SNES Powerpak is now available

[Icarus Moonsight]

i just bought this snes powerpak too the 20th november. always in processing. Cant wait to play star ocean and seiken 3 (secret of mana 2)

so all games in pal format (E) dont work on a US/Canada snes powerpak ?

No. They won't work properly on a US/JPN NTSC 60hz system, unless the roms are patched. Evan posted a link 5-6 posts up you should look at...

jeffg posted that has a modded system with a 50/60hz switch and it has been working for him.

[badinsults]

It isn't so much that the PAL games won't work, it is just that they will play about 20% faster than they should, and there is a strong possibility that there will be graphical glitches. Some games also have copy protection that might prevent them from working with the NTSC lockout chip.

[Troglodyte]

Perhaps it requires a certain version of the lockout chip.

That doesn't seem to make much sense to me, in Jeopardy!'s case, as the game boots up and runs?
Wouldn't it just check for the lockout chip once, at boot time, and then
refuse to run at all? Rather than just run, but with graphical problems.

Because padding the ROM is essentially the same as mirroring.

I think I understand now; you must be referring to memory bank mirroring or something along those lines. I speculated earlier that the Jeopardy! game used a different method of reading and writing to the memory here:

I assume, but have no way of confirming, that the Hi-Res mode trick, changes the way the memory addressing / speed of accessing the RAM is achieved.

However, what I still would like to understand, is how you know that this game does in fact use mirroring, and why it does it. In other words, what advantages do it give to an SNES game developer?

I'm not attacking your knowledge at all, I am just a person that has always been interested in low level hardware / software tricks. I guess it is because I come from a Computer science background, and have always been interested in electronics and programing since a very young age.

[Greg2600]

One thing I never understood about RetroZone is their lack of a message board, where users can share these issues, and they or perhaps the programmers can find solutions.

[badinsults]

That doesn't seem to make much sense to me, in Jeopardy!'s case, as the game boots up and runs?
Wouldn't it just check for the lockout chip once, at boot time, and then
refuse to run at all? Rather than just run, but with graphical problems.



I think I understand now; you must be referring to memory bank mirroring or something along those lines. I speculated earlier that the Jeopardy! game used a different method of reading and writing to the memory here:



However, what I still would like to understand, is how you know that this game does in fact use mirroring, and why it does it. In other words, what advantages do it give to an SNES game developer?

I'm not attacking your knowledge at all, I am just a person that has always been interested in low level hardware / software tricks. I guess it is because I come from a Computer science background, and have always been interested in electronics and programing since a very young age.

Really, my knowledge of of SNES hardware is very limited. I was asking Nach, who created NSRT and is one of the developers of ZSNES. I suggest asking him yourself if you have any technical questions. He has an IRC channel on Freenode at #nsrt.

[Leo_A]

One thing I never understood about RetroZone is their lack of a message board, where users can share these issues, and they or perhaps the programmers can find solutions.

The NESDev forum seems to be their unofficial forum where such discussion and interaction takes place.

http://nesdev.parodius.com/bbs/index.php

[akgameboy]

So I've found some games that I think have incompatibility issues.

Can anyone confirm that these won't work (they don't work on my Powerpak):

1.Jeoparady! (Doesn't work me either. But I have the cartridge.)
2.Family Feud (Made by the same makers of Jeoparady, so I'll have to get the cartridge.)
3.WWF Raw
4. Sanrio World Smash Ball

I've found some more that do not work, but I do not remember what they were.

[Greg2600]

The NESDev forum seems to be their unofficial forum where such discussion and interaction takes place.

http://nesdev.parodius.com/bbs/index.php

Oh, didn't know that. Thanks.

PS: The price went up to $135.

[Mitch]

So I've found some games that I think have incompatibility issues.

Can anyone confirm that these won't work (they don't work on my Powerpak):

1.Jeoparady! (Doesn't work me either. But I have the cartridge.)
2.Family Feud (Made by the same makers of Jeoparady, so I'll have to get the cartridge.)
3.WWF Raw
4. Sanrio World Smash Ball

I've found some more that do not work, but I do not remember what they were.

When you say they don't work do you mean they crash have graphic glitches or what?

For me Jeopardy had moderate graphic issues but was still fully playable.
I'll test the others on your list and see how they work for me.

Mitch

[akgameboy]

Jeoparady freezes right after the "GameTek Presents" screen. The others won't load at all. I hit Start Game on the Powerpak and it just goes to a black screen. I've used multiple roms too, so I don't think an unclean rom is the problem.

[c0ldb33r]

PS: The price went up to $135.

Interesting. I wonder why it went up.

[skaar]

What is with this Jeopardy obsession? Why don't you guys focus on the thousand other games that WORK?

[Mitch]

What are the CRCs for your problem ROMs?

I tested out Family Feud and it would make it to the title screen but wouldn't accept input and there was no sound. Hitting reset fixed it.
I decided to try this with Jeopardy and it fixed the corrupt graphics issue I was having.

WWF Raw worked fine for me with no errors.

Sanrio World Smash Ball I could not get to work. The english translation one would crash with an error code. The original Japanese one would load to a black screen and hang, which seems to be the same issue you are having.

Mitch

[schnuth]

I got my SNES Powerpak today and can't get it to work at all. I e-mailed RetroUSB but I'm not expecting a response over the holiday weekend. The compact flash card I bought from them can't be recognized by my computer. I got another CF card, but can not get it to be recognized by the Powerpak no matter what I do. Including reformatting it on two different computers and getting the same errors. I fear I got a defective unit. Ah well, I was really hoping to play with it over the long weekend.

[Mitch]

I got my SNES Powerpak today and can't get it to work at all. I e-mailed RetroUSB but I'm not expecting a response over the holiday weekend. The compact flash card I bought from them can't be recognized by my computer. I got another CF card, but can not get it to be recognized by the Powerpak no matter what I do. Including reformatting it on two different computers and getting the same errors. I fear I got a defective unit. Ah well, I was really hoping to play with it over the long weekend.

What do you get if you turn on the powerpak without the cf card inserted?
Also, make sure you are formatting it as FAT or FAT32. If you format it as NTFS it won't work.

Mitch

[schnuth]

What do you get if you turn on the powerpak without the cf card inserted?
Also, make sure you are formatting it as FAT or FAT32. If you format it as NTFS it won't work.

Mitch

If I turn it on with the CF card not inserted it says there isn't a card inserted. I'm pretty perplexed about this. I've tried reformatting the card multiple times on different computers with no luck either.

[Mitch]

I've tried reformatting the card multiple times on different computers with no luck either.

What file system are you formatting is as, FAT, FAT32 or NTFS?

Mitch

[schnuth]

What file system are you formatting is as, FAT, FAT32 or NTFS?

Mitch

I've tried both FAT and FAT32 with no luck.

Aaron

[eastbayarb]

I am on the same boat. My 8gb CF card, formatted for FAT32 doesn't work. PowerPak says it's a formatting error

[skaar]

Try deleting all the partitions on the disk and doing a full format. CF cards are notorious for compatibility issues... I'm hoping my Sandisk 2GB will be happy. I ordered the 1GB with it too just to be safe