undamned's musings

Rockman Collector Panic!

2011-04-23T18:17:00.001-07:00

With the wonders of game console emulation and near limitless accessibility to files via the interwebs, almost any old generation game is playable by the masses. However, when it comes to Rockman, there is at least one game in this franchise that no amount of emulation or digital piracy will allow you to experience.

Discovery:

It was around '05, after discovering the wonders of surfing Yahoo Auctions Japan (YAJ), that I first laid eyes on a Panic Shot! Rockman cabinet. At the time, my Rockman collection was not quite as mature as it is at present, but I knew I could truly enjoy one such machine adorning my home.
I contacted the proxy bidding service I was using at the time, and my heart broke a little when they notified me that they were not set up to ship such large items. It was a shame, being as I would have gladly paid many times the asking price of the machine just in shipping costs alone. In the 7 or so years I've been using YAJ, I've only seen Panic Shot! Rockman for sale twice. Oddly, the listings were within about 6 months of each other (different sellers) and as I recall, the machines were listed for only 20,000JPY and 15,000JPY. Neither one sold.
As I continued in my Rockman/arcade collecting, I came across a promotional flyer for the game. I figured, if I couldn't get the machine, it would at least be nice to have the sales flyer. I saw the flyer pop up multiple times in my auction surfing, but one day I noticed one that looked a little different. I picked that one up, too. After some studying, it appeared there were two different machines, one of which was ready for production (stock photo), the other a concept sketch.
In '09 I donated scans of my flyers to The Arcade Flyer Archive (TAFA) in lieu of writing this article. While my writing was still in draft form, I came across yet another flyer for this machine.

(will be linked after TAFA's next update....)
I put the article on hold until I could get the latest flyer in hand, scanned, and donated to TAFA. Well, you know how laziness/business works (got married, finally settled into a house, etc., etc.). Two years later, the flyer has been scanned, and here's your article.

Differences:

Comparing the 3 flyers shows that there are still only two designs (the 3rd flyer merely replaces the concept sketch flyer). The playfields have totally different artwork, as do the main scoreboard areas.
Also, the hit cards behind Dr. Wily have changed from robot masters to Metalls.
One discrepancy I did notice between the flyers and one of the units I came across on YAJ, is that there is no redemption card dispenser on the auction unit. So, either Capcom made this feature optional, or the YAJ seller decided to remove it from their machine (if you look closely at the photo at the top of the article, there is a line with red print in the instruction box on the header of the machine. This is not stock).

Operation:

The ultimate goal of the game is simple enough: get as many points as possible in order to win a prize. Points are made by hitting either the target hanging below Dr. Wily's UFO or the cards behind him. The rear cards are worth 100 points each, while Wily's UFO target is worth 1000 points. The UFO moves back and forth across the play field, so you can't just keep hitting the same angled shot over and over to rack up those 1000 pointers.
The flyers mention that when the Wily target is hit, the figure features "comical action" and the UFO and back panel lights flash brightly. I imagine some of that "comical action" involves Wily's voice, as the flyers claim that both Wily and Rockman's voices are featured in the game.

After the game is over, the computer calculates the player's total score and, if the "win" light flashes, a prize card is dispensed. I suppose the game center could put in whatever sort of cards they desire, but what is advertised on the machine itself is cards from the Super Barcode Wars Rockman Series. The image above the dispenser shows Blues and Rockman (cards #2 and #1 in the series).

(Top: "Card is gonna come out!", Bottom: "Card Exit")
Inspiration:

To my knowledge, pinball tables are a rarity in Japan, let alone Japanese manufactured ones. That leads me to believe that inspiration for Capcom's mini pinball table came from abroad, namely the US. Certainly one of the most memorable mini pinball machines ever created was Bally's Baby Pac-Man. Bally tried to combine both the video game and pinball table experiences into one machine. Panic Shot! Rockman's similarities to the mini pinball aspect of Baby Pacman are fairly blatant. The play fields are similarly sized, the Ghost cards have been replaced by robots, and some of the other scoring gimmicks are consolidated into Wily's UFO.

Thanks:

Greg Bower - for his superb JP translation help!
Dan @ The Arcade Flyer Archive - for the wonderful service he provides the arcade community!

NES 2 AV Toploader Mod + LED Mod

2011-04-06T15:08:00.000-07:00

Recently a friend of mine asked me about NES clone systems. He basically wanted a reliable system with composite video output. After some discussion about the shortcomings of clones (cheaply made controllers, lacking sound/color pallet, etc.), we concluded that an official NES toploader with an AV modification was the optimal solution. During our conversation I warned him that if he wanted me to do the modification, I might make some other aesthetic "improvements." "Cat hair mod" was mentioned.

I scored a reasonably priced ($62, shipped) unit off an eBay seller and began planning what to do with the thing. I'd never done an AV modification on an NES toploader before, but I figured it couldn't be too hard. After a bit of looking around the interwebs I came across some helpful info which basically consisted of a small video circuit and where to grab the mono audio signal. I didn't follow any particular guide, but this guy's work is pretty close to what I did (major differences being that I opted to solder the video circuit directly to the NES's circuit board and I used RCA jacks instead of a headphone jack).

Some guides tell you to steal parts from the original video circuit. My advice is to preserve the original video circuit and just buy the extra parts required for the new one. You can retain your ability to use the RF output and it should cost less than $1.00 in parts to do so.

I contemplated using some cool Megaman art or a random cat face or something like that but, while digging through some pictures I had saved on my computer, I came across the perfect art candidate: Brandon Kusma.

Before settling upon my art selection, I had also considered adding a power indicator LED to the system. I had thought of putting an LED underneath the system, for a nice under-glow, or maybe just a simple red LED somewhere visible, ... but such things do not become us.

So, there you have it: an NES Toploader AV Mod, complete with light up N64 Kid graphics.

Links:
Watch the video on Youtube.

Hornswaggled by Taito: R-GEAR Edition

2009-08-25T16:04:00.000-07:00

I just about crapped myself upon hearing the rumor that with Taito's release of Ray Storm HD, they would be including the previously unreleased title, R-GEAR. As of late I've gotten a little too used to dreams coming true (i.e. CAVE porting everything under the sun to the XBOX 360), and as a result, royally set myself up for disappointment. R-GEAR the game is not being included with the purchase of Ray Storm HD, but merely a playable ship called the "R-GEAR" (as well as the R-GRAY 0 from the original Playstation Ray Storm).

(Famitsu photo courtesy of ariesu)
In lieu of keeping alive the dream that Taito may actually let us play the real R-GEAR one day (or more realistically, when some saint finds the prototype PCB in a dumpster after Taito folds), I'd like to take you on a little trip back in time.

In October of 2005 a clip of a mysterious Ray Force looking game popped up on Hameko, a repository for game related videos. The game was supposedly titled "R-GEAR" and, although it resembled Ray Force (even had the same fonts and HUD), it had all new stage design (forest planet, new space fortress) and a 2nd ship armed with a lightning weapon like Ray Storm's R-GRAY 2.

The existence of this video begs some questions:

Was this video intended for the public?
Was there ever a physical prototype?

The splash text in the Hameko video featured the initials BGR. BGR (aka BGR-44) is a well known Japanese video game player, so I thought maybe Taito had him playtest whatever portion of the game was completed. After doing a bit of homework, though, it seemed the video was more promotional in nature than top secret.

According to 2 sources (1, 2), at the [1997?] Tokyo Game Show, you could purchase Ray Storm and Ray Tracers (a racing game by Taito) as a set called the "RAY-RAY Collection." Included with this set was a bonus CD-ROM aptly titled "RAY-RAY CD-ROM."

(Scan courtesy of Curious Cat)
Supposedly the CD-ROM contained the following goodies:

Videos
BMP wallpapers for your PC
Sound Tests
Polygon Model Tests
Other development materials

What I was suspecting at this point was that BGR got ahold of this disc and felt like sharing the love via that clip that was uploaded to Hameko. My suspicion was confirmed last year when BGR uploaded a video to youtube, this time covering much more of the disc's contents:

(Click image)
So, what about the possibility of a prototype floating around somewhere? There was some discussion here about how development began on Taito's F3 system and then moved to their FX-1 platform (Ray Storm/G-Darius hardware) for the sake of Playstation compatibility, come the time for a home port.

This being the case, as long as the R-GEAR footage was from an actual prototype PCB and not just code running on a development PC, it then boils down to Taito's protocol regarding the archiving of prototype games. R-GEAR was probably being developed around 1994, which was still in the thick of the F3 era. This unfortunately increases the chances of the prototype PCB's ROMs being overwritten for some other F3 game in development. Even if that were the case, there's still a chance that the source code was archived.

Where does that leave us now? These are my recommendations for passing the time until the day we get to finally play R-GEAR:

Work on that 1 credit clear of Ray Force
Listen to plenty of Zuntata CD's
Watch this video:

(Click image)
And I guess if you are curious enough to try and track down a RAY-RAY CD-ROM, the Catalog # is SLPM-80078. They do turn up on Yahoo Japan Auctions occasionally, but be prepared to shell out, as the last two sold for around 10,000 JPY (~$100) each.

References:
1. R-GRAY 0 info
2. Hameko dates

Links:
Possibly the biggest Ray series fan, ever: Curious Cat + her curious blog

Taito F3 PCB 101

2009-08-06T21:51:00.000-07:00

I'm still not completely certain what about Taito has stolen my heart over the years. Maybe it's fun characters like Bub and Bob. Maybe it's their deceptively cute puzzle games like Landmaker and Puchi Carat or their amazing-to-this-day shooters like Ray Force. Whatever the cause, I'm a huge fan and a bit of a hardware nut, which has resulted in getting acquainted with a few of their more popular hardware platforms.

Today I'd like to discuss/dispell some myths regarding Taito's F3 hardware. Most arcade collecting folks are acquainted with Taito's F3 Cartridge System. Those eye catching cherry red carts just beg a reason for you to own some. What many folks are less acquainted with are the bare PCB F3 games. Some people know they exist, but little more than that. Even your most detailed MAME list won't give details as to which version of F3 hardware was dumped.

There are a total of 5 variations of dedicated F3 PCB. There are two F3 MAIN PCB's, one of which has 2 possible daughter boards, and the F3 Cartridge prototype PCB. The easiest way to distinguish between the two F3 MAIN PCB's is by the color of the electronic components near the JAMMA edge. One PCB has a long row of WHITE components, the other a long row of ORANGE components. There doesn't seem to be any correlation between release dates and PCB versions, so rather than refer to them as "old" and "new" versions, I will simply refer to them as "WHITE" and "ORANGE" versions.

Let's start with the ORANGE F3 MAIN PCB. Games that use the base version of this PCB are Riding Fight, Ring Rage, and Arabian Magic:

This base PCB was not enough hardware for the likes of Taito's Grid Seeker:

A small daughter board board mates with the sockets for IC66 and IC67 of the main PCB and is secured via a single stand-off near the edge. The next upgrade handles both Light Bringer (aka Dungeon Magic) and Ray Force (aka Gunlock):

This larger daughter board actually has a name, "EXPAND PCB." If you've played either of those games, you won't be surprised that they needed more real estate to fit in all that awesomeness.

The WHITE F3 MAIN PCB is home to Top Ranking Stars (aka Prime Time Fighter), Hat Trick Hero '93 (aka Taito Cup Finals), and Ray Force (yes, again):

Somehow Taito squeezed Ray Force into the WHITE board. I've not cross checked the parts between the WHITE and ORANGE version Ray Force games, but I'm curious how much work was needed to port this (may have been as simple as using higher capacity ROM's and changing a few addressing PAL's) and also if there are any noticeable game play differences.

The only other F3 PCB's I'm aware of are prototype F3 Cart PCB's. These utilize a standard F3 Cartridge System motherboard which merely lacks the plastic frame, a few IC's (my Landmaker proto is missing IC10 and IC32), and all PAL's and sound IC's are socketed.

Here is a photo comparison between a prototype F3 Cartridge (left) and a production F3 Cartridge (right):

Some of you may be thinking to yourselves that you've seen some of the games mentioned here in F3 Cartridge form somewhere. Boot F3 carts have been around for a while. They pop up on Yahoo Japan Auctions from time to time and have probably made their way to eBay on occasion. Boot carts that I'm aware of are:

Arabian Magic
Hat Trick Hero '93
Light Bringer
Ray Force
Ring Rage

Here's a small collection of pictures that I gathered from a Yahoo Japan Auctions seller a while back. If you are still in disbelief, check out this guy's work (these photos were archived when his site was still hosted at http://www.ngy1.1st.ne.jp/~momochi/):

(ROM's missing from original PCB next to his shiny boot cart)

(ROM mapping for boot cart)

(Boot cart running)

As we near the end of this discussion, some of you may be wondering why I have not mentioned the Space Invaders DX PCB. The reason is simple, really. It's not an F3 PCB. I've owned and inspected it myself. Not only is it a different layout from WHITE or ORANGE F3 MAIN PCB, but it also lacks the silk screen label "F3 MAIN PCB" which the other F3 boards boast. I guess Taito was just feeling nostalgic when they ported the game to the F3 Cartridge System.

In conclusion (and for those of you that just need a simple list to copy and paste into your site/blog/forum to show the interwebs how much you know about F3) here are the 8 production PCB only Taito F3 titles (9 different PCBs):

Arabian Magic - ORANGE F3 MAIN PCB
Riding Fight - ORANGE F3 MAIN PCB
Ring Rage - ORANGE F3 MAIN PCB
Grid Seeker - ORANGE F3 MAIN PCB + IC66/IC67 Daughter Board
Light Bringer - ORANGE F3 MAIN PCB + EXPAND PCB
Ray Force - ORANGE F3 MAIN PCB + EXPAND PCB
Ray Force - WHITE F3 MAIN PCB
Hat Trick Hero '93 - WHITE F3 MAIN PCB
Top Ranking Stars - WHITE F3 MAIN PCB

Preventing XBOX 360 RROD

2009-06-22T22:39:00.000-07:00

The net is flooded with (horrid) information about how to fix your XBOX 360's RROD, yet I've never come across any extensive articles about preventing failure. If you are like me and have a working 360, but are worried about it, this article is definitely for you.

So, why not wait until your system RROD's to deal with it? Procedures like the "x-clamp fix" may get your system going again, but they are terrifying from an electro-mechanical standpoint. Avoiding the problem altogether is the hardware-safe and intelligent solution. Preventing overheating will take care of the majority of would-be RROD's, but there are various sources for the problem of overheating. One problem is simply poor ventilation, but a sorely overlooked issue is the poor heat sink mounting of the XBOX 360.

Poor Heat Sink Mounting

In this section I'd like to compare traditional PC CPU heat sink mounting to that of the XBOX 360. (Before I go on, this heat sink portion of the article is based upon the original 2 heat sink setup, not the 3 heat sink design that Microsoft later implemented. This modification is only recommended for the original 2 heat sink design.) In the case of the PC heat sink, there is dynamic tension from the spring clamp holding it to the CPU. What I mean by dynamic is that the tension holding this assembly together can flex and change as needed.

The XBOX 360 heat sink has a static tension holding it to the CPU/GPU. What I mean by static is the opposite of dynamic: it does not change according to need. At first glance, it appears that the PC design and the 360 design are similar, being as they both have spring mechanisms in place. However, there is a gross dissimilarity. On the 360, both the PCB and the heat sink are bolted to the metal chassis. This means any irregularity in the straightness of the chassis or the PCB will directly effect the quality of the contact between the heat sink and the CPU/GPU. Therefore the only dynamic aspect of this system is the (coincidental) flexibility of the PCB, which is not a proper source of suspension.

The key to fixing the 360 heat sink mounting scheme is to give it truly dynamic tension like that of the PC heat sink. To do this, we must free the 360 heat sink from the metal chassis. This is done simply by drilling out the screw holes in the metal chassis beneath the heat sink to prevent it from making contact with the x-clamp.

With this modification the 360 heat sink can self adjust according to heat and part irregularities rather than being held in a fixed position which will most likely not provide the proper tension necessary for efficient contact with the processor.

(Photo of one of the modified chassis areas. After the chassis modification, each screw must be reinforced with a washer to keep the x-clamp from popping off of the bare screw heads.)

Poor Ventilation

Well, we've covered the mechanical issues. What about the ventilation issues? The 360 has two "exhaust" fans. This means that rather than "blowing" air across an area, you are "pulling" it across. Well, much like the exhaust that comes out of your car, that air had to come from somewhere, right? In your car, air comes from the engine's "air intake."

In the 360, air comes from various vents in the system case. The picture below labels the intake vents.

Small vent that is less than 1/4 of the length of the system (HDD covers the rest)
Entire side is vented
Two vent strips leading to the core of the system
Two vent strips leading to the bottom of the motherboard

Many people forget that this machine is essentially a gaming PC. Any of you in that scene know how much air flow you need to adequately cool a gaming PC. The 360 clearly needs all the help it can get. Considering that side B makes up about 50% of the system's air intake, blocking that side by standing the console vertically is a glaringly bad practice.

You need to ensure ambient air flow around the whole unit. Never run it anywhere it "just fits." This is not a Nintendo product. Check out the section of your User Manual aptly titled, "Prevent the Console from Overheating":

"Do not place the console or powersupply in a confined space, such as a bookcase, rack, or stereo cabinet, unless the space is well ventilated."

A Few Final Thoughts

1.) One person has voiced concern regarding the integrity of the stock x-clamps because after removing them from their system they were able to mutilate them. I will not go on a metallurgical rant, but suffice it to say that there are many different flavors of spring steel with varying elastic limits (which said person clearly exceeded). While installed, the x-clamp arms are limited to about 1 - 1.5mm of vertical travel. To get the heat sinks (and therefore the clamps) to move that much you'd basically have to drop the console from a considerable height (probably 12" +). Not only are the clamps well capable of handling such movement, but they are capable of handling it many times.

The individual did get the part about needing more force for the "x-clamp fix" than the x-clamps can provide themselves. Ever wonder why some systems don't last after such a "fix?" You are mashing 4 layers (GPU/CPU, GPU/CPU PCB, solder balls, and motherboard) together and in the process causing immense stress on all parts involved. It's only a matter of time before traces crack or any number of other failures.

2.) Being as the XBOX 360 does not boast an evaporative cooling system, you are actually going to need a reasonable ambient air temperature for the system fans to do their job. Microsoft specifies an operating temperature of 5°C to 35°C (41°F to 95°F). Based on what we've seen of this system's tendency to overheat, I'm going to say that 35°C (95°F) is truly 35°C (95°F). In other words, if you are running your system with an ambient temperature of 35°C (95°F) or higher, even after following the steps in this article, your XBOX 360 may still be in danger.

Further Reading

You may scoff at this, but read your User Manual. The XBOX 360 has proven to be a delicate flower, so care for it accordingly: Manuals

After all the (quite painful) internet reading I've done on this subject, I found one (1) article worth reading. It is an interview with "an individual who has worked on the Xbox 360 project for many years." The interview is not focused on preventative measures, it merely illustrates, in gross detail, why this system has had such a horrible failure rate: Interview

(Note: the interviewee and I seem to disagree on the whole vertical vs. horizontal issue. He makes the point that vertically, the system has more exposed surface area to cool, to which I respond: A.) the D panel is an indirect heat sink, at best, and B.) at the cost of the coveted ventilation of the B panel? And he was wrong about it opening more vent holes, although it does let the bottom of the motherboard breath a bit better.)

LOL (Lap Out Loud)

2009-05-05T08:49:00.000-07:00

While working on the YsBox, I was interested in ways of improving the cooling scheme. The stock Dell heat sink for the main processor has a nice big slab of copper, but the surface is far from perfect. A while back I had done some reading on the process of "lapping." Lapping is merely creating a surface that is as flat as possible. Heat sinks (both discrete and integrated, integrated being those that are permanently fixed to a processor) can be lapped using tools as simple as a piece of glass and varying grits of sandpaper.

I read a hand full of guides on the subject, but I found this "how to" video to be the most comprehensive: Part 1, Part 2. After lapping, both my CPU's integrated heat sink and the main CPU heatsink (using 400-2000 grit), temperatures really didn't seem to drop (disappointing). Mechanically / theoretically it is indeed a better setup as there is much more uniform physical contact between the two parts, but apparently this CPU just doesn't get hot enough to utilize such a setup (afaik, most people who do this are overclocking their CPU's).

In the end, I'm still happy I did this process for the great learning experience.

Capcom Power System Changer: Back from the Grave

2009-04-28T01:16:00.000-07:00

Don't ask me why, but there has been a resurgence of chatter about the Capcom Power System Changer. So, being as there is still some interest in this thing, that was motivation enough for me to visit my photo archive of "cool crap I've come across on Yahoo Japan Auctions." Rather than jump right into the Changer stuff, let me give you a little history.

Many folks see Capcom's CPS-2 as the product that marked the dawn of the "plastic case era" for this arcade game company. Not true. Others a bit more seasoned would recall a hand full of Capcom's CPS-1 QSound games which had plastic housings. Still not there yet. Capcom actually used plastic housings pre-QSound. The titles I'm aware of are Varth and Capcom World 2. These cases were purely for protection/aesthetics.

Shortly thereafter Capcom secured the rights to use ¹Archer's proprietary QSound enhancement technology. At this point Capcom was looking at some changes to their hardware, just to support QSound, so they went ahead and designed a newfangled version of their CPS-1 product. They redesigned the housing (this time fully enclosed), complete with built in cooling fan, external ²volume control, as well as a faceplate with all the aux. connectors. In addition to that, their new electronics boasted anti-piracy technology and left/right RCA jacks for running stereo sound directly to an audio amplifier.

The titles I'm aware of in this format are Tenchi wo Kurau II, Cadillacs Kyouryuu Shin Seiki, The Punisher, Muscle Bomber, and Muscle Bomber Duo (and their respective non-Japan variants). Note that housing color does not indicate region of release, as in the case of CPS-2.

Capcom released their Power System Changer within a year of the last CPS-1 QSound arcade game, which leads me to believe they were working these projects in parallel.

I was overjoyed when a kind soul pointed me to an official Capcom document (many thanks to Summy House) which lists the games for this system. Here is a snapshot of the list:

And here is the translation:

Tenchi wo Kurau II
Muscle Bomber
Captain Commando
Cadillacs [Kyouryuu Shin Seiki]
Knights of the Round
Muscle Bomber Duo
Capcom World 2
Final Fight
King of Dragons
Street Fighter II [Turbo]
Punisher

As you've probably read elsewhere, Capcom later released Street Fighter Zero. That makes for an even dozen games. I was disappointed to find that I only had photo's of 7 of the 12 titles, but this will at least wet your appetite a little for what was available:

Aside from the original arcade content, some (all?) of the games also had extensive options. Check out the options for Final Fight (button mapping, stage select, etc.):

As you'll read in most descriptions of the system, it makes use of the Capcom Power Stick Fighter.

For those of you not familiar with the unit, there were connections for it to be used on the Nintendo Super Famicom (above), X68000, FM Towns Marty (below), and supposedly the Sega Mega Drive.

Not as fancy as the RF (radio frequency) wireless controllers of the current generation gaming consoles, but Capcom made an IR (infrared) add-on unit which allowed you to un-tether this beastie.

For those of you on the hunt for a Changer, my best recommendation is to keep a keen eye on the arcade section of Yahoo Japan Actions. My experience has been that at least one of these pops up for auction annually. Here are a few more photos of the Changer and games with tasty packaging:

Footnotes:

1. On numerous Capcom flyers advertising QSound, a little disclaimer is included, "QSound Chips have been developed by Archer and incorporate Archer's proprietary QSound sound enhancement technology." The only Archer I could think of was the stereo equipment manufacturer that sold product through Radio Shack stores. Were they a remnant of this Archer? In my curiosity I e-mailed QSound Labs to ask them about this. They promptly replied, "The inventors vended the technology into a company called Archer Communications in 1988. In 1992, we changed the name to QSound Labs, Inc."

2. Aside from the volume dial, there is another dial close to the side. I have no idea what this was meant for, as it is unused on my Slam Masters CPS-1 game.

Links:

NFG's CPS Changer expose

YsBox Ultra!

2009-04-02T10:57:00.000-07:00

You may have read my YsBox article already. Well, like a good little engineer, I was thinking of ways to boost the performance/efficiency of my original design. Areas of improvement would be graphics performance and cooling efficiency.

Around the middle of my YsBox project, I found out that a low profile Nvidia 9800 GT graphics card was available from Sparkle (SX98GT512D3L-MN).

This intrigued me and I purchased one when a decent price surfaced. The power demands on this card are in the ballpark of 100W, which still leaves plenty for the rest of my box, being as I'm running a 35W processor and my power supply is capable of 280W. Cabling posed some issues, as there are no spare power connections coming out of the power supply. Rather than construct a custom cable, I wanted to see if I could come up with an "off the shelf" solution. $12 later I had a harness that would take SATA Power and split it into SATA Power and 6 Pin PCI-E Power.

Unfortunately after solving the power connector dilemma I found some mechanical conflicts. As you can see in the following 2 photo's, the 9800 GT needs to share space with the CPU heatsink shroud.

The following photo indicates (highlighted green) the areas of the CPU heatsink shroud and the 9800 GT's rear heatsink which need "adjusting."

The parts fit beautifully after this adjustment.

Being as the Dell's CPU and 9800 GT's massive heatsink are sharing the same air flow, I wanted to maximize cooling efficiency through the core of the unit. I was troubled by the location Dell chose for the hard drive. It almost completely blocks the main exhaust vent for the system fan.

Hot air from the CPU blows through this area. In leau of protecting the hard drive from this heat, Dell mounted a little blower underneath of the hard drive. Although this may be helpful, I still don't like this setup.

Toward the front of the unit, below the DVD drive, is a 3.5" bay. To my dismay, it is not a standard full depth 3.5" bay, as to allow you to simply move your hard drive down there. I did find it is deep enough to allow for some creative mounting of a 2.5" (laptop) hard drive. There are off the shelf 2.5" to 3.5" mounting kits, but they do not fit properly with Dell's "sled" system. I ended up building a custom hard drive sled and I was quite pleased with the final product. (Note: the outer screws on the sled are only partially threaded in order to slide into the chassis rails properly.)

With this neat little conversion I mounted my 2.5" hard drive comfortably out of the area of main air flow. Now the CPU and graphics card have a nice path for air to flow through the core of the system, from the front grill to the rear vents.

I am quite pleased with the final product.

Pricing:

As much as I had certain changes I really wanted to make to the YsBox, I didn't want to do anything that would take what was originally a budget savvy system and turn it into something unreachable for many folks. My upgrade from the YsBox to the YsBox Ultra ended up being about a $100 upgrade.

YsBox Ultra (what I paid, including shipping):

$111.98 - Sparkle Nvidia 9800 GT (Low profile)
$99.74 - Dell Optiplex 745 SFF, w/ DVD drive
$15.00 - Intel Celeron 2.2Ghz 35W CPU
$26.50 - 100GB Seagate 2.5" 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
$11.95 - Misc. Power Cable Converters/Adapters
$10.44 - Accessory Kit
$275.61 - Total

The Test Drive:

dB rating for this machine is a bit higher than the ~35dB of the original YsBox (under full load, 2 feet away). I'd say it's a fair trade-off for the increase in video horse power

Rather than copy data from my previous article, I thought I'd just make note of the areas I saw noticeable improvement.

In Game Performance:

Ys: The Oath in Felghana:
(Results @ 1280 x 1024 Resolution, 75 Hz, Maximum Settings, Game Difficulty Normal)

Every part of the game is a solid 75fps (aside from momentary scene loading).
Ys Origin:
(Results @ 1280 x 1024 Resolution, 75 Hz, Maximum Settings, Game Difficulty Normal)

Every part of the game is a solid 75fps (aside from momentary scene loading).

The Linkage:

Dell
Falcom
A nice (albeit more expensive) alternative system for an YsBox is the HP Pavilion Slimline. Here is a thorough investigation/discussion of it. It's key advantages are sleek looks and smaller size (2" shorter)

The YsBox is Here!

2009-03-11T19:01:00.000-07:00

This article outlines a little project I just finished recently. The goal of the project was to create a "consolized" PC with the purpose of playing Falcom games (namely the "Ys" game series). This system was to be small, powerful, quiet, and budget savvy.

The Basics:

In looking for a small computer we must first consider the bare minimum requirements for our application. In this case, being as the more recent Falcom games utilize a 3D engine, we will require a decent 3D graphics card. Based upon this, we rule out: PC's without expansion slots and PC's with weak power supplies. The more I looked at small aftermarket PC cases, the more I realized that many OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) PC cases, such as those from IBM, HP/Compaq, Dell, Acer, ect. are a better balance of size, power, cooling, and expandability.

We already know that we need a good 3D card, but we aught to narrow it down further. PCI cards are basically out of the question. What you pay for a fair graphics card with a PCI interface vs. a PCI Express variant is plain silly. For example, you can buy an Nvidia 8500 GT PCI card for $75, or you can buy an Nvidia 9500 GT PCI Express card for $60. If we compare their performance, we see that the 9500 GT trounces the 8500. So, going with PCI Express is not only cheaper, but also provides better performance.

People certainly have different tolerances for noise. In my opinion, the PS3 runs unacceptably loud when it's hot. Same with the XBOX 360, for that matter. When investigating the loudness of a system, there are a few factors to look into: the power consumption of the CPU and the means of cooling said CPU. Older CPU's and high end CPU's both consume lots of energy. Early Pentium 4's consume at least 73W of power. Newer Intel multi cores consume at least 65W. The "off the shelf" solution for taming these baddies is to increase airflow by adding more fans or ramping up the speed of existing fans. More/faster fans means more noise, which is counterproductive to our goal. Where's the ace in the hole? Intel released a small series of desktop Celeron processors that only consume 35W. Lower power produces less heat, requires less airflow, and produces lower noise levels.

It's hard to say what a target price for such a PC should be. Modern gaming consoles are too expensive, in my opinion, so I placed my price point below those.

The Nitty Gritty:

I won't bore you with the tales of my failed attempts at meeting the goals of this project, but suffice it to say, what I came up with is a nice solution.

There are 3 Dell models of interest for this project: Optiplex 745, Optiplex 755, and Optiplex 760 (Small Form Factor models). All of them use the same case (despite Dell woefully using the wrong images on their own website).

The case measures: 9.26 x 31.37 x 34.03cm (3.65 x 12.35 x 13.40in.), which when compared to modern gaming consoles, it's right in there (yes, photos are indeed to scale).

Both the Optiplex 745 and 755 have 275W power supplies. The 760 has a 235W supply, which is still plenty of power for the Nvidia 9500 GT graphics card (I have run the 9500 GT on a Small Form Factor Optiplex GX280 which only has a 160W supply).

Intel's 35W CPU lineup for desktop computers is as follows (Note: all these CPUs are Single Core, 800 MHz FSB, 512 KB Cache, LGA775, and require a motherboard w/ Intel EM64T-enabled BIOS, like the Dell units I have specified):

Celeron 420 (SL9XP): 1.60 GHz
Celeron 430 (SL9XN): 1.80 GHz
Celeron 440 (SL9XL): 2.00 GHz
Celeron 450 (SLAFZ): 2.20 GHz

For reference, a used processor should cost around $15, $20, $30, and $40 respectively (including shipping).

If you are running Windows XP, I can almost guarantee that you do not need to upgrade the memory on these units. Going from 512 MB to 1 GB did not improve game performance by any perceivable degree. If you want to run Windows Vista (???) or just upgrade memory anyways, Newegg has great deals on Kingston Memory (often with free shipping). All 3 units have 4 memory slots for non-ECC DIMMs.

I also put together an "Accessory Kit" which contains items that will make this system even easier to use:

Stereo 3.5mm Headphone Plug to Female RCA Adapter - for running audio to your TV or stereo amplifier ($3.25 shipped)
Component Video Adapter - for those of you who want to play on your HD TV and don't have VGA, DVI, or HDMI connections ($2.20 shipped)
PS2 Game pad to USB Adapter - a familiar pad puts these games right at home with your other consoles ($4.99 shipped)

YsBox (target pricing, including shipping):

$60.00 - Nvidia 9500 GT (Low profile)
$10.00 - Low Profile adapter for graphics card
$100.00 - Dell Optiplex 7xx SFF w/ DVD drive
$20.00 - Intel Celeron 35W CPU
$10.00 - Accessory Kit
$200 - Total

YsBox (what I paid, including shipping):

$56.07 - XFX Nvidia 9500 GT (Low profile)
$6.99 - XFX Low Profile adapter for graphics card
$99.74 - Dell Optiplex 745 SFF, 1.6 GHz 35W, w/ DVD drive
$xx.xx - Intel Celeron 35W CPU (came inside PC)
$10.44 - Accessory Kit
$173.24 - Total

Note: OEM systems typically come with a Certificate of Authenticity (COA), which licenses you to a copy of Windows. Most of the systems I find have a Windows XP Pro COA, which is perfect for this project.

The Test Drive:

First off, this system boots quick. With a shortcut to a game in the Windows Startup folder, from the time I press the power button (from a cold boot) to the time the game starts is less than 30 seconds.

Noise generated at full load, measured from 2 feet away, is right around 35dB.

In Game Performance:

Ys I + 2 Complete:
(Results @ Maximum Resolution, Maximum Settings, Game Difficulty Normal, fps not available)

No perceivable slowdown.
Ys: The Oath in Felghana:
(Results @ 1280 x 1024 Resolution, 75 Hz, Maximum Settings, Game Difficulty Normal)

Level gameplay is a solid 75fps aside from loading new scenes.

Boss battles typically stay in the 70's until you face Garland, where I've seen fps drop to 30 when things are really getting hectic. Galvaran is capable of dropping fps down to 41.
Ys Origin:
(Results @ 1280 x 1024 Resolution, 75 Hz, Maximum Settings, Game Difficulty Normal)

Indoor Area's run 30-75fps. Some areas on the outside of the tower, or with very involved backgrounds, can drop fps into the 40's, even without enemies present.

Boss battle fps are all over the scale. Dules can have a range as broad as 20-55fps.
Xanadu Next:
(Results @ Maximum Resolution, Maximum Settings, Game Difficulty Normal, fps not available)

No perceivable slowdown.

The Linkage:

Dell
XFX
Falcom

Buffing my Nerd-dom

2009-03-11T13:15:00.001-07:00

My wife is a big Star Trek fan, so she's been catching me up on the Voyager series. I honestly haven't followed Star Trek since The Next Generation, so this was kind of an experiment. I must say that I've been enjoying it so far (we just finished season 2). Capt. Janeway does a great job being strong and the rest of the crew is interesting enough. I think so far my favourite character is the Dr. He's sarcastic yet pleasant at the same time, somehow. The most annoying character is Tuvoc. I've nicked him "Tuvoc Shakur." The way he says "sensors" overturns mountains. Chakote is a cool character, but I can't help but call him "chipolte." Yes, like the sauce.
-ud