Most number of playable systems [Archive]

View Full Version : Most number of playable systems

Dirty Tiger

07-23-2003, 11:28 PM

I have beeb gawking at the Game Roooom Pics, there are some very impressive collections. I did notice one thing many of the consoles pictured were not hooked up. I realize that a collector must keep some stuff out of use:This is my question.

What is the most number of systems you guys have hooked up at one time, ready to go, so that you can switch from system to system as the urge strikes?

SoulBlazer

07-23-2003, 11:30 PM

For me, it's five (six if you count the 32X as being seperate then my Sega CD), but I KNOW others can blow that out of the water. :D

FABombjoy

07-23-2003, 11:33 PM

I have 23 distinct systems hooked up across 3 TVs (http://labwww.csv.cmich.edu/luke/videogames/gameroom/Schematic.gif), and 2 additional redundant systems (2 extra Genesis varients).

Ikari Warrior

07-23-2003, 11:33 PM

I'm at 17, hooked up and readily playable.

ApolloBoy

07-23-2003, 11:41 PM

All of my systems are hooked up to 2 TVs except for the 800XL, the C64, and the VIC-20.

Dirty Tiger

07-23-2003, 11:45 PM

23 systems to 2 tv's. How does one do that?

Six Switch

07-24-2003, 12:15 AM

I have at least ten hooked up to two tvs,but more are in the basement so I can't give an exact number.

AB Positive

07-24-2003, 12:18 AM

I had 14 up and running on my TV at one time but sales and easibility of -un- hooking the systems shaved me back down to about 7

-AG

Viper_3000

07-24-2003, 01:22 AM

15 to my 1 bedroom tv. Now if only I had a refridgerator and a microwave I wouldn't have to leave my room..... :D

atomicthumbs

07-24-2003, 02:29 AM

RetroYoungen

07-24-2003, 02:48 AM

Let's see, NES, Genesis, Sega CD, Dreamcast, Playstation, Jaguar. 6. Hey, it's an older TV and I don't have a lot of cables or AV-switchers. Oh, and then there's space... (I live with my parents, space is a premium :D )

NEOFREAK9189

07-24-2003, 05:00 AM

I'm at 18, video games hooked up and readily playable.
1 pc for emulator
2 VCR-
1 dvd
1 cable box digital
1 apple 2 pc
all in 1 tv :P

cheesystick

07-24-2003, 08:45 AM

I have 8 hooked up. One is hooked directly into the tv, 3 are hooked into the cable through a train of RF switches, and 4 are hooked into a madcatz multi-switch box. Total sweetness.
-crispy

fcw3

07-24-2003, 09:00 AM

Twelve on my home office TV and nine on my living room PC (10 if you count the PC hooked to the TV).

Aren't switch boxes and backwards-compatable cables wonderful ?

FRED

Keir

07-24-2003, 09:05 AM

I have 6 systems hooked up right now (7 if you include Virtual Boy), with room for one more on my second TV. However, through my Super 8, Laseractive modules and Genesis/SMS adapter, I have the ability to play 13 different systems.

den68

07-24-2003, 10:06 AM

at the moment I've got 13 systems hooked up to 2 TV's. the TV in the living room has 4, Dreamcast, PS2, XBOX, Game Cube. the TV in the basement has 9, Saturn, PS1, Dreamcast, N64, NES, Genesis (w/Sega CD), SNES and SMS.

the basement is a HUGE mess of cables.

chadtower

07-24-2003, 10:17 AM

I have 24 systems (plus 2 vcrs and a beta) hooked up to the same 32" TV with a series of AV and RF switchboxes. Around 14 of those are also split to a 17" TV right next to it so it can be viewed on both at the same time, or one system playing on one TV and another on the other TV. Very cool with absolutely fantastic picture and sound quality (with no cords in sight!)!!!

BOO-YAH!!!

Could you show us some pics of this? I'm working on a very similar setup right now and am interested in how you hide your cords.

omnedon

07-24-2003, 11:40 AM

22 to one TV. It's in my basement, and the cords are not hidden. A 27" TV in the centre, topped and surrounded with IKEA 51" STEN shelving. Nothing but systems, VCR and speakers on the 4 spans of shelving, each with 4 levels of shelving. Only the Atari Video Pinball, 2600, Inty, CV,5200 and 7800 use RF to connect. All else connect through a composite switchbox. I occasionally have to pull composite cables for one system to play another, but all the composite cables are labelled and tethered by the switchbox.

All the AC adapters are in a row and labelled. I plug in what I'm going to play with an extension cord. I just run it to the system I want to play.

It's all very organized, and reasonably easy to use. My nine year old can switch it from the directly connected Xbox to the temporarily unconnected N64 in 10 seconds.

I do system repairs, and it' very convenient for testing to just pop out my console from it's spot, and test the repair candidate with known working cables. :)

chadtower

07-24-2003, 11:47 AM

Power is definitely a real concern. What I'm starting to wonder, about all of you folks with 20+ systems all hooked up and ready to go... how many of you are using some sort of electrical protection on them, be it a surge protector or even better a couple of UPS units? In the next few weeks I'm going to have an electrician come in and add about 4 outlets to my corner of doom so I can stick a few UPS in there, and keep all consoles plugged in and not worry about it...

bargora

07-24-2003, 12:06 PM

11 systems on one TV. Four are RF (5200, 7800, NES, Genesis), while the rest are S-Video

Nature Boy

07-24-2003, 12:06 PM

All 21 systems, hooked up to two TVs. Switchboxes and cable splitters abound, but it's possible. I'm going to branch out to three TVs to make it a bit simpler (and to improve some picture quality), but it works well as is.

The key I found was to convert all the old systems away from the "TV/Game" switchbox. Best Buy has RCA to Co-ax connectors which work wonders with the Intvs, O2s, and VCS's of my collection (using a 4 way cable splitter in reverse (i.e. the one in I actually use as an out) is mandatory, since you can't 'chain' this way, not that you'd want to).

For power I've got it all on four large sized AC adaptors (with maybe a 5th pluggled in, I'm not sure). They're all surge protected, and I never have more than 4 things on at once anyway (TV, Speakers, System, RF Modulator) so I've yet to have a problem.

chadtower

07-24-2003, 12:55 PM

The AC problem you ran into there would have nothing to do with having them all on at once. It would be when a power surge came through and fried all 21 systems at once. You don't really want that to happen. Another issue that most people pay no attention to is power DIPS. They don't fry your hardware all at once but they degrade the electronics slowly and constantly over time enough that it lowers the lifetime of the unit substantially. That's where a UPS comes in... you may see 2 power surges a month that get filtered by a surge protector but your electronics will see several power dips every hour. The odds are actually better that dips will kill your stuff than that surges will but you'll never know since it doesn't happen instantly.

How much does BestBuy charge for those rca-coax adaptors? I am going to buy a bunch of them but don't really want to pay the $4 each that Radio Shack charges.

FABombjoy

07-24-2003, 05:43 PM

Power surges / dips aren't a real big deal with console systems. The power adapters convert 110V to around 9V (the average requirement for systems). A 110V - 9V adapter reduces by the power by about 12 times. So, a 20%+ surge in power would work out to 132V, which would figure to 11V at the console. From there, the console's internal voltage regulators will convert that to a 5V regulated voltage supply. Most of the power regulators have a wide working voltage range, from 6-18V for example, and our 11V example is well within spec in that case. You can compute a similar example with a dip voltage (like 100V). What the regulators can't get in voltage, they will make up for in amperage (during voltage dips).

Obviously, some consoles will be built better for power fluctuations than others, but the voltage/current requirements for consoles are less of a concern than for computers which require 200-300+ watts of power, and have components that are more voltage sensative (especially as CPU core/bus voltages get lower and lower).

This may have been a confusing explanation, but I have to eat dinner now. In short: a surge protector should be sufficient for your game consoles, because game consoles don't require as much power as other electronic appliances. I have never seen a system go out due to power surge/dip.

john_soper

07-24-2003, 06:15 PM

20 systems that support 28 different game types, one 1702
monitor, every signal s-video or psuedo s-video
Pics and discussion at: www94.pair.com/jsoper/uber_main.html

The Manimal

07-24-2003, 07:53 PM

Let's see....

My room's TV: NES and SNES.

Basement TV: NES

Other Basement TV: Sears Video Arcade (VCS/2600 clone, but better IMO!)

Unhooked-up: PlayStation, Genesis, GameCube, N64.

Anyone know of any power selectors? Like a a/v swithbox, but for power instead? They probably exist. I want to hook up more, but I've got like 10 devices hooked up to each outlet.

One outlet has TV, 5 VCRS, 1 LD Player, 2 DVD Players, 1 Switchbox, and 2 VG Systems...

Yikes...

Other has fish tank, alarm clock, receiver, cd player, cd recorder, cassette deck, turntable, equalizer...

Sylentwulf

07-24-2003, 07:59 PM

All of my systems are ready to play within less than one minute. Only my PS2 and GC are ACTUALLY hooked up right now.

stonecutter

07-24-2003, 10:25 PM

I have 15 systems all hooked up and playable at this moment on one tv. Done with a couple of switch boxes and a complex circuit of rf wiring lol. Nice and tidy too, all wiring out of sight and systems stored in two dressers from previos bedroom sets. Pull out a drawer turn it on and away you go once the system switch is selected. When your done push it back... many people have been in my basement and have no idea what is in those dressers.... but comment on all the old games they see on my shelving lol.

Goodwill Hunter

07-24-2003, 11:16 PM

21 systems hooked up to my main TV...I have a TV on the side, but that is just for keeping the news/weather/music on in the background. I have 4 AV switchboxes daisy-chained under my TV, all pushbuttons labeled by system, so it's just a button push or two to bring up what ever system I want to use. It had been up to 24, but since I haven't played them in a while, and I needed the room, I packed away my TI-99, O2 and Channel F. Oh well.

Rich

ubersaurus

07-25-2003, 12:03 AM

I have 15 systems hooked up across two tvs and a c64 monitor, that has, well, a c64. If you want to count the ones owned by my family that are hooked up you get up to 20.

atomicthumbs

07-25-2003, 12:05 AM

Nature Boy

07-25-2003, 08:45 AM

How much does BestBuy charge for those rca-coax adaptors? I am going to buy a bunch of them but don't really want to pay the $4 each that Radio Shack charges.

I can't remember to be honest. But they're not much cheaper than $4, if at all.

XJR15

07-25-2003, 11:37 PM

When I get some time... all systems will be displayed with easy access to all cords... In front of the television, there will be hookups for one system at a time considering thats all you can play at once. Bring the system over, hook up power, attach rf/av hookups and you are good to go!