First off, welcome back Coury, I've missed your videos. I hope to see more in the future. As a SSDS3 owner this was a very welcome look at the new offering and one i've been waiting for. Glad to see an unfiltered review. Looking forward to everything you and Marc have in the pipes.
After buying in to MISTer, I sold my pce/ssds3 setup. Made my money back that I put out but was able to hold onto the PC engine controllers for use with snac adapter. These are great options if you want to have to turn your system off and back on every time you want to change a game.
Original pce hardware is, uhh, prone to issues. To be gentle about it. The sound quality is especially shite, with the humming out of that Interface Unit. I will never use pce hardware again now that mister exists. But, to be fair, it would have been awesome to have a Turbo Duo with imports back in the day.
ehhhh...I think with the MiSTer and SNAC's you still are paying too much. If you wanted to forego real hardware anyway you could have just purchased the MagicEngine emulator on the PC which has been emulating this system in its entirety pretty perfectly for two or so decades. If you are using the MiSTer for a LOT of consoles (and I am sure you are) then maybe you are getting your money's worth. But for just this console, hell no. All of that said, having the real hardware and devices like the Super HD/SD device is a niche thing for people that want to use real hardware and cherish that real hardware...myself being one of those people. I have FPGA and emulators too, but there's really something special about owning the real stuff. It's sad that you sold it all off.
Good breakdown. I got the HD System 3 Pro a month or so ago for my PC Engine I picked up a few months back and I'm pretty happy with it overall. I almost got the SD version but then saw this was releasing so I waited for it and had it imported from Terra Onion. Everything for the most part works great although I've run into a few small issues with CD based games... namely when trying to reset back to the menu I might run into an error screen which I then have to manually reset the console. This can probably be fixed with firmware updates. I've also had a few issues playing some rom hacks and translations but I almost feel like that's to be expected... although Rondo of Blood ran perfectly (as far as I can tell, I have no frame of reference since I've never played it before) and I played through that without issue and that was the biggest title I was wanting to play. That game kicked ass by the way and it's the first Castlevania I've played through to the end. That's pretty much it. Overall there's no other way way I would really be able to reasonably enjoy my PC Engine without this device and it's performed pretty much the way I expect it to. I'm using an Insurrection Industries RGB cable with mine and I will say that if I already had an SD version of this I wouldn't pay for the upgrade. The Supergrafx games just aren't worth the extra cost even though there are some good games there. I bought my PC Engine mostly for the shmup library so having Aldynes is a plus but it's not essential as there's TONS of much better games for the CD or Hucard. Again though I'm pretty pleased with this product. It obviously must be decent when my biggest complaint about it is the stupid blue color of the shell lol. I REALLY wish there was a white option to match the PC Engine color.
I genuinely love that 44k mostly USA/Can/EU people watch a video that covers loading supergrafx roms onto real supergrafx hardware. Only 75K consoles existed (I’m guessing that means 50k or less out in use now worldwide) and they were originally sold in Japan.
There are some neat features with this one, but yeah, I'm not entirely sure it's worth the upgrade either. Dual analog + HDMI out would have been huge if it worked. 720p at the highest is also a bummer.
I still have no clue what happened to my Turbo Grafx 16 and all my games I had when I was a kid. I’m assuming my mom threw it away or gave it to someone. I had a real fondness of it, and really wanted to rekindle our love. But it’s so freakin expensive, it makes no sense when you can just emulate everything. So I decided on a Core Grafx HD System Pro combo, that’s been flawless. Couldn’t be happier!
I’m still on the fence about adding this one to my setup. It would be one thing if I could just pick it up to use with my TurboGrafx but with it not being officially supported I’d feel compelled to track down a PC Engine or Core Grafx and this unit is already expensive on its own without adding the need to track down other hardware to use it on.
[Coury] I went with my wife and kids for the first time this summer and it was incredible. Definitely going to go back and do the longer cave tour. Its nuts when they take you in the cave and turn off the lights - like being in a sensory depravation chamber.
Awesome video as always! I love the honesty about the hardware. Personally, this one kinda blurs too many lines for me. I really dislike that they want to do other cores on this, because it makes it feel like a MiSTer that has a PC Engine slapped onto it. If I wanted to play NES games, I'd use my original, or get an NT Mini/MiSTer. What makes it even worse is that they obviously haven't even perfected the cores for the system it's intended to replicate! The fact this thing essentially bypasses part of the SuperGrafx hardware, only to emulate it poorly, is simply the antithesis of why I use original hardware/dedicated FPGA hardware in the first place.
Well not only could the simulated composite colors improve the colors from certain games but many games were also designed with composite video in mind for certain effects as well.
I tested some games on my Hd system 3 and sounds good to me comparing to a pc engine with ifu+cdrom2 addon. I dont know if the video was recorded with a previus firmware version of the unit
So now that I have it: where do we get the "experimental" NES core for this thing? I'm finding no information about it anywhere on the internet. I know it's not the selling point of the SHDS3 and all, but because I know about it, I gotta try it!
Here I was thinking about getting a Core Grafx if I were to invest in a Super SD or HD. Though now I've seen how analogue signals are often much better on the SD, making it a much better fit for me. But then I find out the HD AND particularly the SD have horribly flattened audio. No thanks. Man, I guess I won't be getting either. $300 is way too much to pay for these caveats and trade offs.
My favorite part of the video? How almost every shot of the game list includes the Ys games. Though I hope for Ys VI you got the English Dubbed translation patch, since the text-only translation makes you miss out on a LOT of the story.
We love Terra onion and we love all of the other companies that make retro products for gaming like analog and the everdrive series. However I am so glad that we also hold them responsible to make good products and don't just give them free advertisement without criticism. So thank you My Life In Gaming for giving an honest and critical review of all products, and showing their faults. We pay good money! Love ya TerraOnion still, but year keep reiterating please.
0:32 what exactly is meant by everdrives providing a "*fairly* (emphasis on the fairly) authentic way of exploring a system's library"? Doesn't the original hardware read the rom from the everdrive the exact same way as an original cart, since the rom that is read is the same rom that was ripped anyways from the original games themselves?
Depending on the game and system, certain flashcarts might have to emulate different mappers or audio hardware, which can potentially lead to incompatibilities or inaccuracies. So it may not always be a 100% "perfect" method for playing certain games when compared to an original cart.
@@SeanBarkerNegaScott128 which consoles are you aware of that aren't 100% accurate with what specific everdrives? I have the N8 everdrive for the NES, Super Everdrive X5 for the SNES, the Everdrive 64 for the N64, and the Mega SD for the Genesis. From what I understand, all of those are 100% accurate and the exact same as playing an original cart.
@@quibquatch3975 They're not necessarily 100% accurate when they need to use FPGAs to emulate certain specific things like a dedicated audio chip in an original cart, or some audio components of the full original hardware (e.g. Turbo Duo). The Super SD and HD do still appear to have some audio issues compared to original hardware, and you'd wonder why. You mention a lot of everdrives, so let's just take the N8 as an example. In my case, the audio in games like Akumajo Densetsu, Gimmick and Lagrange Point on my N8 is obviously inferior compared to the original carts with the real chips. It might potentially be better on newer revisions like the N8 Pro, but the point is this is something Everdrive users have had to deal with just like people relying on software emulation where high quality and accurate audio always has been one of the biggest sticking points. As for SNES Everdrives there is still issues with how well games with special chips run, and some don't run at all still as far as I know even on an SD2SNES/FX Pro, like Tengai Makyou Zero because of the SPC7110 chip (correct me if I'm wrong, I'm not up to date on games I already have the original cart of). At any rate say you have the Super Everdrive X5, which definitely doesn't play all the enhancement chip games that the SD2SNES lineup do play either, so that flashcart especially is a far cry from 100%. I wouldn't buy an X5 unless I knew I had all the original enhancement chip cartridges I'd ever want, and there are a lot of them, including essentials like Megaman X, Yoshi's Island and Star Fox.
@@quibquatch3975 I should also add that for MegaSD, the FM emulation for SMS games isn't super accurate in current firmwares at least, and I don't believe Virtua Racing is supported nor are there plans to pick it up. I'm not aware of any issues with Genesis mappers or Sega CD games in current firmwares at least. : P
@@Mogura87 I wouldn't be surprised if SPC7110 support comes to SD2SNES at some point - it's clearly been figured out because MisterFPGA has has SPC support about 2 years now.
Is a pity Terraonion moved to andorra. Knowing I will have to pay 40+€ in import duties because they moved to the country over is not worth making deals with them.
I'm really sad the ODE's are going to microSD those fail for me in 3-5 years but I still have full size SD that are old enough to drink I dont know if its the connector or what but I hate them ive thrown so many away always the same they lose the ability to write & can only read files over time
As Supergrafx user, it's tough to justify buying this. The lesser compatibility with Supergrafx games, and the fact that the HDMI ouput isn't simultaneous, makes me just want to wait for a further iteration or another offering entirely.
The audio is going to be a dealbreaker for a lot of people. Still cool to have more options. Now the real problem is finding a coregrafx that doesn't cost as much as a used car.
Honeslty the best way to go regarding PC Engine CD and NeoGeo if you ask me. I hate emulation, but in these 2 cases I make the exception, unless I want to sell my house to pay for the entire NeoGeo/PcEngine collection.
I just bought one. It does not recognize ANY CD-ROM BIOS file. Terra Onion has closed their forums. I basically just paid $400 for $40 Turbo Everdrive functionality.
It's sad PC-E CD-ROM is pretty much at "must emulate" state now, I really like the design of the console, but the failure rate and price is really deterring.
I bought a used and modded (RGB and region) PCE Duo-RX for $700 with a Turbo EverDrive not that long ago. Burned copies of the CD games I wanted. Not an impossible barrier to entry but I can see why people emulate...
The audio is a big let down on both the SD and HD versions compared to original hardware. Man, I didn't know I was missing out on the music/sound effect audio levels when I play with my SSDS3.
@@Izquierda Yeah the MiSTer devs do a good job, but still not the same with all cores. I haven’t compared the PC Engine sound, but I prefer my original VA3 genesis sound over the MiSTer. The MiSTer sounds good, but it’s just not the same. There’s something about the original early genesis sound.
@@Redonepunch Oh yeah Genesis is a different matter, I was talking about the Turbografx/PC Engine core which is pretty much as perfect as can be, IMO good enough to dump all original hardware. But that's not the case with Genesis and other systems. For Genesis sound nothing really is like the original.
That firmware update process is probably why I'll never own a TO device, tbh. Looks neat, if anything changes might change I'd probably change my mind, but the serial seems like a disaster waiting to happen, with either the website going offline or the serial sticker falling off.
@@arslanxelan9606 That's great for that user. I just have to wonder what happens, say, 5-10 years down the road, someone buys the device from someone else, or it gets given to them, but it has no serial on the bottom anymore. Another item for the ewaste pile? On top of what guarantee is the site even going to be around from before? The idea just seems generally anti end-user.
I can't understand how anyone can justify the price of aging OG hardware + $300 add-ons like these when MiSTer can do all of the same things & better, plus has tons of other consoles & computer cores. The value is just insane. To each their own I suppose.
MiSTer value is untouchable but it will never have the magic of real hardware and it's butt ugly as a physical device. Everyone I know with a MiSTer still treasures their vintage hardware; it's always a complement rather than a replacement.
So sounds to me that HDMI is the way to go with this over Analog...what a shame. Hopefully this gets patched because I don't recall the SD System 3 was as bad.
Interesting. Yeah. This might have been an upgrade that isn’t needed. If all you want is Supergrafx/Roms/HDMI/Palettes. I’m sad and happy to say the price of the SSD3 Pro is more than a Mister. Just get a mister along side of your PCE. I just don’t see why.. considering this breaks Supergrafx and also has worse analog video out. Some 2 steps forward one step back kind of moments here from Terraonion
@@visker81 except the Mister only plays NES, SNES, Sega Master System, Genesis, PC Engine/Turbografx, and Neo Geo as the only "mainstream" consoles. The FPGA isn't powerful enough to run anything past the SNES/Genesis 4th generation, although I hear people are working on the Sega Saturn. The rest of the consoles such as random home computer stuff and second generation Atari 2600 type consoles still has work to be done, and you can't use original controllers with the Mister. Also it's not exactly plug in play, there is a lot of tinkering around that needs to be done with the firmware, settings, and formatting the micro SD card. That's a big no sell for me, and I personally don't see the point in the Mister when at that point you're basically doing emulation as it is, which kinda defeats the purpose of the entire "real deal original hardware" thing. It looks like a good solution though for people who don't really care about real hardware and want a compact setup due to space or aren't really that enthusiastic about gaming in general.
I’ve been hesitant about this device- there’s evidence that even standard PC Engine games are using FPGA to some extent so… what’s the point if your hardware is mostly emulated anyway?
While this looks like an excellent device it is difficult to justify when the $199 Analogue Duo is right around the corner, offering a more reliable modern hardware, a fully digital signal path and (likely) more options for video. The Duo will be especially easy to justify given that I can sell my old Turbografx to recoup a good portion of the cost.
@@pinkace All previous Analogue devices have featured jailbroken firmware, which is part of the appeal. While not confirmed (for plausible deniability reasons) pretty much everyone is expecting this to be the case with the Duo as well. Hardware shows an SD card slot.
I'm pretty happy with my current SSDS3, so I don't think availability to 5 games is really gonna push me over the edge. I'm happy that people who don't have one have a new option though!
you aren't kidding when you say retro game prices have hit a point of absurdity. I bought a copy of Pokémon Emerald for $38 4 years ago with a dead battery. Soldered a new battery into it and someone just bought it off me for $150. The pokémania / retro game craze is a massive bubble and I think it's gonna crash within the next year or so because of economic downturn and it's just completely unsustainable at these prices. I've gotten to a point now where I just want to ditch my collection of games except for games I really care about / want to keep in my collection and just sell the rest now while the going is good and maybe get back into it if the market ever becomes reasonable again. Luckily we have flash carts and ODE's and emulators if I just want to play the games of old consoles. Retro gaming is cool but collecting but the joys of going on a hunt and fanding a cool game that you've never seen before for a resonable price are long gone and it's killing the joy of the hobby.
This happens with everything though. Stuff starts out expensive and desirable, becomes 'old', 'outdated' and worthless, most items then wind up in landfill, then after about 20 years, people go hunting for the stuff they wanted as teenagers but couldn't afford. At first, bargains can be found, but once people do so en masse, the limited supply means prices shoot up. You can always find cheap items, whether it's games, cars or anything else - you just need to shop in the zone where stuff is old enough to be unvalued, but not so old that people have nostalgia for it. At the moment, that means stuff like PS3 and Xbox 360 games, which are practically free. Ditto for plasma screens.
I prefer ode and flash cart on original hardware to collecting just for the sake of collecting. I have the games I love physically but that’s it. I’d rather actually play the games than try impress people coming by with my entire game sets for each system and end up looking like a filthy person who needs to be on the hoarder’s tv show.
I have one for my TG16 and I had to unscrew and completely remove the plastic shell to get it to fit. Once I did this though I didn’t feel like there was much risk in damaging the pins. After the pcb is safely installed you can reinstall and loosely screw the plastic case back in to protect it.
My first, the orignal SSD3S never worked, still doesn't... my NeoSD doesn't work either, never did. TO discord offered little to no help. I guess it makes a nice art piece....
15:58 “Until now this pallet has only been officially implemented in the MiSTer FPGA’s TurboDuo core but thanks to the Super HD System³’s pallet feature you can now load it on real hardware” Not exactly. UperGrafx got it over a year ago. That’s right: UperGrafx had composite colors with digital video on original hardware first. ;)
Paying premium price for this you need tools to get sd card out thats sucks And supergrafx support is like get the system out first and fix later thing I think megasd is the one its worth the money
Nice video! But you mention at 06:04 that the FPGA is emulating the CD-ROM drive. But a FPGA simulates hardware, right? Because IMHO it’s not emulation.
It is hardware based emulation. Just like a software based emulator recreates the hardware of a system in software, an FPGA emulates (simulates to use your term) that hardware with different hardware.
Just think in another 20-30 years we will be treating all our AAA game titles of today as we are these roms. All being stored on tiny devices easily emulated
I think we'll be seeing people treat their consoles with as much delicacy as we do for 30-40 year old consoles now, but definitely not the games, since they're all on CDs beyond a certain point. Also, we're living in an age where these games can't possibly be running on just crude machine code. The bare CPU instructions are not as integral to the user experience as it is for say the NES. There's more layers of abstraction in today's code (I would assume, since most people programmed in interpreted languages nowadays. I'll eat my words if I'm actually wrong about this). Therefore, I don't think it makes sense for the retro tech fetishization to extend to more recent consoles. If anything, it will be people preserving and collecting games in the same way that people do so with comic books, where it's people into collectibles rather than computer enthusiasts dominating the hobby. Not to say that everyone who's into retro consoles is a computer enthusiast necessarily.
I have issues with normal roms using the shds3 plugged into my supper grafx in both mode 1 and 2. TO has been very hesitant to even respond to me. Bonks won’t even load, startup screen glitches and loops. Several others as well. Some run fine.
Geez, it's such a mixed bag. I might forgive the bad audio levels if the system had dual output or just let me use digital audio with analog video. The Supergrafx core being noticeably inferior to actual hardware is unforgivable and better be fixed. It's very frustrating to have an actual SGX and know this attachment is forcing its own poor implementation over the original hardware support I had with the ssds3. I picked up the Pro just for the palette support. I'm starting to feel it wasn't quite worth it since I'm trading features to get it. The improved audio accuracy is welcome, but I'm starting to feel like the MiSTer will provide me a better result. It really sucks to have to compromise so much on original hardware. Especially when paying this much. I'm really hoping they can fix some of this with updates
Dat Mammoth cave shirt! Thats, why I'm here. I don't believe in registering for firmware updates. That's futarded. They should be provided firmware updates hassle-free like analogue. That's why I won't buy it.
That MLiG theme tune makes me happy :)
Yeah, it's awesome and I love how it fades in
SAME
17:42 So that's the reason why Terraonion is avoiding give review units to some people who do proper reviews of the product. 😅
First off, welcome back Coury, I've missed your videos. I hope to see more in the future. As a SSDS3 owner this was a very welcome look at the new offering and one i've been waiting for. Glad to see an unfiltered review. Looking forward to everything you and Marc have in the pipes.
After buying in to MISTer, I sold my pce/ssds3 setup. Made my money back that I put out but was able to hold onto the PC engine controllers for use with snac adapter. These are great options if you want to have to turn your system off and back on every time you want to change a game.
Original pce hardware is, uhh, prone to issues. To be gentle about it. The sound quality is especially shite, with the humming out of that Interface Unit. I will never use pce hardware again now that mister exists. But, to be fair, it would have been awesome to have a Turbo Duo with imports back in the day.
@@jaymorrison8419 Had the US turbo duo back in the day, still kicking myself that I gave that up lol
ehhhh...I think with the MiSTer and SNAC's you still are paying too much. If you wanted to forego real hardware anyway you could have just purchased the MagicEngine emulator on the PC which has been emulating this system in its entirety pretty perfectly for two or so decades.
If you are using the MiSTer for a LOT of consoles (and I am sure you are) then maybe you are getting your money's worth. But for just this console, hell no.
All of that said, having the real hardware and devices like the Super HD/SD device is a niche thing for people that want to use real hardware and cherish that real hardware...myself being one of those people. I have FPGA and emulators too, but there's really something special about owning the real stuff. It's sad that you sold it all off.
The quality of these videos somehow continues to improve over time. It’s wild to see how great this all looks and sounds.
Good breakdown. I got the HD System 3 Pro a month or so ago for my PC Engine I picked up a few months back and I'm pretty happy with it overall. I almost got the SD version but then saw this was releasing so I waited for it and had it imported from Terra Onion.
Everything for the most part works great although I've run into a few small issues with CD based games... namely when trying to reset back to the menu I might run into an error screen which I then have to manually reset the console. This can probably be fixed with firmware updates.
I've also had a few issues playing some rom hacks and translations but I almost feel like that's to be expected... although Rondo of Blood ran perfectly (as far as I can tell, I have no frame of reference since I've never played it before) and I played through that without issue and that was the biggest title I was wanting to play. That game kicked ass by the way and it's the first Castlevania I've played through to the end. That's pretty much it.
Overall there's no other way way I would really be able to reasonably enjoy my PC Engine without this device and it's performed pretty much the way I expect it to. I'm using an Insurrection Industries RGB cable with mine and I will say that if I already had an SD version of this I wouldn't pay for the upgrade. The Supergrafx games just aren't worth the extra cost even though there are some good games there. I bought my PC Engine mostly for the shmup library so having Aldynes is a plus but it's not essential as there's TONS of much better games for the CD or Hucard.
Again though I'm pretty pleased with this product. It obviously must be decent when my biggest complaint about it is the stupid blue color of the shell lol. I REALLY wish there was a white option to match the PC Engine color.
So cool finding out about these. Looking at reviews and watching setups etc. But quite happy carrying on without them. Great review again gents. 😁
Don't own a PC-Engine or TurboGrafx-16 but it's always entertainment to watch your videos.
I genuinely love that 44k mostly USA/Can/EU people watch a video that covers loading supergrafx roms onto real supergrafx hardware. Only 75K consoles existed (I’m guessing that means 50k or less out in use now worldwide) and they were originally sold in Japan.
Oh my god I JUST watch the previous installment of this doing an archive binge!
I'm not even interested in getting this and still enjoyed the heck out of this video. Great job as always, guys.
Still waitin for that Sega Saturn AVC Cartridge for home made H264 CD playback.
Honestly this channel deserves 1+ million subs! Keep at it fellas
Truth. Keep spreadin' the word amigo.
There are some neat features with this one, but yeah, I'm not entirely sure it's worth the upgrade either. Dual analog + HDMI out would have been huge if it worked. 720p at the highest is also a bummer.
Terraonion are scumbags mocking Krikzz for escaping the war in Ukraine with his family. Don't support those garbage humans
I still have no clue what happened to my Turbo Grafx 16 and all my games I had when I was a kid. I’m assuming my mom threw it away or gave it to someone.
I had a real fondness of it, and really wanted to rekindle our love. But it’s so freakin expensive, it makes no sense when you can just emulate everything.
So I decided on a Core Grafx HD System Pro combo, that’s been flawless. Couldn’t be happier!
I’m still on the fence about adding this one to my setup. It would be one thing if I could just pick it up to use with my TurboGrafx but with it not being officially supported I’d feel compelled to track down a PC Engine or Core Grafx and this unit is already expensive on its own without adding the need to track down other hardware to use it on.
Loved this review, great one Coury!!
Thank you for clarifying on the TG-16. was looking for a clear answer
Nice Mammoth Cave shirt, Coury! One of my favorite places I've ever been.
[Coury] I went with my wife and kids for the first time this summer and it was incredible. Definitely going to go back and do the longer cave tour. Its nuts when they take you in the cave and turn off the lights - like being in a sensory depravation chamber.
Awesome video as always! I love the honesty about the hardware.
Personally, this one kinda blurs too many lines for me. I really dislike that they want to do other cores on this, because it makes it feel like a MiSTer that has a PC Engine slapped onto it. If I wanted to play NES games, I'd use my original, or get an NT Mini/MiSTer. What makes it even worse is that they obviously haven't even perfected the cores for the system it's intended to replicate! The fact this thing essentially bypasses part of the SuperGrafx hardware, only to emulate it poorly, is simply the antithesis of why I use original hardware/dedicated FPGA hardware in the first place.
That Intro music still kills!
It gets me pumped every time!
Loving the Nexzr music in the background!
Great video as always!
Well not only could the simulated composite colors improve the colors from certain games but many games were also designed with composite video in mind for certain effects as well.
Where’s the Wii episode?
This is objectively more important than my classes.
00:16 the result of Coury coming home after a night of binge drinking to record B-roll.
Love the Mammoth Cave shirt! I went there as a kid and great time. Also, great job as always!
That audio comparison was crazy. They really missed the mark big.
I tested some games on my Hd system 3 and sounds good to me comparing to a pc engine with ifu+cdrom2 addon. I dont know if the video was recorded with a previus firmware version of the unit
So now that I have it: where do we get the "experimental" NES core for this thing? I'm finding no information about it anywhere on the internet. I know it's not the selling point of the SHDS3 and all, but because I know about it, I gotta try it!
Here I was thinking about getting a Core Grafx if I were to invest in a Super SD or HD. Though now I've seen how analogue signals are often much better on the SD, making it a much better fit for me. But then I find out the HD AND particularly the SD have horribly flattened audio. No thanks. Man, I guess I won't be getting either. $300 is way too much to pay for these caveats and trade offs.
Not to mention that for the price of a PC-Engine and any of the Super HD System 3, you could buy a full MiSTer setup.
It's garb - Get a mister and enjoy the range of cores
My favorite part of the video? How almost every shot of the game list includes the Ys games.
Though I hope for Ys VI you got the English Dubbed translation patch, since the text-only translation makes you miss out on a LOT of the story.
We love Terra onion and we love all of the other companies that make retro products for gaming like analog and the everdrive series. However I am so glad that we also hold them responsible to make good products and don't just give them free advertisement without criticism. So thank you My Life In Gaming for giving an honest and critical review of all products, and showing their faults. We pay good money! Love ya TerraOnion still, but year keep reiterating please.
0:32 what exactly is meant by everdrives providing a "*fairly* (emphasis on the fairly) authentic way of exploring a system's library"? Doesn't the original hardware read the rom from the everdrive the exact same way as an original cart, since the rom that is read is the same rom that was ripped anyways from the original games themselves?
Depending on the game and system, certain flashcarts might have to emulate different mappers or audio hardware, which can potentially lead to incompatibilities or inaccuracies. So it may not always be a 100% "perfect" method for playing certain games when compared to an original cart.
@@SeanBarkerNegaScott128 which consoles are you aware of that aren't 100% accurate with what specific everdrives? I have the N8 everdrive for the NES, Super Everdrive X5 for the SNES, the Everdrive 64 for the N64, and the Mega SD for the Genesis. From what I understand, all of those are 100% accurate and the exact same as playing an original cart.
@@quibquatch3975 They're not necessarily 100% accurate when they need to use FPGAs to emulate certain specific things like a dedicated audio chip in an original cart, or some audio components of the full original hardware (e.g. Turbo Duo). The Super SD and HD do still appear to have some audio issues compared to original hardware, and you'd wonder why. You mention a lot of everdrives, so let's just take the N8 as an example. In my case, the audio in games like Akumajo Densetsu, Gimmick and Lagrange Point on my N8 is obviously inferior compared to the original carts with the real chips. It might potentially be better on newer revisions like the N8 Pro, but the point is this is something Everdrive users have had to deal with just like people relying on software emulation where high quality and accurate audio always has been one of the biggest sticking points.
As for SNES Everdrives there is still issues with how well games with special chips run, and some don't run at all still as far as I know even on an SD2SNES/FX Pro, like Tengai Makyou Zero because of the SPC7110 chip (correct me if I'm wrong, I'm not up to date on games I already have the original cart of). At any rate say you have the Super Everdrive X5, which definitely doesn't play all the enhancement chip games that the SD2SNES lineup do play either, so that flashcart especially is a far cry from 100%. I wouldn't buy an X5 unless I knew I had all the original enhancement chip cartridges I'd ever want, and there are a lot of them, including essentials like Megaman X, Yoshi's Island and Star Fox.
@@quibquatch3975 I should also add that for MegaSD, the FM emulation for SMS games isn't super accurate in current firmwares at least, and I don't believe Virtua Racing is supported nor are there plans to pick it up. I'm not aware of any issues with Genesis mappers or Sega CD games in current firmwares at least. : P
@@Mogura87 I wouldn't be surprised if SPC7110 support comes to SD2SNES at some point - it's clearly been figured out because MisterFPGA has has SPC support about 2 years now.
Is a pity Terraonion moved to andorra. Knowing I will have to pay 40+€ in import duties because they moved to the country over is not worth making deals with them.
Wooo Monday and new MLIG?! Yes please
I'm really sad the ODE's are going to microSD those fail for me in 3-5 years but I still have full size SD that are old enough to drink I dont know if its the connector or what but I hate them ive thrown so many away always the same they lose the ability to write & can only read files over time
As Supergrafx user, it's tough to justify buying this. The lesser compatibility with Supergrafx games, and the fact that the HDMI ouput isn't simultaneous, makes me just want to wait for a further iteration or another offering entirely.
It's just a half-assed product. Remember the video noise issues??
The audio is going to be a dealbreaker for a lot of people. Still cool to have more options. Now the real problem is finding a coregrafx that doesn't cost as much as a used car.
That would sure be swell.
Great video!
I have a few PC Engine games on Wii and Wii U (Virtual Consoles). Great picture quality and sound.
Honeslty the best way to go regarding PC Engine CD and NeoGeo if you ask me. I hate emulation, but in these 2 cases I make the exception, unless I want to sell my house to pay for the entire NeoGeo/PcEngine collection.
Has there been any news of Terraonion fixing the analog RGB issue in 13:28? Voultar seemed to explain the cause & solution on Twitter.
No.
I like the quality and tone of your videos so much, i watch/listen even if i have no interest in the specific hardware. ;']
I just bought one. It does not recognize ANY CD-ROM BIOS file. Terra Onion has closed their forums. I basically just paid $400 for $40 Turbo Everdrive functionality.
Aw geez. As if blocking certain people on Twitter didn't already make me never want to touch Terra Onion's products with a ten foot pole.
It's sad PC-E CD-ROM is pretty much at "must emulate" state now, I really like the design of the console, but the failure rate and price is really deterring.
I bought a used and modded (RGB and region) PCE Duo-RX for $700 with a Turbo EverDrive not that long ago. Burned copies of the CD games I wanted. Not an impossible barrier to entry but I can see why people emulate...
@@SeveredLegs
$700, ROFL
yeah those interface unit setups will give you plenty of problems to fix
@@jaymorrison8419 Interface unit setups? And what are you ROFLin' about...I didn't get ripped off! :D
@@SeveredLegs
you don't even know what the Interface Unit is? LOL
The audio is a big let down on both the SD and HD versions compared to original hardware. Man, I didn't know I was missing out on the music/sound effect audio levels when I play with my SSDS3.
Audio is honestly a letdown with most Fpga implementations unfortunately
@@Redonepunch Not really, on MiSTer sound is virtually flawless. In fact better than original while still "accurate".
@@Izquierda Yeah the MiSTer devs do a good job, but still not the same with all cores. I haven’t compared the PC Engine sound, but I prefer my original VA3 genesis sound over the MiSTer. The MiSTer sounds good, but it’s just not the same. There’s something about the original early genesis sound.
@@Redonepunch Oh yeah Genesis is a different matter, I was talking about the Turbografx/PC Engine core which is pretty much as perfect as can be, IMO good enough to dump all original hardware. But that's not the case with Genesis and other systems. For Genesis sound nothing really is like the original.
That firmware update process is probably why I'll never own a TO device, tbh. Looks neat, if anything changes might change I'd probably change my mind, but the serial seems like a disaster waiting to happen, with either the website going offline or the serial sticker falling off.
Once you register your device there is no need to remember the serial. Its there on the site. Although the site going down is a whole another issue
@@arslanxelan9606 That's great for that user. I just have to wonder what happens, say, 5-10 years down the road, someone buys the device from someone else, or it gets given to them, but it has no serial on the bottom anymore. Another item for the ewaste pile? On top of what guarantee is the site even going to be around from before? The idea just seems generally anti end-user.
I can't understand how anyone can justify the price of aging OG hardware + $300 add-ons like these when MiSTer can do all of the same things & better, plus has tons of other consoles & computer cores. The value is just insane. To each their own I suppose.
Trust me the point isn't lost on me. I will probably sell mine and buy a mister.
@@chrisw8069 I don't mean to dump on people who collect OG stuff - I get it, it's pretty awesome. It's just gotten so insane with the prices lately.
@@siskavard I plan to keep the original hardware, just get rid of some of this "extra" stuff.
MiSTer value is untouchable but it will never have the magic of real hardware and it's butt ugly as a physical device. Everyone I know with a MiSTer still treasures their vintage hardware; it's always a complement rather than a replacement.
Because I don’t want a Mister and I can afford it?
why is it blue
THX for this video. Did firmware updated for fix supergraphx compatibility?
Does the analog audio out also have issues? Not sure if I missed it in the video.
So sounds to me that HDMI is the way to go with this over Analog...what a shame. Hopefully this gets patched because I don't recall the SD System 3 was as bad.
Interesting. Yeah. This might have been an upgrade that isn’t needed. If all you want is Supergrafx/Roms/HDMI/Palettes. I’m sad and happy to say the price of the SSD3 Pro is more than a Mister. Just get a mister along side of your PCE. I just don’t see why.. considering this breaks Supergrafx and also has worse analog video out. Some 2 steps forward one step back kind of moments here from Terraonion
MISTer is the answer to everything.
@@visker81 except the Mister only plays NES, SNES, Sega Master System, Genesis, PC Engine/Turbografx, and Neo Geo as the only "mainstream" consoles. The FPGA isn't powerful enough to run anything past the SNES/Genesis 4th generation, although I hear people are working on the Sega Saturn. The rest of the consoles such as random home computer stuff and second generation Atari 2600 type consoles still has work to be done, and you can't use original controllers with the Mister. Also it's not exactly plug in play, there is a lot of tinkering around that needs to be done with the firmware, settings, and formatting the micro SD card. That's a big no sell for me, and I personally don't see the point in the Mister when at that point you're basically doing emulation as it is, which kinda defeats the purpose of the entire "real deal original hardware" thing. It looks like a good solution though for people who don't really care about real hardware and want a compact setup due to space or aren't really that enthusiastic about gaming in general.
@@quibquatch3975 I’ll let other people pick your post apart. Rife with errors breh.
@@arcadeages3917 um, k? I was asking for advice, not to be "picked apart". Thanks for your super helpful input.
the blue translucent choice is killlllling me. why couldnt they just have made a clear one. they would have sold twice as many.
I’ve been hesitant about this device- there’s evidence that even standard PC Engine games are using FPGA to some extent so… what’s the point if your hardware is mostly emulated anyway?
Silly question…no roms come I stalled correct??
Just wanted to say...I love your channel 🥰
While this looks like an excellent device it is difficult to justify when the $199 Analogue Duo is right around the corner, offering a more reliable modern hardware, a fully digital signal path and (likely) more options for video. The Duo will be especially easy to justify given that I can sell my old Turbografx to recoup a good portion of the cost.
If you already own the games, then yea, but you will need to factor in the cost of an everdrive if you want to compare the Analogue Duo to this.
@@pinkace All previous Analogue devices have featured jailbroken firmware, which is part of the appeal. While not confirmed (for plausible deniability reasons) pretty much everyone is expecting this to be the case with the Duo as well. Hardware shows an SD card slot.
@@pinkace every Analogue device thus far has played roms from sd card so I suspect the Duo will as well
Yeah, modern hardware is super reliable.
I'm pretty happy with my current SSDS3, so I don't think availability to 5 games is really gonna push me over the edge. I'm happy that people who don't have one have a new option though!
So the build quality is poor, the audio quality is bad, there are several incompatibilities and it costs 320$. Totally worth it! :D
The first version also had many problems, why do people still send them their money
Does the Genesis Analog plug outputs Composite and S-Video? Or just RGB?
[Try4ce] Composite and RGB, no S-video.
Mammoth cave! that just a few hours south of me.
you aren't kidding when you say retro game prices have hit a point of absurdity. I bought a copy of Pokémon Emerald for $38 4 years ago with a dead battery. Soldered a new battery into it and someone just bought it off me for $150. The pokémania / retro game craze is a massive bubble and I think it's gonna crash within the next year or so because of economic downturn and it's just completely unsustainable at these prices. I've gotten to a point now where I just want to ditch my collection of games except for games I really care about / want to keep in my collection and just sell the rest now while the going is good and maybe get back into it if the market ever becomes reasonable again. Luckily we have flash carts and ODE's and emulators if I just want to play the games of old consoles. Retro gaming is cool but collecting but the joys of going on a hunt and fanding a cool game that you've never seen before for a resonable price are long gone and it's killing the joy of the hobby.
This happens with everything though. Stuff starts out expensive and desirable, becomes 'old', 'outdated' and worthless, most items then wind up in landfill, then after about 20 years, people go hunting for the stuff they wanted as teenagers but couldn't afford. At first, bargains can be found, but once people do so en masse, the limited supply means prices shoot up.
You can always find cheap items, whether it's games, cars or anything else - you just need to shop in the zone where stuff is old enough to be unvalued, but not so old that people have nostalgia for it. At the moment, that means stuff like PS3 and Xbox 360 games, which are practically free. Ditto for plasma screens.
The combo of high prices and bizarre release schedules is very frustrating.
I prefer ode and flash cart on original hardware to collecting just for the sake of collecting. I have the games I love physically but that’s it. I’d rather actually play the games than try impress people coming by with my entire game sets for each system and end up looking like a filthy person who needs to be on the hoarder’s tv show.
Can you post the link for the composite palette?
What game is being played at 2:26?
Gt the likes up to 66"7"..it was bothering me...
this is one of the most overpriced retro gaming add-ons, especially considering the very rocky history of the product
It is ridiculous
Should test the custom cores :P
None are out sadly :(
I'm sticking with the SSDS3. Don't see any reason at all to update.
Really interested in getting this but only have the TG16. Don't know if it's worth risking damaging the pins to get it.
I have one for my TG16 and I had to unscrew and completely remove the plastic shell to get it to fit. Once I did this though I didn’t feel like there was much risk in damaging the pins. After the pcb is safely installed you can reinstall and loosely screw the plastic case back in to protect it.
@@BumperSam
How can they have gotten the basic measurements wrong
Is the output on this 4:3 or 16:9 ??
My first, the orignal SSD3S never worked, still doesn't... my NeoSD doesn't work either, never did. TO discord offered little to no help. I guess it makes a nice art piece....
They appreciate your coke money, snort snort
Wait a min what is that pc engine that is the System 3 Pro connected to? Just a reshell?
[Try4ce] It is.
Retro Game Restore shell
15:58 “Until now this pallet has only been officially implemented in the MiSTer FPGA’s TurboDuo core but thanks to the Super HD System³’s pallet feature you can now load it on real hardware”
Not exactly. UperGrafx got it over a year ago. That’s right: UperGrafx had composite colors with digital video on original hardware first. ;)
This seems like alot of incompatibility and glitches for the price they are asking.
Do you remember the first version?? People were modding them after paying several hundred dollars.
18:06 I'd say not close enough imo and I'm on a phone listening to this and the difference is striking
My HD system pro unit has that annoying audio noise buzz. Any tips?
Haha, I had to try different SD cards to reduce the access noise in the first version of the product.
Paying premium price for this you need tools to get sd card out thats sucks
And supergrafx support is like get the system out first and fix later thing
I think megasd is the one its worth the money
Fine guys I’ll stop watching the actraiser stream for a bit and watch this :p
Nice video! But you mention at 06:04 that the FPGA is emulating the CD-ROM drive. But a FPGA simulates hardware, right? Because IMHO it’s not emulation.
It is hardware based emulation. Just like a software based emulator recreates the hardware of a system in software, an FPGA emulates (simulates to use your term) that hardware with different hardware.
What’s the game at 6:08 that looks like Wonderboy in Monsterworld?
Dynastic Hero
@@mylifeingaming brilliant thanks, a quick glance online and it’s basically Wonderboy
I'm holding out hope for the Analogue Duo with a PC EverDrive but if I had original hardware, I'd grab one in a hurry.
Can somebody explain how the PS1 and N64 Digitals generate their video differently than this does?
11:28 for anyone curious why they're asking.
@@somebonehead thank you!
You should credit the first PSX ode - the xstation or the pio based loader psio, not the mode....
Where did he credit anything? All he said was they made an ode for all those systems
$300 and they use Micro USB?
It simulates the Supergrafx video IC. It does not emulate it.
what song at 11:10?
Darude Sandstorm
I hope they make one that's compatible with the analogue duo.
Just think in another 20-30 years we will be treating all our AAA game titles of today as we are these roms. All being stored on tiny devices easily emulated
I think we'll be seeing people treat their consoles with as much delicacy as we do for 30-40 year old consoles now, but definitely not the games, since they're all on CDs beyond a certain point. Also, we're living in an age where these games can't possibly be running on just crude machine code. The bare CPU instructions are not as integral to the user experience as it is for say the NES. There's more layers of abstraction in today's code (I would assume, since most people programmed in interpreted languages nowadays. I'll eat my words if I'm actually wrong about this). Therefore, I don't think it makes sense for the retro tech fetishization to extend to more recent consoles. If anything, it will be people preserving and collecting games in the same way that people do so with comic books, where it's people into collectibles rather than computer enthusiasts dominating the hobby. Not to say that everyone who's into retro consoles is a computer enthusiast necessarily.
I have issues with normal roms using the shds3 plugged into my supper grafx in both mode 1 and 2. TO has been very hesitant to even respond to me. Bonks won’t even load, startup screen glitches and loops. Several others as well. Some run fine.
Neat but I don't support Terraonion for their weird serial registerion and scummy method of shipping out of a small country to avoid tax.
Geez, it's such a mixed bag. I might forgive the bad audio levels if the system had dual output or just let me use digital audio with analog video. The Supergrafx core being noticeably inferior to actual hardware is unforgivable and better be fixed. It's very frustrating to have an actual SGX and know this attachment is forcing its own poor implementation over the original hardware support I had with the ssds3.
I picked up the Pro just for the palette support. I'm starting to feel it wasn't quite worth it since I'm trading features to get it. The improved audio accuracy is welcome, but I'm starting to feel like the MiSTer will provide me a better result. It really sucks to have to compromise so much on original hardware. Especially when paying this much. I'm really hoping they can fix some of this with updates
like for ya 👍
11:19 game name ?
Fausetté Amour
What games at 11:20?
Fausetté Amour
@@Mogura87 thanks!
Anyone know the game at 12:18?
Renny Blaster
@@Mogura87 Great, thanks!
That color though... WHY?!
Terraonion saved retro gaming 🏆
Dat Mammoth cave shirt! Thats, why I'm here.
I don't believe in registering for firmware updates. That's futarded.
They should be provided firmware updates hassle-free like analogue.
That's why I won't buy it.
argh the file set up is pissing me off lol