The Official Sharp X68000 Thread!

[Steven Pendleton]

7 hours ago, elmer said:

 

"Yes", it's a beautiful machine, and "No" you're not the only person here that has seen one. Some of us actually own them (an XVI in my case).

 

They're not even *that* fragile really, AFAIK ... except that but you've *got* to replace the PSU before it fries the motherboard.

 

And that's not even new tech ... Japanese fans have been selling boards on Yahoo Japan to allow you to use a micro-ATX PSU for years, and there are even better internal options available these days.

 

Also, a re-cap may be needed, just like *every* other computer/console of the similar time period.

 

The SCSI-to-SD solution that's available for the X68000 even the early SASI models, plus everything else that uses SCSI, has been around for years, too.

 

It's just that *this* isn't the forum where you're going to meet a lot of X68000 owners, or hear about X68000 fixes or new hardware.

Good! Too bad nobody even looked at my thread over in the Classic Computing section when I asked several months ago...

6 hours ago, cdoty said:

I saw the x68000 and FM Towns Marty in Japan, in the 90's. I also bought one, and developed a game for it about 15 years ago.

 

I've considered getting another one, but the repair horror stories have me reconsidering that decision.

You bought... the X68000 or the Marty? I'm guessing the X68000.

[cdoty]

17 hours ago, Steven Pendleton said:

Good! Too bad nobody even looked at my thread over in the Classic Computing section when I asked several months ago...

You bought... the X68000 or the Marty? I'm guessing the X68000.

 

I bought both several years ago, and sold them off. I've repurchased a Marty.

[Steven Pendleton]

16 minutes ago, cdoty said:

 

I bought both several years ago, and sold them off. I've repurchased a Marty.

The Marty is pretty expensive, I think. BEEP has a small collection of X68000 games for sale, but I don't think I've ever seen any games for the FM Towns or the Marty, now that I think about it. Maybe I just overlooked it since I was looking specifically for X68000 stuff, but I'll definitely check for FM Towns (Marty) next time I go to BEEP. I heard they are making a MiSTer core for the Marty (and X68000, for that matter), but I'm not sure of the details.

[cdoty]

On 8/27/2020 at 12:04 AM, Steven Pendleton said:

The Marty is pretty expensive, I think. BEEP has a small collection of X68000 games for sale, but I don't think I've ever seen any games for the FM Towns or the Marty, now that I think about it. Maybe I just overlooked it since I was looking specifically for X68000 stuff, but I'll definitely check for FM Towns (Marty) next time I go to BEEP. I heard they are making a MiSTer core for the Marty (and X68000, for that matter), but I'm not sure of the details.

They come up pretty consistently through Sendico, so it seems there is still a market for them. There's more under FM Towns, but there's certain software the Marty can't run because of it's limited memory.

https://www.sendico.com/browse?category=&query=fm+towns+marty

Edited August 30, 2020 by cdoty

[roadrunner]

Another cool game Baraduke 


 The main character is Kissy, a female, and ex-wife of Taizo, aka Dig Dug.

 

 

[Steven Pendleton]

Rise from your grave~

 

In the time since this thread died and its undeath ~7 hours ago, I have acquired a single X68000 game, Cotton. Yay. No X68000 yet, so I can't play it. Sadness.

[BurritoBeans]

Figure I'll give this thread a nice 'ol bump six months out, not about games for now but at least the hardware to run 'em.

 

I've had interest in X68Ks for years. I bought a Compact about six years back which I used to love, but I always felt "cheated" as I wanted a tower-model with the 5.25" floppies. Not sure exactly why I feel that way, the Compact is a fine machine, but maybe it's just that finding software I find interesting on 3.5" disks was always a pain. I'm proud to say that now, after a while, I finally got myself something more like what I originally wanted! $300, a steal if I say so myself, and I'll probably end up spending just as much (if not more!) to get the games I want for the thing!

 

 

It ain't the prettiest externally, you can see that front-left side is scuffed up a bit, but I don't think that'll be a tough repair as it's just flat gloss black plastic. Speaking of repairs, so far what I've figured out needs to be done for "safe operation" through asking around and reading online:

• The PSU needs to be replaced

I've seen a lot of people talking about retrofitting some sort of SFX power supply into the thing and adding a 74xx04, while that's nice I'm not entirely sure it's what I'd want to do. I've picked out making one of these as my solution as while pricier I think it would just be cooler, I'm more a fan of having the "right shaped" PCB, and it keeps a more original cord.

• The I/O board needs a new SRAM battery and electrolytic capacitors

It looks like I got lucky with picking the Expert, dodging the barrel batteries I've heard make these things into absolute nightmares. Instead of a huge mess I have an I/O board that looks like this:

 

 

So it seems by just dropping some sort of coin cell holder in I could do pretty much exactly what I need, there being pads for a non-rechargeable SRAM battery (what I have now) or a rechargeable (what I probably won't do). Regarding the caps these look ok to me, there's nothing visibly leaking anyways, so I honestly think I'm just going to hold off until I power the computer on and maybe find that audio output is weak.

• The 5.25" drives need recapped

This is one I think I'll be quicker to do, I've been having a lot of failing drive drive mechanisms in Japanese computers recently (A lot of PC-98s for some reason, 8" and 5.25") and it seems like redoing capacitors plus a good cleaning generally helps.

 

So yeah, you could say I'm excited to have this as a repair project. I'll finally get to mess with the 5.25" games on real hardware, a copy of Mr. Do!/Mr. Do! Vs. Unicorns sitting on my shelf right now as the first thing I'll run in here. I'm not all too interested in shmups, I just suck at them so I ignore them, but the various arcade conversions and other genres of games do interest me. I don't know why but I used to absolutely love Cameltry in emulators, I've never seen the game anywhere else even though I know it was ported other places, so I think I'll be looking to buy a copy of that if I can!

[roadrunner]

Why did the Sharp X68000 use 5.25" drives?
Asked 28 days ago Active 24 days ago
Viewed 764 times




https://retrocomputing.stackexchange.com/questions/22457/why-did-the-sharp-x68000-use-5-25-drives

 

[BurritoBeans]

Hah, speaking of things like this thread coming back to life about an hour ago, the Expert lives after a month and a half! Apologies for the messy desk picture, tearing this thing down made me throw stuff all around and I have yet to clean up again.

 

 

Step-by-step through what I did:

 

• The power supply was replaced.

I was just going to order my own PCBs but, after looking on eBay to see if anyone else had PicoPSU boards for sale, I found this listing. Pretty cool if I say so myself, the removable terminal blocks are an awesome feature, and it was a bit crammed with all the new wiring but that's alright. It works, it's a lot more reliable, and I have no complaints.

 

• The SRAM battery was replaced.

Simple enough to do, just tear the old one out with side-cutters and solder a new CR2032 with positive on the same side as the diode. I could've gone with a rechargeable battery but, as I want to know when it's flat and time to replace things, I figured a standard battery would be fine enough.

 

 

• I bought a keyboard adapter.

Seriously, good lord those original keyboards are expensive. Maybe it's being used to the PC-98 but, at least with the PC-98 you only spend ¥1,500-3,000 on a good keyboard. Maybe ¥5,000-7,500 if you want the original model and it's not in some yugen-listed lot that becomes a bid war. ¥14,000 on suruga-ya? ¥12,500 on YAJ? That's a bit much at the moment. So, after being told the same seller had RaSCSI boards for sale, I found this booth listing for a Logitech Unifying Receiver to X68000 adapter. Pretty cool if you ask me, yeah you need to have the alternate key image to tell what does what else but in games I doubt it'll be a huge issue.

 

 

So, with all that done, the machine runs! Mr. Do/Mr. Do Vs. Unicorns and one of the Viper games are all I still own for X68000, I'll buy more games eventually, but my current plan is to write a 5.25" boot disk with all the settings so I can get that RaSCSI going.

[roadrunner]

Pac-Mania review for Sharp X68000


https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/x68000/936746-pac-mania/reviews/153646

[roadrunner]

Examination: the Sharp X68000



https://newretrowave.com/2017/06/26/examination-the-sharp-x68000/

[roadrunner]

Another cool game Desperado


 

 

[Punisher5.0]

On 12/31/2021 at 6:28 PM, BurritoBeans said:

Hah, speaking of things like this thread coming back to life about an hour ago, the Expert lives after a month and a half! Apologies for the messy desk picture, tearing this thing down made me throw stuff all around and I have yet to clean up again.

 

 

Step-by-step through what I did:

 

• The power supply was replaced.

I was just going to order my own PCBs but, after looking on eBay to see if anyone else had PicoPSU boards for sale, I found this listing. Pretty cool if I say so myself, the removable terminal blocks are an awesome feature, and it was a bit crammed with all the new wiring but that's alright. It works, it's a lot more reliable, and I have no complaints.

 

• The SRAM battery was replaced.

Simple enough to do, just tear the old one out with side-cutters and solder a new CR2032 with positive on the same side as the diode. I could've gone with a rechargeable battery but, as I want to know when it's flat and time to replace things, I figured a standard battery would be fine enough.

 

 

• I bought a keyboard adapter.

Seriously, good lord those original keyboards are expensive. Maybe it's being used to the PC-98 but, at least with the PC-98 you only spend ¥1,500-3,000 on a good keyboard. Maybe ¥5,000-7,500 if you want the original model and it's not in some yugen-listed lot that becomes a bid war. ¥14,000 on suruga-ya? ¥12,500 on YAJ? That's a bit much at the moment. So, after being told the same seller had RaSCSI boards for sale, I found this booth listing for a Logitech Unifying Receiver to X68000 adapter. Pretty cool if you ask me, yeah you need to have the alternate key image to tell what does what else but in games I doubt it'll be a huge issue.

 

 

So, with all that done, the machine runs! Mr. Do/Mr. Do Vs. Unicorns and one of the Viper games are all I still own for X68000, I'll buy more games eventually, but my current plan is to write a 5.25" boot disk with all the settings so I can get that RaSCSI going.

 Is there a guide for making a new PSU with that PCB? My original PSU died years ago and I never got around to fixing it but reading your post got me interested again.

[BurritoBeans]

On 2/8/2022 at 9:36 PM, Punisher5.0 said:

 Is there a guide for making a new PSU with that PCB? My original PSU died years ago and I never got around to fixing it but reading your post got me interested again.

I sadly didn't have anything, just a few reference pages. NFGGames has a nice area including the wire color codes so you know which goes where, that proved extremely useful as I didn't check things beforehand, the creator also has some tips on his GitHub repo, but that was about all I had to work with. I just bought the power supply they mentioned in the eBay listing and did the best I could to plug everything in the right way.

 

So far so good but my soft power section is broken, turns out gamesx has a nice section regarding fixing it but I've been slow on getting through it.

[Punisher5.0]

6 hours ago, BurritoBeans said:

I sadly didn't have anything, just a few reference pages. NFGGames has a nice area including the wire color codes so you know which goes where, that proved extremely useful as I didn't check things beforehand, the creator also has some tips on his GitHub repo, but that was about all I had to work with. I just bought the power supply they mentioned in the eBay listing and did the best I could to plug everything in the right way.

 

So far so good but my soft power section is broken, turns out gamesx has a nice section regarding fixing it but I've been slow on getting through it.

Thanks for all those links!

[roadrunner]

Good article here -


Sharp x68000 – The Japanese Amiga Alternative
January 16, 2021  Graham W Wöbcke  1 Comment Favorite Games, Games, Graham W Wobcke, Sharp x68000




https://www.everythingamiga.com/2021/01/sharp-x68000-the-japanese-amiga-alternative.html

[roadrunner]

Happy 35th Birthday to the Sharp X68000!


https://www.fanbyte.com/news/happy-35th-birthday-to-the-sharp-x68000/

[roadrunner]

Flying Shark


Alternate Titles

"Hishou Zame" -- Japanese title
"Flying Shark" -- European title
"Flyingshark" -- Alternate European title spelling



 

Game info here -


https://www.mobygames.com/game/sharp-x68000/sky-shark

 

[Steven Pendleton]

On 4/22/2022 at 4:04 AM, roadrunner said:

Flying Shark


Alternate Titles

"Hishou Zame" -- Japanese title
"Flying Shark" -- European title
"Flyingshark" -- Alternate European title spelling



 

Game info here -


https://www.mobygames.com/game/sharp-x68000/sky-shark

 

Hishouzame is the basics of shooting perfected. Extremely tight game design and highly playable once you learn the stages. Basically everything that came after it was directly influenced by it, making it one of the most important and influential games in its genre. The arcade version is getting released on PS4 and Switch on Thursday. X68000 version is not included, though.

[SlidellMan]

How come no one here has even mentioned Technosoft and Zoom's contributions to the X68000?

Example One: Thunder Force II

 

Example Two: Phalanx

 

[roadrunner]

R+R 

 

 

[roadrunner]

DEMPA SHIMBUNSHA, TAITO, X68000
BUBBLE BOBBLE, X68000



https://thekingofgrabs.com/2021/11/06/bubble-bobble-x68000/

[SiberianSpForces]

Got a chance to play on one at MGC and it was running Castlevania. Didn't realize it was included in Castlevania Chronicles. 😋

[lazzeri]

Anyone here? 🙂

 

To whom it might concert: I´ve spent the last three weels frantically compiling a list of all commercially released X68000 games. No Doujin, no applications, no magazines - only commercially released games in big box or Takeru format.

 

There´s over 740 games listed in the damn thing. 😅

 

I´ve used the TOSEC as primary source and then carefully checked every game´s existence using two of the major collectors site in Japan.

 

Listed are the game name, the japanese original game, publisher, release date and number of discs.

 

That took a hell of work. Hope it can be useful to anybody else.

 

Commercial X68000 Games List.xlsx

[lazzeri]

BTW, I was just sorting out and organizing my little X68000 games collection. Hope you like it. 🙂

 

There was a little 6-months frenzy period around 2010 that I was basically buying every x68k lot I could lay my hands on. Then I found out that there were over 600 known commercial games (back then!) and that went away. But i´m starting to feel the itch again. Oh well.