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  • Joined: 30 Jul 2008
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Tectoy rising from its grave...
Post Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2016 2:32 am
Apparently they will release a new Mega Drive in a week or so...



What is said in the video:
"Mega release (launch) from Tectoy!" (duh, we get it, its a Mega Drive...)
"Are you curious? Register now" (and they forgot to put a link to register, which is now posted in the comments section...)

If rumours are true, this one will have a cart port, and HDMI.
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Post Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2016 10:44 am
If this IS an HDMI-Out Mega Drive, I'm totally interested in this thing.
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Post Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2016 12:05 pm
I'm quite intrigued myself. How will they implement the machine?

Knowing their recent track record however, it seems it may be emulator based.
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Post Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2016 1:05 pm
Maybe another console with cheap plastics? XD
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Post Posted: Tue Oct 25, 2016 2:32 pm
Wow, interesting. But I honestly doubt that they´re using good chips ect, which means that I think it will be another Mega Drive II console instead of an MD type 1 model.
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Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 9:29 am
Apparently it will also have an SD card, it will look like the first Mega Drive and will come on a box similar to the original.

There are also rumours about it having wireless controls and costing around R$500 (something around US$160-$170)
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Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 2:59 pm
Nothing is confirmed but Stefano Arnhold already hinted this new Mega Drive will be different from their current cheap Sega consoles. Apparently it will be aimed to collectors (this console will cost twice the price of current Mega Drive).

Right now there are many rumours being discussed on Brazilian forums.
If they're real the project is already better than NES Classic.

Tectoy released wonderful products AND complete garbage in the past - so nothing will surprise me about the new Mega Drive. However they seem to be very well intended (and aware of what collectors want) this time.

Personally I'm optimistic.
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Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 8:41 pm
Thanks for the info Macbee!
Maybe we get a wonderful christmas present this year?^^ I will let myself be surprised.
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Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 9:43 pm
homebrew development contests organized by tectoy would be amazing! ;)
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Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 9:46 pm
law81 wrote
Maybe another console with cheap plastics? XD

tectoy stuff used to be quite well built in the 80’s and 90’s - i actually don’t know a thing about now, how things changed since then
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Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 10:21 pm
Gordman wrote
Thanks for the info Macbee!
Maybe we get a wonderful christmas present this year?^^ I will let myself be surprised.

You're welcome!
I'll update this topic as soon as I have more news about it.

nitrofurano wrote

tectoy stuff used to be quite well built in the 80’s and 90’s - i actually don’t know a thing about now, how things changed since then

In fact Tec Toy went into bankruptcy in late 1990s. They returned in 2001 (as "Tectoy" instead of "Tec Toy") but the new company was small, selling low-quality and uninteresting products - almost a caricature of what they used to be.

You can read more about the bankruptcy process here (in Portuguese):
https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tectoy#1997.E2.80.932001:_Queda_nas_vendas_e_conco...
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Post Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 10:29 pm
macbee wrote

In fact Tec Toy went into bankruptcy in late 1990s. They returned in 2001 (as "Tectoy" instead of "Tec Toy") but the new company was small, selling low-quality and uninteresting products - almost a caricature of what they used to be.

sad... i didn’t know that...
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Post Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2016 5:46 pm
Nothing was confirmed yet - but a website called "Campo Grande News" says they got the following information with someone who works at Tectoy:

- New Mega Drive would look exactly like the first, original console.
- Would accept old cartridges and SD cards.
- Would accept AV and HDMI cables.
- Would come with the classic 3-button gamepad (compatible with old Genesis gamepads).
- The box would look like the first Brazilian Mega Drive box (with a big screenshot of the main character from Altered Beast being transformed).
- No final word about hardware (SoC? Software emulation? FPGA?)
- It would be 100% made in Brazil (not imported AtGames stuff).
- Tectoy wouldn't release new carts but they can release games in SD card format.
- It may be compatible with other consoles (Master System?)
- It would cost 499 BRL.

Is this true? No one knows, we'll have to wait a few more days to see!
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Post Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2016 6:32 pm
macbee wrote
Nothing was confirmed yet - but a website called "Campo Grande News" says they got the following information with someone who works at Tectoy:

- New Mega Drive would look exactly like the first, original console.
- Would accept old cartridges and SD cards.
- Would accept AV and HDMI cables.
- Would come with the classic 3-button gamepad (compatible with old Genesis gamepads).
- The box would look like the first Brazilian Mega Drive box (with a big screenshot of the main character from Altered Beast being transformed).
- No final word about hardware (SoC? Software emulation? FPGA?)
- It would be 100% made in Brazil (not imported AtGames stuff).
- Tectoy wouldn't release new carts but they can release games in SD card format.
- It may be compatible with other consoles (Master System?)
- It would cost 499 BRL.

Is this true? No one knows, we'll have to wait a few more days to see!


500 Temers, original design and box... Looks like some collectors high quality limited edition, witch is pretty much the oposite of tectoy's products nowdays. But I remember reading an interview with Stefano I believe, shortly after that poll about the relaunch of the old consoles, where he states they were having a hard time to find the original specification of the proprietary chips.
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Post Posted: Fri Oct 28, 2016 12:24 am
macbee wrote
- It would cost 499 BRL.


Daang, that's around $200 Australian! I wanted to import one, but... look at that price!

Time to save up!
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 11:02 am
Looks like it's just a clone console that plays ROMs from SD with composite-out: http://www.tectoy.com.br/pre-venda-mega-drive-edicao-limitada/p/995040461825

That's really disappointing :(
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 11:24 am
But It's not based in emulators, and works with an sd...it's better than expected!
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 11:49 am
Considering the recent products of tec toy, this is better than expected, the only disapointment is the lack of HDMI, that was given by certain in most speculations
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 11:55 am
Last edited by ICEknight on Mon Oct 31, 2016 2:07 pm; edited 1 time in total
Quote
Processadores (integrados em um single chip):

MC68000 7,16MHz
Z80 3,58MHz

Not based on emulators? That sounds like a Genesis-on-a-chip to me.

Also, there's this thing...

Isn't that a permanently-attached plug? It would be a bummer if you can't actually unplug the AC cable.
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 12:28 pm
ICEknight wrote

Also, it's most likely going to run at 50Hz. =\

weird, Brazil is (all or mostly) 60hz...
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 2:01 pm
nitrofurano wrote
weird, Brazil is (all or mostly) 60hz...
Oh ok, I thought TecToy's consoles run at 50Hz.
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 3:27 pm
nitrofurano wrote
ICEknight wrote

Also, it's most likely going to run at 50Hz. =\

weird, Brazil is (all or mostly) 60hz...

There's no 50Hz stuff in Brazil. Despite the name PAL-M is 60Hz only.

So this "collector's edition" is a huge disappointment. But for a "non-collector" item (for the average adult who had a Mega Drive when was a kid) it's a very nice console - the best released by post-bankruptcy Tectoy so far.

And my favorite thing is that brand new, licensed 3-button controllers will be back to stores: http://www.tectoy.com.br/pre-venda-joystick-mega-drive-3-botoes/p/995055111828
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 8:43 pm
I bought it today! Let's wait until June 2017...

Flygon wrote
macbee wrote
- It would cost 499 BRL.


Daang, that's around $200 Australian! I wanted to import one, but... look at that price!

Time to save up!


Price is R$ 399,00
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 9:13 pm
What a disappointment. No HDMI, weak selection of games. It has nothing going for it.
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 9:32 pm
macbee wrote
And my favorite thing is that brand new, licensed 3-button controllers will be back to stores: http://www.tectoy.com.br/pre-venda-joystick-mega-drive-3-botoes/p/995055111828


This is only 14,00€, wow! They are officially licensed, so they must be responsive. For that price, I think it is worth to import one or two =)
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Post Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 11:10 pm
The lack of HDMI output, as well as apparent cartridge compatibility issues (Virtua Racing, Sonic and Knuckles) don't fill me with hope.

Let is hope that the issue is due to badly thought out cart slot design, and not in the ASIC (?) itself.

If it's still able to be made a 'perfect' clone with user modification/intervention, than there's fantastic news in knowing the components are still being manufactured. Even if their current application is misapplied.
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Post Posted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 1:27 am
Just dreaming something like this, one day...

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Post Posted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 4:40 am
The oficial FAQ has a lot of disappointing info:

- Sound is confirmed to not be 100% accurate;
- Some cartridges don't work;
- Accessories (Game Genie, Sega CD, Power Base Converter, 32X, Meganet, Activator, Mega Mouse) don't work;
- Only composite video, no RGB or HDMI;

Some of the accessories not working, such as the Game Genie, the Activator or the Mouse, sounds really fishy... What is it about a Sega-on-a-chip that would prevent these from working?

To me personally, the lack of HDMI is a deal breaker. I already own a number of functioning MD/Genesis consoles, but the composite signal looks atrocious on my HDTV, so that would actually be THE reason to get an HDMI MD. Sadly, there's nothing this console offers that I don't already have.

As for the power supply, it's very common for electronics in Brazil to have them built into the devices themselves, so the power cord isn't detachable. This was in fact brought up in an interview, how Tec Toy wanted to do this and SEGA refused, claiming that there could be heating issues and such, but Tec Toy did it anyway, without official approval. And how SEGA later ended up "stealing" the idea for the Saturn, IIRC.
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Post Posted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 9:33 am
Sound not accurate... total deal-breaker here now. :(

TecToy's been swimming under that electric shower a bit too hard, methinks.
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Post Posted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 2:31 pm
tokumaru wrote
Some of the accessories not working, such as the Game Genie, the Activator or the Mouse, sounds really fishy... What is it about a Sega-on-a-chip that would prevent these from working?

Regarding pass-through cartridges like the Game Genie, maybe this thing reads the ROM contents and dumps them into its memory like the Retron 5?
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Post Posted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 10:05 pm
tokumaru wrote
Sound is confirmed to not be 100% accurate


they say it's because original hardware components are no longer built, but that sounds weird to me, as both the FM and the PSG chips were off the shelf components still being sold today!
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Post Posted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 10:53 pm
There's weird timing effects that change YM2612 sound, I think you get variation between Mega Drive revisions. However, here I think it's much more likely to be because it's software emulation.
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 1:28 am
I'm pretty sure this is gonna be 10 times better than anything ATGames has made.

I guess we can only wait until a review comes out...
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 8:57 am
@Maxim: didn't they wrote in the FAQ it's not emulation?
Quote
3) O Mega Drive é um emulador? Processa os jogos com componentes similares aos do console original ou roda os jogos via emulação?
O Mega Drive não é um emulador. O aparelho possui um circuito que integra componentes similares ao do produto original, uma vez que os circuitos integrados originais não são mais fabricados.

so it seems to be made with hardware, SOC/CPLD stuff... so I was wondering why they didn't succeed in making the sound correct :|
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 1:03 pm
ICEknight wrote
Regarding pass-through cartridges like the Game Genie, maybe this thing reads the ROM contents and dumps them into its memory like the Retron 5?

Which sorta contradicts the statement that this doesn't use an emulator... Well, I guess they could be copying the cartridge's contents to RAM for use with a SOAC, but I wonder why they'd do that... Having extra RAM for this sounds more expensive than accessing the cartridge in real time.
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 4:04 pm
That was really disappointing.

And the most suspicious thing is that there isn't a single video with the hardware running games, so we can see how accurate that thing is (or isn't).

They clearly says that they only garantee those 22 games on the list to run, others "are the player's risk to take".

Not running Virtua Racing and Sonic & Knucles (they say so, in their FAQ) doesn't inspire confidence either...
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 4:41 pm
tokumaru wrote
ICEknight wrote
Regarding pass-through cartridges like the Game Genie, maybe this thing reads the ROM contents and dumps them into its memory like the Retron 5?

Which sorta contradicts the statement that this doesn't use an emulator... Well, I guess they could be copying the cartridge's contents to RAM for use with a SOAC, but I wonder why they'd do that... Having extra RAM for this sounds more expensive than accessing the cartridge in real time.
This may sound a bit farfetched, but perhaps it burns every ROM it's going to use into Flash memory, as seen on the Everdrive?

Wouldn't make much sense unless they want to market the ability of being able to temporarily/permanently dump and play your games without their cartridge plugged in, but...
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 5:11 pm
If you have data on an SD card then you need to copy it to byte addressable (or word addressable for Mega Drive) memory. If you need to support that then you may as well use the same thing for cartridges, for simpler operation but some compatibility loss. It would also tie in with the specific cartridges with compatibility problems, because they read from the cart at runtime in unusual ways. I suspect a lot of game saves won't work right too.
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 8:22 pm
True, I forgot about the SD card. That would indeed be a good reason to require that all games be copied to RAM before running.

But what about the Activator, for example? Isn't it just a controller?
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Post Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 9:53 pm
Light guns are very timing sensitive so that would be tricky to get right. The mouse one makes no sense to me though.
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