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PC Engine/TG Appreciation and Collecting Thread, Because who needs a 2nd controller?

S

Shin Johnpv

Member
You're not going to find a rom dump for the Arcade card because it's not just a rom. It adds more ram to the system. The System 2.0 and 3.0 cards do the same for none Duo systems. Duo systems have that ram built in, and the everdrives starting with version 2 include that ram as well. They however do not include enough ram to work as Arcade Duo cards, so you'll need to buy that to play the few arcade cd games.
 
D

DracoBlade

Member
Hey friends, going to glorious Japan next month after a lifetime of pining! Rather than bore you with my trip itinerary, I would like to hear what you guys think. Is it a good idea to pickup a Duo (or Duo R) if I find one whilst in Japan if I want it to be RGB modded for my PVM/mini-xrgb? AKA is it viable to buy an unmodded one in Japan and then comission a modder? For that matter, any recommendations for modders you'd recommend? If it ends up being the same price to buy an unmodded to rgb mod as just buying a pre-modded system I think I'd just go the latter route.
 
S

Shin Johnpv

Member
That is absolutely a good idea. I would recommend going unmodded and then getting it modded when you come back. I don't know the mod scene in Japan so I can't think of anyone to recommend you buy a pre-modded one from. I'm going to assume you are in the US in which case I would recommend either KeithCourage or Voultar for getting it modded for RGB. Keith can be found at https://www.facebook.com/turbografxfan/ and Voultar can be found at https://twitter.com/Voultar_Modshop or http://voultar.com/

Hope that helps.
 
D.Lo

D.Lo

Member
Shin Johnpv said:
You're not going to find a rom dump for the Arcade card because it's not just a rom. It adds more ram to the system. The System 2.0 and 3.0 cards do the same for none Duo systems. Duo systems have that ram built in, and the everdrives starting with version 2 include that ram as well. They however do not include enough ram to work as Arcade Duo cards, so you'll need to buy that to play the few arcade cd games.
Click to expand...
Arcade card just had System 3.0 software, so I assume the dump would be the same, like you said the RAM is the difference.

DracoBlade said:
Hey friends, going to glorious Japan next month after a lifetime of pining! Rather than bore you with my trip itinerary, I would like to hear what you guys think. Is it a good idea to pickup a Duo (or Duo R) if I find one whilst in Japan if I want it to be RGB modded for my PVM/mini-xrgb? AKA is it viable to buy an unmodded one in Japan and then comission a modder? For that matter, any recommendations for modders you'd recommend? If it ends up being the same price to buy an unmodded to rgb mod as just buying a pre-modded system I think I'd just go the latter route.
Click to expand...
Personally I would buy a pre-modded system online. Japan will be great to buy software though.
 
D

DracoBlade

Member
D.Lo said:
Arcade card just had System 3.0 software, so I assume the dump would be the same, like you said the RAM is the difference.

Personally I would buy a pre-modded system online. Japan will be great to buy software though.
Click to expand...

Any must have CD/HuCard's you'd recommend to look out for beyond the traditional recommendations of Thunder games, Dracula X, etc.? I'm up for most everything in regards to genres, especially shooters ofc!
 
A

AmyS

Member
Y4cJnP3.jpg


sbTUfVA.jpg
WIBWqqw.jpg
Click to expand...

DBmbInf.jpg


9MLJAsY.jpg


wySvZlc.jpg


z97xTAC.jpg


hgPBNsA.jpg


zfhNK0F.jpg


It's almost hard to believe this port was released 27 years ago in July, for NEC's PC-Engine Pro SuperGrafx.

JiynpRG.jpg
.
 
T

TeaJay

Member
I wish the Turbo Everdrive would play SuperGrafx games. There's not many, but the PCE port for Daimakaikura would be one I'd love to try.
 
L

Laevateinn

Member
For Daimakaimura, is it basically: Arcade > X68000 > Saturn/PSX (are these different?) > Supergrafx > Genesis > everything else?

Why isn't the Turbo Everdrive compatible with the SuperGrafx? Are the HuCards slightly different?
 
T

TeaJay

Member
That's a lot more technical question than I can answer. Different hardware between the regular PCE and the SuperGrafx?

All I know is you can use the TED in SuperGrafx but can't use your regular PCE to play SG games.
 
L

Laevateinn

Member
TeaJay said:
That's a lot more technical question than I can answer. Different hardware between the regular PCE and the SuperGrafx?

All I know is you can use the TED in SuperGrafx but can't use your regular PCE to play SG games.
Click to expand...

Well, that makes sense since the SuperGrafx has way more powerful hardware than the regular PC Engine. I thought you were saying that you can't load SuperGrafx roms on a SuperGrafx with the Turbo Everdrive.
 
S

Shin Johnpv

Member
TeaJay said:
I wish the Turbo Everdrive would play SuperGrafx games. There's not many, but the PCE port for Daimakaikura would be one I'd love to try.
Click to expand...

It can, but you need to use it on a SuperGrafx. The SuperGrafx has different internals than a regular PC Engine. It'd be like trying to play Super Nintendo on a regular Nintendo.
 
D

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
Laevateinn said:
My kids already have a Nintendo. How could Nintendo exploit us by forcing us to buy a new expensive Nintendo? Why are there all these other people trying to make us buy Nintendos?
Click to expand...
One of the things about that video that always left me wondering is how they show so much of the final stage and final boss of Super Mario World. I mean, is that not a little strange to anyone else? Why would they specifically show footage from the end of the game? Not that anyone was thinking about such things back then but it is certainly odd.

I can't imagine the news folks played through it - did Nintendo provide footage? I'd love to know what's up with that. Showing off visual effects?
 
L

Laevateinn

Member
dark10x said:
One of the things about that video that always left me wondering is how they show so much of the final stage and final boss of Super Mario World. I mean, is that not a little strange to anyone else? Why would they specifically show footage from the end of the game? Not that anyone was thinking about such things back then but it is certainly odd.

I can't imagine the news folks played through it - did Nintendo provide footage? I'd love to know what's up with that. Showing off visual effects?
Click to expand...

Nintendo probably wanted to show off big sprites, Mode 7 and lighting effects more than anything so I bet they provided that footage as a subtle marketing tactic. If any kids were watching the news with their parents they would have begged their parents for an SNES.

I'm sure there was at least one nerd back then that was upset over spoilers though.
 
M

Moor-Angol

Banned
yesterday I finally (re)joined the PCE family




I had a Coregrafx 2 back in the early 2000's but after some couple of years I sold both the systems and the games cause I needed money -_-
But I kept those 2 cause I knew that someday another PCE would have entered in my home :)

 
M

Moor-Angol

Banned
Thanks :)

Now I need a list of games.
Don't want (and I can't) spend so much money, I like platform, action, shmup and racing (especially top-down view which are common on the PCE iirc)

For example, I already have on target Alien Crush (which I remember back in the day)
 
L

Laevateinn

Member
Moor-Angol said:
Thanks :)

Now I need a list of games.
Don't want (and I can't) spend so much money, I like platform, action, shmup and racing (especially top-down view which are common on the PCE iirc)

For example, I already have on target Alien Crush (which I remember back in the day)
Click to expand...

You picked the wrong system to start collecting.
 
M

Moor-Angol

Banned
Laevateinn said:
You picked the wrong system to start collecting.
Click to expand...

I live in Japan, this makes difference ;)

It's just that after almost 20 years I forgot most of the PCE line-up...
And to be truth, I didn't get back the PCE for collecting games, I want to sell them so I needed a Coregrafx to try the games before selling, obviously if something interesting (and cheap) comes on my hands I can keep it for me :)
 
C

Cell_Biology

Member
If I wanted to get into the TurboGrafx now would it be too late?

I want to ideally have the CD games as well as Hue card games available, so would my best option be to get a PC Engine Duo? I see they are going for around $250-300 on the low end now.
 
P

piggychan

Member
Cell_Biology said:
If I wanted to get into the TurboGrafx now would it be too late?

I want to ideally have the CD games as well as Hue card games available, so would my best option be to get a PC Engine Duo? I see they are going for around $250-300 on the low end now.
Click to expand...

Best of both worlds. The cd-roms are region free however the hucards are not.

Beware of buying CD-rom games now. A lot of the rarer expensive titles have been reprinted and could trick you into buying an original.

Anyway I just got back from a trip from hong kong and managed to find a few dealers still selling pc engine stuff. The prices are a bit steep now but in the end I didn't buy anything pc engine or saturn related.. Beware tho, sellers don't like you taking pictures of their warez

549CF395-4E68-4914-B19D-00498472A593.jpg


A87D9410-19A9-4F8D-9114-C6978C5FA328.jpg


48C98268-B191-4082-B0D7-655DEED1DD0F.jpg


42E688F6-4C3C-4849-BCCA-AF6799DA3EBF.jpg


B249595C-3824-46BE-9CCE-53EE998219B9.jpg


Pic isn't great since that day was incredibly packed in a tight space but I was 50/50 in grabbing that horror story for about 1300+ HKD. Sadly I let it go.
39B8D54F-C9A0-404A-9825-5E5A103E5FA5.jpg
Click to expand...

EDIT:

some of these places only 2 people can fit into the the shop! you and the shop owner!
 
A

Azure Phoenix

Member
Guess I'm officially joining PC Engine owners club, I snagged a RGB modded Duo R from eBay the other day which looked to be in really nice condition. It's a not a doujindance one and the seller mentioned having done some light maintenance to the internals so I'm hopefully it'll be a good quality job. Unfortunately I went over budget so I could only afford to grab a couple of cheap games to start with.

I guess I should ask now, are there any known UK power supplies that a Duo R can be run off or should I break out my voltage converter?
 
T

TeaJay

Member
At this point in time, I'd suggest getting an Everdrive (and remember that the Duo systems will play CD-R's without additional modding) for your PC Engine needs, but if you're going for originals, good luck!

Nevertheless welcome to the club. There are some excellent PCE games out there.
 
C

Cell_Biology

Member
Azure Phoenix said:
Guess I'm officially joining PC Engine owners club, I snagged a RGB modded Duo R from eBay the other day which looked to be in really nice condition. It's a not a doujindance one and the seller mentioned having done some light maintenance to the internals so I'm hopefully it'll be a good quality job. Unfortunately I went over budget so I could only afford to grab a couple of cheap games to start with.

I guess I should ask now, are there any known UK power supplies that a Duo R can be run off or should I break out my voltage converter?
Click to expand...

If you don't mind me asking, what did you pay for an RGB modded Duo R? I want to get a Duo R, ideally RGB modded but I wouldn't be against getting just a regular Duo R and getting it RGB modded down the line.
 
A

Azure Phoenix

Member
Cell_Biology said:
If you don't mind me asking, what did you pay for an RGB modded Duo R? I want to get a Duo R, ideally RGB modded but I wouldn't be against getting just a regular Duo R and getting it RGB modded down the line.
Click to expand...

It was £230 plus postage (about £50). I might have overpaid a little, but honestly I was just fed up of scouring the internet and either finding EU/US sellers trying to charge £300+ for ones that are "mint condition" yellow/brown "from a smoke free home", doujindance's eBay shop of horrors, or facing a ton of fees and no guarantee from Yahoo Auctions.
 
C

Cell_Biology

Member
Azure Phoenix said:
It was £230 plus postage (about £50). I might have overpaid a little, but honestly I was just fed up of scouring the internet and either finding EU/US sellers trying to charge £300+ for ones that are "mint condition" yellow/brown "from a smoke free home", doujindance's eBay shop of horrors, or facing a ton of fees and no guarantee from Yahoo Auctions.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I'd say you got a good deal on it. Ideally, I would love to find it from a Gaffer so we can cut out the eBay middle man, but I'll keep my eyes out for any good deals on eBay, looking to spend around $350~ which is the equivalent of what you paid.

Edit: Would this be something close to what you got? http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEC-PC-Engi...891004?hash=item2f036c487c:g:AAwAAOSwi7RZEx6L
 
A

Azure Phoenix

Member
Cell_Biology said:
Thanks. I'd say you got a good deal on it. Ideally, I would love to find it from a Gaffer so we can cut out the eBay middle man, but I'll keep my eyes out for any good deals on eBay, looking to spend around $350~ which is the equivalent of what you paid.

Edit: Would this be something close to what you got? http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEC-PC-Engi...891004?hash=item2f036c487c:g:AAwAAOSwi7RZEx6L
Click to expand...

Similar, but that's the seller who creates such monstrosities as this.
 
B

bobble

Member
Azure Phoenix said:
Similar, but that's the seller who creates such monstrosities as this.
Click to expand...

I know folks who have had doujindance PCEs for years that work with zero problems. Feedback is great on ebay. I guess all I'm saying is don't forget Voultar is trying to sell his own services, ya know. Capitalism~!

Voultar does seem to do great work! Not talking trash just wanted to throw a positive voice too.
 
A

Azure Phoenix

Member
bobble said:
I know folks who have had doujindance PCEs for years that work with zero problems. Feedback is great on ebay. I guess all I'm saying is don't forget Voultar is trying to sell his own services, ya know. Capitalism~!

Voultar does seem to do great work! Not talking trash just wanted to throw a positive voice too.
Click to expand...

Capitalism has nothing to do with it, the picture (along with others) is of the work performed on a unit sold by doujindance. Doesn't matter if it is 1 unit or 100, that was deemed as sellable. If you're content spending over $300 on something that has been bodged together with bubble wrap and copious amounts of glue simply because it works that's up to you. If I'm spending that much I damn well want a quality job.

Regarding feedback, how many customers do you think ordering pre-modded consoles are cracking open the case to inspect the workmanship before leaving feedback? I'm willing to bet none.
 
C

Cell_Biology

Member
Turbo Duo R came in the mail yesterday, its such a sleek console, doesn't look dated at all. Everdrive should be coming in the next couple of days. Had to buy a Euro RGB SCART cable because the one it came with was Japanese. I need to look up games I need to buy and play now. Happy to be part of the club.
 
S

Shoyz

Member
I bought a janky TurboExpress back in 2013/2014 for ~$60. It took about 30 seconds for the screen to 'warm up' and for the picture to come in, which only worked using a custom-made AC cable (not batteries, I assume it gives additional power for some sort of throttle), and the sound was really quiet (although this also warmed up over a longer span of time). But considering that repaired units cost ~$150 at the time, and I wasn't planning to use batteries, a working unit at that price seemed like a score.

I finally got around to buying a soldering kit for other reasons, and remembered I had it sitting in the closet. Checked ebay out of curiosity and saw they're up to $300 now, yikes. Plugged it in, despair! The screen wasn't kicking in and the sound was dead. But after letting it sit for about 3 minutes it did finally show the picture, but no sound.

Having ordered a capacitor kit and getting my soldering kit, after a few hours of practice, reckless impatience kicked in and I decided to replace only the easy capacitors right away and see if it improves. I popped it open to a couple of surprises; the original owner not only attempted a partial capacitor repair before selling it, but also somehow cut the end of the TV tuner ribbon cable off! Hrmm. My confidence in being able to repair it dwindled when I saw that they already replaced all of the well known trouble making capacitors for the audio.

But after a headache of a time trying to get at the really tiny ones by the IR shield, I was able to replace the two tiny ones they missed in the audio cluster. I also discovered that with a gentle touch, one of their capacitors..fell off. And looking closer at their work, I realized that they weren't very good at soldering, and did a really botch job at it. Worse yet, attempting to re-do one of them I realized they had used lead-free solder that wouldn't melt for the life of me.

But after swapping a small handful, I booted it up, the screen turned on instantly, and the audio was back and loud! But Magical Chase still crashes on my Turbo Everdrive. Why..
 
M

Mzo

Member
Anyone have any idea what the PC Engine Works Deluxe Editions of Beyond Shadowgate and Might and Magic III go for these days? Never opened mine and I'm getting rid of them.
 
T

TeaJay

Member
I'm a big fan of Shadowgate and I really wanted to like Beyond, but it was just _so_ janky and hard to control. Plus the stupid fistfights didn't fit the theme at all.

(the recent remake was kinda mediocre so whenever I want to play Shadowgate I play the NES version. I haven't played the N64 one.)
 
A

Azure Phoenix

Member
Well the PC Engine Duo R I ordered ended up being a bit more of a headache than I expected.

First of all it didn't seem to be working on RGB, but I found out that was because the JP21 cable I was provided is different from European Scart (never knew). After I bought one of those I could then only get a red, blue and purple image, found out that the mod job on this had red and blue wired up slightly different than the cable I bought. Fixed that and then found it still was red, blue and purple and after a few hours of checking connections inside the system the culprit ended up being the TV out connector, if you push the plug at a slight angle the picture is fine, so I assume there is a slightly loose solder joint somewhere.

Either way, I seem to have a picture finally, now to wait a few years for the games to get delivered and I can test if the rest of it works alright.
 
P

PumpkinSpice

Banned
Azure Phoenix said:
Well the PC Engine Duo R I ordered ended up being a bit more of a headache than I expected.

First of all it didn't seem to be working on RGB, but I found out that was because the JP21 cable I was provided is different from European Scart (never knew). After I bought one of those I could then only get a red, blue and purple image, found out that the mod job on this had red and blue wired up slightly different than the cable I bought. Fixed that and then found it still was red, blue and purple and after a few hours of checking connections inside the system the culprit ended up being the TV out connector, if you push the plug at a slight angle the picture is fine, so I assume there is a slightly loose solder joint somewhere.

Either way, I seem to have a picture finally, now to wait a few years for the games to get delivered and I can test if the rest of it works alright.
Click to expand...

Did you buy CD games?

If so, like I wouldn't feel bad about just burning them before they arrive to test it out.
 
A

Azure Phoenix

Member
Finally fixed the Duo R, turns out at some point too much force had been used when plugging in the cable and the top part of the green pin had been bent upwards, after bending that pin back down it works fine now.

Anyway, now I can finally ask a question about games. I keep on seeing sealed copies of CD games listed on eBay for the same price as used copies, are they likely to be genuine or is there a problem with repros/bootlegs in the PC Engine scene (as there is with Mega Drive)? Some are obviously old copies, but a few look like they're just out of a factory (eg. this one).
 
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