Retro handheld emulator consoles

[67418b4b11f41voodoo47]

this looks interesting;

http://gamepieadvance.com/2017/04/13/kickstarter-coming-soon/

[67418b4b121d2Olfred]

If you want anything soldered I could do it for you.
Sending stuff inside of europe should be fairly cheap.

[67418b4b12362voodoo47]

thanks, but no actual soldering should be necessary as far as I can tell (//nope, there's a bit, but not too much //funnily enough, the newest CM version now has none):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4rKXcX7Iu8

just some general pc part assembly knowledge and a bit of plastic model building experience, and I've got both of those. so if they work out the kinks and keep the price under $100, this will be an insta-buy - always wanted to check all that old stuff I've missed back when I was young (had a Gameboy and a C64, and played a few PS1 games, but that was all).

[67418b4b1244eOlfred]

Just took a quick glance over it and saw they also sell just the boards for self assembly, usually they come cheaper.

[67418b4b12573voodoo47]

I had no time to dig around yet, but if I understand correctly, they plan to sell them as self-assembly kits one way or another. which is fine for most people as long as soldering iron and glue gun is not involved - the reason why didn't I attempt something similar myself yet (there are tons of how-tos on youtube) is because the amount of solder and hotglue involved, with the results functional, but looking patchy at best.

this has none of that, and looks like the ideal solution so far.

[67418b4b126bcKolya]

The first thing he says in that video is that he already soldered on the connector for the raspberry pi. 

[67418b4b12984voodoo47]

yeah, watched the video fully this time, and there is some after all, but even if so (this is not the final product afaik), it's not a big deal, as I actually don't mind a bit of soldering, as long as it's a reasonable amount (meaning NOT 20 wires that you need to attach one by one. one header is manageable). I have the tools, though it's been years since I've actually used them for something.

basically, this is a bit too much for me (at the time. things might change if all of the custom parts start to be available for purchase);

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dV-W23lONI4


//edit 2019: closed source devices above $15 are not worth the hassle anymore, go for something that has an open OS.

anyway, bought this for the time being - while far from perfect (true retro console gamers say the sound is mostly bad, but I'm not much of an audio guy anyway), it's a good deal for $29. was actually considering one of these fake fakes of fakeness because sometimes I desire stupid cheap crap, but got put off by all the bs in the end (fake design, fake games, fake cartridges just for the sake of being fake, even though this actually could be a decent product for the price if they were to drop all the dumb stuff that isn't really fooling anyone) and went for the first one that is not pretending to be something it isn't. two times the price, but definitely two times less pain.

maybe it will even play Wolf3D, so why not.

[67418b4b12ab4voodoo47]

also, it looks like you can now replace the cd drives of Saturn and Dreamcast with a sdcard board (and this has been possible for quite a while - I'm spending way too much time around here, it seems).

[67418b4b12ba5Olfred]

There is also an SD card interface for the C64

[67418b4b12d06voodoo47]

aww. I don't have a working c64 anymore though (nor the space to set it up, even if I had one). also, they do not come cheap, but they are a niche product I guess - you wanna go nuts, you gotta cough up the dough.

speaking of which, the sega optical drive replacements are not cheap either (both usb and sdcard boards are well over 100E a piece). this is enthusiast only stuff, not a cheap fix for an unit with a broken drive.

also adding hdmi outputs to old Nintendo consoles seems to be a thing.

[67418b4b12e4eOlfred]

As long as you don't mass produce electronics, they will be expensive compared to anything you usually come across.
Alone the soldering of a board might take someone an hour to do it, mass production might be 2 minutes done by a machine. And nowadays they are so flexible that you don't need to build a new machine, just change some settings.
And as usual the parts are way cheaper if you buy them in the mass.
Considering all that and the custom case for it, I think the pricetag is quite fair for the C64 SD card interface.
Also, IIRC the shematics were freely available, so you could build your own, which in the end might turn out cheaper, but then you invest the time to build it to it.

[67418b4b12f43voodoo47]

true - now that you mention it, the AGP.5 agp to pci adapter (I was involved in the early stages of development a little) ended up costing about that much (first batch 125E, last one 75E if memory serves).

[67418b4b13046voodoo47]

ever thought that NES mini would be a really nifty device.. if it could play the entire NES library, and not just those default 30 games? well guess what.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9aCrSRzJAc

[67418b4b1355evoodoo47]

bought this for the time being

yaay, package from china today. so basically, the device is a knockoff/fake version of the AtGames Sega Genesis portable. tried about five games, and I was not too impressed - Aladdin has half of the text in russian (?), Golden Axe is not displaying all sprites (mana potions invisible), the device gets stuck loading the menu screen after powering up sometimes (maybe it will go away after fully charging), and it's way too easy to cover the speaker with your thumb. the sound seems to be fine though, the buttons are ok, and the screen is adequate.

and of course there's this:

so is it worth $29? eeeeh it's really close, but I'd say yes (the sdcard slot being the saving grace), if you just want to screw around a bit. however if you plan any serious/real use, the original is probably the way to go, even though it's twice more expensive. assuming that all the mentioned problems are exclusive to the knockoff version, of course.

//ok, I have to take that back - the lockups are quite frequent, and the hardware clearly doesn't have enough horsepower to play all included games at proper speeds. requested and received partial refund, knocking down the total price to $15 - that is adequate for what it offers.

//looks like the device can actually play nes, snes and gba roms as well with various levels of playability (already sold mine, so can't test). so if you can get a unit that runs stable, and don't pay more than $20, I'd say it's worth it.

//having more experience with other similar devices now, I have to (yet again), change my opinion - a $30+ device should be capable of saving the games in some form. so taking that, and all the other drawbacks into consideration, the final final verdict is "not worth it", unless you can get it for maybe less than 15 bucks. and even then it's still a maybe.

[67418b4b137ccKolya]

@voodoo47 This might be interesting to you:

TechCrunch
Darrell Etherington
BittBoy is a retro pocket console that does a lot for very little
The GameBoy Pocket remains one of the best-designed pieces of mobile gaming kit ever in my opinion, which is why I was intrigued by the BittBoy, a new..

[67418b4b138c9voodoo47]

I've already seen it somewhere - the device is a bit too limited for my taste.

[67418b4b13ab2voodoo47]

well what do you know - looks like someone finally figured out an assembly friendly pi zero retro handheld kit:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITOEWL1NZO8

maybe not exactly elegant, but seems to work nicely (should run everything from the 4th gen and older, maybe even some ps1 stuff once the emulators get there), is very easy to put together (no soldering), and finally, the price is well below a hundred bucks for the basic kit. I think I'm getting this one once I'm done with all the RL stuff planned for this year.


// looks like the gamepie advance has evolved in the meantime - a CM3 model is available now, it uses pi 3 instead of pi zero, and the kit does not need soldering anymore, so as long as you are capable of modifying the GBA shell, you are good to go.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2l9U8-OVS8

should be about 200 dollars for the kit and all the other required parts, but the investment may be worth it, as it will play 5th gen stuff as well. hmmm..

[67418b4b13c0bOlfred]

On the first one I wonder how their custom board and the pi zero are actually connected to each other. I hope not simply by mushing contacts together and I don't see any springs there.

Looking at both cases I would prefer the GBA one over the Raspi Boy. But what really bothers me on the GBA one are the tiny extra buttons. I can't imagine that it feels anything nice while playing.
There ist a vast majority of handheld pi projects out there, some even come with analogue controls. But some aren't even close to finished or as easy to put together than these ones.

But as already mentioned, if you need any soldering I could do it. And shipping shouldn't be that expensive througout europe.

[67418b4b13d7evoodoo47]

yeah, raspi boy is using springs. also, looking at some more videos, one can use larger buttons on that gba shell, so it should be ok.

also, you apparently can pop this $50 piece of junk open, load Dingux and play Doom (16:36), so there's that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy9il-QAe-Y

I think I'm getting one as soon as the price dips under $49.99 shipping included, cheap stuff that can be screwed around with is my kind of game.

[67418b4b140b3voodoo47]

yaay, got rid of the Genesis portable knockoff (one interesting thing I found out too late is that it actually plays nes, snes and gba roms as well, though the emulation is going to be hit and miss, most likely) - pretty good deal, bought it for $30, got a $15 refund, got to mess around with it, and sold it for $20 (the buyer didn't complain, guess he found the device satisfactory). so, lets nab some more cheap crap in the meantime - and going straight for the bottom of the barrel, because why not.

so what will you get if your requirements are a rechargeable battery, no ten thousand fake game repeats and a price of one nice lunch? the answer is, the RS-33 (or 83, because they can't even get their numbering straight in the knockoff land) handheld console.. thing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wqUQIEOdNY

and surprise surprise, this is actually quite usable - the plastic isn't that awful, the screen is pretty good, and the games run ok. there is an annoying intro screen where you need to select english game list each time you start the device, some games are being duplicated so you definitely aren't getting 268 of them, and a lot of them will be garbage I imagine (not really a NES guy), but you should be able to extract a dozen or two decent ones out of this deal, I'd say. miniusb charging (yeah, the old one), and no sdcard slot or audio jack (would increase the cost of the unit two times, most likely), so you are stuck with whatever is loaded there.

but yeah, this is not bad - if you want to play a bunch of NES games on a portable system in a thief/accident rich environment, this thing might just do it for you. and when something happens, hey, it's 10 bucks, lol.


//it's got that stupid thing with Mario (pretty much the flagship game here) running a bit too fast and the A and B buttons being reversed. aaand sold for 15 bucks - this is fun. lets up the game a little;

-a RS-8A handheld for $13.
-a RS-6 BittBoy knockoff for $16.
-a RetroMini player for $32.

[67418b4b14352voodoo47]

yaay, two packages from china today.

the RS-6 BittBoy knockoff:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVguuhiHecA

is kind of cute, but d-pad is rubbish, a lot of games seem to be rom hacks, or are in chinese despite selecting english, Mario runs too fast, and the plastic feels all chalky and unpleasant. not worth it, I'd say.


the RS-8(A? who the hell knows, the model with 260 games and a built in battery):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfZnOLavvu4

Mario runs at correct speed, menu works properly (even the preview screens), the screen is nice, no game repeats and not too many crappy or untranslated ones as far as I can tell. the d-pad is, uhh, not amazing, but if dirt-cheap, with a built in battery, and still functional is what you want, this is the best thing so far. //and both sold, 16 an 18 euro respectively. looks like there is a local demand for knock-off consoles ready to be exploited.


anyway, I think I'm done with the cheapest junk, and overall, I would not recommend it. it seems like the chinese manufacturers are currently transitioning from "we are scamming people with fakes for some quick money" into "we actually want to deliver a proper product that does what it should for the price", and they are just not there yet - the UI is annoying to use in some cases (more or less, depending on the device), some roms are having speed issues (NTSC vs PAL most likely), some are just crappy fake games downloaded from the internet, and other ones have not been translated so they are completely unusable. but if they manage to clean up the UI, supply a set of proper roms of real english games and make sure they all run fine while keeping the prices at current levels, they might have something interesting at their hand - for example, the RS-8 software in a RS-6 shell with a slightly better finish and a set of 100-200 real, good NES games for $20 or less could make a very, very decent product.

the $30-something stuff should start to arrive soon, hoping that it will fare better (sd card and savestate support is available at this level).

[67418b4b14530voodoo47]

so yeah, the retromini is here;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxGWcqIh9FI

and finally, no more bs anywhere - menu is not annoying, the included games are proper, and as long as you get the black english version with 40 games built in, you can access the internal storage and replace the pre-installed roms with whatever you want (they are proper, but I don't think I'll be playing the barbie games anytime soon). supports saving, and three savestates per game, mainly meant to play gba roms, but nes, snes and sega genesis will work as well. the buttons are nice, and the surface feels ok.

sounds too good to be true? yeah, the device is not fast enough to run everything at proper speeds, and all non-gba games will be scaled horribly, making any text almost unreadable. so again, the software is the weak spot - the device would greatly benefit from custom firmware, but no such thing is available at this point (it might be in the future, as it has a hackable chipset, it seems).

[67418b4b14690fox]

Are there schematics for it?

[67418b4b147d1voodoo47]

I have pretty much zero knowledge in this area, but if I understood correctly, devices that use cpus/chipsets from the same family as Dingoo A-320 should be hackable, and capable of loading the Dingux os in one form or another, allowing the use of better emulators and more (the earlier mentioned RS-97 is a good example).

anyway, pretty sure everything that is known about the RetroMini can be found here.