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MiSTer FPGA


Newsdee

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  • 2 weeks later...

Sure I appreciate a nice enclosure, be it PC, projects, MiSTer, or otherwise. For protection of one tree they let the forest burn down. They the tout RSK202/1 as being the tour de force of your gaming area, embellished with premium materials and craftsmanship. But like most of these overdone cases they broke its aesthetics with excessive labeling & printing. And the connectivity wiring popping out of the top - that ruins it all. First thing that grabbed my attention was the blue wire curving over to some other box. Nope not good enough.

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Yeah, cable sockets on top are a bit of a WTF decision, especially for a case which is supposed to be on display.

 

But me, I'm a cheapskate, so the price is alwyas the main factor. At 130USD this is a bit better deal than Checkmate, and yet... My poor MiSTer is still caseless, and if it ever gets one it'll most likely be a DIY hack job.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Okay I think I need some help here.

 

I happen to have a lot of free money now, I want a MiSTer. A guy from work has one from MiSTeraddons that he likes, but he thinks I should get one from (https://www.antoniovillena.es/store/product-category/mister/) because of the decapod--which I totally agree with since I can use real controllers then, and not questionable usb adapters.

 

However, all these MiSTer vocabulary words mean very little to me. I *THINK* all I need is either the (complete slim), or (complete Mini) plus the (decapod) is all I need correct? I'm still also trying to figure out if there's anything I'm missing choosing between the slim and mini--very confusing.

 

Does anybody speak this new MiSTer language?

outside of form factor is there a reason to choose slim, or mini?

How bad is it to leave the main generic MiSTer stuff to go for this antonio custom stuff?

 

and I haven't read this thread all the way through, just searched for 'antonio' and 'decapod' and didn't come up with anything--has it been mentioned? I really like the thought of being able to use real controllers, since I'm generally heavily invested in those.

Edited by Reaperman
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13 hours ago, Reaperman said:

How bad is it to leave the main generic MiSTer stuff to go for this antonio custom stuff?

 

and I haven't read this thread all the way through, just searched for 'antonio' and 'decapod' and didn't come up with anything--has it been mentioned? I really like the thought of being able to use real controllers, since I'm generally heavily invested in those.

Never heard of this supplier, or a number of things on their site including the decapod... but nothing inherently wrong with any of that.  I don't follow the whole real controller adapter discussion much, so that could be why.  I know for a fact there are other original controller connection alternatives for a more standard MiSTer setup... although I couldn't talk about any at length.  Obviously, the more you diverge from the most common setups, the less support and community experience there will be with your particular customizations.


In the order notes, it lists that in order to use that controller adapter you need to download the various fpga cores from a special repository... i'm not sure if that is standard with other controller adapters, but that would give me pause.



 

 

 

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I'm starting to learn way more MiSTer vocabulary words than I hoped I'd need to.  Let's see how I do:

 

Decapod seems to be roughly equivalent to several of the SNAC adapter options mentioned over at MiSTeraddons (link) except all built into one--the thing is that many of those SNAC adapters seem to be out of stock and never coming back :( (link)

 

Per the SNAC page, the SNAC (and it would follow, also the DECAPOD) cannot control main menu functions, which is a real bummer, so after less than 24hrs, I'm now leaning away from either the snac or decapod, and back to those fast buffalo usb controllers I've been hearing about. I'm now probably looking at MiSTeraddons for being my supplier for a nice, (basic system), unless there are others I should really consider. Besides, in the time I sat around thinking about it, the decapod went out-of-stock anyway ;)

 

----------------------------

Since my best controllers are custom neo geo things, and I've already built various adapters for them (most recently for NT Mini), I could certainly just padhack that buffalo into an adapter, and then I have a super-fast controller that also handles main-menu functions--two birds! (but then I have to make a thing again...)

 

anyway, if anybody else is wondering here's some decapod testing I found on the 'tubes.  Pausing it, that switching system seems a bit crude, but yeah, it seems to do what it says on the tin.

 

 

 

Edited by Reaperman
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1 hour ago, Reaperman said:

Per the SNAC page, the SNAC (and it would follow, also the DECAPOD) cannot control main menu functions, which is a real bummer, so after less than 24hrs, I'm now leaning away from either the snac or decapod, and back to those fast buffalo usb controllers I've been hearing about. I'm now probably looking at MiSTeraddons for being my supplier for a nice, (basic system), unless there are others I should really consider. Besides, in the time I sat around thinking about it, the decapod went out-of-stock anyway ;)

 

SNAC is something best used for unique controllers only if required (like a zapper).  Antonio's hardware designs in general deviate from project standards and usually have inherent potential risks of incompatibility and/or reliance on code support that is not part of the official project.

 

Using a decent USB controller these days with MiSTers fast USB polling pretty much eliminates any actual human based concerns around latency.  Something like the Daemonbites can be built/purchased if you want to use original controllers.  I've built some Genesis ones that work great.

 

 

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Well, I pulled the trigger on the regular old (MisterAddons pre-built) with passively cooled aluminum case, so I'm now in on the fun.  If I like 'standard experience' enough, I'll probably go for a jamma adapter and slap it into my cabinet. Surprisingly my order already got marked as shipped, so I'd better hurry up pulling down these rompacks...

 

Any starter controller recommendations? I recently bought a wired (8bitdo sn30 pro) for the purpose, which gets decent (lag scores) but jeez is its dpad awful, and pushes totally flat. lots of thumb repositioning easily undoes any lag advantage.

Edited by Reaperman
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1 hour ago, Reaperman said:

Any starter controller recommendations? I recently bought a wired (8bitdo sn30 pro) for the purpose, which gets decent (lag scores) but jeez is its dpad awful, and pushes totally flat. lots of thumb repositioning easily undoes any lag advantage.

 

For my MiSTer / retronuc I have an SN30 Pro+ which I use a secondary controller where I need dual/analog sticks.  I have a lot of different controllers, but my primary main retro controller (six face buttons/shoulders) for a long time now has been an M30 2.4G USB.

 

I also have M30 2.4G pads for use with an actual Genesis or a USB adapter such as the aforementioned Genesis Daemonbite.  Amongst the legions of controllers I have the M30 dpad rates near the absolute top.

 

The SN30 Pro+ use case controller will probably be phased out in favor of an XSX controller and wireless dongle when the xow drivers are perfected a bit more.  The XSX controller is a great modern dual stick device with a fantastic dpad.

 

 

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Oh wow, I don't think I'll have time for much else besides more MiSTer in my immediate future. Lots of new A8 to catch up on, and GBA in high quality on the big screen. I don't know how to phrase it, but the large number of cores and ease of switching, gives it the effect of feeling almost 'too emulator-y,' in a way I don't recall the NT Mini doing for me. I just remember a specific game exists, and poof, I'm playing it.  A nice touch that I can be playing games on the MiSTer while at the same time, the onboard FTP server is shoving 10,000 more games onto it. My PC's all hate writing to that MiSTer SD card.

 

As for the specific misteraddons case/pre-build. They are quite forward about the setup getting warm, and it sure doesn't disappoint! Knowing that's how it works in advance is one thing, but if this specific one were given as a gift, it'd probably worry the recipient. I think a case with a cooling fan would be a better choice.

 

As for controllers, I ordered a daemonbite neo geo adapter with ~1ms response time so I have the option of using my 'big' controller--but until that adapter arrives, honestly, that 2.4g m30 does well, and I'll probably switch to some flavor of arcade stick and do some of those arcade cores later on. A shame those arcade cores don't seem to save high scores. I'll have to check the neo geo side--that has the best chance if there's support for MVS sram(?), or failing support for that, there is a potential unibios+memcard option, but there's a lot the core would need to get right for that method.

 

As an unexpected bonus, I really like being able to set controls (potentially even per-game), which gives me options like setting moon patrol's 'up' direction to a proper 'jump' button which gives console/computer versions more of an arcade feel. Sure I could just play the arcade version...but something about a8's moon patrol still feels more like home. For NT Mini, I actually made a whole (controller adapter thing) just to achieve a similar result, and MiSTer just does it natively. --nice!

Edited by Reaperman
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1 hour ago, Reaperman said:

Oh wow, I don't think I'll have time for much else besides more MiSTer in my immediate future. Lots of new A8 to catch up on, and GBA in high quality on the big screen. I don't know how to phrase it, but the large number of cores and ease of switching, gives it the effect of feeling almost 'too emulator-y,' in a way I don't recall the NT Mini doing for me.

I always thought the NT Mini a little too polished and consumery. Not computery enough. Not something that excited me.

 

1 hour ago, Reaperman said:

I just remember a specific game exists, and poof, I'm playing it.  A nice touch that I can be playing games on the MiSTer while at the same time, the onboard FTP server is shoving 10,000 more games onto it. My PC's all hate writing to that MiSTer SD card.

I bet so. Don't be surprised if the SD card blows out. Some are cheap-ass low quality TLC good for 300 - 700 re-writes and that it!

 

1 hour ago, Reaperman said:

As for the specific misteraddons case/pre-build. They are quite forward about the setup getting warm, and it sure doesn't disappoint! Knowing that's how it works in advance is one thing, but if this specific one were given as a gift, it'd probably worry the recipient. I think a case with a cooling fan would be a better choice.

I can tell you that the DE10NANO was meant to operate in open air. Don't know what the chip's temperature reaches when in an enclosed space with zero ventilation. So as an engineer I'd be somehow addressing the issue.

 

1 hour ago, Reaperman said:

Sure I could just play the arcade version...but something about a8's moon patrol still feels more like home.

See here for the few home conversions I prefer over their arcade counterparts.

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  • 1 month later...

I've decided to try to bring my MiSTer back to life. It never worked properly, but I'm going to try it anyway. There are too many arcade games on there that I want to play for me to miss out on this thing just because none of the controllers that I have tried on it work. I have no idea what is wrong with it, but I may try using a USB hub, as I just have a simple USB converter thingy that used to mostly work, but now nothing works at all aside from my keyboard. At least, that's how it was last year when I last attempted to use the MiSTer. Does it matter what USB hub I use? I can just go to some electronics store and buy something, I believe, but maybe I'm wrong.

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24 minutes ago, Steven Pendleton said:

Does it matter what USB hub I use?

Needs to be OTG, with directly or via a added cable: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Main_MiSTer/wiki/How-to-start-with-MiSTer#2-usb-connection

 

Unpowered should do, at least for some basic stuff like KB+pad. If you want to connect more devices, especially hard drives, better get a powered one. Mine has got 4 slots and handles wi-fi + wireless pad/kb/mouse no problem.

 

Last week there was a big Linux update and it broke some of the assorted USB hubs. But it seems to be mostly sorted now. Apart from that, everything should really work out of the box, at least when it comes to the most popular gamepads.

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15 minutes ago, youxia said:

Needs to be OTG, with directly or via a added cable: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Main_MiSTer/wiki/How-to-start-with-MiSTer#2-usb-connection

 

Unpowered should do, at least for some basic stuff like KB+pad. If you want to connect more devices, especially hard drives, better get a powered one. Mine has got 4 slots and handles wi-fi + wireless pad/kb/mouse no problem.

 

Last week there was a big Linux update and it broke some of the assorted USB hubs. But it seems to be mostly sorted now. Apart from that, everything should really work out of the box, at least when it comes to the most popular gamepads.

Alright. I just don't want to waste any more money on this thing if it is in fact non-functional. It worked mostly fine when I got it aside from a select few controllers that have never worked (M30 2.4g and the PC Engine mini controller), but then it got progressively worse as time went on and an increasingly large amount of controllers stopped working. Now basically nothing works and I can't even map buttons on the majority of them. One of my friends has a MiSTer, so I'll see if I can steal his USB hub and attach it to my MiSTer to see what happens.

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It's odd because if we're talking USB/wireless controllers, then they (and new functionalities, like lights on Dualshock, etc) are being added, not the other way around. So I guess it's something with your setup, especially if it was working in the beginning and you haven't done the latest update yet.

 

This is a lag test comparing a large number of controllers. You can see which ones are definitely working.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1KlRObr3Be4zLch7Zyqg6qCJzGuhyGmXaOIUrpfncXIM/edit#gid=0

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20 minutes ago, youxia said:

It's odd because if we're talking USB/wireless controllers, then they (and new functionalities, like lights on Dualshock, etc) are being added, not the other way around. So I guess it's something with your setup, especially if it was working in the beginning and you haven't done the latest update yet.

 

This is a lag test comparing a large number of controllers. You can see which ones are definitely working.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1KlRObr3Be4zLch7Zyqg6qCJzGuhyGmXaOIUrpfncXIM/edit#gid=0

Yeah, I have multiple controllers on that list and basically none of them work or did work but then stopped. The weirdest one is the Dualshock 4. It lets me map everything, but then the d-pad doesn't work in the MiSTer's menu. I have to use the analog sticks to navigate even if I specifically choose not to map the analog sticks to anything. Why they work as up and down despite not being mapped at all is beyond me.

 

It's possible that I got a broken DE-10 Nano, as some of the pins were bent when I got it. I never used it at first for several months, though, as I was waiting for various other things to arrive in the mail or for other things to exist, as I was waiting for that BlisSTer thing and then got tired of waiting for it and cancelled my order. By that point, I think my DE-10 Nano's warranty no longer covered it or something. I'd have to check, but it's probably way too late now.

Edited by Steven Pendleton
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  • 2 weeks later...

First let me state I am not really into the MiSTer, I do have a MiSt and it does what I need (be a better Amiga then any actual Amiga).  One of the reasons I never got into the MiSTer is that it just looks terrible, wires coming out of every side and things hanging off it.  Dont get me wrong I am truly impressed by what is being done.  With that said I am still so shocked that when I finally saw a consolized version that looked good and well thought out no one is talking about it:

 

Retro Man Cave Consolized MiSTer

 

did I miss something as to why no one is interested?

 

Mister.thumb.JPG.7c283b3d469223334f7ac439217a45b1.JPG

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1 hour ago, c0op3r said:

did I miss something as to why no one is interested?

MiSTer, to me, has always always had the air of DIY about it. And it's still a new and developing platform. Still on the frontier. That's how I see it.

 

Not too different in concept from how software emulation boxes didn't take off either. Software Emulation is still best done on a modern generic x86 machine.

Edited by Keatah
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MiSTer is my preferred retro platform, so I'm very much into it. I've not seen that "consolized" thing with the USB up front and presumably the outputs in the back. I'd be very interested in buying a case if it isn't cost prohibitive. That's the problem with these solutions; they cost far too much. 

 

That RSK202/1 looks interesting, but it's enormous. I'm looking for something the size of a Dreamcast but shorter. It seems like a 9x9 square about 2 inches tall would give it plenty of room. 

 

The MiSTer Multi System linked above looks about perfect, but it isn't available. 

Edited by derFunkenstein
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1 hour ago, c0op3r said:

did I miss something as to why no one is interested?

There's an entire thread about it somewhere out there.

 

I like my "things hanging off it" MiSTer because it makes it much more cheaper, and I look at the screen, not the thing itself :) But, there are cases for it which make it look exactly the same like MiST anyway.

 

I guess it's all subjective, but if I was into looks, I'd go for the old, cubed MiSTer anyway. To me it looks way better: small, anodized (or whatever you want) box vs a 3D printed (aka ugly) pancake. And both do pretty much the same.

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49 minutes ago, youxia said:

There's an entire thread about it somewhere out there.

 

I like my "things hanging off it" MiSTer because it makes it much more cheaper, and I look at the screen, not the thing itself :) But, there are cases for it which make it look exactly the same like MiST anyway.

 

I guess it's all subjective, but if I was into looks, I'd go for the old, cubed MiSTer anyway. To me it looks way better: small, anodized (or whatever you want) box vs a 3D printed (aka ugly) pancake. And both do pretty much the same.

I never saw the tread -sorry.  I was even shocked all the twitter people that talk about the MiSTer all the time have not said anything (at least not in the circles I see).

 

Also like I said I think the MiSTer people/group are way more about function over form, which I understand, if you are just about playing games accurately and on the cheap, NOTHING even comes close.  There is a learning curve to the MiSTer (and MiST for that matter) but there are a ton of great resources out there.  I think what you might have messed in the video/presentation is that for NEW to the MiSTer that setup is actually cheaper than buying the stack unit.

 

So to me it brings the best of both worlds a console like device and amazing arcade cores on the cheap.  Oh and on a personal note I kinda like the "pancake" it is ver reminiscent of the Neo Geo CD top loader (or the CDz) both of which I owned in the past.

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12 hours ago, c0op3r said:

I think what you might have messed in the video/presentation is that for NEW to the MiSTer that setup is actually cheaper than buying the stack unit.

 

So to me it brings the best of both worlds a console like device and amazing arcade cores on the cheap.  Oh and on a personal note I kinda like the "pancake" it is ver reminiscent of the Neo Geo CD top loader (or the CDz) both of which I owned in the past.

It remains to be seen if it will really be cheaper since at the moment the 141 pounds figure they quote is without the case itself, and possibly costs of shipping from UK and/or VAT. But if you really want to do MiSTer "on the cheap" much more important is the fact that you don't need all of these components. When you realize that you can save yourself ~100USD.

 

That said, I'm not really knocking the "Multisystem" - it's another option in the ecosystem and options are always good. But it's also not some revolutionary thing - pretty much just a different shape. Ok, it's all on one board so it saves the "hassle" of putting few components together, but in reality the whole allegedly arcane process of "building" of MiSter is heavily exaggerated - in the basic version all you have to do is stick in the SDRAM, put a heatsink/fan combo on, plug in USB extension and you're good to go.

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Just found out that there's a Sega Saturn core in the works from srg320, the person behind all the SNES expansion chip support and a bunch of other things. It's apparently to the point where it can (glitchy) play Daytona, which means VDP1 and VDP2 are functional but just need a bit of work. This is extremely impressive.

 

Saturn FPGA. Daytona USA. - YouTube

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