custom firmware for sega flashback 2018

rrifonas · Feb 2, 2019

Beetch18 said:
Does the atgames firmware update change the emulation or just add sd card support? Someone on reddit said it improves emulation but I thought it just added sd support. I downloaded wd_gangster2's firmware update to add sd card support and have been very happy with it. Would consider downloading at games update if emulation improvements are included though.

The firmware for Genesis Flashback 2018/MD Flashback 2018 released in Atgames website and the one created by wd_gaster2 does the same thing. It replaces one file in the data partition to enable support for SD Card. It doesn't touch the emulators.

The firmware released by Atgames for the Legends Flashback DOES HAVE improvements in the emulation.

If you want to 'try something different' for you Genesis Flashback you can try one of my custom firmware to replace Genesis Plus GX with Picodrive, or wait until tomorrow to have Picodrive working with Sega CD support. The Picodrive is not as accurate as Genesis Plus GX, but it's faster and Sega CD have a better framerate than in Genesis Plus GX.

D-an-W · Feb 2, 2019

What he said ^^^

BillyHGamer · Feb 2, 2019

Beetch18 said:
Does the atgames firmware update change the emulation or just add sd card support? Someone on reddit said it improves emulation but I thought it just added sd support. I downloaded wd_gangster2's firmware update to add sd card support and have been very happy with it. Would consider downloading at games update if emulation improvements are included though.

Can you play all cartridge games and all compatible

HopTronix · Feb 2, 2019

@rrifonas Just got my 2018 Model with SD card slot yesterday. Can’t wait to try the custom Picodrive firmware with CD support.

rrifonas · Feb 2, 2019

I updated Post #97 with the new update for Picodrive adding Sega CD support. I did some tests and US and JP games work fine. EU games play fast, the emulator is forcing the game to run at 60fps while it should run at 50fps.

BillyHGamer said:
Can you play all cartridge games and all compatible

No, you can't. This is an emulation device and while most of the cartridges can be 'dumped' just fine, a few of them have problems. Games that should have problems running from cartridge:
+ Sonic 3 doesn't work due to its memory to save games
+ S&K with other carts, it can't merge the ROMs
+ SSF2 due to bank switching
+ Virtua Racing

dcuk7 · Feb 2, 2019

@rrifonas Have you tried any other emulators on this (such as Final Burn Alpha)? Just wondering how far this unit can be pushed!

rrifonas · Feb 3, 2019

dcuk7 said:
@rrifonas Have you tried any other emulators on this (such as Final Burn Alpha)? Just wondering how far this unit can be pushed!

While the hardware (and software) is quite the same as the Legends Flashback, the menu has only 1 slot for emulator. It would possible to run FBA but most of the games would run slow, except for CPS1, CPS2 and Neo Geo, these games run at full speed. MAME 2000 works fine in the Legends Flashback and it would run well here.
The only way to increase the number of "slots" for emulators would be converting it into a Legends Flashback, but doing this you will lose the support for cartridges, and we would need to adjust the partitions.

Excalibur007 · Feb 3, 2019

rrifonas said:
I updated Post #97 with the new update for Picodrive adding Sega CD support. I did some tests and US and JP games work fine. EU games play fast, the emulator is forcing the game to run at 60fps while it should run at 50fps.

Did the previous Picodrive option run EU games too fast as well? I thought a previous post said it ran very well and did not have the sound issue with EU games that the GenPlusGX firmware has.

I can flash to this firmware and if I don't like it, revert to GenPlusGX by running that version update again, correct?

rrifonas · Feb 3, 2019

Excalibur007 said:
Did the previous Picodrive option run EU games too fast as well? I thought a previous post said it ran very well and did not have the sound issue with EU games that the GenPlusGX firmware has.

I can flash to this firmware and if I don't like it, revert to GenPlusGX by running that version update again, correct?

I have tested a PAL Master System game (Sonic 2) and it work fine with Picodrive. I did not tested Sega CD games before because they are not working with Picodrive. I think I've tested one Genesis game and it also worked.
You can revert to Genesis Plus GX if you want.

Excalibur007 · Feb 3, 2019

rrifonas said:
I have tested a PAL Master System game (Sonic 2) and it work fine with Picodrive. I did not tested Sega CD games before because they are not working with Picodrive. I think I've tested one Genesis game and it also worked.
You can revert to Genesis Plus GX if you want.

It may have been on AtariAge that someone was talking about PicoDrive working well with EU games before. I don't remember.

So I guess CHD formatted SegaCD games will not work with PicoDrive, (only working with GenesisPlusGX).
Kinda disappointed that PicoDrive still doesn't support FM sound for the Master System. I was hoping they would have added support for that by now. PicoDrive is still such a mixed bag... better speed with SegaCD and 32x, but still lacking compared to GenesisPlusGX. I guess we have to weigh the pro/cons of each. At least you've made custom firmwares for both. Thank you for that!

Also, I'm loving the ability to load the rom partition from the SD card. It's great to be able to so easily replace the built in games with my own, like last year's model. I'm pretty much still using my config from last year for that, with the addition of the mini thumbs. I still have to go back and add in games that weren't compatible with last year's, like Super Hang-On and such.

Excalibur007 · Feb 3, 2019

Okay, so after a bit of testing, here are my thoughts on PicoDrive vs GenesisPlusGX.

PicoDrive did not run full speed with hardly anything.
Master System: Inconsistent performance, drops frames, has speed up/slow down issues and has sound pops. Of course, no FM sound support either.
Genesis: Seemed to have issues with PAL games similar to the GenPlusGX emulator. Alien Soldier sounded bad and played too fast, but also dropped frames. NTSC games seemed inconsistent as well with sound pops and inconsistent frames.
SegaCD: This played slightly better than GenPlusGX. There were minimal sound pops -- a few in the BIOS, but I did not notice performance issues in the games I tried. Heart of the Alien was selectable which for some reason does not seem to be selectable with GenPlusGX. No CHD format support.
32x: Playable, but with sound pops and some frame drops.
Game Gear: No support
SG-1000: No support

Genesis Plus GX in my opinion seems to be the emulator of choice for now.
Master System: runs solid with consistent framerates and FM sound support.
Genesis: solid emulation for NTSC games, but sound issues with PAL since it's forcing 60Hz.
SegaCD: Some slowdowns, especially in the BIOS, but most games run fine. Secret of Monkey Island has a lot of sound pops. Road Rash, Soul Star, Snatcher, and most other games run great. Heart of the Alien is not selectable from the first in-game menu -- for some reason I can only choose Out of this World. Supports CHD files so less disk space is used, due to compression, and less clutter with having only one file instead of multiples for bin/cue.
32x: No support
Game Gear: Solid emulation with consistent framerates.
SG-1000: Solid emulation with consistent framerates. Color palette seems accurate which is an issue with some other emulators.

We just need the emulation improvements given to GenPlusGX on the Legends Flashback for our Genesis/Megadrive Flashbacks.

I expected much better from PicoDrive. It's the only Genesis emulator that runs full speed on the old 3DS. It runs SegaCD games great on a New 3DS, so I thought it would run even better on this hardware. I don't know why, but the only thing it did well on my Flashback was SegaCD. I seriously think even last year's emulator was better than this PicoDrive... much better... seriously.

HopTronix · Feb 3, 2019

PicoDrive is running Sonic CD well here. At least through three levels. 32X support is working well.

rrifonas · Feb 3, 2019

I personally prefer Genesis Plus GX than Picodrive. While I have the impression Picodrive is faster (and it is, at least running Sonic CD), "something" seems off. My tests are mostly based on the Legends Flashback which has 128MB RAM x 256MB in the Genesis Flashback so I think the differences are most perceptible. My Genesis Flashback has a hardware issue and it freezes after 15 minutes so I'm basically using it to check if the updates are good before releasing then here.

If you think the 2017 emulator is better try loading Outrun in the 2017 Flashback and let me know what happens

.

Excalibur007 · Feb 3, 2019

rrifonas said:
If you think the 2017 emulator is better try loading Outrun in the 2017 Flashback and let me know what happens .

True, I definitely did not like being unable to play a few of the Genesis staples on the 2017 model, like OutRun and Super Hang-On. I don't remember if Space Harrier 2 worked. I remember something being off with the Lotus games as well. However, there weren't that many that it was incompatible with, and of the games it played, it did a better job than PicoDrive on this model. Alien Soldier played far better on the 2017 emulator. I wasn't satisfied at all with last year's emulation, but I wasn't joking when I said I prefer it over PicoDrive on this year's.

The 2017 model played the Piko Interactive cartridge release of Duke Nukem 3D, but for some reason it does not work on this year's model, although it does play the rom just fine.

I am glad I tried PicoDrive though. It satisfied my curiosity and made me appreciate GenPlusGX much more.

While GenPlusGX doesn't play SegaCD 100%, it does play most games without noticeable slowdown. I actually played all the way through Road Avenger for the first time yesterday. I'm really glad AtGames chose it for the 2018 model. I just hope they fix the 50Hz/EU MegaDrive games support like I guess they did for the Legends Flashback.

D-an-W · Feb 3, 2019

To load Sega CD with multiple bin and a single cue do I just keep them all in the same zip file?

EDIT: Could someone who has several different game types on their SD Card please share a screenshot of the folder structure if at all possible?

rrifonas · Feb 3, 2019

D-an-W said:
To load Sega CD with multiple bin and a single cue do I just keep them all in the same zip file?

EDIT: Could someone who has several different game types on their SD Card please share a screenshot of the folder structure if at all possible?

zip is not supported for Sega CD. You will need to have .cue/.bin in the same folder, or use .chd files if you prefer a single file (Genesis Plus GX only).

You can use chdman (it's part of MAME) to convert .cue/.bin to .chd, and then back to a single .cue/.bin.
To create .chd files:
chdman createcd -i "C:\GAME\mygame.cue" -o "C:\Destination\mygame.chd" -f
To convert .chd to a single .cue/.bin:
chdman extractcd -i "C:\GAME\mygame.chd" -o "C:\Destination\mygame.cue" -ob "C:\Destination\mygame.bin" -f

Excalibur007 · Feb 4, 2019

Would you be able to do the same thing (script to load rom partition from SD card) for the Atari Flashback HD?

D-an-W · Feb 5, 2019

@rrifonas should the first extract option be -i and not -I ?

rrifonas · Feb 5, 2019

Excalibur007 said:
Would you be able to do the same thing (script to load rom partition from SD card) for the Atari Flashback HD?

Atari Flashback 8 HD: no
Atari Flashback 9: yes, if someone dump the partition.

D-an-W said:
@rrifonas should the first extract option be -i and not -I ?

Yes, I'm sorry for the typo.

lolapaloooza · Feb 8, 2019

Hi @rrifonas!! for us noobs here

can you please give us a step by step guide on what to do? and if possible.. what files are needed and which file goes where on the SD card? (i tried all possible ways bud had no luck at all)

Another question i got.. i played Aladdin from the SD card and the sound quality was awful.. is there any way to fix this?

Thank you in advance!

custom firmware for sega flashback 2018

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