Wanting to buy a turbografx, need some pointers please!

[marurun]

I had that everything for a number of years. Good stuff.

I love that your example has the black US drive, the white briefcase, and the gray Core. Talk about a crazy, mixed-up console.

[Breetai]

I love that your example has the black US drive, the white briefcase, and the gray Core. Talk about a crazy, mixed-up console.

He has a good sense of humour.

Best part is that it all works!

[marurun]

Of course. The color isn't what makes it all compatible!

[Thierry Henry]

A question regarding the SuperGrafx,
To hook it up to a Super CD-ROM2 unit would I need two power supplies to make the whole thing work, or could it function in a similar manner to let's say a CoreGrafx when paired with the CD-ROM2 unit using that short power jumper cable?



Edit: nevermind, I found my solution for $6.99 over at retrogamecave.

[BurningDoom]

I wonder if an RAU-30 would work...

What is the "Interface Unit"?

[Breetai]

I wonder if an RAU-30 would work...

What is the "Interface Unit"?

It is what connects the CD-ROM to the PC Engine. On the Sega CD, it's built right in. On the PC Engine/Turbografx, the CD-ROM can actually function as a stand-alone CD player. You can literally plug an AC adapter into it, hook it up to an amp or headphones, and use it like a music CD player. The idea I think NEC/Hudson was going for was versatility. One nice thing about it that Sega missed the boat on... the combo unit only used one AC adapter.

The Turbografx-16/Turbo-CD setup also uses an IFU. I just mixed and matched the TG-16 to the Japanese IFU to be silly. It doesn't actually work.


As for the Super Grafx/Super CD-ROM2 combo that Thierry asked about above, the patch cable that lets you just use one AC adapter with the system does not work with the Super Grafx. You DO need two AC adapters for that set-up... unless you make a hack for it, like Retrogamecave did.

[BurningDoom]

I wonder if an RAU-30 would work...

What is the "Interface Unit"?

It is what connects the CD-ROM to the PC Engine. On the Sega CD, it's built right in. On the PC Engine/Turbografx, the CD-ROM can actually function as a stand-alone CD player. You can literally plug an AC adapter into it, hook it up to an amp or headphones, and use it like a music CD player. The idea I think NEC/Hudson was going for was versatility. One nice thing about it that Sega missed the boat on... the combo unit only used one AC adapter.

The Turbografx-16/Turbo-CD setup also uses an IFU. I just mixed and matched the TG-16 to the Japanese IFU to be silly. It doesn't actually work.


As for the Super Grafx/Super CD-ROM2 combo that Thierry asked about above, the patch cable that lets you just use one AC adapter with the system does not work with the Super Grafx. You DO need two AC adapters for that set-up... unless you make a hack for it, like Retrogamecave did.

So you have to have the Interface Unit to actually use a Turbo-CD as a gaming system? Plus the system card? Wow, that's must be an expensive unit, complete.

[Hobie-wan]

So you have to have the Interface Unit to actually use a Turbo-CD as a gaming system? Plus the system card? Wow, that's must be an expensive unit, complete.

Well you got an interface unit with the CD bit when you bought it in the store, as well as a system card. They were vastly different shapes here and in Japan. Though for later games you needed the later system cards that had more memory and whatnot in them. In Japan, there were 4 (well kinda 5ish) system cards. In the US we only got the 2nd and 3rd one.

But yes, this is why getting a Duo is much simpler. You get the card and CD game bits all integrated with a built in system 3 card. If you have a US one, that lets you play all US released games. With a Japanese system you can play everything but Arcade and Supergrafx games with a Duo. An Arcade Duo card (the 4th one) will cover you for everything but Supergrafx games. There was an Arcade Pro card that you used instead if you had a PCE with CD unit, this is the other 4th card.

[Breetai]

So you have to have the Interface Unit to actually use a Turbo-CD as a gaming system? Plus the system card? Wow, that's must be an expensive unit, complete.

Well you got an interface unit with the CD bit when you bought it in the store, as well as a system card. They were vastly different shapes here and in Japan. Though for later games you needed the later system cards that had more memory and whatnot in them. In Japan, there were 4 (well kinda 5ish) system cards. In the US we only got the 2nd and 3rd one.

But yes, this is why getting a Duo is much simpler. You get the card and CD game bits all integrated with a built in system 3 card. If you have a US one, that lets you play all US released games. With a Japanese system you can play everything but Arcade and Supergrafx games with a Duo. An Arcade Duo card (the 4th one) will cover you for everything but Supergrafx games. There was an Arcade Pro card that you used instead if you had a PCE with CD unit, this is the other 4th card.

I love how confusing this all is to anyone who isn't into the PCE/TG. I feel all smart or something.

Here BurningDoom, I did some work in MS Paint for you (and anyone else who is understandably confused):



(actually that is an Arcade Card Pro in my PC Engine above, but whatever)

In the US, the released systems were the:
-Turbografx-16 (RF out only. An upgrade module for AV was available)
-Turbografx-CD add-on (which includes the IFU of course, and the System 2.0 Card (called the System Card))
-Turboduo (combo cartridge/CD unit with the Super System Card 3.0 upgrade built-in)
-Turbo Express (handheld TG-16. No, you cannot attach the CD unit)

System BIOS Cards (they are backwards compatible):
-System Card (aka. System 2.0/2.1) -had 64K of RAM
-Super System Card upgrade (aka. System 3.0/3.1) -this added 192KB of RAM for 256KB total


In Japan:
-PC Engine (RF only)
-PC Engine Core Grafx (same thing but with AV-out and a different colour scheme)
-PC Engine Core Grafx II (same thing as the Core Grafx, but with a different colour scheme)
-PC Engine Shuttle (same thing as Core Grafx, but looks way different and has no CD-ROM connector)
-PC Engine GT (same as the Turbo Express; a handheld PC Engine)
-PC Engine LT (sort of like a GT, but with a flip-top screen like the GBA SP. It can only be powered with an AC adapter. You CAN hook it up to a CD-ROM!)
-PC Engine Super Grafx (upgraded PC Engine with more RAM and other improvements. Only 7 games took advantage of this; 5 of which ONLY work on this unit).
-PC Engine CD-ROM2 add-on (came with the IFU or sold seperately. It also came with the System Card 1.0, I believe). You need a special attachment to get this to hook up to the Super Grafx or LT.
-PC Engine Super CD-ROM2 add-on (same as above, but had the Super System Card 3.0 upgrade built-in and looks completely different than the original unit. Matches the Core Grafx II colour scheme)
-PC Engine Duo (combo cartridge/CD unit with the Super System Card 3.0 upgrade built-in)
-PC Engine Duo-R (same as the Duo, but looks different and lacks a headphone jack)
-PC Engine Duo-RX (same as the Duo-R, but has a slightly different colour scheme and comes with a 6-button controller instead of the standard 2-button)

System BIOS Cards:
-System 1.0 -had 64K of RAM. Basically useless except it is required for Altered Beast CD. Just get the cartridge version of Altered Beast if you really want it.
-System 2.0 -updated the system BIOS
-System 2.1 -slightly updated the system BIOS again. If you have the 2.0, you probably won't notice a difference.
-Super System 3.0 -had 256KB (1.5MEG) of RAM total. GET AT LEAST THIS!!!!!
-Arcade Card Pro -added over 2MB (17.5MEG) of RAM. Only a few later releases used this. Sapphire is the most well known. All the Neo Geo fighter ports used this as well, and blow away their SNES/Genesis counterparts. The video quality with this blows away anything on the Sega CD.
-Arcade Card Duo -added 2MB (16MEG) of RAM. Can only be used on the Duo line of systems and the Super CD-ROM2 add-on, as they already had 256KB (1.5MB) RAM built in. The Arcade Card Pro also works on these systems, so this would be a useless card if it wasn't much cheaper than the Pro.


All CD games are region-free. Cartridge games are region locked (and Arcade CD games as a result, as the Arcade Card/cartridge is required for them). There are converters (all expensive) available to play PC Engine games on a Turbografx, but not the other way around.



I know it's a lot, but hopefully that makes things much less confusing. You can also check this page out: http://pcenginefx.com/main/nec_compatibility_guide.html.

[Thierry Henry]

^^
Excellent write-up/guide! Very useful for all the "but what does this do?" and "is that compatible with that?" etc etc type questions.

One thing I wasn't quite sure of was that the Arcade Card Pro also worked on the systems that had the Super System Card 3.0 upgrade built-in. I initially had thought only the Arcade Card Duo could do that job.



The PC Engine line of systems and add-ons,

Mix and match, mix and match, mix and match...............