PC Engine II - GamePro Rumors Column

[jlued686]

I didn't find anything in the search for this, but I thought this was a pretty funny article. I hadn't heard this rumor before, but I'm sure some experts on here probably know all about it. My question is: what if NEC had released something like what GamePro describes below; a 32-bit cart-based console that was backwards compatible with the PC Engine? Sounds like horseshit to me, but again, maybe you guys had heard this before.

[SignOfZeta]

"10 MHz"

Such specific details in a wall of bullshit.

[elmer]

Such specific details in a wall of bullshit.

It sounds like a garbled description of Hudson's Iron Man board.

IIRC, we do know that the Iron Man board used a custom Hudson processor that got replaced by the NEC V810 in the shipping PC-FX ... so a 10MHz 32-bit 6280-compatible CPU sounds somewhat plausible.

The WDC 65816 (in the SNES) showed one way of expanding on the basic 6502/6280 instruction set.

Even the 10MHz bit sounds plausible as half the 21MHz clock frequency in the PCE/PC-FX.

OTOH ... it really does sounds like he had nothing to write about that month, so he just went down to the local bar and started drinking until "inspiration" hit.

He must have drunk a few before writing "The existing Genesis by comparison has a 24-bit graphics processor and no sprite processor." ... that certainly doesn't sound anything like the Sega Genesis that I worked on!

jlued686: Thanks for posting the page, that was fun to read. 

[jlued686]

Glad you enjoyed it.

The most curious part of that "rumor" to me was the claim that it would be a cart-based console. Was there ever any indication that the PC Engine's successor would run anything other than CD-ROMs? If this article said the "PC Engine II" would be backwards compatible with PC Engine CD games, that would've been more conceivable. But to have Genesis-sized carts and a slot for HuCards? That just sounds...absurd. Am I wrong?

[elmer]

Was there ever any indication that the PC Engine's successor would run anything other than CD-ROMs?

This was written in 1991. CD-R technology was very new, and burners cost approx $30,000.

Hudson's Iron Man demo board (that they were hoping to interest a manufacturer in buying) was probably running on a cartridge for early development. I'd bet that that's what the writer is referring to.

[SignOfZeta]

Yeah, they would have used a basic ROM or one of those huge CD-ROM emulator things. Also, CD-ROM was still considered more "optional extra" than a default game format so that's the mindset in which this was written. It was also right around this time that the PCE was changing all that. 1991 was maybe the last good year for HuCARDs before CDs took over.

I'm curious. What's an average clock speed from a general use 32-bit CPU in 1991? I couldn't actually think of any myself...

[NecroPhile]

Thanks for sharing this silly article; methinks the author might've been drunk when he wrote it.

As for the 'genny sized carts', that doesn't sound very plausible.  I'd believe dual format with cd and larger carts that still used the original huey slot, but no way they'd do two different cart slots and no discs.

[OldMan]

This was written in 1991. CD-R technology was very new, and burners cost approx $30,000.

Uh, no. My first burner (a 1x ricoh) was about $500. Throw in the scsi card needed to run it at another $200. Heck, Throw in the pc, too, at $2500.

Still less than $10,00. MAYBE total, $5000-6000.
If you already had the pc, less than $1000 more.

[elmer]

This was written in 1991. CD-R technology was very new, and burners cost approx $30,000.

Uh, no. My first burner (a 1x ricoh) was about $500. Throw in the scsi card needed to run it at another $200. Heck, Throw in the pc, too, at $2500.

Still less than $10,00. MAYBE total, $5000-6000.
If you already had the pc, less than $1000 more.

I think that you may be thinking of a few years later, as prices really plummeted fast in the early 1990s.

Wikipedia states that a CD-R burner was $35,000 in 1990, and $10,000-$12,000 in 1992.

The first sub-$1,000 CD-R wasn't until 1995.

The advert that I posted in this thread ...
https://www.pcengine-fx.com/forums/index.php?topic=20873.msg455229#msg455229

... shows that a 2x CDROM was costing $800-$1100 in June 1990.

[elmer]

I'm curious. What's an average clock speed from a general use 32-bit CPU in 1991? I couldn't actually think of any myself...

Well, the 68040 was released in 1991 with a 20MHz-40MHz, and the 80486DX-50MHz also came out in 1991.

But those were high-end chips, and way too expensive for cheap consumer-electronics consoles.

The 68000 came out in 1979 with an 8MHz clock speed, and it didn't hit home computers until 1984, and was still used in the Genesis at the same clock speed in 1989.

In 1991 the Sharp X68000 XVI was released with a 68000 running at 16MHz.

Move forward to 1992 and you get the Amiga 1200 running an 8-year-old 68020 at 14MHz, or the Atari Falcon running a 68030 at 16MHz.

10MHz sounds slow ... but if it was a pipelined architecture running at 2-or-3 clock cycles per 32-bit instruction (i.e. like a 6502), it could still have beaten the heck out of a much-faster 68000 (that can take dozens of cycles on an instruction).

And the other thing ... sprite-and-background based consoles really don't do a lot of processing on the CPU.

It's not until you get to the 3D-generation that processors needed to be really fast with lots of math.

[SamIAm]

I wish I could find it, but once I read an interview with the guy who ported Ultima VI to the FM-Towns in 1990, and he said that whenever they felt they really needed to test a build via a real CD, he actually headed to a local CD pressing plant and had them make up a glass master for him. I'm not sure if it's because burners weren't available during that particular month, or because they were just too expensive for him. This was not a Japanese dev, by the way.

[OldMan]

I think that you may be thinking of a few years later,

Ok, my bad. Just asked the nephew to verify, and he says he was in middle school (7-9 grade). Sine he was born in 81, that would make it 93-94.
Do remember it was a first home model burner. I got it to make mix cd's for an ex. The XMas before, I got her a cd player, but she had nothing to listen to (except the beatles white album and pink floyd dark side)

[Arkhan Asylum]

It always cracked me up how Amiga had a faster CPU than a PCE, but the games all sucked.

[Groover]

I'm surprised they thought the game where to come out on anything but a CD.

[Artabasdos]

The Sega rumours are retarded. 64 channel sound? The Saturn only had 32 ffs, and it had the best sound chip of its generation. In 1991 most PC only had 256 colours at best, and VGA was as expensive as hell AFAIK.