Which Saturn should I buy?

[an1]

Hello,

I'm looking to get into the Saturn, but I'm unsure what exactly to buy. I want to be able to play CD-Rs with NTSC US/JP games. My current plan is this:

- Get a US Saturn
- Install a 'Phantom Universal Sega Saturn Modchip'
- Get a 'Action Replay Plus 4M' so I have both RAM expansions and can play games from any region
- Stepdown converter (I'm in Europe)
- Get the correct SCART cable for RGB hookup

Sounds good?

Some Qs:

- Can I make this simpler & cheaper, for instance could I buy a PAL Saturn (easier to buy & the right PSU)? Would that have full compatibility with NTSC US/JP games with the modchip + AR?
- Which revision to buy? Model 1/2? US/JP? Reliability/Compatibility/Image Quality differences?
- Can I buy the phantom chip somewhere in Europe (I'd like to avoid customs delay/pickup)?
- Which SCART RGB cable to buy for an NTSC console? retrogamingcables.co.uk is what I'd go for, but they are out of stock :/
- Anything else I'm missing (total Saturn newbie)?

Thanks for any advice!

[buckoa51]

If you're not worried about playing PAL (European) games your plan is fine. If you are, you'd probably want a 50/60hz switch too. If you buy a PAL saturn it will be locked to 50hz and that's not good for playing imports.

[zyrobs]

I'd personally go for a late model 1 or early model 2 PAL Saturn (the VA SD PAL one). Add a region free bios, a modchip, and a 50/60 switch. The switch is the easiest to install in those types, though the bios is more difficult since it is glued down.

That gets you everything playable without converters, and you can use the official scart cables which are very high quality.

Action replay is okay but I prefer using a normal backup cart, because you can save in-game to those. And the AR sometimes dies. You can buy Japanese ones very cheap. 4mb ram expansion is only needed for a few games, it's not that important IMO. I haven't touched my action replay in years.

for SCART cables, thefoo.83 on ebay sells very good ones. But it looks like they only have c-sync ones for sale right now, which may not center the picture properly on some TVs.

Bad_ad84 sells chips from the UK:
www.obscuregamers.com/threads/modding-parts-sales-thread.21622/

You might be able to get a setup cheaper if you get a Japanese units, but then you need a converter, a third party scart rgb cable. If you only plan on playing Japanese games, you won't need anything else other than maybe a backup or a 4mb cart (or an AR).

You can also mod the AR to a pseudo Saturn cart to load backups and use as a 4mb ram expansion, but it doesn't work 100% for every game, and then you lose the ability to back up your save games to it.

I wouldn't go for US saturns since USPS horribly overcharges on shipping, and most US users didn't take good care of their units.

[an1]

Doesn't matter if I buy a JP or US Saturn, right? NTSC is important, region gets taken care of by the Action Replay?

[zyrobs]

right, but then it will be more difficult to mod them to 50hz because they'll output ntsc at 50hz, so you'll get a black and white signal unless you use SCART RGB.

PAL units are easier to mod to 60hz (since PAL60 is a thing, and because they come with SCART cables out of the box), some of them even have pre-made solder pads, you literally just drop a switch onto the motherboard.

[an1]

Am I making a mistake in not caring about PAL compatibility? With most older consoles the European library is inferior with less releases and games with slowdown and borders, so I try to always go 100% NTSC and just play US/JP games. Would I miss out if I had no PAL compatibility? If I just modded a PAL console for 60Hz, would it be 100% NTSC US/JP compatible? That'd be nice as I then don't have to deal with the voltage difference.

[zyrobs]

For me, getting a pal Saturn isn't about game compatibility, but being able to run in 220V without a converter and have colour picture in both 50/60hz modes with every type of cable. I put a switch in it but I don't really ever switch it back to 50hz.
There are a handful of PAL optimized titles that would have the bottom of the screen missing when run in 60hz mode. But I'm guessing you wouldn't worry about that, there are maybe one or two PAL exclusive titles affected by that (one of those gokart racing games?).

>If I just modded a PAL console for 60Hz, would it be 100% NTSC US/JP compatible?

It would output a PAL60 signal - 525 lines at 60hz (like NTSC) with 4.43MHz colour encoding (like PAL) - and switch the Saturn internally to operate in 60hz mode. That is all. Games would run as on a USA/JP machine of course, but you'd still need to defeat the region protection: the best way for that is a region free bios.

[an1]

I think I'd still just go with an NTSC machine, one less thing to modify. I don't think I'll ever play a PAL game and the Saturn draws so little power that the stepdown converter shouldn't be too problematic.

I looked into the region free BIOS, but the solder job is just not doable for me. I'll have to settle for the Action Replay solution, which should hopefully be OK?

[zyrobs]

AR is okay, but you won't be able to save to the cart in-game. You can only use it as a backup for the internal memory.

PAL units have an advantage in that they can use the first party SCART cables which are very high quality, plus they auto switch to 4:3 (third party cables for NTSC units switch to 16:9).

You could just ask someone to mod your unit, or to sell you a premodded one. Bad_ad84 in the UK can do all of that, Bucko sells switchless modded units (you press Reset to cycle through eu/us/jp modes), I can do mods too but I'm in mainland Europe so shipping to UK is too expensive.

[an1]

I've heard that the internal save RAM is tiny and I have to transfer saves back and forth in the AR menu. Bit of a pain, I guess.

I'm scrambling a bit to find a seller for a good SCART cable. RetroGamingCables.uk seems sold out :/

www.retrogamingcables.co.uk/sega/saturn

Any idea where to get a quality SCART cable? I want to avoid the problems outlined by the RetroRGB folks:

retrorgb.com/saturn.html

I'm in Germany, so mainland is a plus! I think I can handle the modchip installation myself, I mean, it's just one wire to solder, and I managed to take my PS3 fat apart, so my ribbon cable handling skills are sharp ;-)

Is the switch mod difficult?

[buckoa51]

PAL units also run slightly more of NTSC spec when set in 60hz, that can cause issues with upscalers and/or HDTVs.

We can fit region free BIOS etc normally but we're currently busy clearing our existing backlog of modding work. (we don't do the cycle-switch mod any more)

[an1]

Thanks, I guess I can always get a region-free BIOS later if I have complaints with the AR method. Certainly not a solder job I can do myself, good to know there's somebody that could do it for me in the future.

btw, can anybody give me an opinion of this modchip

www.robwebb1.plus.com/saturn/v3_front.jpg

vs this

www.r43ds.org/products/Phantom-Universal-Sega-Saturn-Modchip.html

?

I can get the former from inside the EU, which is easier for me, but I've seen more & clearer instructions for the latter. Any experiences?

[buckoa51]

The Phantom is considered to be the better chip. Bad_ad84 may have some and is EU based (UK, yes we're still in for now at least *rolls eyes*)

[an1]

Ok, thanks! I send him a PM, would be nice to skip customs for this.

btw, any suggestion on SCART RGB cables for a JP Model 2 Saturn? retrorgb.com/saturn.html has me a bit worried and the usual sellers (RetroGamingCables.uk) are out of stock :/

As somebody who actually has a UK bank account and would like to shop & work there again, I'm still hoping for a miracle ;-)

[zyrobs]

Jul 9, 2017 17:55:15 GMT an1 said:

I'm scrambling a bit to find a seller for a good SCART cable. RetroGamingCables.uk seems sold out :/

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Sega-Saturn-RGB-SCART-EURO-HQ-Cable-CSYNC-CLEAN-SYNC-Cable-for-all-consoles-/172768339231?hash=item2839cba51f:g:QrEAAOSw44BYRCRa

I use the older, non-c-sync versions. I haven't used the c-sync versions, but I heard at least one guy who said the picture goes a bit off center with those.

Jul 9, 2017 17:55:15 GMT an1 said:

I'm in Germany, so mainland is a plus!

Oh yeah, shipping costs from me to there is half as much as to the UK. I can set you up a modded machine (region free, 50/60 switch, modchip) if we can agree on a price, I have two PAL machines spare. However I need a week to get a switch to one of them.

Jul 9, 2017 17:55:15 GMT an1 said:

Is the switch mod difficult?

Depending on the motherboard version it can be as simple as sliding a switch onto the motherboard and soldering it in place, or as difficult as raising a pin and connecting it to a switch that you have to secure somewhere.

Jul 9, 2017 19:59:32 GMT an1 said:

btw, can anybody give me an opinion of this modchip

It's an older type, the phantom is the same but with a slightly different board layout that helps with compatibility for certain models. They use the same microcontroller code though. I think unless you luck into a Sanyo model, they should work equally fine. And even if you find a non-compatible model you can tinker with them and the spare channels on the 7404 to change the phase of the timing signal, which may help compatibility.

Also, if you install the chip yourself, do not connect power to the power supply directly, connect it to one of the locations on the CD drive.