If Sega Actually Made a new console....

[Guntz]

Plasma is the best!

[kool kitty89]

And if a wonder happens and it is somehow compatible through
hardware, only hardcore collectors/fans would possibly buy it. No
one wants to play old games today except us. And I also don't want
old games on new hardware, the old consoles are perfectly capable
of running and emulation works great on PC.

Umm, you do realize that numerous 3rd parties have genuine hardware clones on the market, right? Plus Tectoy, who never stopped producing Mega Drives. (or SMSs even I think, at least as plug-and play)
Granted the a/v quality is lacking in most cases, and as most (outside tectoy) are nintendo+sega dual clones, they lack native controler ports, but they are real hardware (and without the issues with the NOAC, as most flaws are due to external circuitry, not the ASIC, off colors in video perhaos, if any of the asics have composite video encoding built-in -too strong green in some clones) Soem even have Virtua Racing and SMS compatibility.
Yobo's FC 3 plus has excellent video and audio quality, but lacks Virtua Racing and genesis controller compatibility unfortunately. (but it uses hardware compatibility for SNES, NES and MD/Genesis, no emulation -just a converter to interface NES/SNES controllers with the genesis)

The thing is, real consoles are pretty affordable, though most Model 2s are not the best option for US users. (video cannot be modded with the samsung encoder, and it's the worst compsite) Poor audio can be modded, but is indeed weak stock.

[nathanallan]

kool_kitty89 is absolutely correct, Tec Toy has never stopped making Mega Drives, they even are still making SMS consoles. It's neat how they have kind of "evolved" the platforms, there's even that Guitar Idol console out, as well as many, many others that are really odd.

From what I have read, some of the quality has gone down (I don't have one here in front of me so limited to what I read about them).

But in that part of the world, the Mega Drive is a current gen console!

[N.Saibot]

Umm, you do realize that numerous 3rd parties have genuine hardware clones on the market, right? Plus Tectoy, who never stopped producing Mega Drives. (or SMSs even I think, at least as plug-and play)
Granted the a/v quality is lacking in most cases, and as most (outside tectoy) are nintendo+sega dual clones, they lack native controler ports, but they are real hardware (and without the issues with the NOAC, as most flaws are due to external circuitry, not the ASIC, off colors in video perhaos, if any of the asics have composite video encoding built-in -too strong green in some clones) Soem even have Virtua Racing and SMS compatibility.
Yobo's FC 3 plus has excellent video and audio quality, but lacks Virtua Racing and genesis controller compatibility unfortunately. (but it uses hardware compatibility for SNES, NES and MD/Genesis, no emulation -just a converter to interface NES/SNES controllers with the genesis)

The thing is, real consoles are pretty affordable, though most Model 2s are not the best option for US users. (video cannot be modded with the samsung encoder, and it's the worst compsite) Poor audio can be modded, but is indeed weak stock.

OK, maybe I'm wrong, I was really sure that all those modern
Mega Drives are emulating and having no compatibility through
hardware. But still, they are all worse than the "real deal" and you
actually stated the same thing. I would honestly rather emulate,
than buy a clone with lots of disadvantages and without any choice
for the controller. On a PC I can at least choose the controller I'll be
using and the video quality will be top-notch.

[N.Saibot]

kool_kitty89 is absolutely correct, Tec Toy has never stopped making Mega Drives, they even are still making SMS consoles. It's neat how they have kind of "evolved" the platforms, there's even that Guitar Idol console out, as well as many, many others that are really odd.

From what I have read, some of the quality has gone down (I don't have one here in front of me so limited to what I read about them).

But in that part of the world, the Mega Drive is a current gen console!

You have a very neat part of the world there sir, in my town I can hardly find a Mega Drive or a game for it on the fleamarket!

[kool kitty89]

kool_kitty89 is absolutely correct, Tec Toy has never stopped making Mega Drives, they even are still making SMS consoles. It's neat how they have kind of "evolved" the platforms, there's even that Guitar Idol console out, as well as many, many others that are really odd.

From what I have read, some of the quality has gone down (I don't have one here in front of me so limited to what I read about them).

But in that part of the world, the Mega Drive is a current gen console!

A loot of newer incarnations are cartless plug and play models, and that guitar idol thing must have added hardware to support that on top of the MD ASIC. I think they do still have real cart-compatible MDs and SMSs maybe, but I kind of think the market is so saturated with used systems it's shrunken a bit for that portion. (I do wonder if they have newer model Power Base Converters though, given how rare those are for the official ones in US or Europe even)

OK, maybe I'm wrong, I was really sure that all those modern
Mega Drives are emulating and having no compatibility through
hardware. But still, they are all worse than the "real deal" and you
actually stated the same thing. I would honestly rather emulate,
than buy a clone with lots of disadvantages and without any choice
for the controller. On a PC I can at least choose the controller I'll be
using and the video quality will be top-notch.

No, not the FC3 plus, it onyl has 2 drawbacks, no virtua racing (or 32x/PBC/CD) compatibility, and no native controllers. Video and sound are better than many real stock MD/Genesis models (well for those without RGB), sound especially. The added advantage is it's compatible with SNES and NES too.

Other close tend to be cheaply made, the ASICs normally aren't at fault (maybe if they integrate composite video encoding -not for sound though), I think most are based on the ASIC TECTOY uses. Indeed, some have been able to mod consoles for controller support and better sound I think. (maybe video) and One fo the clones (GenX or GN Twin?) actually works with Virtua Racing, unlike official late model MDs/Genesis (and TECTOY MDs), the Genesis 3 and majesco distributed VA4s are like that I think.

Still, as cheap/plentiful as MDs are in most regions, there's less of a market for clones in general. (indeed, clones tend to be more expensive and mainly desirable for convenience)

You have a very neat part of the world there sir, in my town I can hardly find a Mega Drive or a game for it on the fleamarket!

You're in Germany, so that's Nintendoland, right.
The cheapest stuff in Europe is probably from the UK (Segaland ), that is if you can get good shipping prices.

[nathanallan]

If it were up to me all those S. American consoles would be here, but shipping from there is crazy expensive, adn they'd all have to be modded for NTSC They have a form of PAL that (I am told) most tv sets can use nowadays, but they'd still need a lot of tweaking (again, as I am told).

Plus they're expensive anyway just to buy. A friend told me that there aren't flea markets and things like there are here in the US, they don't run things like that there.

[kool kitty89]

If it were up to me all those S. American consoles would be here, but shipping from there is crazy expensive, adn they'd all have to be modded for NTSC They have a form of PAL that (I am told) most tv sets can use nowadays, but they'd still need a lot of tweaking (again, as I am told).

Plus they're expensive anyway just to buy. A friend told me that there aren't flea markets and things like there are here in the US, they don't run things like that there.

The refreshs rate is the standard 60 Hz (granted most EU PAL sets work fine in 60 Hz as well), it's the color carrier which is different still, so composite video will be colorless. (unless newer TVs work with PAL colorburst) RF is another issue entirely and that would be serious on the MDs with RF only.

Plus the sound is crap anyway (bad mixing circuit) and I think they may have similar incompatitibly as the genesis 3. (at very least no CD port)

[N.Saibot]

...
No, not the FC3 plus, it onyl has 2 drawbacks, no virtua racing (or 32x/PBC/CD) compatibility, and no native controllers. Video and sound are better than many real stock MD/Genesis models (well for those without RGB), sound especially. The added advantage is it's compatible with SNES and NES too.

There are still drawbacks and you named them: no native
controllers, no 32x and no Mega CD. But if it is an almost
real console inside... Guess it's a nice and convenient
thing. But imagine how cool a dedicated emulator PC would be:
plugged into a real TV or a big CRT Monitor through RGB,
added compatibility for like everything that's emulateable at this
point and you can still mod a Saturn or 6-button Mega Drive
controller to work with USB.

...
You're in Germany, so that's Nintendoland, right.
The cheapest stuff in Europe is probably from the UK (Segaland ), that is if you can get good shipping prices.

Right, those bloody Nintendo-lovers are totally going crazy here : P
There is SO much Nintendo stuff on flea markets, like hundreds
of games sometimes, from the NES, to the portables, to SNES and
what not. SNES games are in the majority though.

I am aware of UK, buying from there can be a bit pricey, but it is the
only option you have when you can't find stuff on german ebay. Surprisingly,
the german ebay has quite a good amount of Sega stuff too, not that
much worse than ebay.co.uk.

[kool kitty89]

There are still drawbacks and you named them: no native
controllers, no 32x and no Mega CD. But if it is an almost
real console inside... Guess it's a nice and convenient
thing. But imagine how cool a dedicated emulator PC would be:
plugged into a real TV or a big CRT Monitor through RGB,
added compatibility for like everything that's emulateable at this
point and you can still mod a Saturn or 6-button Mega Drive
controller to work with USB.

There are some subtles (or not so subtle depending on how detail oriented you ar) differences between clones and emulation, one big one being interlaced display from a PC (or modded xbox etc) rather than the 240p of the original for most things, but also some other peculiarities in resolution and pixel aspect ratio as well as color saturation and such.
Of course, if you use a HDTV for output with VGA or DVI from a PC, you get a perfect emulator immage, no artifacts from down converting to standard definition. (or issues with a real console on many HDTVs with deinterlacing especially)

The genesis 3 (and final, majesco distributed model 2s) have similar incompatibility (stock) as most clones, actually more as at least one close supports virtua racing, but they do fully support the original controllers, have good video and sound. (except mono only on the Gennesis 3)
The clones are indeed real MDs inside, well it's cloned hardware on a chip, but it's still th ereal hardware (sega even had the main hardware on a single chip by the final MD2s and all model 3s). Again, I think most are based on the chip TECTOY uses and also seem to share the poor external audio circuitry as the TECTOY MDs. (at least tectoy uses real controllers stock -as would clones if there were any newer, dedicated genesis -or genesis+SMS clones -the latter should be a lot simpler than SNES+NES clones as the MD ASIC supports SMS compatibility already)

It would certainly be interesting to see a dual Master System+MD clone consoel with 2 cartridge slots. Obviously the market would be fairly small in North America alone, but it would make sense in Europe at least.