Hi all, long time no see. I've got a 32M NTSC SWC here, running on a Super Famicom (SHVC-001) in RGB. When I turn it on it looks fine in the menu, but the video starts flickering after a few seconds of playing a game. More details: Doesn't matter whether the game is on cart, floppy, or even if it's the built-in tile game - the image becomes flickery. In one game (Umihara Kawase) I can just about tell that the game isn't running as fast as it should be (about 25-50% of the speed), although the music is running at the normal pace. My TV can cope with 60Hz signals. The SFC works fine without the SWC plugged in. Both the SFC and the SWC are being powered by Megadrive PSUs, rated at 10V/1.2A. As I understand it these should be perfect. Tried swapping them over, no difference. The SWC has its own internal tests, it passes these but flickers on the first of them. So what's going on here? My intuition is that it's not getting enough power, except that it is getting enough power by my reckoning. I can't open the unit (the seller will accept a return but on condition it hasn't been opened, which is fair enough, and I don't particularly want to return it anyway). Any ideas?
Did you try seeing if Composite or S-Video is having the same problem? And maybe it's not a power problem but instead interference from the SWC affecting the video signal or something like that. I recall hearing that the GDSF3 or some copier like it was not recommended to be used with RF video cause of noise generated by it.
Rolling really fast. It starts out ok - the company names come up fine, then at the menu it gets messy. No, though it did cross my mind. Thing is, I do have a composite cable around somewhere, but I don't think it will make a difference - like I say, games don't run at their correct speed, and I don't believe interference from the SWC could cause that (and even if it did, the video source wouldn't make any difference). I hooked up my PSUs to a multimeter to confirm that they are kicking out what they say, and it turns out that yes, they are, so it should be fine. Frustrating.
Sound like region settings to me. I remember using one of those knock off snes consoles without a lockout chip and getting similar effects in certain games. Is the SWC second hand? You could open it to see what lockout chip it has.
I can't open the SWC, but it's definitely an NTSC-J unit. The SFC is an official Asian one with a 50/60Hz switch (official, not a mod). I'm guessing this is the problem, then.
50/60Hz switch = unofficial, and it sounds like you have it set to 50 Hz. At the very least 60 Hz games will be 17% slower. If you're certain you have it right, the only other possibility is that you're using the real-time save mode.
Not for Asian countries that commonly had both 50 and 60 Hz. Taiwan for instance. Go look on Google. Give me some fucking credit, I do know how to use a switch! I'm not, but I'm curious as to what difference you think this would make.
Nintendo never sold/licensed 50/60 Hz switched consoles. I have a HK SNES (modified UK) with the switch by Mani Ltd, but it's not official. Also Taiwan is 110V 60 Hz NTSC, just like Japan :nod: I'm sure you do know how to use the switch, but I would completely understand if it were left in 50 Hz mode when you have a multi-system TV and many 60 Hz games will work in 50 Hz mode. Real-time save mode steals CPU cycles from the game during the vertical blanking period to poll the controller and interrupt if necessary. Any time dependent code in Vblank could then be displaced and cause PPU updates to spill into the frame (artifacts) or prevent game logic from completing before the next Vblank (slowdown). If it's not one of those two things, there's nothing really that could cause the game to slow down. Damage to the copier would make the game to flat out crash eventually because of corrupt emulation RAM access. SNES doesn't have any sort of software TV system control or anything that could confuse the games. EMI and power are probably still things to look into regarding flicker, the SWC might not actually be using the external power supply and the burden on the SFC could show as PPU wonkiness (but not really slowdown). Oh yeah, you don't have a controller with Slow-Mo do you? That confused the hell out of me once. Copiers also often have software slow-mo though it is never turned on by default.
Just for kicks, I did try it in 50Hz, and it had the same problem. It's part of the retail design, that's close enough for me. My mistake. Worth knowing, cheers. Nah, it's an official pad.
