These colors will be an option with Deluxe+ version, however to keep price down on Deluxe+ if you want a color it will be an additional cost. See colors below. Close up of Charcoal Gray: Close up of Midnight Blue: Close up of Wine Red:
Hi guys. I've been following Krikzz's work for some time now as well as the SNES PowerPak. I have a question though that hopefully someone can tell me for sure. Can someone tell me how the loading times compare between the two? It seems like the SNES PowerPak is nearly instant while the S EverDrive takes a minutes or two depending on the rom size (4Mb - 32Mb in most cases). I have been trying to find a video that shows the real time loading, but almost every review either cuts the loading out or has it load from a previously loaded DRAM memory save. This won't be the only determination of my purchase, but I'd love to see a proper comparison. I am am used to loading since I have been using Super Magicoms, Pro Fighters, and Wild Cards since the early 90's. Thanks! Also, I did read the review by JimmyCrackCorn (nice job btw), but I'm still a little unclear on the loading times. So the Super EverDrive is pretty much instant from loading a rom for the first time from an SDcard to the onboard memory? If so this must be a big improvement over the Genesis EverDrive since that seemed to take some time to load each rom. Or perhaps my info is outdated.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJGgMu-gJm4 shows a few loads in real time... chrono trigger and super mario world iirc
super everdrive loading time about one minute for 4mbyte rom, but you not need to reload rom after power off or reset here is shown real timings http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9442QF-qtAw&feature=player_embedded#at=201
Yes. SNES games must be copied to Flash ROM first. The PowerPAK's primary advantage I can think of is being able to load the 96mbit Star Ocean hack. Other than that they play all the same games. One uses SDRAM, one uses FlashROM. One uses CF Cards, one uses SD Cards. The primary difference for most people is the price. The PowerPAK with DSP1 and 2GB CF card currently costs $145. No option without DSP1 is available at the moment. The Super EverDrive is $87 bare bones, no case, no SD card, no DSP1. $129 with case and dsp1. So compared to the PowerPAK I would say it's a bit better deal, but if you can get your own case and live without dsp1 or install your own then you can get the $87 bare bones and get a much better deal. I think that's a pretty complete and unbiased comparison between the two. No matter what either will be so much better than classic Copiers.
I think load times are definitely a big plus for the PowerPak, I hate waiting! That said, almost all SNES games I will use are not that big, and shouldn't take much longer than most Genesis games to load. As was said, appears that saving games on the PP is a big pain, much easier on Everdrive.
Thanks for the links. So it seem to be about 15 seconds per 4Mbit rom (from start to finish). That's roughly twice as fast as loading a game from a floppy diskette to the SWC DX. I don't recall if it was much faster over EPP, but then again I'm sure no one here cares about the old SNES copiers anyway. I was just using it as a personal reference. For most games it won't be too bad, but with the larger, 32MB games (DKC,s , Chrono Trigger, etc..) waiting 2 minutes might make you a bit impatient. Is there any chance you (Krikzz) will be switching the type of RAM to allow for instant loading? For someone who wants the DSP1 to play Pilot Wings and Mario Kart, among others it makes it a much tougher purchase decision between the two products. Also, how about memory limitations? Are they both limited to FAT16 (2GB?) I know 2GB is a lot, but when you start throwing in complete sets for USA/Euro/Jpn/hack/demos/etc.. it may require more.
Loading times on these carts are a little misleading, I think. The Powerpak always loads the game, anywhere from a few to about 18 seconds for the bigger games, but it always has the load times. The Super Everdrive has 1 initial load time to flash the game to memory from then on if playing the same game you only need to start the game and it starts instantly, no need to re-flash. The advantage on the Powerpak is being able to play any game at anytime quickly, so if you jump around from game to game the Powerpak is a great choice. The Super Everdrive is great if you play 1 game at a time since it will be instant loading after the initial flash. Those small load times will add up on the Powerpak if playing an RPG as it requires more than 1 sitting to complete. The advantage in overall flash time would be for the Super Everdrive if you play 1 game at a time.
PowerPAK can use atleast a 4GB CF card and maybe even larger though I don't recall FAT16's limitation. I think Super EverDrive is limited to 2GB. But you can always have multiple cards. He will not be switching the type of "RAM" as he doesn't use RAM in the EverDrive for SNES. It uses Flash ROM. That is why loading is slower. RAM can be written much faster but it requires power to retain the contents. If you turn off the PowerPAK, within a short period of time the contents of RAM will start being lost. EverDrive uses FlashROM which retains the contents even without power so you can turn your game off, remove the cartridge, go somewhere else and start it up later, even years later, and it will still have the game loaded. If he made a EverDrive for SNES using RAM that would be a nice option. Same for Sega MD. It might cost more though, I'm not sure. DSP1 definitely makes it harder to choose between the two since the price gap closes a fair amount.
Depending on what kind of games you're playing, auto-save is probably the biggest feature difference between the two (Super PowerPak lacks it). I can't imagine throwing a complete ROM collection makes much sense on either, btw. No sense in having to scroll through so many games. I think there are hard limits on how many ROMs can be listed per directory, too, but I don't know for sure.
I don't think there will be any changes to the PCBs of the Super EverDrive or the EverDrive-MD for quite awhile. He is working on other flash carts and based on EverDrive's sales I'd say they are holding their own against the competition. Both have their positives and negatives. I imagine maybe in a few years he may come back around to the MD and SNES versions and start tweaking again when he has run out of other projects. I for one am glad, now I can carry way more EverDrives at one time without fear of them being obsolete in 2 weeks after purchasing.
RAM generally should be cheaper. Also RAM can handle more writes than flash mostly but most people won't write games more than 10 000 I think.
100 000 rewrite cycles reserve for flash, not 10k as you say ram implementation will not be cheapre because i should be use more expensive fpga. ram 8mbyte and flash 8myte cost is same, may be ram little more cheap
so anyone mind directing me to this dsp1 installation tutorial ? haven't been able to find it and just got my copy of pilot wings and am eager to slice it up
