41 replies to this topic

[atarilovesyou]

I'm about to pull the trigger on these NES and Atari mulitcarts. I'm just wondering if there's anything that members here would like to add about them, from experience? The Powerpak looks to be a good product and there's tons of games I'd like to try on the NES but don't really want to get the physical carts. From most reviews, the Harmony cart (or is it Cuttle, I can't remember now, the recent one available) looks very much worth it.

I've already got a Coleco Mulitcart, and I'm very happy with it (other than I bought it right before they released the SD cart version).

Any tips?

[ls650]

The Harmony equals fantastic value. I can highly recommend it.

[TheGameCollector]

Yeah all of these devices are awesome. There may still be certain games where you need the authentic carts or repros to play them without errors, but the amount is usually quite small. I've really been enjoying SNES RPGs that are usually very expensive for free because of the Everdrive. You have to pay a lot at once for a device like these, but you start to see how much value it saves you once you beat 10 or 20 games and keep going. It's like you paid for the first 10 or 20 games and got the other 700 or 1000 for free.

They're better for gamers than they are for collectors. The main reason I stopped collecting is that I didn't have space or a job. I have to sell games from my collection just to eat right now. Until I find a new job. And when I do, I think I'd rather go after games I haven't had in my possession before. Playing the same old games has gotten stale. I think I've only beaten 300 games in my lifetime when there are over 9000 games out there.

[Reaperman]

I don't have a harmony yet, but I have and love both powerpak units.

The NES unit's special trick is that with a very minor modification to your NES, you can get the improved sound in the japanese Castlevania III--that to me is worth about half the price of the unit alone. It's also been helping me experience tons of japanese fan translations and hacks. But there are a fair number of games that it doesn't support, and you will trip over one before too long. It doesn't tend to run on clone hardware, which is a slight shame, since it'd be nice to use it with one of the more advanced handhelds china has been putting out lately.

[atarilovesyou]

What kind of mod do you have to do to the NES?...I thought that CV3 required a certain type of chip to get that improved sound. About the NES Powerpak, which model did you get? I'm just going to get the USB connector rather than the CF cards...I didn't find the website described the benefits well enough, I'm thinking it's so you can have extra cards to hold more games?

[Reaperman]

atarilovesyou, on Tue Feb 7, 2012 11:11 AM, said:

What kind of mod do you have to do to the NES?...I thought that CV3 required a certain type of chip to get that improved sound. About the NES Powerpak, which model did you get? I'm just going to get the USB connector rather than the CF cards...I didn't find the website described the benefits well enough, I'm thinking it's so you can have extra cards to hold more games?

Powerpak has built-in support for that chip, it just needs to have a specific pin on the cart connect to something. The mod involves soldering a single wire between two pins on the NES cart connector--there is a picture of the mod included in the 'default load' zipfile for powerpak's CF card. The difference in that game is really night and day with the improved sound.

For which version I have, it's the full NES Powerpak (CF Version). The 'lite' powerpak doesn't support many mappers, and likely doesn't support saving. It may even be 1-game-at-a-time. I can't access the retrousb website from here to verify all the details, but it had so many limitations that I never paid it much attention. I got the distinct feeling that it was primarily for development.

Edited by Reaperman, Tue Feb 7, 2012 12:46 PM.

[retrogamer73]

I own a NES and SNES Powerpak, and would highly recomned both of them.

[snstay]

I own both the harmony and powerpak . I think they are both great. I also spent some time and think i have a real good nes rom set. Its all sorted for example,
licenced games
unlicenced games
famicom
famicom disk system
light gun
power pad
rob (lol only two)
homebrews
hacks
and games compatable with the four score
if interested pm me id be happy to share. i almost got booted off nintendo age for posting them.Apparently they frown on rom trading.


Thanks

Scott

[wood_jl]

I have the Harmony for the Atari - it rocks, and the Powerpak for the NES - and it rocks, too.

For the SNES, I have the Super Everdrive - and I recommend it. For the NES, there is only one - the Powerpak - but for the SNES there is either the SNES Powerpak or the Super Everdrive. Although I'm willing to contend with CompactFlash for the NES (since that's the only flashcart available for the NES) I prefer the Super Everdrive for the SNES since it uses SD-card. They're both good, but because the NES Powerpak is great (and the only available solution) doesn't mean you're bound to the SNES Powerpak, because the Super Everdrive (from stoneage gamer) rocks!

[atarilovesyou]

Thanks for the tips. The NES version has three options, a USB reader and two CF versions (2 and 4 GB). I'm just not sure if I need the cards, all I want is USB loading from my computer (like my Coleco Multicart)...unless there's a specific reason for the CF cards, but aren't those the old bulky compact flash cards? I'm thinking it's just in the way you access the memory on the cart. Maybe having removable CF cards allows for more games. I don't have a CF reader on my computer so I'll just do the USB version, I think...plus, it costs less.

[OldSchoolRetroGamer]

The flash cards are required for the NES version, there is no internal storage for the roms unlike say the Colecovison 128in1, even that was replaced by the SD version. The idea being you do not even need USB cable or software, just drop the roms direct to the card.

[atarilovesyou]

Hmmm...not a problem if they're SD cards, but CF cards, I'll need an adaptor to read them. That's why I was hoping for a direct USB solution...I'll go check out the website one more time. With the 4 GB card, total cost is almost 200 bux...yikes.

[Hatta]

Replaceable flash media is preferable to internal flash media because you can replace it when the flash inevitably dies. The cost is reasonable, considering the engineering that goes into these things, and the fact that they can replace an entire collection....hundreds of games.


It's definitely worth buying a good internal multi-card reader. This is the one I have. It's really well built, worth every penny compared to the cheapo ones. The only complaint I have is that it requires two USB headers on the motherboard, the USB port on the front is just a passthrough to the motherboard, there's no internal hub unfortunately.

[OldSchoolRetroGamer]

atarilovesyou, on Tue Feb 7, 2012 11:00 PM, said:

Hmmm...not a problem if they're SD cards, but CF cards, I'll need an adaptor to read them. That's why I was hoping for a direct USB solution...I'll go check out the website one more time. With the 4 GB card, total cost is almost 200 bux...yikes.

I agree. prefer SD cards. However you could consider, and I do not know how ell this may work, but there ARE CF to SD adapters, you insert a regular SD card into a casing that adapts it to CF size specification. I bought one form some company in CHINA on Ebay pretty cheap and it works fine in my wife's SONY ALPHA 200 Camera! This is great as I bought her a nice 8GB SD card to use. Don't see why that would not work just as well.

Also, if you go the regular CF card route there is no reason you cannot just get the flashcart then add your own CF card you can probably find from a cheaper source. Just some things to consider.

[atarilovesyou]

Thanks again for all the help.

One last thing, though, and I should know this but...by playing a ROM on a mulitcart on actual hardware, is this 'actually' playing the game, as in, it's not emulated? I would say there's no difference between a ROM played on actual hardware, but I don't know the technicalities. I can't tell the difference between my Coleco carts and the ROMS I have on my multicart.

Is there any emulation going on at all, or are these in fact 'THE' games, bit for bit? Thanks.

[OldSchoolRetroGamer]

That is where many people are confused, because devices like that use "ROMS" many assume it is emulation becuase in their minds they equate ROMS = EMULATION. Really though it is just a different means of storing the game code. Loaded from original cart or from ROM on a flashcart in the end your just loading the code so your not likely to see any difference unless of course there was something off with the rom dump. I am sure some of the more technically inclined will give you a more thorough answer but in my experience as a games player from my Harmony cart to my Everdrive MD there has been no difference, that is, if I compared the game loaded form original or flashcart side by side I would not tell the difference. Usually inaccuracies in timing, graphics, sound from the original are noticed when the ROM is loaded into an emulator, for example on your PC and these "issues" are more to do with the HARDWARE being emulated, the emulation of the hardware is not 100% accurate and so that is where you can notice the difference. This is also why clone hardware (Famiclones etc) have similar issues with sound, graphics or complete incompatibility in some cases, because the hardware is not 100% accurately imitated. SO YES SHORT ANSWER THEY ARE THE GAME BIT FOR BIT. YOU ARE ACTUALLY PLAYING THE GAME.

[Jibbajaba]

I love my Harmony cart along with the rest of my flash carts, but never pulled the trigger on the NES Powerpak. There seems to be a higher-than-usual number of incompatible games, and I think I would have to further mod my RGB-modded NES to use it in the first place. I like collecting NES carts, and there really aren't enough NES carts made out of unobtanium for me to justify its higher price tag when compared to the Everdrive line of flash carts. The SNES has a higher number of top dollar games, and the Super Everdrive is cheaper than the NES Powerpak.

To be fair though, I own just about ever NES game that I want (which really isn't *THAT* many), so dropping $200 on a powerpak just doesn't make much sense to be personally. That doesn't mean that it isn't a high-quality product.

Chris

[Reaperman]

Yeah, as long as the flash cart was designed well, and supports the game, there aren't emulation-like performance differences.

The only problem device I've seen was a once-popular GBA device called a 'supercard,' which had primary storage that was slower than the rom in a standard gba cart, so a significant minority of games had slowdown issues.

There have been some great games that I would never have experienced if it weren't for these devices, so they're a huge part of my collection. I think that a genesis cart is next on my list, since I'm starting to get into genesis shooters ($$$$.$$), and I have an upcoming business trip that I'd like to take my Nomad on but carts are awfully bulky for that.

Edited by Reaperman, Thu Feb 9, 2012 3:26 PM.

[StoneAgeGamer]

OldSchoolRetroGamer, on Thu Feb 9, 2012 9:14 AM, said:

That is where many people are confused, because devices like that use "ROMS" many assume it is emulation becuase in their minds they equate ROMS = EMULATION. Really though it is just a different means of storing the game code. Loaded from original cart or from ROM on a flashcart in the end your just loading the code so your not likely to see any difference unless of course there was something off with the rom dump. I am sure some of the more technically inclined will give you a more thorough answer but in my experience as a games player from my Harmony cart to my Everdrive MD there has been no difference, that is, if I compared the game loaded form original or flashcart side by side I would not tell the difference. Usually inaccuracies in timing, graphics, sound from the original are noticed when the ROM is loaded into an emulator, for example on your PC and these "issues" are more to do with the HARDWARE being emulated, the emulation of the hardware is not 100% accurate and so that is where you can notice the difference. This is also why clone hardware (Famiclones etc) have similar issues with sound, graphics or complete incompatibility in some cases, because the hardware is not 100% accurately imitated. SO YES SHORT ANSWER THEY ARE THE GAME BIT FOR BIT. YOU ARE ACTUALLY PLAYING THE GAME.

Rob I need to hire you as my Ambassador of explaining Flash Carts.

[keilbaca]

I have the Harmony and the Everdrive for the Genesis. I love both, and it makes it nice and easy to not having to dig out my game collection just to pick out a cartridge. I still have all my original games for both consoles, it just makes life easier.

The NES PowerPak is coming in the very near future.

[Hatta]

atarilovesyou, on Thu Feb 9, 2012 1:16 AM, said:

Is there any emulation going on at all, or are these in fact 'THE' games, bit for bit? Thanks.

For the NES PowerPak the mappers are emulated on the cart. There's no way around this, except putting each and every physical mapper chip in the cart. Fortunately, all the mappers do is tell the CPU where to get the program, the program itself runs on the NES exactly the way it does on the real cart.

[StoneAgeGamer]

Hatta, on Thu Feb 9, 2012 3:59 PM, said:

atarilovesyou, on Thu Feb 9, 2012 1:16 AM, said:

Is there any emulation going on at all, or are these in fact 'THE' games, bit for bit? Thanks.

For the NES PowerPak the mappers are emulated on the cart. There's no way around this, except putting each and every physical mapper chip in the cart. Fortunately, all the mappers do is tell the CPU where to get the program, the program itself runs on the NES exactly the way it does on the real cart.

Right same thing with the SD2SNES. It has to emulate the enhancement chips.

[Mitch]

Jibbajaba, on Thu Feb 9, 2012 2:38 PM, said:

To be fair though, I own just about ever NES game that I want (which really isn't *THAT* many), so dropping $200 on a powerpak just doesn't make much sense to be personally. That doesn't mean that it isn't a high-quality product.

Chris

I just checked the retrousb website and the powerpak is $135. I'm not sure where the $200 price came from.

Mitch

[Jibbajaba]

Someone else mentioned that price and I just repeated it, that's all. After checking, the Powerpak, plus the CF card, plus a USB reader for the CF card, plus shipping is $170. I'm a pretty techie guys with a lot of toys, but I own neither a CF card or a CF card reader so I would need both, and RetroUSB doesn't seem to be gouging for either one. Thats just what they cost. So not $200, but up to $170. I can buy a lot of NES games for $170.

Like I said before, it's a good product, and in general I like flash carts. But the Powerpak cart is not tempting for me. But I like collecting NES carts. I could sell my whole NES collection and buy the Powerpak and have plenty of money left over, so I'm not saying that it isn't cost effective. But I paid like $60 or less for my Everdrive. That's barely a nice dinner out with the wife. $170 is a much tougher pill to swallow.

Chris

[snstay]

I think jibbajabba has a valid point. But say you buy a powerpak for 170 dollars, not only do you get all the nes games you also get all the famicom (even though a majority of them are rpg games in japanese lol) you get all the disk systems games , hacks, homebrews i mean you may be able to buy alot of games for 170 dollars but i have thousands of games on my set.
And i dont have to store them, or even change out cartridges.

I know that is for alot of people and thats cool. But its not for me, i like the simplisity of having all these games on one cart.
And i think 170 is a drop when you think about what you get.
I rally enjoy both my powerpak and harmony cart both for the same simplistic reason.


Scott