This machine has caught my eye, and I really love the look of it. I've seen a few pop up in places.. but I'm really unsure on how much I should pay for one. Possibly looking for one boxed . Is there any known faults I should also look out for?
There are three different models, the Wondermega 1 which was released by Victor and there is also one by Sega (this one is rarer) and the Wondermega 2 which was just released by Victor (this was also cut down and released in America as the JVC X'Eye). Problems for the WM1 include no or dodgy power supply, CD drive failed and motorised lid not working. WM2 loses the motorised lid and feels cheaper but the CD drive can still fail and the lid is a bit more fragile. You are more likely to see the WM2 and there are a few on Ebay at an inflated price. I am not going to price them as they are hard to find complete and boxed, however get a unboxed Wondermega for about $300 and you have done well, for a boxed one expect to pay a lot more. They are very collectable machines. I do have a boxed one for sale (sort of) so feel free to look in the sales thread.
If you want a good boxed Sega or Victor Wondermega then you are looking at 30'000 to 40'000 yen these days. Looks at www.xe.com to convert that in to your curencey. Yakumo
I have a Sega model Wondermega 1 and love the hell out of it. I got it inboxes (but with everything else) at Super Potato for between ¥25,000 and ¥30,000.
I've got my Victor WM1 (everything but box and manual) for exact 10'500yens at a local Hardoff about 2 years ago. Still working fine, what I couldn't say about me two previously owned Mega CD devices. So this is my ultimate machine to play ANY Mega Drive games (except Mega-LDs) Positive: S-Video ex-work (good for those who only have Svid or badder) Negative: No RGB ex-work anymore (bad for those who can use RGB)
The Victor Wondermega 1 can be converted easily to RGB, you can even feed the cable out of the screw hole that the modem would have attached to. Do you have a stack of boxed WMs hidden away Yakumo as I've not seen a boxed wondermega go for any less then 50,000 on yahoo recently. They are a machine that seems to have increased in value over the last few years.
I also think paid around 10000 yen or there about for my MIB Sega WM1 several years back. Can't remember how much I paid for unboxed Sega WM1 though...
Wow, are they going for that much now? I wish I had kept all the ones I ever owned. They are a beautiful system, in fact probably the best looking console ever made.
Wow, they'll set me back a bit. I'll get one day then . Thanks for the replies everyone. I do agree with you Yakumo they look fantasic, was this similar to like the Rolls Royce of SEGA's Megadrives? It sure sounds like it with these motorised CD lids and stuff. But yes I'm looking for the Victor models the Sega consoles. I noticed the one below has the Victor logo on it. Is this the model 2 version of the wondermega?
No, that's the Model 1 that was made by Victor. Both Sega and Victor made Model 1's. Rumor has it that there were only 5,000 Sega branded models made. Anyone care to chime in on that?
It's not a "Model 1," it's an RG-M1. It's a pretty cool little device. Obviously the main draws are the beautiful design, the motor-operated disc tray, and the rarity of the item. One thing that gets overlooked often are the A/V outputs: unlike any other iteration of the Genesis/Mega Drive, it has S-Video and stereo audio directly out of the back of the device (as opposed to Sega's DIN adapter). The quality of the S-video image is really good, although I wish it had a way to output RGB.
Well the Sega version is the lovely named HWM-5010. However Model 1 and Model 2 are easy ways to tell the two machines apart. All it requires is a soldering iron and some video quality cable and it then outputs RGB...The audio AV jacks are very noisy compared to the headphone socket on the front of the console.
The Wondermega Model 2 is F*ing ugly. I wouldn't know why anyone would want to buy that. A Mega Drive 1 and Mega CD 1 combo looks far better. But yes, the original Wondermega be it the Victor or Sega model are both pieces of gaming history. There never has been a console as sexy or equipped as them. And please, don't anyone mention the Panasonic Game Cube. It's basically a silver cube. Yakumo
Come on guys. Makes me wish I didn't own Genesis stuff instead of the "cool" Mega Drive. All this praise slowly inches my half-joking idea to switch ever closer.
