FPGA Based Videogame System

[SegaSnatcher]

It was the largest TV I could afford at the time I bought it. I wanted a 32" HDTV but was not prepared to pay $700 for it. And yeah, like I'm gonna spend $300 on a fancy upscaler (which adds lag btw) and get all my consoles modded for rgb. I already have access to seven generations of Nintendo hardware (and 3 generations of Game Boy) over HDMI. RetroUSB AVS, Super NT (currently in transit), UltraHDMI modded N64, HDMI digital adapter for Game Cube, Wii-U (Wii b/c), and of course the Switch. The Atari consoles I can't imagine playing on anything but a CRT, and all that leaves is Turbografx and Sega Genesis for the FPGA treatment. Mega NT is coming so I'm good.

 

Lastly I'd like to add that I still believe 1080p is overrated for retro upscaling. 720p allows integer scaling without cropping or windowboxing and looks just as good.

 

As long as the Super NT can default to 720p when it reads the edid data on my set, it will run fine.

With Kevtris's interpolation feature I can tell you 1080p scaling is not a problem. Games look fantastic on my Panasonic Plasma.

 

I'm just saying, you're robbing yourself from truly experiencing what the Super NT is capable of by limiting yourself to such a low quality display. Its been 10 yrs buddy, come on there are so many great HDTVs out there that are inexpensive.

 

If you are ever in the market for a new HDTV and need advice shoot me a PM I will gladly help out.

[Namdor]

For anyone who has received their super NT I was wondering if you can choose the boot logo you like the most to boot Everytime? I heard there was 30 boot animations that appear at random. Once I find one I like the most I want to be able to set it forever.

 

Thanks

[RabidWookie]

 

 

for me, none at the moment. until they get support for fx and sa-1, its just a stupidly overpriced everdrive as far as im concerned. the dozen or so obscure games and hacks that work on it over the everdrive arent worth it imo.

Many Everdrives use 3.3v flash without proper mitigating components, which could damage your consoles and/or the cart over time. From what I've read the SD2SNES is properly designed to prevent these issues.

[keepdreamin]

 

Also, its 2018 and the biggest TV you own is only 26"? If you can afford a $200+ FPGA console, surely you could have spent $500 for a proper HDTV.

 

Yeah... that's kinda

[SegaSnatcher]

For anyone who has received their super NT I was wondering if you can choose the boot logo you like the most to boot Everytime? I heard there was 30 boot animations that appear at random. Once I find one I like the most I want to be able to set it forever.

 

Thanks

The only thing you can do is disable it.

[Andromeda Stardust]

For anyone who has received their super NT I was wondering if you can choose the boot logo you like the most to boot Everytime? I heard there was 30 boot animations that appear at random. Once I find one I like the most I want to be able to set it forever.

Thanks

Nah I want to see them all on infinite rotation. It would be cool if Kevtris or Analogue released a demo ROM for Everdrive users (or future jailbreak cores ), that cycles through all 30 intros. Be sure to set up the intro delay so that you don't miss the animation during the display sync period.

[kevtris]

Anyone else notice something interesting at 5:00 in Digital Foundry's review?

 

Also, about the settings: It might be nice to have a feature to export the settings to a save file. That would allow us to share our custom settings with others easily too.

hah. yeah that's the 5200 Jr, an all in one atari 5200 that fits inside an atari 2600 jr. shell. I made it back in 2002-2003 or so. It has a "Scene demo" style menu I did and real live ripped scene demo music! I was going to make a video about it at some point but haven't had time yet. That orange chiptune player has a few videos about it, and the other is the super nt proto/dev pcb.

[Riptide]

Can we stop judging each other regarding how we like to play our games? Most of us are here because we want something different than the majority of people out there anyway.

[keepdreamin]

 

Like with the NT Mini, I eventually plan on hooking it up to my 14" CRT on my office desk.. and why not?

 

That's like buying racing fuel for a clapped out Chevette.

Edited February 11, 2018 by keepdreamin

[NE146]

 

That's like buying racing fuel for a clapped out Chevette.

 

True.. difference is though it's nothing to pick up the Super NT and it's power cable, and move it to whatever TV you want, which here is anything from the various CRTs, to any of the modern sets in the main rooms. The hdtvs in the various rooms are mostly in use by everyone else for watching shows and whatnot. I'd rather play by my lonesome on an old CRT in the office sometimes

[cacophony]

Many Everdrives use 3.3v flash without proper mitigating components, which could damage your consoles and/or the cart over time. From what I've read the SD2SNES is properly designed to prevent these issues.

 

"Oh that won't hurt the Super Nt" - kevtris

(my favorite quote from MLiG video along with the one about how the SNES PPU was a pushover)

[Andromeda Stardust]

With Kevtris's interpolation feature I can tell you 1080p scaling is not a problem. Games look fantastic on my Panasonic Plasma.

I'm just saying, you're robbing yourself from truly experiencing what the Super NT is capable of by limiting yourself to such a low quality display. Its been 10 yrs buddy, come on there are so many great HDTVs out there that are inexpensive.

If you are ever in the market for a new HDTV and need advice shoot me a PM I will gladly help out.

 

With all due respect Snatcher, in our household we tend to be frugal and keep using stuff until it breaks. You wouldn't criticize someone for keeping a 30 year old 13" crt hooked up, so why criticize me for keeping an older flat panel? In this post modern throwaway and replace economy, you'd think some people including retrogamers wouldn't hold onto and preserve things.

 

The old saying "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" holds merit here. I didn't need to throw out my still working NES, SNES, N64, GameCube, Wii/Wii-U just because I got a Switch, did I? So if we are actively using a 12-year-old 720p hdtv that fits our current needs, why toss and replace it? That's wasteful. And here's a newsflash for you; did it ever dawn on you that maybe a shiny new 40" or even 55" hdtv might not fit in our current setup without a massive furniture rearrange? So please stop assuming that what's right for your home setup and fits your budget is right for everyone. I work hard for the money and the fact I'd rather buy a Super NT with $200 of disposable income, than to upgrade my current TV and do without a new console, is my peroggative.

 

Can we stop judging each other regarding how we like to play our games? Most of us are here because we want something different than the majority of people out there anyway.

 

Agreed. I am done on this topic.

[kevtris]

I hope the Super NT does not output 1080p by default. My 2006 Sanyo is 720p/1080i only. The 720p Mini consoles and AVS work flawlessly with it, but if any devices are locked to 1080p in their default setting, it will run into problems on my set. I also have a 1080p gaming monitor in my bedroom so I could manually reconfigure settings on that if necessary.

It compiles with EDID in your tv/monitor, and will select the highest quality source possible (by default). You can always try setting 720p on another working monitor, and it will never try to output 1080p after that. By default it is set to 1080p, and it should "ring down" to 720p, or 480p if your tv/monitor does not support 1080p. The EDID is read and this determines the mode your tv/monitor can use. Apparently some early hdmi crt's (yeah I didn't know those existed) might've had bad EDID information or something that prevents them working right. Since it's impractical for me to test one of these, I cannot fix it. If someone sends me an EDID dump, I will give it a look to see if I can figure anything out.

 

(note: if you change it to output 720p max, be sure to save settings or else it won't stick)

 

All things analogue aside, I have two more general questions about FPGAs if you have time to answer Kevtris.

 

What are your thoughts on the MISTer board? In a hypothetical world where the analogue nt/s-nt never happened, do you think you would've considered porting your 8bit cores to the MISTer or continued pursuit of your own hardware solution?

 

We are all familiar the clone consoles that use NOAC ASICs and many of the inaccuracies they have, but is the code for your NES core the type of information that would be used to get an ASIC made? I realize using an FPGA obviously allows for bugfixes (and multiple cores), but once the vast majority of bugs have been found could analogue take your code and get a bunch of highly accurate NOAC ASICs? (not that this would be a smart/dumb business decision, just asking if possible)

 

I don't know a lot about the mister project, so I looked it up:

 

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Main_MiSTer/wiki

 

 

This is DIY and open source project

This means the primary way to get it in your hands is to assemble it yourself. Author doesn't sell any boards nor software and thus has no direct interest to how many users will use it. There are sources where you can (sometimes) buy assembled boards however they are not affiliated with author who gets nothing from such sales. So, please refrain from complains about add-on availability. The main idea of this project is not about sales.

 

 

MiSTer uses 3 daughter boards:

• SDRAM board. This is a small boards plugged into GPIO0 connector of the DE10-nano board. Although DE10-nano has fast DDR3 memory, it cannot be used to emulate a retro EDO DRAM due to a high latency and shared usage from ARM side. So, SDR SDRAM on daughter board is required for most cores to emulate a retro memory.
• I/O board. This board is plugged into GPIO1 connector of the DE10-nano board. It provides a legacy VGA output (6 bits per component), analog audio (3.5mm phone jack), digital optical audio, buttons, LEDs. This board is optional. It's useful if you prefer VGA over HDMI or you want to put the board to some case. Also this board is useful for core development because HDMI scaler code requires around twice more time to compile the core. Thus compiling for VGA-only will speed up the development.
• RTC board. This board is plugged into LTC connector. Provides the real time clock. It's optional board. You still can have the real time clock without the board if MiSTer is connected to internet.

Schematics and gerber files are available. Boards are considered as DIY(do it yourself). There are no restrictions who and how these board will be manufactured and sold, so any 3rd party is welcome to manufacture and sell it.

 

 

No disrespect, but this makes it pretty much a non-starter for most people who would want to use it unless they can get PCBs made, solder surface mount parts to them, etc. The only source I saw for completed boards was a person selling hand made ones on a forum thread and it seems he only had made 50-100 of the boards so far, and was sold out. There's no enclosure and it's just bare PCBs. Again this is no disrespect or anything and I wish 'em the best, and please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Would it be possible to change color palette analogue super nt like analogue nt mini?

Probably in a later update?

 

Since the super nt is RGB, there's no palette. In the near future I will be exposing the gamma boost function so you can set it to any value you like, though. (vs. it being preset to 2 values like it is now. off and on).

 

I assume the NT Mini running on a CRT runs at 60.08hz?

 

It does.

[cacophony]

We're obviously getting a jailbreak firmware which is why they have declined to comment about it.

 

If we weren't getting it nothing would prevent them from saying no.

 

It would harm sales though.

 

I really hope we hear something soon, either way. I'm trying to decide if I should buy a second one for my CRT (+ eventual Analogue DAC), and knowing that it would have some rom loading ability would make that decision much easier.

[Andromeda Stardust]

It compiles with EDID in your tv/monitor, and will select the highest quality source possible (by default). You can always try setting 720p on another working monitor, and it will never try to output 1080p after that. By default it is set to 1080p, and it should "ring down" to 720p, or 480p if your tv/monitor does not support 1080p. The EDID is read and this determines the mode your tv/monitor can use. Apparently some early hdmi crt's (yeah I didn't know those existed) might've had bad EDID information or something that prevents them working right. Since it's impractical for me to test one of these, I cannot fix it. If someone sends me an EDID dump, I will give it a look to see if I can figure anything out.

 

(note: if you change it to output 720p max, be sure to save settings or else it won't stick.

Thanks for spelling this out. So if I set up the scanline and scaling settings how I like it on the living room 720p TV, then save my settings, then set it up how I like it on my 1080p bedroom pc monitor, and save the settings there, it will remember the previous 720p configuration when I plug it in the living room?

[SegaSnatcher]

With all due respect Snatcher, in our household we tend to be frugal and keep using stuff until it breaks. You wouldn't criticize someone for keeping a 30 year old 13" crt hooked up, so why criticize me for keeping an older flat panel? In this post modern throwaway and replace economy, you'd think some people including retrogamers wouldn't hold onto and preserve things.

 

The old saying "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" holds merit here. I didn't need to throw out my still working NES, SNES, N64, GameCube, Wii/Wii-U just because I got a Switch, did I? So if we are actively using a 12-year-old 720p hdtv that fits our current needs, why toss and replace it? That's wasteful. And here's a newsflash for you; did it ever dawn on you that maybe a shiny new 40" or even 55" hdtv might not fit in our current setup without a massive furniture rearrange? So please stop assuming that what's right for your home setup and fits your budget is right for everyone. I work hard for the money and the fact I'd rather buy a Super NT with $200 of disposable income, than to upgrade my current TV and do without a new console, is my peroggative.

Nothing frugal about paying $200 for a HD SNES lol. I'm not Mr. Money bags, but if I'm going to invest in products like the Super NT then I will make sure I'm getting the most out of it, within reason of course.

 

I just question the need for a Super NT when a 26" Sanyo is all you're working with, plus you already have an OG SNES. At that point you probably would have been just fine paying $50 for the HD Retrovision Component cables.

 

Sorry, I just find it very weird that someone who is willing to pay a decent premium on a Super NT hasn't bothered to upgrade to something a bit better than a 26" Sanyo from 2006. Usually the people with those displays are buying those cheap ass clone systems from Retro-Bit and Hyperkin.

 

Lastly, I'm not about throwing away stuff either. I'm still rocking a Plasma from 2010, the difference is that Plasma was amazing in 2010 and still holds up today. Where as, and I'm not trying to be rude here, your Sanyo was low quality in 2006 and not even close to some of the inexpensive LCDs that exist in 2018.

Edited February 11, 2018 by SegaSnatcher

[z3razerviper]

 

It would harm sales though.

 

I really hope we hear something soon, either way. I'm trying to decide if I should buy a second one for my CRT (+ eventual Analogue DAC), and knowing that it would have some rom loading ability would make that decision much easier.

 

Why would a jail break harm sales? If anything it would help sales...

[kevtris]

Thanks for spelling this out. So if I set up the scanline and scaling settings how I like it on the living room 720p TV, then save my settings, then set it up how I like it on my 1080p bedroom pc monitor, and save the settings there, it will remember the previous 720p configuration when I plug it in the living room?

yes that's correct.

[Namdor]

Bummer I'll probably just disable it then. Would be a nice 4.(whatever) firmware update to be able to choose though.

The only thing you can do is disable it.

 

[cacophony]

 

Why would a jail break harm sales? If anything it would help sales...

 

My point was that revealing that their wouldn't be a jailbreak would harm sales (relative to not saying anything)

Edited February 11, 2018 by cacophony

[z3razerviper]

 

My point was that revealing that their wouldn't be a jailbreak would harm sales (relative to not saying anything)

 

Oh yea that would really hurt sales.

[SegaSnatcher]

 

My point was that revealing that their wouldn't be a jailbreak would harm sales (relative to not saying anything)

Poor Kevtris is probably dying to say whether it will or won't happen, just so we can move on from this discussion.

[F34R]

Nothing frugal about paying $200 for a HD SNES lol. I'm not Mr. Money bags, but if I'm going to invest in products like the Super NT then I will make sure I'm getting the most out of it, within reason of course.

 

I just question the need for a Super NT when a 26" Sanyo is all you're working with, plus you already have an OG SNES. At that point you probably would have been just fine paying $50 for the HD Retrovision Component cables.

 

Sorry, I just find it very weird that someone who is willing to pay a decent premium on a Super NT hasn't bothered to upgrade to something a bit better than a 26" Sanyo from 2006. Usually the people with those displays are buying those cheap ass clone systems from Retro-Bit and Hyperkin.

 

Lastly, I'm not about throwing away stuff either. I'm still rocking a Plasma from 2010, the difference is that Plasma was amazing in 2010 and still holds up today. Where as, and I'm not trying to be rude here, your Sanyo was low quality in 2006 and not even close to some of the inexpensive LCDs that exist in 2018.

I mainly use a 23" computer led monitor, a 27" Sony KV-27FV310, a Sony PVM-20L2MD, Ultrak CM1900 crt, for my retro gaming. I have a 65" 4k tv in the main family room for Xbox One X/PS4PRO. My Super NT will be along side my crt's with all my other retro consoles.

[SegaSnatcher]

Kevtris, what is hiolding the bottom rubber pad in place? Just some glue? I like to open things up, but if its held by glue then I won't bother.

[SegaSnatcher]

I mainly use a 23" computer led monitor, a 27" Sony KV-27FV310, a Sony PVM-20L2MD, Ultrak CM1900 crt, for my retro gaming. I have a 65" 4k tv in the main family room for Xbox One X/PS4PRO. My Super NT will be along side my crt's with all my other retro consoles.

High quality CRTs are great and still have their place in gaming world. A 2006 26" Sanyo LCD, not so much.

Edited February 11, 2018 by SegaSnatcher