68010 would be all that's necessary.

 

I posted here because as I stated before, I can't find the txt file list that was compiled of games tested with the 68010 that worked.

 

Here's a YouTube vid:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hIDUBmx-E0

 

 

http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=1893.40

 

Above is a discussion on games that do work with the 68010 but it isn't the full list that was linked to the discussion but isn't available [broken link]...

Edited November 2, 2013 by Lynxpro

[Austin]

I kind of want to try this now. I mean, if it's just, "pop the old chip out, slap the new one in," then it's a no brainer. How hard is it to get ahold of these chips? I wonder if it would positively affect 32X games as well, some of the ones that obviously seem to rely on the Genesis a good bit anyway.

[Lynxpro]

I kind of want to try this now. I mean, if it's just, "pop the old chip out, slap the new one in," then it's a no brainer. How hard is it to get ahold of these chips? I wonder if it would positively affect 32X games as well, some of the ones that obviously seem to rely on the Genesis a good bit anyway.

 

 

They [Motorola 68010] are about $10 on eBay. I paid more than that on eBay for a Motorola 68882 FPU for my Atari Falcon. The 16Mhz versions are more expensive but might be less compatible with Genesis titles. Shaq-Fu doesn't work with any version of the 68010.

[Jess Ragan]

They [Motorola 68010] are about $10 on eBay. I paid more than that on eBay for a Motorola 68882 FPU for my Atari Falcon. The 16Mhz versions are more expensive but might be less compatible with Genesis titles. Shaq-Fu doesn't work with any version of the 68010.

Aw, what a SHAME! (chuckles)

 

Seriously though, are the benefits of installing a 68010 worth the trouble? Because what I've heard is that it improves performance marginally while making games incompatible. If it's just Shaq Fu, that's no big deal, but if it's dozens of others, forget it.

[Austin]

Aw, what a SHAME! (chuckles)

 

Seriously though, are the benefits of installing a 68010 worth the trouble? Because what I've heard is that it improves performance marginally while making games incompatible. If it's just Shaq Fu, that's no big deal, but if it's dozens of others, forget it.

 

Bare Genesis consoles are so cheap though, it might be fun to try it with a second system.

[Bruce Tomlin]

Off the top of my head, here is the deal. It gets you a better instruction pipeline and most importantly it really improves the looping (DBNE, etc.) instructions. Since the video runs on its own clock, this lets a game do more work in a single frame, which avoids lag. The main down side is that the "MOVE from SR" instruction is now privileged, but Genesis games shouldn't be running in User Mode anyhow. I guess if anything, the improved timing could cause problems in stuff that's really timing dependent.

 

It also allowed you to resume instructions that had an exception (like a page fault) without restarting them, which was important for virtual memory, but which should be completely irrelevant on the Genesis.

 

Trivia: The reason MOVE from SR was made privileged was to allow true Virtual Machine mode by allowing your in-the-VM system to not have any way to know it wasn't running on the real hardware. An OS could intercept that call and indicate that the caller was in supervisor mode when it was really in user mode. It took Intel only 20 or so years to get that working right on the x86. By that time people had come up with enough crazy workarounds that it didn't really help much to do it the "right way".

[Christophero Sly]

Why is that Sonic game running so slowly in that video? Everything is moving in slow-motion and the music is playing so slow it sounds like I'm listening to it on a walkman with dying batteries. Is the slowdown an artifact of this mod? Has the video been deliberately slowed down for the purpose of demonstrating something? Or is that really the difference between PAL and NTSC?

[Austin]

Or is that really the difference between PAL and NTSC?

 

Yep. It's that bad if a game isn't optimized properly for PAL territories.

[Christophero Sly]

Yep. It's that bad if a game isn't optimized properly for PAL territories.

Wow! That's a sea change in my understanding of PAL gaming. I never really understood just how much slower PAL was.

 

That's how folks in Europe had to play Sonic? Oh, man, that's so unfair!

 

How many Genesis/MD games were optimized for PAL? Is Sonic just an outlier, or does that video reflect the comparative differences between PAL and NTSC gaming across the board on the Genesis/MD, and even beyond, I guess?

[Jess Ragan]

I'm wondering if this is perhaps why Double Dragon felt much too fast on the Sega Genesis. Maybe it was originally designed for PAL systems, but Accolade didn't bother to adjust the speed when it was ported to America.

[Austin]

I'm wondering if this is perhaps why Double Dragon felt much too fast on the Sega Genesis. Maybe it was originally designed for PAL systems, but Accolade didn't bother to adjust the speed when it was ported to America.

Possibly. It is definitely the reason why Shadow of the Beast runs as fast as it does. I wonder what other games developed in the UK were not optimized for US release.

[Lynxpro]

What amazes me is how well Tengen's [Atari Games'] version of Gauntlet (IV) runs on the Genesis/Mega Drive. They supposedly used a lot of the arcade game's source code for this version yet the arcade game used a 68010 CPU instead of a 68000 [which the Genesis/Mega Drive has]. In comparison, on the Atari ST, you can get comparable arcade speed if you swap out the 8Mhz 68000 with a 16Mhz 68000. Then again, the ST [and Amiga] port(s) also use DMA sampling for the audio to make up for not having the YM2151 audio chip [not to mention the TI synthesis chip] whereas the Genesis/Mega Drive has a similar YM audio chip [although not equal to the YM2151] so the ST/Amiga ports take a performance hit for relying up sampling.

Edited August 24, 2014 by Lynxpro

[mbd30]

Apparently "Back To The Future III" wasn't properly converted from PAL and that's why the first level of the US version is so challenging.

[Gredler]

I am going to start trying to mod my genesis, I wonder if this should be on the list - very cool thanks for sharing!