Do you still mod your game consoles?

General purpose discussion about gaming and emulation.
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Eviltaco64X
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Do you still mod your game consoles?

Post by Eviltaco64X »

All I've done in the past few years is softmod a 20 GB PS3. The Christmas exploit was a great way for the system to go out in its twilight. MultiMAN Cobra Mode for everyone.

On a side note, it is incredible to see how far modding has come. An army of Ben Heckerdorns is forming.
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Re: Do you still mod your game consoles?

Post by VampDude »

I still modify my consoles, if only there's a need to do so.

I'm currently waiting on a MODBO5 from China, for the PS2 which I ordered a few weeks back (it was $3).

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I really just wanted an excuse to use my soldering iron, since my MegaDrive 2 projects two years ago... Which I never finished as I have five more MegaDrive II consoles, three MegaCD's and two 32X units (plus an old MegaDrive that I won't mod - it's my go to for my EverDrive and heaphones). My main goal was to make two SEGA Neptune's, where all I did was add the PAL/NTSC switch and the Japanese/English switch to one MegaDrive 2 and make an NTSC 32X run in PAL (where I need to revisit and add the switch). For parts though, the U.S. 32X units are much cheaper than the MegaDrive 32X units and they're exactly the same (except for the signal). I may revisit the MDII's sometime in the future. 8-)

Spoiler!
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I don't actually remember if I had to cut away the plastic for the Japanese cartridge to fit in the SEGA 32X? I think it just fit, which is a handy tip for anyone modding MD/Genesis consoles (had to cut the plastic on my switched console though).

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Though I've been playing with an AtGames console and a PiZero, making a better console than what they ever did (still looks like an ugly piece of shit). :lol:

Spoiler!
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|darc|
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Re: Do you still mod your game consoles?

Post by |darc| »

Absolutely. In the last few years I've done the following mods/hacks to my systems:

Atari 2600
- RGB output, palette selection, pause button (2600RGB kit)
- Harmony cartridge (play ROMs from SD card)

NES
- RGB output, palette selection (NESRGB kit)
- USB connectivity (CopyNES kit)
- Nintendo multiout connector
- Change color palettes or reset console via player 1 controller
- Color-changing LED for palette selection (red for normal palette, green for improved palette, orange for arcade palette)
- Added expansion audio support
- Disabled lockout chip
- Created Gimmick! repro cart
- Converted Lagrange Point (Japanese) cartridge to English translation
- Everdrive N8 cartridge (play ROMs from SD card)
- Flash-based Famicom Disk System hardware emulator (FDSStick)

SMS
- SMSFM kit to enable FM-based sound in games that support it
- Master Everdrive (play ROMs from SD card)

SNES
- Added RGB support on 1CHIP-03 SNES model (model with best, most clear output of all SNES models)
- Added coax S/PDIF digital audio output
- Created StarFox 2 repro cart
- SD2SNES (play ROMs from SD card)

Genesis
- Alternative audio circuit to make model 2 Genesis sound like model 1 Genesis
- Headphone jack added
- Mega Everdrive (play ROMs from SD card)

Sega CD
- Region free BIOS

PlayStation
- Stealth modchip for playing CD-Rs and region-free support
- Added coax S/PDIF digital audio output

Saturn
- Modchip for playing CD-Rs
- Region free BIOS
- Added coax S/PDIF digital audio output

N64
- Added RGB support

Dreamcast
- Multiple selectable BIOS, with region-free and DreamShell BIOS chips
- Added coax S/PDIF digital audio output
- Internal serial-based SD card reader
- IDE/SATA hard drive
- Built-in VGA connector and headphone jack
- Built my own video output box for a custom video output solution (31KHz RGBS) to an XRGB-mini Framemeister upscaler
- GDEMU board to play GD-ROM images from SD card
- Telephone line simulator + Netopia box to "dial into" my home network to play online modem-only games
- probably other shit I'm forgetting

PlayStation 2
- Modchipped for region-free / backup PS1 and PS2 titles
- Hard drive installed

GameCube
- Added HDMI output
- Modchip to play region-free / DVD-R games

Xbox
- Modchip and replacement hard drive

Wii
- Drivechipped for backups


probably forgetting some stuff but yeah. If you couldn't tell I like playing on real consoles, not particularly a fan of emulation.
I mostly play on a 20" RGB CRT monitor.
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Re: Do you still mod your game consoles?

Post by Eviltaco64X »

VampDude wrote: Sun Jul 15, 2018 3:37 pm I still modify my consoles, if only there's a need to do so.

I'm currently waiting on a MODBO5 from China, for the PS2 which I ordered a few weeks back (it was $3).

I really just wanted an excuse to use my soldering iron, since my MegaDrive 2 projects two years ago... Which I never finished as I have five more MegaDrive II consoles, three MegaCD's and two 32X units (plus an old MegaDrive that I won't mod - it's my go to for my EverDrive and heaphones). My main goal was to make two SEGA Neptune's, where all I did was add the PAL/NTSC switch and the Japanese/English switch to one MegaDrive 2 and make an NTSC 32X run in PAL (where I need to revisit and add the switch). For parts though, the U.S. 32X units are much cheaper than the MegaDrive 32X units and they're exactly the same (except for the signal). I may revisit the MDII's sometime in the future. 8-)

Though I've been playing with an AtGames console and a PiZero, making a better console than what they ever did (still looks like an ugly piece of shit). :lol:
Hey Vampdude, long time. We used to go back and forth about Saturn modding a lot. Didn't you have one with a faulty PSU/issues with a step-down converter?

The (newer?) mini Model 1 from AtGames looks OK. They gave it the US/JP color scheme and slapped the Mega Drive logo typically used on carts in the wrong spot. It says.. a lot.
Image
|darc| wrote: Wed Jul 18, 2018 5:01 pm Absolutely. In the last few years I've done the following mods/hacks to my systems:

Atari 2600
- RGB output, palette selection, pause button (2600RGB kit)
- Harmony cartridge (play ROMs from SD card)

NES
- RGB output, palette selection (NESRGB kit)
- USB connectivity (CopyNES kit)
- Nintendo multiout connector
- Change color palettes or reset console via player 1 controller
- Color-changing LED for palette selection (red for normal palette, green for improved palette, orange for arcade palette)
- Added expansion audio support
- Disabled lockout chip
- Created Gimmick! repro cart
- Converted Lagrange Point (Japanese) cartridge to English translation
- Everdrive N8 cartridge (play ROMs from SD card)
- Flash-based Famicom Disk System hardware emulator (FDSStick)

SMS
- SMSFM kit to enable FM-based sound in games that support it
- Master Everdrive (play ROMs from SD card)

SNES
- Added RGB support on 1CHIP-03 SNES model (model with best, most clear output of all SNES models)
- Added coax S/PDIF digital audio output
- Created StarFox 2 repro cart
- SD2SNES (play ROMs from SD card)

Genesis
- Alternative audio circuit to make model 2 Genesis sound like model 1 Genesis
- Headphone jack added
- Mega Everdrive (play ROMs from SD card)

Sega CD
- Region free BIOS

PlayStation
- Stealth modchip for playing CD-Rs and region-free support
- Added coax S/PDIF digital audio output

Saturn
- Modchip for playing CD-Rs
- Region free BIOS
- Added coax S/PDIF digital audio output

N64
- Added RGB support

Dreamcast
- Multiple selectable BIOS, with region-free and DreamShell BIOS chips
- Added coax S/PDIF digital audio output
- Internal serial-based SD card reader
- IDE/SATA hard drive
- Built-in VGA connector and headphone jack
- Built my own video output box for a custom video output solution (31KHz RGBS) to an XRGB-mini Framemeister upscaler
- GDEMU board to play GD-ROM images from SD card
- Telephone line simulator + Netopia box to "dial into" my home network to play online modem-only games
- probably other shit I'm forgetting

PlayStation 2
- Modchipped for region-free / backup PS1 and PS2 titles
- Hard drive installed

GameCube
- Added HDMI output
- Modchip to play region-free / DVD-R games

Xbox
- Modchip and replacement hard drive

Wii
- Drivechipped for backups


probably forgetting some stuff but yeah. If you couldn't tell I like playing on real consoles, not particularly a fan of emulation.
I mostly play on a 20" RGB CRT monitor.
:o

I've tried to respond to this once before and got lost doing so. It's an impressive list of accomplishments. I didn't know half of these mods even existed. How did they add a pause feature to the 2600? Is the Saturn a Model 1 or 2? Have you considered overclocking such a tricked out Dreamcast?
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Re: Do you still mod your game consoles?

Post by |darc| »

Eviltaco64X wrote: Fri Aug 17, 2018 5:04 pm :o

I've tried to respond to this once before and got lost doing so. It's an impressive list of accomplishments. I didn't know half of these mods even existed. How did they add a pause feature to the 2600? Is the Saturn a Model 1 or 2? Have you considered overclocking such a tricked out Dreamcast?
Yeah, about 5 years or so a friend of mine bought an NES at a Goodwill with some issues and she brought it to me so I could try to fix it. I ended up going into a huge obsession with retro gaming hardware for a few years. My life was just working, reading retro gaming boards, and hardware hacking.

The 2600's pause feature is simply literally pausing the 2600's CPU in hardware. The Atari 2600 is such a simple console that this generally works without breaking the game.

The Saturn is a very early model 1. It is such an early revision that the motherboard was manufactured before the BIOS code was ready, so they put a DIP socket on the board and afterwards the BIOS ROM chips were placed into the sockets. Meaning for this particular early rare Saturn model, the region-free BIOS is literally just swapping out one chip in a socket for another. No soldering, plug 'n' play.

Overclocking is something I haven't really messed with on any console in any form. Given that it almost always causes issues somewhere, the risk needs to be worth the reward. The rewards for overclocking would be to fix slowdown in existing games or to increase the performance of emulators or homebrew software. The risks are damaging hardware, corrupting data, instability, preventing certain parts of the system from operating at all, etc. I'm not saying I'd never do an overclock mod on a console but I've never really particularly seen the point on DC.
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Re: Do you still mod your game consoles?

Post by Eviltaco64X »

|darc| wrote: Sun Aug 19, 2018 11:58 am
Eviltaco64X wrote: Fri Aug 17, 2018 5:04 pm :o

I've tried to respond to this once before and got lost doing so. It's an impressive list of accomplishments. I didn't know half of these mods even existed. How did they add a pause feature to the 2600? Is the Saturn a Model 1 or 2? Have you considered overclocking such a tricked out Dreamcast?
Yeah, about 5 years or so a friend of mine bought an NES at a Goodwill with some issues and she brought it to me so I could try to fix it. I ended up going into a huge obsession with retro gaming hardware for a few years. My life was just working, reading retro gaming boards, and hardware hacking.

The 2600's pause feature is simply literally pausing the 2600's CPU in hardware. The Atari 2600 is such a simple console that this generally works without breaking the game.

The Saturn is a very early model 1. It is such an early revision that the motherboard was manufactured before the BIOS code was ready, so they put a DIP socket on the board and afterwards the BIOS ROM chips were placed into the sockets. Meaning for this particular early rare Saturn model, the region-free BIOS is literally just swapping out one chip in a socket for another. No soldering, plug 'n' play.

Overclocking is something I haven't really messed with on any console in any form. Given that it almost always causes issues somewhere, the risk needs to be worth the reward. The rewards for overclocking would be to fix slowdown in existing games or to increase the performance of emulators or homebrew software. The risks are damaging hardware, corrupting data, instability, preventing certain parts of the system from operating at all, etc. I'm not saying I'd never do an overclock mod on a console but I've never really particularly seen the point on DC.
Funny how such a minimalist approach (work, read, hack) led to so much effort and so many accomplishments. Broken NESes and VCRs (shitty tracking/eating tapes) were among the first things I ever successfully fixed, but it's been at least a decade since I've worked on an NES and 13 years since I've had the need to repair a VCR.

That makes sense about the 2600. Is the early Model 1 Saturn American? That would be especially unusual.. Nice find, in any event.

Fair point about overclocking. I'd still like to overclock my spare/half-broken Dreamcast at some point when I have some more time (work 40 and in school 3/4-time at the moment). It would bring me no advantage of any sort, but it's something I was really interested in doing 10 years ago.
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