OK my miseries, im assuming Japan region all the way, but i dont actually know so need some assistance s'il vous plait... On Laseractive it is possible to plug in a master system powerbase converter if you remove the casing right..... Is the powerbase region specific, or is it down to the Megadrive PAC? I.E., I have a UK powerbase, can i use this...i presume if i can, i would only be able to play Japan Master system games? Does the Japan powerbase converter have the FM block built in? Any light on the whole situation here would be greatly appreciated, thanks
My understanding is the powerbase is a passthrough for the master system cart since the connector is different between the two systems. I know it doesn't have any actualy processors inside, but it may have a chip to override the cpu and allow the z80 to run the MS game directly - however, this shouldn't vary by region or region lock you.
The PBC doesn't have any active components (ICs), all it does is assert the SMS mode pin and adapt the connector. I believe the MD PAC is based off the MD2 which plays SMS so it should work. The Japanese PBC doesn't have FM support sadly although it would have been possible by using the audio-in pin. In theory it would be quite easy to develop one with this feature using technical documentation on the web.
The Japanese PBC will only fit Mark-III sized carts, you can use your UK one for US SMS carts though.
There's only a handful (5-10) of Euro SMS games that have issues on a 60Hz system - all the others will be fine. You'll need to use an SMS controller rather than a MD pad for a few others though. I believe all card-based games will happily play though any kind of PBC.
