MiSTer FPGA board

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ldeveraux
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by ldeveraux »

donluca wrote:
MiSter is aimed at accurately reproducing the hardware behavior of the various platforms the games are run onto.

If anything, it needs exactly the opposite: a way to have it boot straight to a game just like a real PCB would, without going through any menus.

If you're looking for "flashy" alternatives, look no further than the various RasPi solutions.

If you want an happy in-between solution, GroovyMAME/crtEMU with whatever frontend you enjoy most.
I don't care what you think it's aimed at, folks can sing the praises of the Mister all they want. Without what I'm suggesting it won't reach mass market appeal. Maybe that's not the goal of the project, but why be niche when you can be ubiquitous like RetroPie?
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donluca
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by donluca »

ldeveraux wrote:I don't care what you think it's aimed at,
I'm pretty sure many people don't care about what you think it's aimed at, and that won't stop you from voicing your preferences online :D
folks can sing the praises of the Mister all they want.
Thank you so much for your approval, I'll now go praise the MiSTer with even greater joy. :D
Without what I'm suggesting it won't reach mass market appeal.
It already has and, also due to the chip shortages, there are many people who have been wanting it for more than a year and still doesn't have one.
Maybe that's not the goal of the project,
Correct.
I've already stated what's the goal of the project.
but why be niche when you can be ubiquitous like RetroPie?
Because the price and availability of the platform it runs on unfortunately is not comparable to the RaspberryPi and its thousands variants and clones.
It also doesn't have the support for so many game consoles and PCs like RasPi solutions have.
ldeveraux
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by ldeveraux »

donluca wrote:
ldeveraux wrote:I don't care what you think it's aimed at,
I'm pretty sure many people don't care about what you think it's aimed at, and that won't stop you from voicing your preferences online :D
folks can sing the praises of the Mister all they want.
Thank you so much for your approval, I'll now go praise the MiSTer with even greater joy. :D
Without what I'm suggesting it won't reach mass market appeal.
It already has and, also due to the chip shortages, there are many people who have been wanting it for more than a year and still doesn't have one.
Maybe that's not the goal of the project,
Correct.
I've already stated what's the goal of the project.
but why be niche when you can be ubiquitous like RetroPie?
Because the price and availability of the platform it runs on unfortunately is not comparable to the RaspberryPi and its thousands variants and clones.
It also doesn't have the support for so many game consoles and PCs like RasPi solutions have.
Not sure why you need to dissect my response, I'm not correcting facts as you see them, it's just my opinion. It's also my opinion that if you think the Mister has reached the popularity level of a Pi, even isolated to the retro gaming scope, you're either deluded or have your finger well off the pulse of this situation.
Joelepain
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Joelepain »

I think donluca, like a lot of people here, is fed up of people appearing from nowhere and begining to say I want this, I want that, and if it's not implemented in the next two weeks your project is utter sh*t and ultimately doomed...

The devs do what they want and owe nothing to no one. If people can't understand this basic principle on this kind of forum, just pass...
Last edited by Joelepain on Wed Jul 27, 2022 2:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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donluca
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by donluca »

You missed the part where I specified that *IF* the DE10 Nano FPGA was as cheap and available as the various RasPi/BananaPi/OrangePi boards and had the support for the vast majority of consoles and PCs like RasPi has, it would have reached the same popularity.

Those are two big "if"s that are not going to change any time soon.

Prices are only going to increase which means that RasPi platforms are actually going to gain even more popularity among those that wanted a MiSTer but now can't afford or find one and will content themselves with a RasPi, so nothing to do here.

As for support, programming an FPGA is more effort and the resources are more limited, hence no PS2, no DC or other modern consoles. So MiSTer will always be behind RasPi for platform support.

Those are the reasons why MiSter will never be as widespread as RasPi solutions, not because it doesn't have a cute menu.

Also, here's some nice food for thought to chew on: RasPi boards are based on ARM which are always going to stick around, which means that all those emulators will work even on future boards, 20 years from now.

Terasic might decide at one point to discontinue the production of the DE10 Nano and that means it's game over for MiSTer and people will have to put a huge amount of effort in porting it to other FPGAs (if it will be possible at all, in some cases).

But sure, if you think that what's holding MiSTer back is a nice menu... what can I say. Maybe I'm not the one being delusional or "having my finger well off the pulse of this situation". :D

EDIT: I was replying to ldeveraux, of course.
Joelepain wrote:I think donluca, like a lot of people here, is fed up of people appearing from nowhere and begining to say I want this, I want that, and if it's not implemented in the next two weeks your project is utter sh*t and ultimately doomed...

The devs do what they want and owe nothing to no one. If people can't understand this basic principle on this kind of forum, just pass...
I'm just making fun of the guy who thinks he's a business manager and what's holding the MiSTer back from becoming as widespread as the RasPi is the lack of a nice, colorful menu.
ldeveraux
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by ldeveraux »

donluca wrote:
I'm just making fun of the guy who thinks he's a business manager and what's holding the MiSTer back from becoming as widespread as the RasPi is the lack of a nice, colorful menu.
It must be quite the burden to have all this knowledge and feel pressure to impart it on everyone else. I'm afraid it's a language barrier where you don't understand the word 'opinion.'
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donluca
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by donluca »

ldeveraux wrote:
Wolf_ wrote:MiSTer really has become the dream machine I always wanted
Now all it needs is a proper front end like RetroPie/EmulationStation
Then I'd personally advise you to learn the difference between making a statement and voicing an opinion.

Also, I appreciate your concern about my burdens, but I assure you that knowledge (and the sharing thereof) is not one of them.

And I rarely "impart" it on anyone. I just like to write and let people decide for themselves what to make of it, instead of making public statements about what developers should or should not do.

EDIT: by the way, please, do join the discussion on this other thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&p=1498157#p1498157
There's a user who goes by the name "Despatche" that's just your kind of guy. I'm sure you'll get along like a house on fire.
ldeveraux
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by ldeveraux »

fernan1234 wrote:
ldeveraux wrote:
Wolf_ wrote:MiSTer really has become the dream machine I always wanted
Now all it needs is a proper front end like RetroPie/EmulationStation

This has been explicitly said to go against the philosophy of the lead devs, especially the main dev Sorg. Of course, someone else could create such a front end with a lot of work lacking enthusiastic support from the main devs, but at the same time it's hard to see it getting integrated into the official project even if it happens.
I had to go back a page to find a response worth replying to, but yeah I hear that. It just can't be a daily driver for me without a nicer gui, which is why I keep going back to my pi. Personal preference I guess, I don't drag on the mister for its capabilities, I just weigh the +/- every time I want to play and say 'screw it, the pi is just easier' :lol:
spmbx
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by spmbx »

Funny how different people experience it. For me the minimalist UI is one of the attractive points of the mister. I just want to select a game and go with minimal fuss.
ldeveraux
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by ldeveraux »

spmbx wrote:Funny how different people experience it. For me the minimalist UI is one of the attractive points of the mister. I just want to select a game and go with minimal fuss.
Maybe I'm in the minority then, idk. I rarely turn on the Pi with a plan to play a game, usually just have a free hour and want to scroll through the library and pick something. I feel like I remember when you couldn't even use the controller in Mister's top menu, so I'm out of it...
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donluca
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by donluca »

ldeveraux wrote:It just can't be a daily driver for me without a nicer gui, which is why I keep going back to my pi.
Fair enough.
Wolf_
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Wolf_ »

I feel like a touch of paint to the ui is the last "big ask" that would make a difference on the MiSTer at its current specs. Like it is a gaming console make it a bit visually pleasing to browse the libraries. No need for it to feel like you are trapped in a dos menu until the game fires up. Just give me like a console/arcade view with some emu movies type preview showing off a few of the most popular games for a few seconds like ALttP and Mario on the snes or some SF on CPS2 while I browse that category and a font for the games list that doesn't look like I'm trying to hack the government. That an a fav games section that can boot games from multiple platforms.
ldeveraux
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by ldeveraux »

I guess I'm not the only one then...
ZellSF
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by ZellSF »

"All it needs" "Last big ask".

I would still rather have some features that actually has an impact on games, like a more flexible scaling setup, better integrated composite/s-video support (or at least included shaders to simulate it) and better shader presets.

Relatively huge PSX update a day or two ago btw. Quite a few fixes.
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NewSchoolBoxer
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by NewSchoolBoxer »

Guile wrote:I just assembled my MiSTer and it's amazing but I ran into a problem while testing the NES core on a crt. I have the analog IO board and I'm using component out to a 15khz tv. On NES games I was getting extremely brief dropouts once in a while maybe every 10 minutes or so. I didn't test other cores that long but it never happened once on the SNES or PSX cores so far.

I also had simultaneous output on hdmi and it did not drop the image through hdmi. Any suggestions for what might be causing this?
One dropout every 10 minutes is indicative of a mismatch between 60 Hz video and NES/SNES native output at 60.1 Hz. Every 10 minutes, NES is 1 second = 60 frames ahead and then something realizes that and screws around and syncs video back up.

At least I don't have a better explanation. Came up in Analogue's Mini NT discussion where its analog output is correct off-spec 60.1 Hz but HDMI is in-spec 60 Hz and therefore clone console isn't "cycle accurate" in the digital out case.
Wolf_
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Wolf_ »

ZellSF wrote:"All it needs" "Last big ask".

I would still rather have some features that actually has an impact on games, like a more flexible scaling setup, better integrated composite/s-video support (or at least included shaders to simulate it) and better shader presets.

Relatively huge PSX update a day or two ago btw. Quite a few fixes.
What do you mean "more flexible"? Seems to me it already offers a plethora of scaling options. And if you want analogue video out there are plenty of 0 lag hdmi to your preferred analogue video output adapters. (Also splitters if you want both outputs)
ZellSF
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by ZellSF »

There's basically no control over vertical or horizontal zoom. If you're not happy with the core's overscan settings, sucks to be you basically. The few controls that are, are limited to integer scales.

Also using adapters to play the games as intended, when it's possible without them? Not even getting into finding either good or authentic looking adapters is a bit harder than "just order whatever off eBay".
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HDgaming42
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by HDgaming42 »

Fudoh wrote:
I highly recommend the Portta HDMI to VGA
yeah, that's my recommendation as well. But the Portta requires a limited range input to provide an output without black crush - which I always find a bit unintuitive for a HDMI to VGA converter. YCbCr should be fine as well of course. The limited range requirement might be dependent on the actual input resolution, but at least for 15khz input, it's a requirement.
Any idea what level sync the Portta puts out? I have an RGB modded Sony CRT that I would love to feed my MiSTer into but don't want to damage it...

And assuming it's TTL (I hope not) what's the simplest way to get it down to 75ohm? (I'm not good enough at soldering to work on things as tightly packed as VGA cables.)

The connector is dsub already, so would getting one of these

https://www.digikey.ca/en/products/deta ... GhY0gLoF8g

allow me to just use one of the many VGA to 5xBNC adapters I have kicking around?
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Rock Man
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Rock Man »

Trying to get my MiSTer to work on my PVM via dsub to SCART.

My PVM can't do 480p, so I need to force 240p (15 kHz?) Which means I'm gonna have a little chat with my ini file.

So I leave scandoubler=0 correct? I feel like i need to put 320x240 somewhere. What else would need to be done?
fernan1234
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by fernan1234 »

Rock Man wrote:So I leave scandoubler=0 correct? I feel like i need to put 320x240 somewhere. What else would need to be done?
Do you have an IO board for the analogue output? If so then yeah you leave scandoubler disabled and the original 15khz video should come out of the D-sub connector on the IO board with no further configuration needed. If instead you're using the HDMI output with a DAC, you just need to enable direct video in the ini file.
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Rock Man
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Rock Man »

fernan1234 wrote:
Rock Man wrote:So I leave scandoubler=0 correct? I feel like i need to put 320x240 somewhere. What else would need to be done?
Do you have an IO board for the analogue output? If so then yeah you leave scandoubler disabled and the original 15khz video should come out of the D-sub connector on the IO board with no further configuration needed. If instead you're using the HDMI output with a DAC, you just need to enable direct video in the ini file.
It worked. :)

Turned off scandoubler and enabled composite sync. That did the trick.

I use the analog io
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evil_ash_xero
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by evil_ash_xero »

Well this thread seems fun.

Anyway, I knew nothing of this thing (well, I did, but I didn't look into it) until recently. With all of my OG consoles hooked up, I didn't really see the point to look into this very second. But it seems to be
pretty versatile, and the arcade aspect is extremely attractive to me.
I had a few questions on it.

From what I understand, this is a zero latency device, but it seems that controllers can add latency (I saw a controller latency thing on RetroRGB, and some of it was absurd)? I plan on playing with a CRT, so display latency wouldn't factor in.
If I were to get one, what kind of controller should I use? I would prefer to use my OG controllers (SNES and 6 Button Genesis would be preferable). I hear that's possible, but does that add latency?

Also, how is the arcade support? I'm primarily looking into the usual suspects (90s Capcom, Konami, CAVE, Raizing). Will this be arcade accurate on my CRT?

How is the overclocking on the SNES cores? I have an Analogue Pocket, and the games just don't start (most of the time) when I use the turbo CPU option. I would assume an actual MiSTer would work a lot
better than that. I'm really sick of SNES slowdown. I can eliminate it for the most part in emulators, but... emulators. Actually, the AP got me interested into looking into the MiSTer, as it was so easy to add the FPGA
cores to that device. I thought it would be a real mess to figure out.

Finally, what is a good one to get? I know there is the standard one, that is the one to get. But there are tricked out ones, that I'm open to. I'd like a very nice one, that can take me as far into the gens as possible. If I can do PSX or Saturn, I'd like the power for that. I've seen some with lovely casings, so that would
be something I'd be interested in knowing about. I'm not super keen on a barebones looking one.
I've seen some of these for absurd prices on EBay. I'm assuming this is because they are out of stock at the moment? It seems like a pretty tricked out one still costs under 500 dollars, if you're patient.

Inform me, guys. I'm way behind. And don't be like "what are you stupid?". Because on this topic, yes I am.
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Syntax
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Syntax »

Just get one now before the prices jump up again you wont regret it. So many of my old consoles are not in use now.

Get something with an analog out board and v3 128MB SDRAM and life on CRT should be easy.

As for 0 latency controllers either get a Blissbox BlisSter v2(sold out right now) with the cables for each core and run LLAPI cores or run stock cores and SNAC adapters for each core.
Both allow for native controller support, same speed as the original system.

Updating cores is a breeze too, its all automated in scripts.

PM me when you get it and ill help set it up.
fernan1234
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by fernan1234 »

On latency and controllers, honestly just try whatever USB to whatever original controller you want (or USB versions of said controllers if you're okay with that) and make sure fast USB polling is on in the MiSTer ini settings. You may find that this feels like OG hardware when using a CRT, and won't need to bother with LLAPI or SNAC stuff. It really is that good.
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evil_ash_xero
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by evil_ash_xero »

Syntax wrote:Just get one now before the prices jump up again you wont regret it. So many of my old consoles are not in use now.

Get something with an analog out board and v3 128MB SDRAM and life on CRT should be easy.
Could you point me in the direction of a reliable seller?
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Kez
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Kez »

I'll try to field what questions I can!

If you wanna play on a CRT you've got two options, either get an analog IO board or use HDMI Direct Video with a DAC. I don't have experience with the latter but I have an analog IO board and it works well.

In terms of latency, it's best to select a tested lower latency controller. If you want authenticity you can use like 8bitdo controllers and stuff - I have not measured the latency personally but have never really felt like games are laggy but YMMV of course! You can use original controllers via either a USB adapter which will introduce lag depending on the adapter. The alternative is called SNAC adapters, which are controller specific (meaning you need one for each system) - these also require use of the special serial port on the IO board (it looks like USB but it's not actually a conventional USB connection) - with SNAC the controllers are talking directly to the core so the experience is authentic to real hardware - even special controllers like light guns can work with this method. Not a lot of cores support SNAC, though.

You can look at a list of arcade cores on the wiki - the cores that are supported generally work very well. The direct/analog output will generally be arcade accurate to a fault - this means if the original core produced a weird resolution or refresh rate to work on arcade monitors, it may not necessarily work on a regular 15khz CRT TV.

The main thing that is driving the cost up currently is the FPGA itself, which is purchased on an FPGA development board called the Terasic DE10-Nano. FPGAs generally have been tough to get hold of for a while now and this development board in particular has a lot of additional demand due to the MiSTer project (it was originally just supposed to be something people can buy to hook up to their PC and do FPGA development - it was even subsidized by Intel early on I believe)

In terms of core support - as long as you get the 128MB SDRAM board you pretty much have access to everything. The IO board adds some nice additional functionality (like analogue video/audio out, optical audio out, some buttons for resetting and stuff, the previously mentioned serial port for SNAC (and support for a Roland-MT32Pi add on) and a cooling fan for the FPGA). You'll also want some sort of USB hub add on - technically you can plug an OTG USB HUB into the micro USB port on the DE10-Nano board but that is quite an ugly solution and also puts a lot of pressure on a little port.

So for the vast majority of the functionality that's what you should be looking for: SDRAM, IO Board, USB Hub. Most of the all in one solutions should tick all those boxes - and beyond that there are some that may have other specialist features like JAMMA output and stuff. Mostly it comes down to aesthetics beyond that.
Steven
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Steven »

I'm glad I got this thing when I did; just the DE10-Nano alone is now worth more than I paid for my entire build ~3 years ago. It's gotten ridiculous.

I wouldn't bother with any special controller adaptors or whatever; get some Mega Drive Mini/Genesis Mini USB controllers or a USB Saturn controller for Sega, a PS4/PS5 controller that covers your PS1/Super Nintendo stuff, a PC Engine mini controller if you want something with turbo for PC Engine (I don't know if these are still obtainable, though), and whatever arcade controller you want and call it good. Or just use a keyboard because keyboard is awesome.
fernan1234
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by fernan1234 »

DE10 prices have gotten that bad? Feels good having bought one for 120 USD from Amazon whenever it was that they were still at that low.

And yeah someone mentioned USB adapters can introduce lag but again this will become a non-issue with fast USB polling enabled. Unless you're a speedrunner and need to 100% eliminate the chance of once in a blue moon having your input being eaten while trying to execute a pixel perfect trick and ruining your run, you'll really be no worse off by going the USB route as opposed to the more complicated options.
Steven
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by Steven »

Yeah, they are really bad now. I bought mine for $110 USD in January~February 2020. Now they are $225 USD directly from Terasic.
fernan1234
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Re: MiSTer FPGA board

Post by fernan1234 »

Dang that sucks, but honestly I'd still see it as a bargain for all the value it can provide.
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