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Well the pokeymax project, as entered to abbuc, was intended to provide a low cost simple pokey replacement that supports all features in close to the original chip footprint.   Nowadays there is more spare IO exposed from the FPGA allowing various modules to be enabled at core synthesis time, mostly mapped in a standard software discoverable way. The modules available are: i) Pokey! ii) SID including decent filter for 6581 and 8580 as used in the C64. iii) YM2149 (PSG) as used in the ST iv) Covox v) Covox extension that can play samples from internal fpga ram, compressed using adpcm. Like Paula on the Amiga but uses its own memory due to system memory constraints. vi) PS2 keyboard support with fixed Atari key positional mapping (like the EclaireXL) vii) SPDIF output viii) Analog output ix) Flash support (needed for data for some of the above, otherwise used to store settings) There all take space, so you can decide what to enable based on the size of the FPGA you fit. The 'full' setup I used on the largest 10M16 (recommended) ones is quad pokey, dual sid, dual psg, covox with sample, spdif, analog, ps2   As to what v1-v4 bring, I'll post a small table shortly.      

Depending on how much room there is inside the touch pad, you could try and find membrane keypad the rich size and use that instead, or create a new PCB with surface mounted membrane switches that would replace the original PCB.

PM sent for the 1040 STe.

Can you clarify here if you mean SIO2PC-USB cable version as SIO2USB is a specific device permitting a USB pen/flash drive to be plugged into the unit and files selected from it and read over SIO.

I think the main reason behind the EXP-R is that the deal with Capcom expired, simple as that. But instead of keeping on releasing the exact same system minus the games, they thought it would be less confusing to make it more "different" - hence the new color and the removal of the HDMI port that was not used very much (I myself only used it once for my review).   Absolutely. I don't know if it had been said here already, but Evercade carts are just SD cards in a fancy shell. That's why the Giga Carts don't cost that much more.

I prefer the pump-up models... ⛽

Thanks! First an S-video mod ... then FujiNet .... 🙂 

To be fair, you're probably the one that posted it in the most relevant section.

At a certain point, too much detail and textures makes it harder to play a game like Warlords (or Asteroids or Centipede) because there's more visual noise getting in the way of trying to be accurate about seeing what is going on - the targetting pip, where exactly the enemies are, where their shots are, etc.  Imagine a new Centipede that is the exact same game but now with realistic looking centipedes and other bugs, realistic mushrooms and realistic textured dirt/grass ground.  I mean, have you ever looked at the ground where there are insects?  You know how hard it is to recognize them all, keep track of them?  They can hide in plain site depending on their coloration and shape.  But the original games are very stark, even the ones with some detail like say Bosconian or Sinistar or Rally-X or whatever, the playfield is usually one solid color (black, mostly), the enemies are the same consistent shapes with the same basic colors, the shots are simple and easy to see, etc.  The goal isn't to try to recreate reality, it's to try to make a fun simplified game that requires you to aim and shoot (or whatever, jump over things, grab things, etc.) accurately at things that you can easily pick out.  They're the video equivalents of shooting galleries or ring toss games, they're skills games, not visual treats.  Imagine being an air traffic controller with a radar display that had a bunch of high-rez textures for the ground and mountains and plants, of what use would that be when all you're supposed to care about is which planes are moving where?   On the other hand sims can be detailed.  Even something like Virtua Cop that is old, it looks like a (primitive) movie scene but you're not doing anything really precise, you're just targetting bad guys with a lightgun, so you can have textured bad guys, walls, streets, sky, whatever.  Same goes for racing games because you're not doing anything on-screen like aiming/shooting, you're just using hand/eye coordination to avoid crashing into shit so having cars that really look like cars, sidewalks that look like sidewalks, etc., makes sense.  This gets even more "useful" with PC 1st person shooter/adventure games, all the detail is needed because you spend half your time walking around nothing important in order to get to specific fun areas, or you're exploring dangerous areas.  It would get boring if there was no detail, like those old video games where you're walking through a dungeon but it's just flat tile walls and ceilings that are all the same.  You could even get lost because all the hallways look identical.     Yes, video gaming, not visual gaming, not graphics gaming.  "Video" just means a video display (I suppose as opposed to the previous electromechanical games that projected lights into actual physical cavities or onto molded shapes, or pinball) and we can all agree that original arcade CRTs weren't high-rez enough for detail we take for granted today.  Are you telling me all the original games are not fun or entertaining because they're not realistic or don't have textures?  Even something like Donkey Kong, are those realistic running/jumping animations?  Does the fire look believable to you?  Where are those platforms, anyways?  What the hell is a Pac-Man?  What are those maze walls made out of?  Nobody cares, just make fun games that are challenging, simple obvious recognizable shapes, accurate collision detection.   I'm not against better graphics, but they have to be there for a reason, otherwise you're wasting CPU cycles for bullshit.  Again, PC gaming can have all sorts of eye candy and Easter eggs and gigs and gigs of rendering world to explore, sit on your ass for hours at home (or work, hahaaha) figuring out your next moves.  An arcade game is something that should be making money and that means lots of relatively quick plays, right?  Kind of simple and repetitive, sure, with increasing difficulty.  So, gameplay first, gameplay second, eye candy after if there's time and it doesn't interfere with playing the game.  Get the right controllers, too.   The weirdness is these modern minimally interactive movies that many "gamers" want to spend money on, not much accuracy or challenge, just get to the bright colors and explosions and power-ups and goofy music.  There, I agree, you need more detail to keep them engaged because the gameplay itself isn't going to do it.  Shiny objects.  But is that Warlords?  No.  The only way you could "modernize" Warlords and make those clowns happy would be... a 1st person version where you are moving a warrior along a platform at the edge of the castle tower blocking fireballs that are coming down at you from the dragon flying above.  Could be fun, who knows, but it wouldn't be Warlords, not even close.     Guilty as charged.  My form of "purism" is insisting that the thing you present is the thing you say it is.  Period.  Otherwise, call it something else.  How hard is that?  This applies to movies/TV shows as well, especially adapted from known books.  Also to specific car models as well, usually.  The point being that, yes, you can change some things to the particular game, add this and that, so long as the core gameplay remains, if you're going to keep the same name but add Recharged or Super to it.  I think Marble Madness II is horrible because they removed the trak-ball control.  Heresy.  Space Duel is basically Super Asteroids in terms of gameplay but since the actual asteroids are gone (replaced with geometric shapes) and there are new bits of gameplay added (those dual saucers, the tethered ships, the bonus levels) they changed the name, right?  Galaga is very similar to Galaxian but different enough to change the name.  There's no hard rule there, of course, but you get the idea after seeing enough examples.     True.  A giant screen, 8K or whatever, could allow for more players on a bigger playing field with more options, more castles or different shapes, more dragons that can be in more areas etc.  Much like that Mega Pac-Man game, bigger/more of everything.   Ya, Pong and Breakout combined.  I was thinking Pong more because of the bounce the shot at the other players aspect but of course there is the brick breaking aspect, too.   Keep the core, of course.  But most of these Recharged games don't.  Either they use joysticks instead of the correct controller (more heresy) or they slow down the gameplay in service of having more power-ups to deal with, they sometimes change how the enemies move (for the worse, usually), at some point, it's a similar game but not what the name said it was going to be (think really bad old 8-bit home ports of arcade games that really missed the mark).  You say without changing the core but "the core" aspect is a challenging game (if we're talking about updating an old arcade game), not a casual game for hoarding power-ups.  So long as you are not willing to acknowledge that, you will keep getting into arguments with people who are trying to explain to you why that game isn't the game it claims to be even though it's called that game and has some familiar shapes and sounds in it.     You are forgetting one of the key aspects, which is an analog controller.  Paddle or spinner.  Without that, forget it.  But, ya, there are many possible additions.     That is the challenge, isn't it.  Go too far, it's not that game anymore.  Go not far enough, why did you even bother?     "Needs"?  Why?  What's wrong with the originals?  I think that some of the games do lend themselves to "recharged" versions that would be fun in a modern arcade, bigger screens, more players (co-op) for those games that were only ever single player at a time, more levels.  But then there's the argument of keeping the controllers/gameplay and adding on top, or changing the gameplay to that lazy power-up recharged mess that ruins so many of these older games.  My view of this is trying to imagine what a sequel game would have looked like if the early '80s never ended, we never got the newer CPUs and shaded textures and all that.  But that's not what the average arcade "gamer" wants today, apparently.  Where are my redemption tickets?  Where's the droning music?     Agreed.  The really good arcade games I think are timeless.     So long as it's a video monitor, it's shooting pixels with other pixels.  Just more of them and more detailed shapes/colors/textures.  The question is do you want to play a skills game that isn't very deep (because it's in an arcade) or do you want to immerse yourself in some type of adventure game with a wide open world?  You cannot have both.   I'm not much of a chess player but I don't think I've ever cared what the pieces looked like or were made of so long as they were distinguishable.  My strategy and skill were never affected by the pieces or the board materials.  Do you think that would even matter?  Sure, to brag, look at my amazing chess set, but otherwise, chess is chess.  This the solid gold bathroom fixtures problem.  So what.     Exactly, though I have no idea what most chess players prioritize in terms of game pieces.  Now, if you want to update the game, that would be cool but it wouldn't be chess anymore.  Chess is a simple analog of warfare, I always wondered how adding off-board artillery would change the game, hahaaha.  Or, something like Archon, which was like halfway between chess and dejarik.   I think I could make many "new" arcade games or updates to existing arcade games that would be fun/challenging, but they would always be arcade games, not these recharged, sleepy, over-rendered, slow animated messes.  Which is to say, probably not very successful in modern arcades.  But my friends who grew up going to arcades would probably love them.