The Official Turbografx 16 Thread!

[CZroe]

I thought the Analogue Duo already featured every System Card... [emoji848]

They said it supported the various game disc formats but, then again, so does a base PC Engine with the right combination of systems cards and BIOSes. It's entirely possible for the Analogue Duo to have an Arcade Card Duo built-in (just RAM) that requires a card inserted with Super System Card 3.0 BIOS.

Granted, I think it would be really odd if it shipped without the ability to play Super System Card games out of the box. The only reason I'm even entertaining the idea that it could be BYOB is because they may not have overcome the technical or licensing hurdles to do so and I would expect them to have clarified if they did.

[turboxray]

22 hours ago, CZroe said:

Forgot to mention:


This arrived.

What is that?!

[CZroe]

What is that?!

It's a Silicondust HD Homerun ATSC, CableCARD, and ClearQAM network tuner for Windows Media Center, Playstation 3, and other DLNA clients. Basically, it's a TV tuner that turns your PC into an HD TiVo.

That means it has what looks like HuCard slots on the back (CableCARD slots). Just thought it looked like a prototype white Analogue Duo with the flat frame, raised inset rectangular area on top that's aligned on the back edge and curves down at the front, with a wavy edge on the back (well, vents). Was hoping someone would make that assumption.

I had this and then the triple-tuner HD Homerun Prime but the Prime got hit by lightning many years ago.

[roots.genoa]

8 hours ago, CZroe said:

They said it supported the various game disc formats but, then again, so does a base PC Engine with the right combination of systems cards and BIOSes. It's entirely possible for the Analogue Duo to have an Arcade Card Duo built-in (just RAM) that requires a card inserted with Super System Card 3.0 BIOS.

Granted, I think it would be really odd if it shipped without the ability to play Super System Card games out of the box. The only reason I'm even entertaining the idea that it could be BYOB is because they may not have overcome the technical or licensing hurdles to do so and I would expect them to have clarified if they did.

It would be disappointing if I still had to use my Arcade Card, since I was hoping it would free the HuCard slot to play HuCard games more easily. That's one of the main reasons I'm waiting for the Pocket adapter: being able to play my HuCard games (on the go at that) and let the Arcade Card in my PC Engine + Super CD-ROM².

[Steven Pendleton]

Looks like krikzz is working on a Turbo Everdrive that will play CD games. It looks like Voultar might be getting involved in it, as well, which is definitely a good sign.

 

Honestly... I have absolutely no need for this since it doesn't give me RGB out like the SSDS3 does, but it's still nice to see, especially if the Pocket can't run CD games for whatever reason (and there is no reason that it shouldn't be able to at all, but...), because with this, it should be able to anyway.

Edited October 23, 2020 by Steven Pendleton

[CZroe]

Looks like krikzz is working on a Turbo Everdrive that will play CD games. It looks like Voultar might be getting involved in it, as well, which is definitely a good sign.
 
Honestly... I have absolutely no need for this since it doesn't give me RGB out like the SSDS3 does, but it's still nice to see, especially if the Pocket can't run CD games for whatever reason (and there is no reason that it shouldn't be able to at all, but...), because with this, it should be able to anyway.

Retro Game Restore promised something regarding HuDebug later this year but, well, you snooze, you lose.

HuDebug was their own HuCard that plays CD games from SD. They first demonstrated it years ago! Amazing how many ODE options we will have considering what there was at the beginning of 2018.

[Steven Pendleton]

50 minutes ago, CZroe said:

Retro Game Restore promised something regarding HuDebug later this year but, well, you snooze, you lose.

HuDebug was their own HuCard that plays CD games from SD. They first demonstrated it years ago! Amazing how many ODE options we will have considering what there was at the beginning of 2018.

Exactly. He was using those clear PC Engine cases (which actually got shown off in RetroRGBob's video about the Spark Plug not long ago!) to fund development from what I remember, but I haven't seen anything about HuDebug for some time. I wonder what he will do if krikzz beats him to market. Anyway, I really hope the Pocket can run CD games from the SD card. If not, I guess I'll just get whatever ODE HuCARD I can and play them that way.

 

One of my friends is actually going to cancel his Pocket preorder if there is some sort of confirmation that it can't run ROMs/CD games from the SD (not just for PC Engine, of course, but other stuff as well). I had to remind him that that firmware for the Mega Sg took a week or 2 to become available after launch, so in that case, he's going to leave it sealed until we find out in case we find out after launch. I just really hope those adaptors for the Neo Geo Pocket (Color) and especially the PC Engine are obtainable. The DAC was limited production (I think) and it's still available and same with the Mega Sg adaptors, so I hope I can get both of those.

 

Honestly I'm happy that the Pocket has PC Engine support, and you'll probably remember that that is what I wanted more than anything else, but there is nothing else to do now but wait to see what happens with ROM and CD support.

Edited October 23, 2020 by Steven Pendleton

[CZroe]

Exactly. He was using those clear PC Engine cases (which actually got shown off in RetroRGBob's video about the Spark Plug not long ago!) to fund development from what I remember, but I haven't seen anything about HuDebug for some time. I wonder what he will do if krikzz beats him to market. Anyway, I really hope the Pocket can run CD games from the SD card. If not, I guess I'll just get whatever ODE HuCARD I can and play them that way.
 
One of my friends is actually going to cancel his Pocket preorder if there is some sort of confirmation that it can't run ROMs/CD games from the SD (not just for PC Engine, of course, but other stuff as well). I had to remind him that that firmware for the Mega Sg took a week or 2 to become available after launch, so in that case, he's going to leave it sealed until we find out in case we find out after launch. I just really hope those adaptors for the Neo Geo Pocket (Color) and especially the PC Engine are obtainable. The DAC was limited production (I think) and it's still available and same with the Mega Sg adaptors, so I hope I can get both of those.
 
Honestly I'm happy that the Pocket has PC Engine support, and you'll probably remember that that is what I wanted more than anything else, but there is nothing else to do now but wait to see what happens with ROM and CD support.

You and me both. The day the Pocket was announced I immediately went to the thread to discuss the possibility of a HuCard adapter. It just made so much more sense!

With the Pocket supporting open-source cores I don't see how it's possible for it to not support ROMs from SD card. If the jailbreak doesn't add CD-ROM support for the Pocket then I would be surprised. Still, maybe they want to justify the Analogue Duo as a separate console and might deliberately leave out CD support from the jailbreak but, well, they aren't officially supposed to be affiliated with the jailbreak or marketing it that way.

It would be cool if they added CD support to the dock with a USB CD-ROM. Could definitely be useful for some of the ported open-source cores.

[Steven Pendleton]

25 minutes ago, CZroe said:

You and me both. The day the Pocket was announced I immediately went to the thread to discuss the possibility of a HuCard adapter. It just made so much more sense!

With the Pocket supporting open-source cores I don't see how it's possible for it to not support ROMs from SD card. If the jailbreak doesn't add CD-ROM support for the Pocket then I would be surprised. Still, maybe they want to justify the Analogue Duo as a separate console and might deliberately leave out CD support from the jailbreak but, well, they aren't officially supposed to be affiliated with the jailbreak or marketing it that way.

It would be cool if they added CD support to the dock with a USB CD-ROM. Could definitely be useful for some of the ported open-source cores.

Yeah, there is nothing we can do now but wait. There's no reason that the thing shouldn't be able to run games from the SD card, but I think most people would be interested in CD games specifically since the HuCARD adaptor exists, provided that that is obtainable. I don't see a reason for Analogue to prevent the outside developers from building cores that load ROMs or CD images from the SD card, but maybe they will. I hope not, but this has never happened before and they have that "SYSTEM DOES NOT PLAY ROMS" thing on their new product pages now.

 

I don't think people would be happy if they required the dock for CD games, though... my friend that I mentioned earlier only got the system, so yeah, I don't think he'd be happy. I bought the dock, though, since I'm basically planning on using it like the Switch but for old games. If I could make one change to it, though... well, you know what it is

 

[CZroe]

Yeah, there is nothing we can do now but wait. There's no reason that the thing shouldn't be able to run games from the SD card, but I think most people would be interested in CD games specifically since the HuCARD adaptor exists, provided that that is obtainable. I don't see a reason for Analogue to prevent the outside developers from building cores that load ROMs or CD images from the SD card, but maybe they will. I hope not, but this has never happened before and they have that "SYSTEM DOES NOT PLAY ROMS" thing on their new product pages now.

 

I don't think people would be happy if they required the dock for CD games, though... my friend that I mentioned earlier only got the system, so yeah, I don't think he'd be happy. I bought the dock, though, since I'm basically planning on using it like the Switch but for old games. If I could make one change to it, though... well, you know what it is

 

Yeah, just saying that they could officially support it that way which gives them the excuse to have that functionality embedded for a potential jailbreak to redirect to SD card. Since open-source cores could conceivably use it too, it could happen.

 

In that case very few users will be using originals, just like Nt Mini users with the "official" jailbreak: very few Nt Mini userd have/use the cartridge adapters but Analogue justifies the underlying functionality existing for the jailbreak.

 

[NE146]

I'm just looking forward to finally realizing my dream of playing through Military Madness on the crapper  

 

Emulation for that game on the PSP and 3DS for the game is lacking in one thing or other, (e.g. screen tears in later levels) so it's something that's been oddly elusive at least for me, short of snagging a TurboExpress. 

[Steven Pendleton]

10 hours ago, CZroe said:

Yeah, just saying that they could officially support it that way which gives them the excuse to have that functionality embedded for a potential jailbreak to redirect to SD card. Since open-source cores could conceivably use it too, it could happen.

 

In that case very few users will be using originals, just like Nt Mini users with the "official" jailbreak: very few Nt Mini userd have/use the cartridge adapters but Analogue justifies the underlying functionality existing for the jailbreak.

 

Well, we'll see what happens. I'm happy with HuCARD support, but also having CD games would make the Pocket potentially the best way to play PC Engine games on the market. Too bad it's missing 2 face buttons, as I don't consider L and R to be replacements for those.

 

Anyway, I thought the Nt mini cart adaptors never got released. I know the prototypes got shown off in a video

 

but I don't seem to remember them actually being available for sale anywhere.

[Steven Pendleton]

https://www.retrorgb.com/space-ava-201-the-first-pc-engine-cd-game-with-supergrafx-enhancements-and-arcade-card.html

 

We've been talking about it for a while now, but someone finally made a SuperGrafx Arcade Card game! Technically this is both SuperGrafx enhanced and Arcade Card enhanced and doesn't require either of them, but this is as close to a SuperGrafx Arcade Card game that exists as of the time of this post, so...

Edited October 24, 2020 by Steven Pendleton

[Tanooki]

Hmm krikzz with that comment about turbo cds on the everdrive.  I'd like to know how that would work out and when/if it does.  I would have to imagine a new card with more memory on it and stuff would be required.

[Steven Pendleton]

Remember this thing?

 

https://www.columbuscircle.co.jp/products/?id=1576459457-386973&ca=22

 

I saw one in a store today connected to a PC Engine running R-Type I. It's actually not bad! The picture was sharp and clear, although I'm not sure if it was using the RGB signal or not. The colors kind of change a bit depending on if you view it directly from the front or if you look at it from slightly above/below, but overall I don't think it's horrible.

[+Black_Tiger]

9 hours ago, Steven Pendleton said:

Remember this thing?

 

https://www.columbuscircle.co.jp/products/?id=1576459457-386973&ca=22

 

I saw one in a store today connected to a PC Engine running R-Type I. It's actually not bad! The picture was sharp and clear, although I'm not sure if it was using the RGB signal or not. The colors kind of change a bit depending on if you view it directly from the front or if you look at it from slightly above/below, but overall I don't think it's horrible.

PCE tech experts figured out early on that it's using composite, but similar to TE/GT screen upgrades, modern screens using composite are still better than the old TE/GT stock screen using RGB.

 

It would be interesting to see how it compare to the LT screen, because playing an LT feels like something much more modern, almost like a large GBA screen.

[CZroe]

Well, we'll see what happens. I'm happy with HuCARD support, but also having CD games would make the Pocket potentially the best way to play PC Engine games on the market. Too bad it's missing 2 face buttons, as I don't consider L and R to be replacements for those.
 
Anyway, I thought the Nt mini cart adaptors never got released. I know the prototypes got shown off in a video
[/url]  
but I don't seem to remember them actually being available for sale anywhere.

Yeah, I guess it was only the Mega Sg adapter set that went on sale.

https://www.retrorgb.com/space-ava-201-the-first-pc-engine-cd-game-with-supergrafx-enhancements-and-arcade-card.html
 
We've been talking about it for a while now, but someone finally made a SuperGrafx Arcade Card game! Technically this is both SuperGrafx enhanced and Arcade Card enhanced and doesn't require either of them, but this is as close to a SuperGrafx Arcade Card game that exists as of the time of this post, so...

Wow! I was reading an earlier blog of hers over a week ago and saw where she wondered if someone could make an FPGA VCE that plugs into the EXT port for digital video. I emailed her to tell her that it was not only possible, it had already been done (UperGrafx). She was surprised! We also discussed Darius Alpha and how it doesn't seem to be SGX enhanced. I knew she was working on a specification for SGX CD games but I didn't know she was so close to being done with a fully-fledged game!

Hmm krikzz with that comment about turbo cds on the everdrive.  I'd like to know how that would work out and when/if it does.  I would have to imagine a new card with more memory on it and stuff would be required.

Yes, the CD hardware is essentially just memory and a disc drive. Because HuCard games normally execute and use resources from ROM directly mapped to memory, they don't need much RAM since they don't have to load all their resources into it. CD games have to execute from RAM since you can't map physical media to memory in real time... this is why Windows 9x would essentially freeze when it had to page a program back into memory from the virtual memory swap file. That means you need more RAM to have rich gameplay experiences comparable to a HuCard game, which you really didn't get until the Super System Card 3.0 with extra RAM. The 1.0-2.1 BIOS versions probably had some stock sound effects and fonts and stuff to free up a little of the system RAM for resources loaded from CD, but that would be extremely negligible.

Years before I heard of HuDebug I wondered if the HuCard slot had everything needed for a CD attachment. I asked and was told that it had every connection needed except one, though I don't recall what that was. No idea how HuDebug or Krikzz plan to get around that. IIRC, the HuCard slot does have audio input for CD audio but it would be mono. To get proper stereo there will need to be external mixing or internal mods. Obviously, external mixing is complicated by the fact that some consoles have no AV output (white PCE, TG16) and yet others only have headphones (GT/Express).

[CZroe]

Remember this thing?  

https://www.columbuscircle.co.jp/products/?id=1576459457-386973&ca=22

 

I saw one in a store today connected to a PC Engine running R-Type I. It's actually not bad! The picture was sharp and clear, although I'm not sure if it was using the RGB signal or not. The colors kind of change a bit depending on if you view it directly from the front or if you look at it from slightly above/below, but overall I don't think it's horrible.

 

Yeah, I had just finished watching this when you posted that:

 

It looks worse than I thought. Everything about the construction from the hinge to the speaker grills looks terrible! It doesn't seem to fit some units properly and scratches them. It powers the system and bypasses the power switch without covering/blocking the original power input! If they are just connecting 5v from the USB input to the 5v pins on the EXT port, plugging a noisy or over-voltage USB PSU can easily damage your attached PC Engine. The top is probably the worst place to have the power and video connections since they will weigh down and protrude from the part that moves.

 

The composite output started flickering like crazy when the dude merely touched it around 16:40. Almost certainly not processing 240p correctly anyway.

 

 

[Tanooki]

Your quote is all messed up into some linkage so I'll just write this direct.

 

I remember the same story as I've followed the TG/Duo since the mid-later 90s solidly into the mid 00s, and only again in recent times.  I've seen that about the HuCard slot, and it's not a new story either so I'd lend to the fact it's still peddled to likely be true or it would have been shot down, debunked and buried by now.  SO maybe he can make it work using the SD card contents or on board memory on his flash kit to fire up some CD stuff in mono audio without additional parts.  Or maybe a new kit would be made with the added memory etc ot handle this short comings too.  It would be interesting.

[+Black_Tiger]

11 hours ago, Tanooki said:

Your quote is all messed up into some linkage so I'll just write this direct.

 

I remember the same story as I've followed the TG/Duo since the mid-later 90s solidly into the mid 00s, and only again in recent times.  I've seen that about the HuCard slot, and it's not a new story either so I'd lend to the fact it's still peddled to likely be true or it would have been shot down, debunked and buried by now.  SO maybe he can make it work using the SD card contents or on board memory on his flash kit to fire up some CD stuff in mono audio without additional parts.  Or maybe a new kit would be made with the added memory etc ot handle this short comings too.  It would be interesting.

Years ago I would have thought that it was impossible, but look at the MegaSD. 

 

One way or another it will happen. What will be interesting is how well or accurate the end experience is.

[Tanooki]

I'm watching, that's where I am on it.  I have an everdrive that I got direct from SAG so it is called the PC everdrive.  Only one I ever bought new off them, but I'd replace it if they could cleanly run all that nice CD level stuff, bonus if they got the game saving routines down on games that would have used the ten no koe device or something similar (or the internal battery of the duo.)

[Steven Pendleton]

On 10/26/2020 at 2:05 AM, Black_Tiger said:

PCE tech experts figured out early on that it's using composite, but similar to TE/GT screen upgrades, modern screens using composite are still better than the old TE/GT stock screen using RGB.

 

It would be interesting to see how it compare to the LT screen, because playing an LT feels like something much more modern, almost like a large GBA screen.

Never used the LT, but I have used the GT and it's way better than the GT is. I need to get my Nomad's RGB screen and triple bypass installed eventually...

On 10/26/2020 at 4:44 AM, CZroe said:

Yeah, I guess it was only the Mega Sg adapter set that went on sale.


Wow! I was reading an earlier blog of hers over a week ago and saw where she wondered if someone could make an FPGA VCE that plugs into the EXT port for digital video. I emailed her to tell her that it was not only possible, it had already been done (UperGrafx). She was surprised! We also discussed Darius Alpha and how it doesn't seem to be SGX enhanced. I knew she was working on a specification for SGX CD games but I didn't know she was so close to being done with a fully-fledged game!

 

Your thing turned weird!

 

Anyway, yeah, I will eventually look into trying this SuperGrafx+Arcade Card enhanced thing. Haven't gotten around to it yet. I've actually been considering getting the UperGrafx myself, actually. I don't want to deal with whatever surgery I would need to do for it to work properly on the SuperGrafx, though.

On 10/26/2020 at 4:56 AM, CZroe said:

Yeah, I had just finished watching this when you posted that:

 

It looks worse than I thought. Everything about the construction from the hinge to the speaker grills looks terrible! It doesn't seem to fit some units properly and scratches them. It powers the system and bypasses the power switch without covering/blocking the original power input! If they are just connecting 5v from the USB input to the 5v pins on the EXT port, plugging a noisy or over-voltage USB PSU can easily damage your attached PC Engine. The top is probably the worst place to have the power and video connections since they will weigh down and protrude from the part that moves.

 

The composite output started flickering like crazy when the dude merely touched it around 16:40. Almost certainly not processing 240p correctly anyway.

 

 

Um... I think you forgot something here... like the thing that you were watching...

 

Anyway, yeah, screen itself looks decent if all you do is look at it. I didn't really touch it or anything since I didn't want to risk breaking the display unit or whatever, so I didn't get to inspect its build quality, but I did press the brightness button a few times and it barely did anything. Audio was on mute, so I didn't get to hear how it sounds. Overall, I expected it to basically look like the stock Sega Nomad screen's quality (don't ask why because I'm not really sure myself), but the actual picture quality is much better than I thought it would be. As for the rest... unknown. I'd have to buy it to spend some time with it to actually know if it's crap or not, but at that price I don't really want to waste my time and money when I can buy 1 of several Neo Geo games that I want for the same amount of cash.

Edited October 27, 2020 by Steven Pendleton

[CZroe]

Um... I think you forgot something here... like the thing that you were watching...  

Anyway, yeah, screen itself looks decent if all you do is look at it. I didn't really touch it or anything since I didn't want to risk breaking the display unit or whatever, so I didn't get to inspect its build quality, but I did press the brightness button a few times and it barely did anything. Audio was on mute, so I didn't get to hear how it sounds. Overall, I expected it to basically look like the stock Sega Nomad screen's quality (don't ask why because I'm not really sure myself), but the actual picture quality is much better than I thought it would be. As for the rest... unknown. I'd have to buy it to spend some time with it to actually know if it's crap or not, but at that price I don't really want to waste my time and money when I can buy 1 of several Neo Geo games that I want for the same amount of cash.

 

 

Oops. Here is the one I attempted to link:

 

Since then he uploaded a video where he tears it down:

 

Yeah, the power cable awkwardly protrudes out the side of the part that moves. So much for portability.

 

It powers the system and bypasses the power switch without blocking the original power jack, which means you could probably plug in the original power adapter at the same time and mess something up.

 

He seems to have trouble fitting it to a Core Grafx II and resorts to using it with an original PC Engine instead for most of the video.

 

Though he does eventually show it on his CGII, he also showed where merely attempting to install it before scratched up his console.

 

There are only three poles on that composite AV plug when stereo AV requires four (Composite, Audio Left, Audio Right, and Ground). Either they don't have a Ground (!) or they are connecting mono audio to both audio jacks.

 

Composite output flickers like crazy when he touches the console.

 

The board inside appears to be a run-of-the-mill $20 composite AV to HDMI converter which is entirely unsuited to a retro console since they universally deinterlace non-interlaced 240p. That means latency, blurry scrolling, and ruined transparency effects.

 

The speaker grill is just wrong. They made no attempt to interleave concentric rings of holes and just stepped up the hole count with each ring with some attempt to align holes on the cardinal directions, making strangely variable-sized gaps between the holes. Literally cutting slots would have been better. This looks like some kid was playing with a CAD program and didn't know how to make a speaker grill.

[Steven Pendleton]

31 minutes ago, CZroe said:

 

Oops. Here is the one I attempted to link:

 

 

Since then he uploaded a video where he tears it down:

 

 

Yeah, the power cable awkwardly protrudes out the side of the part that moves. So much for portability.

 

It powers the system and bypasses the power switch without blocking the original power jack, which means you could probably plug in the original power adapter at the same time and mess something up.

 

He seems to have trouble fitting it to a Core Grafx II and resorts to using it with an original PC Engine instead for most of the video.

 

Though he does eventually show it on his CGII, he also showed where merely attempting to install it before scratched up his console.

 

There are only three poles on that composite AV plug when stereo AV requires four (Composite, Audio Left, Audio Right, and Ground). Either they don't have a Ground (!) or they are connecting mono audio to both audio jacks.

 

Composite output flickers like crazy when he touches the console.

 

The board inside appears to be a run-of-the-mill $20 composite AV to HDMI converter which is entirely unsuited to a retro console since they universally deinterlace non-interlaced 240p. That means latency, blurry scrolling, and ruined transparency effects.

 

The speaker grill is just wrong. They made no attempt to interleave concentric rings of holes and just stepped up the hole count with each ring with some attempt to align holes on the cardinal directions, making strangely variable-sized gaps between the holes. Literally cutting slots would have been better. This looks like some kid was playing with a CAD program and didn't know how to make a speaker grill.

lol screw this thing. I think I said before that Columbus Circle makes pure trash, right? Yeah, I think people will believe me now. They probably did before, but you know.

 

Too bad, since it didn't look too bad upon casual observation in the store the other day, and also because I think this sort of thing would be really cool if done properly; I'd definitely buy one if it was of suitable quality, especially if I had a CD/ODE capable HuCARD thing like the one that krikzz is working on.

 

By the way, did you ever get your CD-i fixed? Kind of completely random and 100% off-topic, but I suddenly remembered it!

Edited October 27, 2020 by Steven Pendleton
formatting and stuff

[CZroe]

lol screw this thing. I think I said before that Columbus Circle makes pure trash, right? Yeah, I think people will believe me now. They probably did before, but you know.
 
Too bad, since it didn't look too bad upon casual observation in the store the other day, and also because I think this sort of thing would be really cool if done properly; I'd definitely buy one if it was of suitable quality, especially if I had a CD/ODE capable HuCARD thing like the one that krikzz is working on.
 
By the way, did you ever get your CD-i fixed? Kind of completely random and 100% off-topic, but I suddenly remembered it!

I understand that they couldn't easily source a 4:3 display for the thing but I had really hoped they would use something closer to what we see in a RetroTink 2X for the video scaling/conversion. The hinge doesn't seem to have self-supporting spring-loaded detents and the flat cable connecting the two halves is a bit exposed with no protection. I guess those are mostly aesthetic concerns though and it would've added cost to improve those.


I don't remember what state the CD-i was in the last time I mentioned it but it's been a roller-coaster. Originally I took it apart to fix the drive door that's been broken since I bought it two decades ago, but that was just the start.

The CD-i has a battery built-in/built-on to the SRAM chip that stores your settings. It also has an oscillator that it keeps powered for timekeeping, which I wasn't aware of at the time. Both are in a sort of epoxy/plastic "hat" that is permanently attached to the chip. IIRC, you will get an error when the battery dies since it won't pass checksum routine until it can reinitialize the SRAM.

People always drill into their Timekeeper RAM chips to access and replace the battery, but the data sheet described the battery as part of an optional "hat." There was a distinct separation between the hat and the ceramic chip so I tried to see if I could remove it. I ended up ripping it off, which I kind of expected and figured I would just attach the battery to the place where the hat connected it. Unfortunately, I discovered the oscillator and realized that the datasheet also covered a "ZeroPower RAM" variant of this chip (battery with no oscillator). I was unable to get the oscillator out of the epoxy hat to see what value I needed so it made sense to just buy another Timekeeper RAM chip.

While waiting on the chip to ship from China, I ordered a PAL cap kit from Console5 and documented the differences so that Like could also stock a proper NTSC call kit for the 220/37 CD-i. Of course, there were a couple differences which meant waiting for the remaining caps too. In the mean time, I had the entire system taken apart for weeks so I thought I'd clean it up a bit. Eventually a housemate accidentally knocked the disc drive onto the floor causing the tray to get ripped out and shattering the drive and tray into about 50 pieces. Believe it or not, I got it all glued back together well enough that I think it will work. I also broke a pin when removing a daughterboard that plugs into a DIP socket but that was an easy fix.

The drive also needed a belt but Console5 didn't have one so I ordered various other belts I need and might need and one fit. I believe it was one intended for the Panasonic Q, which my brother was working on one so it didn't hurt to have a spare on-hand. When I went back to Console5 to report this it seems he had already added a CD-i belt, so it was all wasted effort.

When it was finally time to put it all back together, I had no power what-so-ever. I'm pretty sure I didn't forget to plug everything back in because I spent a lot of time figuring all that out again. In the process I ended up breaking the door again (stupidly designed... no wonder it was broken when I bought the thing) and since that's what started all this mess I made the decision not to go back in until I had nothing better to do.

Well, I have a CD-i light gun on the way to me now so perhaps it's time to take another look. OTOH, I need a Digital Video Cartridge for the light gun games so I can stall while I look for a deal on one of those. I might just buy another CD-i with a DVC and use this one for spare parts.


Right now my new Jaguar box is supporting the broken door that won't close. Just got that yesterday "as is, untested" with no power adapter or AV cable and getting it to work was one of those "better things to do."

Funny thing: I dug out a center-negative 9v 1.7A adapter I recently found at a thrift store and plugged it into the console but before plugging it into the wall I Googled to make sure the center-negative polarity was correct. I found a post on Stack Exchange asserting this was correct and resumed connecting it with a NES RF switch.
https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/127679/what-unofficial-power-supplies-work-for-the-atari-jaguar#:~:text=The%20official%20Atari%20Jaguar%20power,a%20center%20negative%20power%20supply.

Still, I didn't have the nerve to plug in the adapter without making sure I hear "center-negative" from at least two sources, since the console itself didn't specify and I have seen horror stories of people using the wrong polarity. I grabbed my phone and hit "Back" to return to the Google results but just before the screen changed my eye caught "1Spot" on the page. That may not mean much to most, but the adapter I already plugged in to the console happened to be a 1Spot instrument power supply for guitar pedals and such.

Here is what the post said:
"I've used my power supply for guitar effect pedals, as they (usually) use a center negative power supply, are 9v output and are pretty cheap. I have a 1Spot daisy chained power supply - I'm thinking I could even power multiple system (Jaguar, Sega Genesis, etc...) using it - since it's made to daisy chain multiple 9v pedals from the same plug."
There was source number 2, but I'm even more amused that someone else had the exact same idea about these, with a Jaguar, no less.

I recognized it at the thrift store specifically because I got one with a crappy @tGames Genesis clone last year. Ironically, someone had cut and spliced it to reverse the polarity to the more common center-positive, but it felt heavy and high-quality with plenty of amps, prompting me to look it up and find out it was intended to power ~8 guitar pedals (daisy-chained). They were too expensive to stock up on for retro consoles (most are center-negative) unlike the Tritons I get from Console5 for half the price. Still, I jumped on it when a saw another at the thrift store a few weeks ago... $2, bundled with a random composite cable. I also switched tips and restored the correct polarity on the one that came with the AtGames Genesis... then promptly gave the crappy clone console away to a game vendor friend with some throw-away adapter 9v center-positive adapter. Those adapters are common as dirt so I have no idea why someone would cut up an quality adapter like the 1Spot for a garbage AtGames clone.