Your Personal Hardware Niggles

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Joe Redifer
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Your Personal Hardware Niggles - Mar 30, 2005 03:51
First of all I' d like to say that despite what may pop into your head when you read the topic title, I am not racist!

Secondly, this thread is about things that annoy you personally about various console hardware. This is not a thread to say " I didn' t like how few colors there were with the Genesis" , but rather mostly physical things about the hardware itself that annoyed you. Here are mine:


NES
-No S-video
-Crappy way of loading cartridges
-Not very reliable (flashing screen happens often)

Sega Master System
-No S-video (but could be modded for it)
-Pause button located on the system itself instead of the controller
-Only a d-pad and 2 buttons on the controller
-Atari-style controller connectors... not exactly the best and most secure

Genesis
-No S-video (but could be modded for it... if you didn' t plan on adding a 32X)
-No stereo output except for the headphone jack
-Headphone jack prone to wear
-Atari-style controller connectors... not exactly the best and most secure
-Cartridge lock removed from US version

TurboGrafx-16
-Only RF output supported. Must purchase a seperate device to even get composite video and stereo audio
-No S-video
-Lock on CD player sometimes shifts out of place, making it impossible to power up the system until lock is turned
-Gigantic controller connection (fixed for the TurboDuo)
-Lack of multiple controller ports
-1x CD-ROM drive

Sega CD
-Only slightly faster than 1x CD-ROM drive
-Bizarre connection method to the Genesis (with wires and the such)
-Extra blinking lights removed from US version
-Bizarre method of opening CD tray, etc
-Requires its own power supply PLUS the Genesis power supply

32X
-Bizarre method of connection to Genesis (tons of wires). If you have a Sega CD as well, you have wires running all over the place conecting one component to the others
-Requires it' s own gigantic power supply, plus the gigantic power supply for the Genesis, plus the giant power supply for the Sega CD
-No S-video, but could probably be modded for it

SNES
-Either the top or the bottom half of just about every SNES turns nicotine yellow

Neo Geo
-No S-video (but could be modded for it)
-Horrible joysticks instead of control pads (CD unit came with crappy control pads)
-Horrible loading time on CD units
-Cartridges bigger than the sun... and more expensive!
-Nothing more than an overglorified Genesis in every single aspect (same hardware, only much more beefed up)

3DO
-Horrendously loooong and unskippable intro whenever machine is powered on
-Daisy-chaining controllers was a horrible idea
-No RGB output. NTSC only
-Controllers lacked response in diagonal directions
-Controllers only had 3 buttons
-Loaded very slowly

Jaguar
-Horrible controller with keypad

Saturn
-Internal battery dies too quickly

Playstation
-Horrendously long and unskippable intro whenever the machine is powered up
-Slow memory cards
-Bizarre controller

Nintendo 64
-RAM upgrade required for some CARTRIDGE games, even though carts don' t load
-Most bizarre controller yet with the " C" button actually being 4 different buttons
-Media on cartridges

Dreamcast
-Bizarre, ineffective controllers
-Slow loading to memory card/VMU
-VMU' s whine when they are powered up with a dead battery
-VERY LOUD movement of laser
-Lame controls for audio CD playback
-It' s white. Should be black or grey since all other Sega consoles were dark

Playstation 2
-Horrendously long and unskippable intro whenever the machine is powered up
-Very slow loading
-Bizarre method of powering the system off (hold top button on system forever)
-Same bizarre controller as original Playstation
-Slow memory cards
-16:9 widescreen flag not sent to TV on widescreen games

Xbox
-Unskippable intro whenever the machine is powered up
-Gigantor controllers with black and white buttons
-16:9 widescreen flag not sent to TV when Xbox is in 480p mode (but is sent in 480i mode)

Gamecube
-Extremely stupid and unskippable intro whenever the machine is powered up with an alternative startup sequence that is even worse!
-Slow memory cards which started out with barely any capacity, then Nintendo just kept releasing bigger and bigger cards and expected everyone to run out and buy new cards right away
-Bizarre controller with buttons that look like they were Play-Doh shot at the controller from a shotgun
-No digital audio support, even though the machine can output digital audio
-Component cable supplied ONLY by Nintendo and ONLY online
-Component cable does not have any audio, so you must leave the audio cables hooked up
-SNES-style A/V port is out of date. Needs to go. There is no reason why the GC needs both a SNES-style port and a digital A/V port, when the digital A/V port could be used alone, just like the Xbox.
-16:9 flag not sent to TV for widescreen games

Terry Bogard
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RE: Your Personal Hardware Niggles - Mar 30, 2005 07:23
Playstation 2
Dual Shock 2 Controllers! THANK YOU and Good night! :D

Ok ok I' ll post more later, right now me at work, lol..

Sharon
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RE: Your Personal Hardware Niggles - Mar 30, 2005 16:32
SNES - hate the cartridges - always had to jam cardboard down the side to make the cartridges fit snugly so the game would play correctly.

PS2 - dislike the controllers immensely (buttons always stick, even when they were new-I' ve owned 6 so far and they all do it).

- I' m not sure if this is the PS2 or the Gameshark, but I' m constantly having to re-input the same game codes over and over and over
< Message edited by Sharon -- 31 Mar 05 0:35:16 >

Adam Doree
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RE: Your Personal Hardware Niggles - Mar 30, 2005 16:42
Come on Bogard, you must have loads of these gripes!

Fragus_Maximus
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RE: Your Personal Hardware Niggles - Mar 30, 2005 18:56
that first list is very long......
Tyler " Frag Master" Bealmear

Terry Bogard
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RE: Your Personal Hardware Niggles - Mar 30, 2005 20:11

Come on Bogard, you must have loads of these gripes!


LOL! Alright alright I do have a few, most aren' t a big deal but a few might be..

1- For starters the PS2 AND Xbox controllers have GOT to go! I hate them both for different reasons.. I hate the Dual Shock 2 controller simply because I think it has the worst d-pad in existence. 3D games are ok with it but any 2D games, especially ones that require quick reflexes such a 2D shooters and fighting games, are made practically unplayable with that thing. That' s also one of the downsides of the PSP' s d-pad, playing Vampire Chronicle with that thing Blows! 3D games are fine with it though. To be fair to the Dual Shock 2, my gripe lies with its 2-pad, the rest of the controller is actually well-done. What I dislike about the Xbox controller is the button placement. It has the worst button placement of the bunch in my opinion, I often times forget about the two buttons way at the bottom right of the controller.
2nd worst d-pad award goes to the 3DO, #1 worst overall controller award could probably go to the Neo-Geo joysticks that came with the console.


2- The Genesis and Neo-Geo are excluded from this next one but I wish headphone jacks came standard in ALL consoles.. You have no idea how much those things kick butt on the Neo-Geo and Genesis consoles. If you wanna quickly record a catchy tune from a game, a headphone jack is ideal!!

3- This next one goes to EVERY console in existense EXCEPT for the Sega Saturn BUT All consoles need to just steal the Saturn' s CD player/media interface AND control pad design. It has the absolute best in both areas.

4- Whoever designed the Dreamcast interface and controller needs to get their arses kicked EVERY DAY, twice on Sundays, for the same amount of time that the console was on the market. I know alot of folks don' t utilize the CD playing capabilities of their consoles but still The Dreamcast had by far the WORST CD Player interface out of all consoles.. How the hell do you leave out a forward search and back search function? That' s one of the most standard and fundamental features in all CD players. That' s like forgetting to include an Eject button on a VCR! So basically with the Dreamcast if you wanted to get to your favorite part of a song you had to listen to the entire thing from beginning up till that point, you couldn' t fast - forward to it..

5- Joe hit the nail on the head with the Master System and the pause button being on the console itself and not on the controller.

6- My main gripe with the DS is basically its existence.. This thing should have been aborted long ago mainly because Nintendo already has the true successor to the Gameboy Advance in the works and supposedly planning to hit the market sometimes in 2006 (if the PSP does well) or early 2007... It just reminds me too much of Sega releasing the 32x even though the Saturn was looming over the immediate horizon.. I don' t know who they think they' re kidding with this whole 3 pillar crap.

7- Atari Lynx: Worst screen resolution evar!!

8- Neo Geo was way too expensive at launch and remained at the $700 price tag for quite a while before finally dropping down to a " I' ll think about it but the answer is still HELL NO" price tag of $650.. What sucked even more is that first generation games like Baseball Stars Professional, Nam-1975, Magician Lord, Top Players Golf and a few others were being sold for $318 EACH! Even a few later released titles sold for that and if you played most of the games in the arcades you' d see that they weren' t even worth plunking down $75 for, much less $318.. Most of the games could be beaten in 15-30 minutes or so..
< Message edited by Terry Bogard -- 31 Mar 05 4:33:18 >