Hey, everyone. I want to make something very clear in case there's some confusion. This is NOT an Installation Service only product. This is absolutely a DIY product that will be sold as a DIY product. Please understand, there are over 15 variations of the SNES mainboard that all require documentation. I'm writing documentation while receiving consoles so that I can cover everything that you, the DIY installer, will need to know. This isn't easy and it takes a lot of time and a great deal of labor. I can't answer "where does X wire go" 5,000 times, but I can answer it once in the documentation and that is precisely why I must gather data for installations, first. I hope that clears up any confusion. Otherwise, enjoy!
Take your time man! My 2-Chip Super Famicom is waiting, but waiting patiently. You are doing a great service to the retro community, so take a breather and work at your own pace 🙏
Thanks very much Tito for covering the SNES Edge-Enhancer. It was a labor of love and I'm excited for everyone who wants one to get one! This kit will absolutely be available as DIY, soon!
Just out of curiosity, is an "epoxy-less" release of the kit in the cards for the far future? Understandably the current concealment is to make sure the correct creator of the solution gets credited.
Pixel artists from the 90's: let's build our assets so the colors smear on the screen and everything looks rounded and colorful. Modders in 2024: let's "FIX" it
Trust me kids - NONE of us noticed as kids in the early 90s. SNES was a GODSEND to us. You've no idea. Of course, we got ours around 1993, so maybe it was a 1 chip. We had NO concept of that back then though. We were on our bellies sprawled out in front of Super Mario World in the dark all night long with the sound low so our parents didn't wake up. We only knew THAT? THAT was awesome.
lol, I came to verify there was a sane person like you in the comments. We all had like 486x440 resolution on that 4:3 aspect ratio tube tv and we ran RF converters tuned to channel 3 so we could interrupt the video signal...we did not care about or notice that minor change. I think we're old enough to know emulators are far better than the SNES we had and we already have fond memories of the hardware as kids so most of us are good with a clone of the remote on a computer these days and people paying hundreds/thousands for original consoles and modding them often are the ones that never used them in the 90's imo
Sometimes its just because of the CRT effects. Im playing on the Snes Mini Classic and if I put the CRT filter to imitate the CRT effects, the retro feeling is way better.
Yeah. The resolution sucked and everything was designed with the blurriness in mind. We don't need sharpness from our 1991 tech, the blurriness hides the imperfections in the raw data. It also allows for subtle effects when certain colors are next to each other that don't happen if you turn up the sharpness
in the Mario All-Stars title screen comparison, you can actually see where Nintendo used lighter colors around Mario's outline to counteract the black smearing. That's so wild.
I mean. it Makes sense honestly. Means they were very in tune with the system itself and how it looked on the most common configurations of consoles + displays. I applaud that actually.
That was one of the first things I noticed too! I thought it might have been reverse ghosting or over-correction, but this explanation makes much more sense.
Speaking of which, who says that the original 2chip output was "faulty" or "poor quality"? What if they designed it that way on purpose? Do we have some sources or is it just something that people assume because "sharp pixels" are fashionable today (while back in the days they were considered undesirable and developers did all they could to hide them)? After all, the 1chip was a cost cutting measure, it's not outside of the realm of possibilities to think that a simplified output was part of the corners cut.
@@kaisersoymilk6912 The original console was designed around CRT TVs, which by their nature also produced some level of smearing/bleed between strongly contrasting areas. I think there's an argument to be made that improving the output quality/sharpness with a mod like this makes sense given that almost all people playing the SNES today are doing so on an LCD screen. On the other hand, leaving the more blurry image is, in a way, adding a little bit of CRT flavor to your LCD image.
not just you. Cranking up the sharpness ruins a great deal of work on Nintendo's part to make the game render a good looking image on period equipment. The picture just breaks down into a mess of colored squares.
One of the things I appreciate so much about your videos is your professionalism! Even when you make mistakes, you don't edit them out, you own up to it, explain what happened and even tell WHY the correct way is the better way. Love the videos!!
I found out not long ago that my GameCube is a first edition, with the proprietary digital output (revised models removed this port). It was right in front of me all those years when I played it regularly, and I was oblivious to it. It won't be long now until I finally get to make use of the port!
@@razeezarMy Gamecube is early enough to have that higher quality output, but the component cables are super expensive and rare because not very many people bothered to get them back when they were available, and I think you had to buy them from Nintendo (and they had a proprietary chip inside so third parties couldn't make cheaper ones).
This sharpness problem isn't so bad if you think back to the 90s when people only used tube TVs. I honestly wouldn't waste my time making a modification like this if I still had my SNES.
I mean my SNES was connected by RF and later composite. Edge enhancing was definitely not our concern back then. I think it's cool this exist for the enthusiast but I personally like my sprites blurred for retro games.
I really appreciate how you include the little mistakes like accidentally knocking off the resistor, and initially using the wrong wires. Stuff like that always happens during projects, and this makes the installations you outline feel a little more attainable, seeing that everybody makes little mistakes like that, and getting to watch you quickly resolve them and move on. Thanks!
I won't lie, the name "Edge Enhancer" made me recoil in horror. It just brings to mind cranked sharpness controls and their halos. Glad to see that's not an issue though
Same. I feel like SNES Video Enhancer might be more accurate, but Edge Enhancer is certainly catchier... and maybe SNES Video Enhancer sounds too vague or generic?
1st time here thanks to the algorithm. Great topic, video quality, editing and script. Now, I can at least figure out how to reassemble my SNES which is a 2-chip model. Hitting the sub button now!
Fixed? The problem was that we all moved away from CRT televisions in the 2000's! This is a cool mod for todays screens but no one thought anything was broken while we played our SNES games in front of our CRT TVs back in the 90's 😂
CRTs have advantages but in this case they were just masking the problem, especially with original RF or composite video. Heck if you play these side by side on a CRT the modded version will still look better. Late gen CRTs in particular had nice sharp pictures that exposed muddy output for what it was.
@@AlexvrbX Sure! Someone literally just posted on my channel on a video I made about how to identify 1chips saying that if you need to take yours apart to see the difference then there isn't one so I had to explain it lmao So I agree with you that there is a difference and that's cool to see (not hating on the mod). My statement was about the title of this video. It's super click baity. Nothing was broken! It's just how things were! And we were happy because it was all about having fun and playing the games we loved. We're in the land of diminishing returns here. Getting close to perfect I guess, and that's cool but I grew up playing these games on consumer CRTs and not PVMs. Not on flat panels. A well built cable and any sort of CRT is enough to give me the nostalgic feels. And it's awesome that way. There's nothing like sitting down with that set up with a friend and falling into a game. 😄
@@JeremyKingTech I meeaaann... I kinda agree with you but they're not wrong either. They ARE fixing a FLAW with the 2 chip setup that isn't present on the 1 chip. Sort of like how there are multiple revisions of the Genesis boards, and some have issues with the audio subsystem, or so-so video output. Most of the model 1's are solid, but many of the model 2's have iffy sound. I've got a semi-rare model 2 VA4 that's pretty great. Similarly there's an audio mod board that "fixes" flawed Genesis units audio in a similar vein to this mod "fixing" common SNES video output. I understand your "this is just how it was" stance but the presence of fixed units without the flaw suggests that neither Nintendo nor Sega intentionally did things that way, but rather there was a design flaw, and sometimes it isnt worth the delay or the engineering effort to fix it before the next major revision... So basically they say "good enough" and move on. That said no, it didn't ruin the experience.
@@AlexvrbX Yeah fair enough. You make great points. It's just a strange framing that seems sensational to me to be like "the SNES was a broken console but now this person did what Nintendidn't until they did with the 1Chip". So it comes across as click baity to me. It seemed more like an issue of tolerances (electrically speaking) - Nintendo certainly didn't release the first waves of SNES in a state that they deemed broken. It was within design spec and when they worked on new variants due to changes in manufacturing they tuned them up more while using new and less parts (like they do with all subsequent console/handheld iterations). My stance doesn't invalidate this mod. It's awesome that it exists! And again, you make valid points. I'm just resisting the framing that the SNES was broken and needed fixing. Next to no one outside of maybe electrical engineers with OCD and high end PVMs were aware of stuff like this back then.
@@JeremyKingTech I see what you mean. Yeah it's definitely not a "faulty console", but none of them are perfect... And as with many consoles, some revisions are better than others!
The whole point of this mod is for people who want to use CRT TVs, none of which even have HDMI. If you wanna use a CRT TV, you need to use RGB or S-Video, which means you can't use the HDMI mods. using a CRT TV makes the pixels look way better than flatscreen TVs, as the lower resolution and imperfect nature of the beams of light cause the pixels to blend in a natural way that you can't replicate with software. Emulators and other things have tried things like scanlines but they still haven't managed to get the look "right".
@@Dhalin While I think it can be and seems true in some cases that CRTs were intended and helped provide some sort of positive effects on graphics, I do think that sometimes the opinions on them can be overblown and that filters should be able to handle most aspects. CRTs come with too many blatant imperfections that only hurt image quality for me to consider them a good choice outside of, maybe, PVMs.
@@LanceThumping Have you ever actually _used_ a CRT display to play a SNES on at all? It really is one of those "don't knock it until you try it" type things. Now, granted, later consoles like the PS2 would come out and CRTs started becoming cumbersome because they would use tiny fonts that would be hard to read (Xenosaga 2 comes to mind), but in the SNES days? It really did look better on a CRT. The console and its games were designed with those "imperfections" in mind.
@@Dhalin Probably, yes. Definitely a Genesis at some point but I'll admit most of my CRT gaming was N64 onward. My gut still leans towards CRTs mostly being not worth it and it'd be better to focus effort on fine tuning shaders/filters to get all the benefits without the downsides.
Been waiting for Voultar to realease this for over a year. I'm ready to provide whatever info (and money) he needs of my childhood day 1 SNES to get the correct mod from him
Mate you gotta stop saying "Cons: there aren't any" you could have taken the time to explan the extremely minor smearing which brings this mod to close to, but not exactly the same shapenss as on chip consoles. MLIG did a detailed analysis wich you could have linked to.
For the people not owning soldering equipment: in many cities are repair cafés or tech hobby meetups that provide equipment and there are many nice people that gladly help people new to the hobby.
I always thought that the blurriness was part of the appeal... It's what made me interested in Retro Consoles in the first place. Sure, emulators have pixel perfect rendering on beautiful modern displays, but these games weren't made for pixel perfect at all, and the blur often softened the jagged edges and flat colors of 8-bit and 16-bit consoles. Honestly, I'd say I prefer the unmodded version in every example shown here. And yeah, you could say that it's a visual glitch and it's "technically" incorrect, but even seeing the examples here, it's clear that the developers were aware of it and worked with or around it to get the results they wanted.
@@charn00h The problem with pixel perfect on modern displays is that the graphics weren't designed to work that way when you get to the 16-bit era. The designers even made use of the scan lines in CRT TVs when designing sprites. If you only have a modern Nintendo like the Switch, play the original Donkey Kong Country and then turn on the simulated scan lines to see the difference. For an even better comparison, play Donkey Kong Country with a real SNES on a CRT TV and then on an emulator with a modern display. The original way is one of the best-looking games on the SNES. Pixel perfect on a modern display makes it one of the ugliest games on the system. It looks shockingly bad.
It's just retro enthusiasts seeking pixel perfection, it goes very parallel along the lines of audiophiles, but only to the point it is making a perceivable change.. since you can actually SEE it did indeed alter something(usually). I'm sure to some speedrunners the 'blur' at pixel edges becomes a limiting factor of if they can pull off some of their crazy pixel alignment strats, so the added clarity and sharpness is probably doing something for them at the very least.
It was made for analog displays, and this is completely unnecessary IMO. But plenty of gamers today never lived in the analog tv era, and to someone who's used to seeing razor-sharp digital pixels, it looks inferior... so they might say yes.
Buying a 1 chip pre modded now would be more convenient than sending in yours and waiting for this one though. He should offer the mod separately to start off with as to not lose potential sales at the beginning.
@@Voultar Is this kit compatible with a Super Famicom 2 chip? I recapped mine and it's similar enough with a SNES that the capacitor kit was interchangeable.
Mike Moffitt has had a board out for quite a bit now that works perfectly, so this is not the first solution. Installation is less involved and it is also fairly cheap.
I mean, how clean the Edge Enhancer video looks is amazing. However, games of this day and age were often designed with those quirks (such as the PPU adding smearing) in mind. That's why old CRTs give us amazing visual clarity on old consoles that HDTVs just can't -- CRTs had some smearing as a result of the electron gun itself, and some old games (such as Castlevania: SotN) did design pixel art with this in mind.
@@atomicskull6405 Console games weren't meant to be played on monitors. All you need to get a perfect picture from any retroconsole is an RGB cable and a good consumer TV (possibly a Trinitron).
Retro Video enchantment for the rich: RGB Video modding community Retro Video enchantment for the based: Composite on the biggest CRT you can get with a high quality comb filter picked up off the road for $20. Looks even better than RGB but don't let sharpness addicts hear you.
Maybe hot take, but these artifacts is one reason for playing on original hardware. It's part of the console's charm. Especially now that we have the option of playing these games on every device possible, the original image is kinda nostalgic to me.
@@fgmenth I think what he is getting at is that original hardware has multiple revisions, some that have that "charm" you mentioned, while others don't. So arguing to play on original hardware so you can experience the artifacts doesn't make a ton of sense because there are people who have only ever played on original hardware 1-chip systems. So to them it wouldn't be "charm" it would be "why does my video quality look worse now?"
@@bnr32jason I know what he's saying. I'm trying to explain the reasoning for my preference. If you grew up with a 1-chip console then it's fine, but if your snes when you were a kid was a normal one like mine, then modding it would change its unique "character". I don't know if it came across well, but this is MY own personal preference. I'm not trying to dictate a rule or anything lol.
In fact, 1 Chip SNES are very common here in Brazil. Our old consoles are all 60Hz, but the composite video uses other system (PAL-M, a NTSC with better colors, basically). I think we brasillians are kinda lucky in this case, we got a lot of 1 Chip SNES here :)
> First time watching Macho Nacho > Sees first intro... neat > Second intro... okay > Third intro... how many intros does a video need?! > Fourth intro... passed out at my desk
@@joelellis9480 it's also just gotta be hiding a common microcontroller or FPGA. I severely doubt the epoxy will accomplish much. though if it brings even one more dollar voultar's way, then more power to his epoxy.
I found your channel probably a year ago. I absolutely love the quality of your videos. It's so simple and easy on the eyes. And the flow is smooth. Great work and great content!
That's a lot of work for something that arguably looks worse. These old games weren't designed to be played in crystal clear sharpness on an lcd. They were designed to be played at low res on a crt where you can't see every individual pixel. What's supposed to look smooth and blended now looks harsh and messy.
For those that aren't aware, when you're soldering that part at 7:13, it's sometimes easier to just take a bit of copy wire and run the solder down that to the pad so that you don't have to worry about being too close to that other component. Then, if need be, you can just have a fine tipped soldering iron to further melt the solder rather than also having to manage the solder.
7:10 - The tip is pretty large for the work you're doing. Capton Tape would also be good. Definitely understand the camera angle, and that definitely adds to the complexity. Fine tip tweezers and a spot of soldering paste instead of solder wire would help mitigate much of this, but it seems you realized this for the later solder points to the console board. Love the video, and glad you are showing this awesome mod.
I don't think epoxy is a measure that will prevent the chinese from reverse engineering , they can easily burn it with a laser and study all the layers of the chip. In a few months this will be available on Aliexpress for 1/10 of the price
The development of that component must have been a labor of love. Most of us won't have a SNES as clean and well kept as the one you've demonstrated this with, so it's time for us to get some q-tips.
IT'S OUT?! AFTER YEARS OF DEVELOPMENT, THE MADMAN FINALLY COMPLETED IT?! Thank you, Voultar!!! After following the project for so long, i didn't think the day would finally come!!
This mod isn't beginner level simple, but it also doesn't look like it takes a ton of practice either. No balling, no surface mount ICs, no bajillion-small-pins-per-side ICs, no use for a hot air station. Just a little bit of light SMD work, most of which can be done with basically any soldering tip. Nice. Looks like it'll make a great DIY project.
This is not a "major" flaw. Literally nobody even knew such a thing was a thing until the modern age of HDMI connections and HDTVs and nerdy 100x zoom analysis videos on UA-cam and such. And the pixel art in many games was even drawn taking this kind of blurring and smearing and so on into account back then, such that the end results often looked much nicer and indeed more correct on old CRTs where all of those visual quirks were present. Some games even needed it to blend areas of low colour with lots of dithering and to help faux transparency basically look right. It's a "flaw" to only the most hardcore nerdy technophiles in the universe. But, yes, this is great to make an already awesome system even better for those who care about things on this level. Now even the most hardcore nerdy technophiles in the universe can love their SNES consoles as much as all the tens of millions of regular SNES fans and gamers out there already do. Ultimately, the SNES has just gotten even better for everyone. It's a win win. :D PS. Major kudos to Voultar for his amazing work.
I would disagree with no one noticed. Like I didn't know about this issue when I first played snes but I instantly was like why is my output slightly blurry. Possibly Americans didn't notice since composit was mainly used compared to RGB scart in Europe.
@@og-chinz I am from the UK and had my SNES connected up via either S-Video or Euro SCART the entire time, and I never noticed such a thing ever. Certainly, I never noticed my SNES being more blurry than any other device I had connected up to my CRT via similar connections. I just saw everything look like it was playing on a nice CRT. And I had a 25" Toshiba Dolby Pro Logic TV back then, and later a 32" Sony Wega Trinitron. And, for sure, any American claiming they could see "blurriness" on SNES compared to other consoles, even though they were already playing with literally the shittiest image output connection I can imagine, is talking poopoo as far as I'm concerned. Note: For all I know, I could have had a 1-chip model mind you. I never ever checked, because I literally didn't have a single reason to even think about such a thing back in the day. I got my system at launch in the UK. Maybe I got lucky, maybe I didn't, but I never noticed and almost certainly wouldn't have given it a second thought either way. It was a 256x224 console resolution on a 640x480 SD CRT when all is said and done. Which kinda goes to my point too.
@@og-chinzThe guys making videos are well versed on the topic of snes blur, while @inceptional says its all make believe, a guy with zero credibility or knowledge of the subject, a fake developer that says independent devs are incompetent.
@@inceptional it's up to preference. there isn't a single objectively best way to display all retro games content, or a way that will please everyone. "Literally nobody" - I was born in 1980, and I cared about those things back then. But I only cared somewhat, because it didn't ruin the games or anything. I just clamored for a day when we'd have display tech that'd make 90s consumer TV tech obsolete. I knew about research being done on OLED TVs and SSDs since the end of the 90s, and was looking forward to both. also, not all retro games artists actually took advantage of CRT's smearing effects (in fact, very few did), though the youtube videos and memes we've all seen would have you believe that every last game took it into account.
YES! Finally, I like the ease of installation and who can say no to such a vast improvement on quality. Tell Voultar Scruffy needs his ASAP😉✨️✨️✨️ GREAT video as always Tito👍🏻
Call me crazy, but it looks better before. Maybe it’s nostalgia but that soft look is very SNES to me. And the blurred edges looked like drop shadow which I thought, as a kid in the 90s, was intentionally done and nice looking.
Well yes these games were designed with a CRT in mind to hide those imperfections and smooth out the blockiness. I find it fascinating many people ignore that.
I agree, I think the mod is missing the point. If they want cristal clear pixels they can use an emulation with enhancements and rise the internal resolution to 4x or whatever. I wouldn't want the original console to look different, I want it to look normal.
@@pelgervampireduck The 1-chip consoles look like the result of this mod, so it still looks like "original hardware", just not the early original hardware. "Normal" depends on what board revision you're talking about. If you want the soft look that's just as justifiable as the sharp look, but calling the 1-chip "sharp" look "not original" feels disingenuous.
@@omgazr0saying they were "designed with a CRT in mind" implies that there were other options lol. If the SNES was supposed to look fuzzy, why did Nintendo fix the blurriness in later revisions? Why did they support RGB video?
No one fixed shit because no one complained about the visuals back then. Remember most Snes's were played through an RF unit on shitty Tv's. So the "single chip" wouldn't of made shit of a difference.
@@neobogard Exactly. Calling it a "major" flaw shows just how out of touch some of these people are with reality. Still, the already awesome and beloved SNES console just got even better for those people too--so MAJOR win win! :D
@@neobogard Exactly, and although what I'm about to write is deeply unpopular, I would go as far as to call it a downgrade. The "enhanced" picture lacks nuances, both in the colors and in pixel edges. I'm not terribly sure that the original 2 chip is "faulty", I rather suspect that the 1chip SNES' output looks more "raw" due to the cost cutting measures.
@@kaisersoymilk6912 Totally agree. A good example is the comparison of Link. Focus on his left hand or his shield and after the mod the colors are all uniform but before the mod there are multiple shades of color giving the effect of highlights and shadow which most likely blended together nicely on a CRT creating more detail. But for me, this mod removes detail regardless if you're playing on a CRT or LCD screen. And I find it funny that in the emulator scene people already have this clean modded raw look yet spend so much time creating CRT filters and scanlines to try and get away from it and create a superior picture and be more authentic! lol
This is incredible timing, I just got a free SNES a few weeks ago I barely saved from being dumped by my uncle. Adding this to my to-do list, this community is fantastic :)
Hi Tito, Could you investigate the screenshot at 14:01 more? There appears to be inverse ghosting reminiscent of "overdrive" to the right of Mario's nose and cap. Could you please inspect a comparison between this mod and a 1-chip model? This mod promises something awesome for the more accurate original SNES, but I'd like to know for sure there are no new visual artifacts introduced. I'll test with my own 1-chip to verify thoroughly, but a quick boot of the MiSTer did not reveal this effect implying an inaccuracy.
i wonder if it's caused by the flex cable reaching from enhancer all the way to video socket pcb, it's quite a long path, maybe he could make a quick comparison tapping RGB from the 3 smd capacitors prior to the flex socket on the interposer and see if that flaw is still present in the capture. If not, soldering individually shielded wires might be a better option than flex
I'd personally say neither. Use "multi-chip" or "non-1chip". The actual amount of chips on the board to represent what the 1chip replaces is 3, but people are just so used to saying 2. So may as well just avoid the number altogether.
@@epektasis242it’s a guitar boost/hard-clipping pedal, but due to reputation/hype and popularity, came to be used outside its specific intended amp sound chain application, usually as an overdrive amp. Originals are worth big bucks.
Fun fact, the "muddy and blurry output" is part of the design of the games. They took this into account and used it to get better definition and detail of the sprites or even create more colors and the consoles weren't able to handle. If you're on a CRT you can can see the colors are actually vibrant and the games look superior on them
Fantastic! I have been waiting for this mod for a long time. Btw, what brand of flux and solder wire are you using? Your soldering joints always look so nice and shiny!
You can tell Voultar is concerned about counterfeit cloning, from the hot glob to the mandatory installation service. And he's not wrong this is a big deal and will hopefully crash the inflated 1-chip market. One thing nobody talks about with 1-chip consoles is like all SNES, they need modification too. The VRM's are still ancient 7805's and a capacitor is needed in the power bridge to fix the horizontal jailbars.
I was excited until I saw the side by sides, especially the FF3 opening screen. This reminded me that most developers of the time designed the graphics with the original chips in mind. This seems like it is a over sharpening the image. We need to remember that the designers of this generation of game where trying to hide the sharp edge of the pixels.
Was it ever broken if it left the factory that way? If the designers intended it to look that way, why change it? Modding consoles to get emulator quality output seems pretty pointless, if you're going to go to these lengths for video quality, stop taking consoles away from people who want them and play virtual console instead.
@@Voultar Any sufficiently advanced engineer's works are indistinguishable from magic ;) -a neuroscientist PS I can't wait to get one of these kits in my hands in the UK! My childhood NTSC 2-chip SNES and I will rekindle our mutual obsession, and playing it will feel like what I thought I remembered playing SNES looked like (i.e. pixel perfect)
Hey, everyone. I want to make something very clear in case there's some confusion. This is NOT an Installation Service only product. This is absolutely a DIY product that will be sold as a DIY product. Please understand, there are over 15 variations of the SNES mainboard that all require documentation. I'm writing documentation while receiving consoles so that I can cover everything that you, the DIY installer, will need to know. This isn't easy and it takes a lot of time and a great deal of labor. I can't answer "where does X wire go" 5,000 times, but I can answer it once in the documentation and that is precisely why I must gather data for installations, first.
I hope that clears up any confusion. Otherwise, enjoy!
Take your time man! My 2-Chip Super Famicom is waiting, but waiting patiently. You are doing a great service to the retro community, so take a breather and work at your own pace 🙏
and im sure im going to get an insecure dogpile by dozens of nerds.
@@ianswift3521well it is relevant when people are wondering why it’s taking a long time to release the product.
@@ianswift3521oh come on, he just explained that it's a process he needs go trough...
Great job as always.
Might be a good point to tell people to cycle the power switch after unplugging the SNES to avoid blowing the fuse when removing the audio module.
UP
Also remember to switch the AES500 chip to 7P mode, found near the bottom of the chip.
I made that up
What do you mean by cycling the power switch? And what fuse will be blown if I don't do this cycle thing?
@@thardump859 try a dictionary
Thanks very much Tito for covering the SNES Edge-Enhancer. It was a labor of love and I'm excited for everyone who wants one to get one! This kit will absolutely be available as DIY, soon!
Yoooo
👑
My body is ready.
THERE HE IS, THE ABSOLUTE MADLAD
Thank you for all of your hard work, Voultar!
Just out of curiosity, is an "epoxy-less" release of the kit in the cards for the far future? Understandably the current concealment is to make sure the correct creator of the solution gets credited.
Is it possible to install this 'Edge Enhancer' mod into the human body? Asking for scientific research .
Same
*AS THE MACHINE GODS INTENDED*
Asking for world domination purposes.
Isn't ole musky already working on the Nurolink thing?
I did, can confirm... edge enhanced.
Honestly, especially in the Metroid comparison, I preferred the blurred version. The “defect” is almost a kind of anti-aliasing.
That's what I was thinking.. Same feelings I have with other enhancement projects like redriver2
100%, the original looks so much better
Pixel artists from the 90's: let's build our assets so the colors smear on the screen and everything looks rounded and colorful. Modders in 2024: let's "FIX" it
especially on a CRT
I'd have to compare it on a crt. My issue is that a crt is already going to blur things together and so blur on blur is often just muddy.
at this rate the modders will be modding NES well into the year 3000. they're always coming up with something new.
Neuralink modchip so good you will think your back in the 90s :)
@@ATomRileyA Complete with artifically added screen flickering and analog noise.
Not much has changed but we mod underwater
Well, it is the best console ever made.
@@RobertPendellsorry I can’t hear you over the eeeeeeeeeeee noise from my CRT
Trust me kids - NONE of us noticed as kids in the early 90s. SNES was a GODSEND to us. You've no idea. Of course, we got ours around 1993, so maybe it was a 1 chip. We had NO concept of that back then though. We were on our bellies sprawled out in front of Super Mario World in the dark all night long with the sound low so our parents didn't wake up. We only knew THAT? THAT was awesome.
Especially playing thru composite or RF even 😂
As though kids are watching this. Everyone watching this video either played or was old enough to play SNES when it was a current/last gen console.
also the tv's we used back then blended all the pixels together anyways.
@@relafleur5114 Which almost everyone did
lol, I came to verify there was a sane person like you in the comments. We all had like 486x440 resolution on that 4:3 aspect ratio tube tv and we ran RF converters tuned to channel 3 so we could interrupt the video signal...we did not care about or notice that minor change.
I think we're old enough to know emulators are far better than the SNES we had and we already have fond memories of the hardware as kids so most of us are good with a clone of the remote on a computer these days and people paying hundreds/thousands for original consoles and modding them often are the ones that never used them in the 90's imo
Always wondered why i prefered visuals on my SNES over emulators.
Its because of the visual smearing. I kinda love it.
Agreed
Well that checks out; we tend to gravitate toward what’s familiar to us - especially so if there’s nostalgia associated with it.
Sometimes its just because of the CRT effects. Im playing on the Snes Mini Classic and if I put the CRT filter to imitate the CRT effects, the retro feeling is way better.
@Luke-ih1oc i was born years after the SNES so it's not a nostalgia thing. I just like it more anyway
Yeah. The resolution sucked and everything was designed with the blurriness in mind. We don't need sharpness from our 1991 tech, the blurriness hides the imperfections in the raw data. It also allows for subtle effects when certain colors are next to each other that don't happen if you turn up the sharpness
in the Mario All-Stars title screen comparison, you can actually see where Nintendo used lighter colors around Mario's outline to counteract the black smearing. That's so wild.
I mean. it Makes sense honestly. Means they were very in tune with the system itself and how it looked on the most common configurations of consoles + displays. I applaud that actually.
That was one of the first things I noticed too! I thought it might have been reverse ghosting or over-correction, but this explanation makes much more sense.
Speaking of which, who says that the original 2chip output was "faulty" or "poor quality"? What if they designed it that way on purpose?
Do we have some sources or is it just something that people assume because "sharp pixels" are fashionable today (while back in the days they were considered undesirable and developers did all they could to hide them)?
After all, the 1chip was a cost cutting measure, it's not outside of the realm of possibilities to think that a simplified output was part of the corners cut.
@@kaisersoymilk6912 The original console was designed around CRT TVs, which by their nature also produced some level of smearing/bleed between strongly contrasting areas. I think there's an argument to be made that improving the output quality/sharpness with a mod like this makes sense given that almost all people playing the SNES today are doing so on an LCD screen. On the other hand, leaving the more blurry image is, in a way, adding a little bit of CRT flavor to your LCD image.
@@brandonkick makes sense but it’s still wild
Is it just me or does the blurry one look better :D it doesn't hurt my eyes as much and it looks more smooth overall to me
not just you. Cranking up the sharpness ruins a great deal of work on Nintendo's part to make the game render a good looking image on period equipment. The picture just breaks down into a mess of colored squares.
One of the things I appreciate so much about your videos is your professionalism! Even when you make mistakes, you don't edit them out, you own up to it, explain what happened and even tell WHY the correct way is the better way. Love the videos!!
I said the same when watching that, this guy is fantastic
I got curious about my own SNES and opened it up thanks to this video. Lo and behold, I've had a 1CHIP model SNES all this time and had no idea.
I don't think you even have to go that far. Based on model numbers on the bottom, you can discern which one it is. Just have to google for it.
I found out not long ago that my GameCube is a first edition, with the proprietary digital output (revised models removed this port). It was right in front of me all those years when I played it regularly, and I was oblivious to it.
It won't be long now until I finally get to make use of the port!
@@razeezarMy Gamecube is early enough to have that higher quality output, but the component cables are super expensive and rare because not very many people bothered to get them back when they were available, and I think you had to buy them from Nintendo (and they had a proprietary chip inside so third parties couldn't make cheaper ones).
I'm going to open mine up too and check because now I'm curious.
Yeah, since my 2 chip Super Famicom is permanently using S-video, I'll be grabbing one of these for sure. Great video as always, Tito. Thank you!
Yeah that is not a super difficult install, I'll wait for the mod kit.
lol the epoxy cybersecurity measure was hilarious.
kibersec i am in one
It is, but also unfortunately necessary
And completely useless too. Using a heat gun its pretty easy to get rid of these epoxy blobs.
The modder has to be able to protect it from cloners to make scrapers.
I wonder if one of those scanners LTT has can see through epoxy in a way that'd be useful.
This sharpness problem isn't so bad if you think back to the 90s when people only used tube TVs. I honestly wouldn't waste my time making a modification like this if I still had my SNES.
true and it's not like emulators and roms exist...
@@redkurn That's true, since it doesn't even happen in emulation. And then there are the Chinese clones that don't have this problem either.
I can assure everyone born after me that we never noticed any blurry graphics back then.
I have the original, never parting with it. Finally got the SNES in 93.
I mean my SNES was connected by RF and later composite. Edge enhancing was definitely not our concern back then. I think it's cool this exist for the enthusiast but I personally like my sprites blurred for retro games.
0:35 That shot of the flying, spinning SNES is gorgeous! I love the transition to the board inside.
I really appreciate how you include the little mistakes like accidentally knocking off the resistor, and initially using the wrong wires. Stuff like that always happens during projects, and this makes the installations you outline feel a little more attainable, seeing that everybody makes little mistakes like that, and getting to watch you quickly resolve them and move on. Thanks!
Your soldering has gotten so much better. A great example of practice makes perfect. Keep up the good work Tito.
I won't lie, the name "Edge Enhancer" made me recoil in horror. It just brings to mind cranked sharpness controls and their halos. Glad to see that's not an issue though
Same. I feel like SNES Video Enhancer might be more accurate, but Edge Enhancer is certainly catchier... and maybe SNES Video Enhancer sounds too vague or generic?
Edge Enhancer sounds like something you'd find in a spray bottle in a beauty supply store.
@@IntegerOfDoom sharpness controls were pretty awful on a CRT too, shudder
@@kaitlyn__L That's what I was thinking of, lol. I am very old
@@DQSpider me too! Haha
OK so that's why you needed to import videos from Bob into Final Cut.
These videos are such high production quality, the camera shots are incredible, content is fun
some capton tape on the resisters close to where you're soldering will reduce the risk of accidentally lifting one of the resisters and loosing it.
*resistors
1st time here thanks to the algorithm. Great topic, video quality, editing and script. Now, I can at least figure out how to reassemble my SNES which is a 2-chip model. Hitting the sub button now!
Fixed? The problem was that we all moved away from CRT televisions in the 2000's! This is a cool mod for todays screens but no one thought anything was broken while we played our SNES games in front of our CRT TVs back in the 90's 😂
CRTs have advantages but in this case they were just masking the problem, especially with original RF or composite video. Heck if you play these side by side on a CRT the modded version will still look better. Late gen CRTs in particular had nice sharp pictures that exposed muddy output for what it was.
@@AlexvrbX Sure! Someone literally just posted on my channel on a video I made about how to identify 1chips saying that if you need to take yours apart to see the difference then there isn't one so I had to explain it lmao So I agree with you that there is a difference and that's cool to see (not hating on the mod). My statement was about the title of this video. It's super click baity. Nothing was broken! It's just how things were! And we were happy because it was all about having fun and playing the games we loved. We're in the land of diminishing returns here. Getting close to perfect I guess, and that's cool but I grew up playing these games on consumer CRTs and not PVMs. Not on flat panels. A well built cable and any sort of CRT is enough to give me the nostalgic feels. And it's awesome that way. There's nothing like sitting down with that set up with a friend and falling into a game. 😄
@@JeremyKingTech I meeaaann... I kinda agree with you but they're not wrong either. They ARE fixing a FLAW with the 2 chip setup that isn't present on the 1 chip. Sort of like how there are multiple revisions of the Genesis boards, and some have issues with the audio subsystem, or so-so video output. Most of the model 1's are solid, but many of the model 2's have iffy sound. I've got a semi-rare model 2 VA4 that's pretty great. Similarly there's an audio mod board that "fixes" flawed Genesis units audio in a similar vein to this mod "fixing" common SNES video output.
I understand your "this is just how it was" stance but the presence of fixed units without the flaw suggests that neither Nintendo nor Sega intentionally did things that way, but rather there was a design flaw, and sometimes it isnt worth the delay or the engineering effort to fix it before the next major revision... So basically they say "good enough" and move on.
That said no, it didn't ruin the experience.
@@AlexvrbX Yeah fair enough. You make great points. It's just a strange framing that seems sensational to me to be like "the SNES was a broken console but now this person did what Nintendidn't until they did with the 1Chip". So it comes across as click baity to me. It seemed more like an issue of tolerances (electrically speaking) - Nintendo certainly didn't release the first waves of SNES in a state that they deemed broken. It was within design spec and when they worked on new variants due to changes in manufacturing they tuned them up more while using new and less parts (like they do with all subsequent console/handheld iterations). My stance doesn't invalidate this mod. It's awesome that it exists! And again, you make valid points. I'm just resisting the framing that the SNES was broken and needed fixing. Next to no one outside of maybe electrical engineers with OCD and high end PVMs were aware of stuff like this back then.
@@JeremyKingTech I see what you mean. Yeah it's definitely not a "faulty console", but none of them are perfect... And as with many consoles, some revisions are better than others!
I'm more impressed you found a Super Nintendo that hasn't gone yellow and brittle.
Thanks for sharing the SNES mod. I love the retro mod community!
Thanks for your support!
I have a 1-Chip SNES an S-Video cable and a 36 inch Sony Trinitron.
It’s a thing of beauty.
I'm surprised there isn't an HDMI mod for the SNES that completely bypasses this issue for all consoles.
The whole point of this mod is for people who want to use CRT TVs, none of which even have HDMI. If you wanna use a CRT TV, you need to use RGB or S-Video, which means you can't use the HDMI mods. using a CRT TV makes the pixels look way better than flatscreen TVs, as the lower resolution and imperfect nature of the beams of light cause the pixels to blend in a natural way that you can't replicate with software. Emulators and other things have tried things like scanlines but they still haven't managed to get the look "right".
@@Dhalin While I think it can be and seems true in some cases that CRTs were intended and helped provide some sort of positive effects on graphics, I do think that sometimes the opinions on them can be overblown and that filters should be able to handle most aspects.
CRTs come with too many blatant imperfections that only hurt image quality for me to consider them a good choice outside of, maybe, PVMs.
@@LanceThumping Have you ever actually _used_ a CRT display to play a SNES on at all? It really is one of those "don't knock it until you try it" type things. Now, granted, later consoles like the PS2 would come out and CRTs started becoming cumbersome because they would use tiny fonts that would be hard to read (Xenosaga 2 comes to mind), but in the SNES days? It really did look better on a CRT. The console and its games were designed with those "imperfections" in mind.
@@Dhalin Probably, yes. Definitely a Genesis at some point but I'll admit most of my CRT gaming was N64 onward.
My gut still leans towards CRTs mostly being not worth it and it'd be better to focus effort on fine tuning shaders/filters to get all the benefits without the downsides.
[Cleber] This is an awesome chip/mod, for sure. Because you can change the original stuff without "broke" anything in the console. The best!
Been waiting for Voultar to realease this for over a year. I'm ready to provide whatever info (and money) he needs of my childhood day 1 SNES to get the correct mod from him
Yeah, I ain't doin' all that. The output is fine. Just use an emulator if you want it sharper.
Ok
Mate you gotta stop saying "Cons: there aren't any" you could have taken the time to explan the extremely minor smearing which brings this mod to close to, but not exactly the same shapenss as on chip consoles. MLIG did a detailed analysis wich you could have linked to.
Production quality is outstanding 👏🏻 Nice soldering work!
For the people not owning soldering equipment: in many cities are repair cafés or tech hobby meetups that provide equipment and there are many nice people that gladly help people new to the hobby.
Goodluck to all those who are gonna do all that soldering! :)
I really, really hope we can get this in Europe too!
Hope this board with this mod lives a long life. Those early boards are prone to chip failures.
Honestly... Is going through all the trouble of installing this worth a few barely noticeable pixels getting fixed?
I always thought that the blurriness was part of the appeal... It's what made me interested in Retro Consoles in the first place. Sure, emulators have pixel perfect rendering on beautiful modern displays, but these games weren't made for pixel perfect at all, and the blur often softened the jagged edges and flat colors of 8-bit and 16-bit consoles. Honestly, I'd say I prefer the unmodded version in every example shown here. And yeah, you could say that it's a visual glitch and it's "technically" incorrect, but even seeing the examples here, it's clear that the developers were aware of it and worked with or around it to get the results they wanted.
You greatly underestimate the power of nostalgic autism
@@charn00h The problem with pixel perfect on modern displays is that the graphics weren't designed to work that way when you get to the 16-bit era. The designers even made use of the scan lines in CRT TVs when designing sprites. If you only have a modern Nintendo like the Switch, play the original Donkey Kong Country and then turn on the simulated scan lines to see the difference.
For an even better comparison, play Donkey Kong Country with a real SNES on a CRT TV and then on an emulator with a modern display. The original way is one of the best-looking games on the SNES. Pixel perfect on a modern display makes it one of the ugliest games on the system. It looks shockingly bad.
It's just retro enthusiasts seeking pixel perfection, it goes very parallel along the lines of audiophiles, but only to the point it is making a perceivable change.. since you can actually SEE it did indeed alter something(usually). I'm sure to some speedrunners the 'blur' at pixel edges becomes a limiting factor of if they can pull off some of their crazy pixel alignment strats, so the added clarity and sharpness is probably doing something for them at the very least.
It was made for analog displays, and this is completely unnecessary IMO. But plenty of gamers today never lived in the analog tv era, and to someone who's used to seeing razor-sharp digital pixels, it looks inferior... so they might say yes.
14:27 I like the smoothed out image in most cases better, but the color accuracy after is nice. I'll just stick unmodded. Thanks for the video though.
I've been following the development of this mod for a while! I was stoked to see your review of this!
Thanks for sticking around!
I love it that people are still producing mods for consoles - amazing
Buying a 1 chip pre modded now would be more convenient than sending in yours and waiting for this one though. He should offer the mod separately to start off with as to not lose potential sales at the beginning.
Now that is some clean soldering. I'm always impressed with your skills 👍
What a cool well thought out board
Thanks a lot!
@@Voultar Is this kit compatible with a Super Famicom 2 chip? I recapped mine and it's similar enough with a SNES that the capacitor kit was interchangeable.
@@Voultar I read further down the comments where you stated it works with SFC boards as well!
Mike Moffitt has had a board out for quite a bit now that works perfectly, so this is not the first solution. Installation is less involved and it is also fairly cheap.
I mean, how clean the Edge Enhancer video looks is amazing. However, games of this day and age were often designed with those quirks (such as the PPU adding smearing) in mind. That's why old CRTs give us amazing visual clarity on old consoles that HDTVs just can't -- CRTs had some smearing as a result of the electron gun itself, and some old games (such as Castlevania: SotN) did design pixel art with this in mind.
A good RGB monitor didn't have smearing.
@@atomicskull6405 Any RGB monitor has smearing when the device’s output does…
@@atomicskull6405 Console games weren't meant to be played on monitors. All you need to get a perfect picture from any retroconsole is an RGB cable and a good consumer TV (possibly a Trinitron).
@@MaavBR Original VGA monitors were very very sharp. The pixels in 320x200 were actually crisp squares not blobs.
Retro Video enchantment for the rich: RGB Video modding community
Retro Video enchantment for the based: Composite on the biggest CRT you can get with a high quality comb filter picked up off the road for $20.
Looks even better than RGB but don't let sharpness addicts hear you.
Another great video Tito, thank you! Voultar, thank you for this awesome work.
Maybe hot take, but these artifacts is one reason for playing on original hardware. It's part of the console's charm. Especially now that we have the option of playing these games on every device possible, the original image is kinda nostalgic to me.
I have a 1 chip so these artifacts aren't part of my console's charm
@@guyverjay1289 cool, so I doubt you'd consider this mod then
@@fgmenth I think what he is getting at is that original hardware has multiple revisions, some that have that "charm" you mentioned, while others don't. So arguing to play on original hardware so you can experience the artifacts doesn't make a ton of sense because there are people who have only ever played on original hardware 1-chip systems. So to them it wouldn't be "charm" it would be "why does my video quality look worse now?"
@@bnr32jason I know what he's saying. I'm trying to explain the reasoning for my preference. If you grew up with a 1-chip console then it's fine, but if your snes when you were a kid was a normal one like mine, then modding it would change its unique "character". I don't know if it came across well, but this is MY own personal preference. I'm not trying to dictate a rule or anything lol.
@@fgmenth I understand you. and let's face it, ANYONE who was playing SNES upon release was using ONLY a 2CHIP. The 1CHIP came years later.
In fact, 1 Chip SNES are very common here in Brazil. Our old consoles are all 60Hz, but the composite video uses other system (PAL-M, a NTSC with better colors, basically).
I think we brasillians are kinda lucky in this case, we got a lot of 1 Chip SNES here :)
Always a good day when Tito drops a video! And an SNES video too my first console to start my love for gaming!
> First time watching Macho Nacho
> Sees first intro... neat
> Second intro... okay
> Third intro... how many intros does a video need?!
> Fourth intro... passed out at my desk
A rare exception where two isn't necessarily better than one.
Thanks for adding a different music. Swapping between a couple of tracks is nice so it feels more fresh with all the detailed filming effort you do.
That epoxy won't stop anyone. A hot air station will make removal trivial.
It's for the video. He's showing a product not yet available.
The epoxy is to hide the blob of jb weld
@@joelellis9480 it's also just gotta be hiding a common microcontroller or FPGA. I severely doubt the epoxy will accomplish much.
though if it brings even one more dollar voultar's way, then more power to his epoxy.
Your soldering skill is so AMAAAZZZIIIIINGGGGG
RIP Voultar. Glad to see his contributions are still helping the community
You're acting like he died
He cared about his fellow modders. May his soul rest in blissful sleep.
Good night sweet prince
@@VoultarYou dead bro. Stop commenting and rest. 😂
Voultar is infamous
Thank you @voultar for your continued work on this!
Cool mod. Voultar mods are good stuff.
Thanks a lot!
I'm so grateful for snes9x emulator and its ability to use retroarch's XBR shaders.
What people don't understand is that all you need is an S-video cable and a CRT and honestly that's good enough.
I used to play on a 15" CRT with an RF adapter when I was a kid. "Enough" is a very subjective term, haha
And where do you get a crt these days? Cant find them anywhere where I live and having one shipped costs a fortune these days.
FB marketplace is a lifesaver. Although you might just have to keep looking for a long time to get what you want. @@AnarickTheDevil
@@AnarickTheDevil where do u live where u cant find a CRT? people throw them away everywhere or u could use craigslist or something surely?
I found your channel probably a year ago. I absolutely love the quality of your videos. It's so simple and easy on the eyes. And the flow is smooth. Great work and great content!
One of the best UA-cam channels out there! Keep it up!
That's a lot of work for something that arguably looks worse. These old games weren't designed to be played in crystal clear sharpness on an lcd. They were designed to be played at low res on a crt where you can't see every individual pixel. What's supposed to look smooth and blended now looks harsh and messy.
For those that aren't aware, when you're soldering that part at 7:13, it's sometimes easier to just take a bit of copy wire and run the solder down that to the pad so that you don't have to worry about being too close to that other component. Then, if need be, you can just have a fine tipped soldering iron to further melt the solder rather than also having to manage the solder.
EDGE EDGE EDGE
GET ENHANCED
7:10 - The tip is pretty large for the work you're doing. Capton Tape would also be good. Definitely understand the camera angle, and that definitely adds to the complexity. Fine tip tweezers and a spot of soldering paste instead of solder wire would help mitigate much of this, but it seems you realized this for the later solder points to the console board. Love the video, and glad you are showing this awesome mod.
I don't think epoxy is a measure that will prevent the chinese from reverse engineering , they can easily burn it with a laser and study all the layers of the chip. In a few months this will be available on Aliexpress for 1/10 of the price
It's also sad to see that it's now unrepairable for the consumer
@@nicoful86 Yes, if we depended on the original developers, we would never have GDEmu easily available to everyone.
@@araujofi hell most people wouldn't have a GDEmu at all with their batches of 12 at 12am est on a tuesday.
@@araujofi Aliexpress is the best thing that's happened to retro-gaming, custom keyboards, and analogue video enthusiasts tbh.
@@araujofi yeah that gdemu dev is hilarious xD
The development of that component must have been a labor of love. Most of us won't have a SNES as clean and well kept as the one you've demonstrated this with, so it's time for us to get some q-tips.
IT'S OUT?! AFTER YEARS OF DEVELOPMENT, THE MADMAN FINALLY COMPLETED IT?!
Thank you, Voultar!!! After following the project for so long, i didn't think the day would finally come!!
Neither did I. Thanks for sticking around! I truly appreciate your support.
Don't think it's available to purchase yet, at least it isn't listed in the video description
I’ll be picking one up as soon as I can
@@Voultar amazing work! Excited to get this installed in my 2 chip SNES!
Madman? More like a smart man.
This mod isn't beginner level simple, but it also doesn't look like it takes a ton of practice either.
No balling, no surface mount ICs, no bajillion-small-pins-per-side ICs, no use for a hot air station. Just a little bit of light SMD work, most of which can be done with basically any soldering tip.
Nice. Looks like it'll make a great DIY project.
This is not a "major" flaw. Literally nobody even knew such a thing was a thing until the modern age of HDMI connections and HDTVs and nerdy 100x zoom analysis videos on UA-cam and such. And the pixel art in many games was even drawn taking this kind of blurring and smearing and so on into account back then, such that the end results often looked much nicer and indeed more correct on old CRTs where all of those visual quirks were present. Some games even needed it to blend areas of low colour with lots of dithering and to help faux transparency basically look right. It's a "flaw" to only the most hardcore nerdy technophiles in the universe. But, yes, this is great to make an already awesome system even better for those who care about things on this level. Now even the most hardcore nerdy technophiles in the universe can love their SNES consoles as much as all the tens of millions of regular SNES fans and gamers out there already do. Ultimately, the SNES has just gotten even better for everyone. It's a win win. :D
PS. Major kudos to Voultar for his amazing work.
I would disagree with no one noticed. Like I didn't know about this issue when I first played snes but I instantly was like why is my output slightly blurry. Possibly Americans didn't notice since composit was mainly used compared to RGB scart in Europe.
@@og-chinz I am from the UK and had my SNES connected up via either S-Video or Euro SCART the entire time, and I never noticed such a thing ever. Certainly, I never noticed my SNES being more blurry than any other device I had connected up to my CRT via similar connections. I just saw everything look like it was playing on a nice CRT. And I had a 25" Toshiba Dolby Pro Logic TV back then, and later a 32" Sony Wega Trinitron. And, for sure, any American claiming they could see "blurriness" on SNES compared to other consoles, even though they were already playing with literally the shittiest image output connection I can imagine, is talking poopoo as far as I'm concerned.
Note: For all I know, I could have had a 1-chip model mind you. I never ever checked, because I literally didn't have a single reason to even think about such a thing back in the day. I got my system at launch in the UK. Maybe I got lucky, maybe I didn't, but I never noticed and almost certainly wouldn't have given it a second thought either way. It was a 256x224 console resolution on a 640x480 SD CRT when all is said and done. Which kinda goes to my point too.
@@og-chinzThe guys making videos are well versed on the topic of snes blur, while @inceptional says its all make believe, a guy with zero credibility or knowledge of the subject, a fake developer that says independent devs are incompetent.
@@inceptionalThese videos about snes blur are popular, im glad these guys are covering this, and showing the flaws of the overrated snes graphics.
@@inceptional it's up to preference. there isn't a single objectively best way to display all retro games content, or a way that will please everyone.
"Literally nobody" - I was born in 1980, and I cared about those things back then. But I only cared somewhat, because it didn't ruin the games or anything. I just clamored for a day when we'd have display tech that'd make 90s consumer TV tech obsolete. I knew about research being done on OLED TVs and SSDs since the end of the 90s, and was looking forward to both.
also, not all retro games artists actually took advantage of CRT's smearing effects (in fact, very few did), though the youtube videos and memes we've all seen would have you believe that every last game took it into account.
YES! Finally, I like the ease of installation and who can say no to such a vast improvement on quality. Tell Voultar Scruffy needs his ASAP😉✨️✨️✨️ GREAT video as always Tito👍🏻
Pretty cool, but I'd rather just install it myself so gonna be in the waiting room
The board on board installation design is absolutely brilliant.
Call me crazy, but it looks better before. Maybe it’s nostalgia but that soft look is very SNES to me. And the blurred edges looked like drop shadow which I thought, as a kid in the 90s, was intentionally done and nice looking.
Well yes these games were designed with a CRT in mind to hide those imperfections and smooth out the blockiness. I find it fascinating many people ignore that.
I agree, I think the mod is missing the point. If they want cristal clear pixels they can use an emulation with enhancements and rise the internal resolution to 4x or whatever. I wouldn't want the original console to look different, I want it to look normal.
@@pelgervampireduck The 1-chip consoles look like the result of this mod, so it still looks like "original hardware", just not the early original hardware. "Normal" depends on what board revision you're talking about. If you want the soft look that's just as justifiable as the sharp look, but calling the 1-chip "sharp" look "not original" feels disingenuous.
@@omgazr0saying they were "designed with a CRT in mind" implies that there were other options lol. If the SNES was supposed to look fuzzy, why did Nintendo fix the blurriness in later revisions? Why did they support RGB video?
it is the "problems" of old media formats that colour our experience of and characterise the aesthetics
What a fantastic much-needed solution. If I didn't already have a couple of MiSTers, I would totally grab a couple of these kits.
After 34 years they finally fixed it! 🤗
Wonder if Nintendont will find a way to sue modders so they will be able to add more to there already Large Lawsuit slush fund.
No one fixed shit because no one complained about the visuals back then. Remember most Snes's were played through an RF unit on shitty Tv's. So the "single chip" wouldn't of made shit of a difference.
@@neobogard Exactly. Calling it a "major" flaw shows just how out of touch some of these people are with reality. Still, the already awesome and beloved SNES console just got even better for those people too--so MAJOR win win! :D
@@neobogard Exactly, and although what I'm about to write is deeply unpopular, I would go as far as to call it a downgrade. The "enhanced" picture lacks nuances, both in the colors and in pixel edges.
I'm not terribly sure that the original 2 chip is "faulty", I rather suspect that the 1chip SNES' output looks more "raw" due to the cost cutting measures.
@@kaisersoymilk6912 Totally agree. A good example is the comparison of Link. Focus on his left hand or his shield and after the mod the colors are all uniform but before the mod there are multiple shades of color giving the effect of highlights and shadow which most likely blended together nicely on a CRT creating more detail. But for me, this mod removes detail regardless if you're playing on a CRT or LCD screen. And I find it funny that in the emulator scene people already have this clean modded raw look yet spend so much time creating CRT filters and scanlines to try and get away from it and create a superior picture and be more authentic! lol
me, realizing how much of my nostalgia depended on the flaws of the medium
I’ve been doing excited about this
This is incredible timing, I just got a free SNES a few weeks ago I barely saved from being dumped by my uncle. Adding this to my to-do list, this community is fantastic :)
Hi Tito,
Could you investigate the screenshot at 14:01 more? There appears to be inverse ghosting reminiscent of "overdrive" to the right of Mario's nose and cap. Could you please inspect a comparison between this mod and a 1-chip model? This mod promises something awesome for the more accurate original SNES, but I'd like to know for sure there are no new visual artifacts introduced. I'll test with my own 1-chip to verify thoroughly, but a quick boot of the MiSTer did not reveal this effect implying an inaccuracy.
i wonder if it's caused by the flex cable reaching from enhancer all the way to video socket pcb, it's quite a long path, maybe he could make a quick comparison tapping RGB from the 3 smd capacitors prior to the flex socket on the interposer and see if that flaw is still present in the capture. If not, soldering individually shielded wires might be a better option than flex
Let us know your findings!
Honestly I enjoyed watching you install the mod more than the enhancements
Should the first models be called 2-chip or 3-chip? Let's all politely argue about it here in the comments, it boosts engagement. 🤓
@mjc0961 nooo... its 2 chip one 1 chip flat chip 🤣🤣🤣
non-1-chip
3 chip obviously
I'd personally say neither. Use "multi-chip" or "non-1chip". The actual amount of chips on the board to represent what the 1chip replaces is 3, but people are just so used to saying 2. So may as well just avoid the number altogether.
>1 Chip
Voutar is a treasure to the retro gaming community. Thanks for this video
The BEFORE footage looks vastly better. Get a real CRT to play these.
I'm astonished how fast and easy the process was done
Insert Boromir quote here: "The SNES has no fixing. The SNES needs no fixing"
I love your clean solder tips
They went full Klon! You never go full Klon. Iykyk, Klon Centaur for the uninformed.
lool
Pin of Shame 😂
@@UnreaLorenzo pin of shame? lol on me? Man I’m just referring to the epoxy over the board lol idc I hope people get a laugh 🤣
@@justincosta89I sure did!
@@epektasis242it’s a guitar boost/hard-clipping pedal, but due to reputation/hype and popularity, came to be used outside its specific intended amp sound chain application, usually as an overdrive amp. Originals are worth big bucks.
Very clean soldering, great work!
Fun fact, the "muddy and blurry output" is part of the design of the games. They took this into account and used it to get better definition and detail of the sprites or even create more colors and the consoles weren't able to handle. If you're on a CRT you can can see the colors are actually vibrant and the games look superior on them
So you don't need this mod if you use a CRT?
@@Fighter4Street you dont need it in general
Fantastic! I have been waiting for this mod for a long time. Btw, what brand of flux and solder wire are you using? Your soldering joints always look so nice and shiny!
Hot air is another way to remove SMD components without hot tweezers. I find it easier than the method demonstrated on those transistors as well
Or you can use 2 soldering irons.
I love your videos so much. The mods are amazing, but even the soldering tips are fire.
You can tell Voultar is concerned about counterfeit cloning, from the hot glob to the mandatory installation service.
And he's not wrong this is a big deal and will hopefully crash the inflated 1-chip market. One thing nobody talks about with 1-chip consoles is like all SNES, they need modification too. The VRM's are still ancient 7805's and a capacitor is needed in the power bridge to fix the horizontal jailbars.
I was excited until I saw the side by sides, especially the FF3 opening screen. This reminded me that most developers of the time designed the graphics with the original chips in mind. This seems like it is a over sharpening the image. We need to remember that the designers of this generation of game where trying to hide the sharp edge of the pixels.
Was it ever broken if it left the factory that way? If the designers intended it to look that way, why change it? Modding consoles to get emulator quality output seems pretty pointless, if you're going to go to these lengths for video quality, stop taking consoles away from people who want them and play virtual console instead.
Just got my order placed for the mod!! Was the first official customer to get it too 😁
Voultar is basically a magician
No no. Just a normal engineer who's been working out this problem for the past few years! Thanks for the support!
@@Voultar Any sufficiently advanced engineer's works are indistinguishable from magic ;)
-a neuroscientist
PS I can't wait to get one of these kits in my hands in the UK! My childhood NTSC 2-chip SNES and I will rekindle our mutual obsession, and playing it will feel like what I thought I remembered playing SNES looked like (i.e. pixel perfect)
The conditions of conquest are always easy. We have but to toil awhile, endure awhile, believe always, and never turn back.