Greed and all that

[kyuusaku]

The main reasons why Flash Carts aren't popular as of yet is that... oh, you already know. Greed and all that

Yea! bunnyboy is soooo greedy selling the PowerPak for $135! He's singlehandedly holding back Nesdev because emulators aren't free or accurate enough for all the high performance free homebrew in development, not to mention loading a ROM is so much slower than exchanging memory cards. I mean, he's already had a monopoly for two years and might even be able to pay bills with the income--ridiculous! By now it seems only fair for PowerPak to be distributed pro bono to us hard-working NES-lovers!

[Mike]

Yea! bunnyboy is soooo greedy selling the PowerPak for $135! He's singlehandedly holding back Nesdev because emulators aren't free or accurate enough for all the high performance free homebrew in development, not to mention loading a ROM is so much slower than exchanging memory cards. I mean, he's already had a monopoly for two years and might even be able to pay bills with the income--ridiculous! By now it seems only fair for PowerPak to be distributed pro bono to us hard-working NES-lovers!

If that's how you feel chap... Personally, I disagree with you.

[Jeroen]

The main reasons why Flash Carts aren't popular as of yet is that... oh, you already know. Greed and all that

Yea! bunnyboy is soooo greedy selling the PowerPak for $135! He's singlehandedly holding back Nesdev because emulators aren't free or accurate enough for all the high performance free homebrew in development, not to mention loading a ROM is so much slower than exchanging memory cards. I mean, he's already had a monopoly for two years and might even be able to pay bills with the income--ridiculous! By now it seems only fair for PowerPak to be distributed pro bono to us hard-working NES-lovers!

Last time I checked he hasnt turned a profit on the powerpak yet. Also you know how much those things cost to produce?

[Mike]

I agree with ya Jero.

Don't know exactly what that kyuu fellow was all on about.. Somehow he drew a correlation between this thread and said PowerPak... Probably a slip of some sort. Well I forgive him.. I'm sure we all can.

Speaking of the PowerPak now.. Last I heard they were out of production?

Is that true?

If so, it doesn't take a genius to see that making the schematics available would be beneficial to all parties.

[kyuusaku]

Mike & Jeroen: notice any sonic booms over your heads?

Mike: to reiterate, schematics are useless with programmable devices such as CPLD and MCU, you additionally need at least the fusemaps and firmware, and for any sort of educational value, source. If you can't come up with a schematic, you probably aren't coming up with a design/program to put into the devices. Regardless, anyone who understands the basics of computer buses can pull apart a discrete mapper game using pinouts published on sites such as this one. In another thread you were also pointed to the FunkyFlash project which contains schematics *and* mapper designs to a fully functional flash cart and you're still going on about the lack of free options; there's nothing stopping anyone from making a flash cart except their self.

And PowerPaks are in stock.

[Jeroen]

Not sure what you mean with "sonic boombs over my head" but can we split this please? It'd be a waste to let this thread be closed.

[Mike]

kyuusaku, it appears as if you've misinterpreted almost every post I've made on the topic and warped it into being some sort of attack on you or something.. I don't really know what's going on inside your head on that, but searching through my posts I've not seen myself "go on about lack of free options"..

It's okay. I forgive you.


There's an olive branch here.. see it? It's an old symbol for peace.. How about you take it? I'm handing it to you... see me handing it to you? Here it is..

*Hands you the olive branch, and cracks open a couple cold beers for everyone in the room*


Awhhh yeah.. I feel so much better now.

[kathaku]

If I could produce one of my UNES devices for as cheap as a powerpak, let alone get custom housing for the thing (how did he go about doing that anyway?) I know I'd be somewhere else. I am personally envious of the powerpak's ability to remain so cheap (being a relative term, I know $135 seemed like a lot more when I first found out about it).

It is true though, a schematic is almost nothing without the firmware for it. That in mind, designing my project would have been a lot easier if more schematics of anything were available. BTW I'm gonna be posting mine sometime soon.

[kyuusaku]

kyuusaku, it appears as if you've misinterpreted almost every post I've made on the topic and warped it into being some sort of attack on you or something..

I'm sorry you believe I've taken it that way because none of your posts have directly involved me and that's not what I meant to communicate. My comments are just responses to your comments (my opinion on your opinion), nothing personal, olive branch taken. I don't dislike you or something, I quite like your demeanor, and don't take this as a personal attack, but in a short time you have:

-asked for plans to build the PowerPak, with a signature implying the "NES scene" (Nesdev?) would benefit from an open source flash cart
-commented that more widespread flash carts would rejuvenate the NES' popularity (in a positive tone)
-commented that flash carts "aren't popular", because of greed
-praised kathaku for making the schematics to his device available (did he offer before your comment?)
-shown enthusiasm over the schematics (which I didn't believe you understood are not usable without firmware)
-expressed interest in an Instructable citing it would increase the number of people capable of working on Nesdev
-quite plainly expressed that free schematics are "beneficial to all parties"

To me that qualifies as "going on about" free (in the open source sense of the word) options.

(Warning: run-on) and the only reason it irks me is because you have made it clear you're all about open source flash carts, and you claim indirectly/by default that (the high cost or propriety of?) the PowerPak is greedy, yet it doesn't sound like you're going to be heading up your own "people's flash cart" (though you've been pointed to FunkyFlash and are on a site with all the necessary NES-specific resources available). Instead, and I could very well be wrong, it just sounds like you want other people to release their projects with the hope that that a saturated market would yield a less expensive device for you and people which might develop free NES software for you to play... Not that there'd be anything wrong with that, but it's hypocritical to criticize capitalist flash carts as they quite similarly look after their own interests and in the PowerPak's case, pretty humbly.

[Mike]

I fail to see in my posts, myself ever mentioning said PowerPak as greedy, lol

According to a search... The first time I mentioned the device, was, well, yesterday, in this thread, replying to a post by Jeroen!

As for the ideal of schematics needing firmware for programming, etcetera.. I'm well aware, and always have been. That's what our electronics laboratory back here is for. No need to worry, friend, it's covered.

But alas, I am always a supporter of Instructables and How-Tos and MAKE and the like. Why? Seeing how other people have achieved the results your after, well, it gives you the opportunity to improve on their designs! Call it open source design, call it part of the scientific method... I call it Fun!

As for market saturation... Nahh. I have no interest in anything like that. Given schematics, etc, I probably wouldn't even build one! But I sure would try to improve on the design. It's what I do... It's what's fun

So, in closing, thanks for accepting the digital olive branch! I'm glad we've avoided a flame war. Haven't been in one of those since I was, oh, around 13 or so? Well it was more than a decade ago.. Maybe 94 or 96.

I think it's safe to say we can close this topic now. I have lunch to eat!

-Mike, hero to the people

[kyuusaku]

I fail to see in my posts, myself ever mentioning said PowerPak as greedy, lol :D

I said by default meaning you didn't specifically say PowerPak but since it's the only "flash cart" of it's kind, I don't know what else you could be referring to as "greedy".

[MottZilla]

He's got you there. PowerPAK is to my knowledge the only available NES flash cartridge so you clearly made that comment about it as there is no other target out there. When I first heard about the PowerPAK I thought it sounded awesome. But when I heard what it cost I had to think about it, for about a minute. But then I realized that 135$ to me was a bargin considering all it could do for me. While I can see how some people will pass on the PowerPAK due to its cost, it's not for everyone really. But if it's worth it to you and you want it I don't believe it is that out of reach to most people that may want it.

The PowerPAK I'm sure has encouraged alot of people to look into the NES again. There's just something special about using the actual hardware opposed to an emulator.

[Mike]

Haha it's all good mate

[Banshaku]

While I can see how some people will pass on the PowerPAK due to its cost, it's not for everyone really. But if it's worth it to you and you want it I don't believe it is that out of reach to most people that may want it.

If you really think about it, it's not that much out of reach: it just the price of ~2 PS3/XBOX360 games (in japan) so it's not that expensive (unless you're a student with no income which is another story).

Just Biohazard 5 + Street Figther IV combined together are more than a powerpak so..

Edit: I few extra confirmation for origin of cost.

[Jon]

I bought one. Compared to what I spent on my first 6 NES games in the late 80s it's cheap. And as a programmer I spend a lot of money on books and tools. $135 is still not that much compared to many books most programmers end up buying. (It's only April and I've bought 8 books already this year). Putting sockets on a donor cart or getting a new empty cart is still pretty expensive when you consider you'll want to get an UV eraser (easily $30) and ample supply of EPROMs (easily $20) and the programmer (which at the cheapest is about $60). Going the route of not buying a PowerPak but still using the real hardware to verify your code I suspect will run around $110 unless you're a particularly adept scavenger.

As a professional embedded developer, $135 is cheap compared to the price of a JTAG bdm/ice/debugger/programmer that I normally have to get for doing similar work. (not that the NES has JTAG, too bad). It's a very small price compared to a good digital oscope(I still need one), and it wouldn't even cover the cables for a proper logic analyzer, let alone the LA itself.

My regret with the PowerPak is that it is not compatible with the NES clones(I like my retro duo's SNES controller ports). And that it's not available in a Famicom version. It would have been interesting to use it on one of those cheap famicom computers with the keyboard being sold in Asia and India. Speaking of which, anyone know how it works, is it done through the normal controller port. It would be nice to build a keyboard for the NES (and mouse, but just duplicate the SNES mouse protocol).

If you don't have a couple hundred bucks to spend on a NES development hobby, then you'll have to make due with the emulators only and test a bunch of different ones to have at least some confidence in compatibility. Compared to hobbies like RC airplanes, bicycling, boating, gardening, etc it's cheaper. Although it doesn't give you an excuse to go outside. So perhaps the PowerPak 2 ought to be wind powered or at least have pedals and a generator to justify it's "high price". It's almost 1/2 of the price of a cheap Chinese-made mountain bike, so expensive. But infinitely better quality.