I completely missed that, thanks for pointing it out! Still like you say, I guess $40 isn't bad if we can store everything we need on the SSD. I need to do some more reading I guess, but I probably will end up ordering one in the end.
Mister FPGA
- Thread starter Metalface Mark
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Soldato
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Yeh ordered in first wave. I don't need it but got it because I like the design. I also ordered the $5 deposit for the dock, but if its going to be delivered at a separate time with added delivery charges I will just cancel it as not really that bothered.
Soldato
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Mines been fine. Maybe I've lost some hearing of higher frequencies as I've got older. I had a heat sink additionally in my package. Maybe that was to replace the fan for a lighter FPGA load?
Yeah I got a heatsink too and thought it might be for a silent setup.
It's not the frequency that's high, it almost sounds knackered, here's a link if you want to listen.
Voice 250221_140847.m4a
drive.google.com
Need to whack the volume up but not nice.
Just unplug it you don't need one, and the Cyclone FPGA that QMTECH uses is the automotive version that has a higher operating temp
Yeah I got the blue founders editions on order, not expecting to see until Christmas though
I think the Mister Pi has a jumper which switches from 5v to 3v which keeps it running but slower/quieter. I would be a bit concerned about running this with only passive cooling. Plus for £140+ I would expect the fan to work.
Despite the noise I thought worth having a play so set up a fresh install on a different SD card, did the Mr Fusion install, update and update all and tried a bunch of games and I'm a bit disappointed if I'm honest.
The games with a USB controller do feel very snappy but the osd and navigation is horrible.
Saving in the cores which support it doesn't seem to work for me, I need to look into this though as must be doing something wrong as I can save the RAM but when I try and load it just resets the game from the start.
There seem to be a few display options and I tried the SNES ones including the CRT filter and they all looked pretty poor.
If I had a CRT to hook this up to maybe it would be different, but at the moment I'm not feeling there is much benefit over a box running Batocera or one of my many handhelds with all the quality of life features, save states and especially shaders.
It's great there are hardware and software options to cater for all types of retro enthusiasts, I just think Mister probably isn't for me.
Soldato
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I was undecided. Then I ran the update_all.sh script.
Game changer.
Now I have TMH(N)T arcade and Simpsons arcade. I'm a very happy man in the unit the size of two tins of SPAM.
I have Batocera which is great. And Raspberry Pi in a bartop which is good, but laggy. The Mister is a good addition to the fleet.
Game changer.
Now I have TMH(N)T arcade and Simpsons arcade. I'm a very happy man in the unit the size of two tins of SPAM.
I have Batocera which is great. And Raspberry Pi in a bartop which is good, but laggy. The Mister is a good addition to the fleet.
Both amazing games, I might be on the fence if it wasn't for the dodgy fan, I've already put the return in with AliExpress.
I got rid of my Pi5 as the performance just wasn't there, I might go for a cheap Beelink type mini PC or an older HP Elitedesk as a nice little retro box.
You need to remember the QMTECH and MiSTER Pi are both cheap Chinese clones. Before the clones were available, the equivalent would have cost you ~£350
You really don't need a fan though, most people run them with a copper heatsink and those that do have fans use quality ones like Noctua NF-AXx10 5V, these are £15.99. I wouldn't be surprised if the ones that come with the clone boards are less than £1!
If you prefer spending more time looking through box art of which game to play than actually playing games, then unfortunately MiSTer isn't for you, the UI has purposely been designed this way for that very reason (one of the reasons anyway).
If you want to quickly search for games, you can install Wizzo's remote app which indexes your games on your phone and you can search and launch them from your phone. There is also Wizzo's Zaparoo which lets you launch games using NFC tags or even from CD's!
£140 is a bargain for what it can do, from what I was reading it only reached silly money due to the popularity and Terasic jacking up the price right? I've not followed the history of mister so just what I've gathered from various forum posts and the like.
I took the fan off and it already had a small heatsink attached and seems to have been running fine. I spent quite a few hours last night and today getting more familiar with the settings and trying out different systems. It's a very impressive piece of kit. And now is silent
I know what you mean about the box art comment, it's the death by choice issue, although I personally don't load my entire collection onto any device precisely due to this. I didn't have trouble finding my games, I just don't think the UI is well designed or intuitive, but that's just me.
I switched from Knuli to MUOS on my RG40XX H as it has a simpler interface and boots much quicker so I don't mind minimism.
I think for me personally the ease of picking up and playing my RG40XX or Odin 2 and being able to use save states is probably the biggest deciding factor.
I was playing Streets of Rage 2 on the Mister earlier and needed to go and do something, my only option seemed to be powering off the system thus quitting the game and having to start over later. Same with Mario World last night on SNES, I needed to finish a couple of levels before I'd get to a save point so I don't lose my progress.
You could say I've been spoilt by modern gaming, and that's probably true. I'll be honest I don't want to have to finish an entire level of Desert Strike in one go anymore. And more accurately life and kids get in the way of long sessions for me.
I've enjoyed having a tinker and getting to know what it's all about as a month ago this FPGA business was all a bit of a mystery and I get why people love it.
Associate
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What is the availability like for the Mister Pi? I am thinking of buying one but everything is sold out.
Pretty scarce it seems and can't find any restock dates.
The QM Tech clones have been available recently on Aliexpress, me and someone else on the forum bought them just a couple of weeks ago so keep checking and you might get lucky if you don't mind an alternative.
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Associate
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Ah that's kind of disappointing. I was hoping the Mister Pi would have increased the availability. How is the QM Tech clone?
They are pretty much the same apart the QMTECH has a bespoke IO board, but that's not too much of a problem as it comes with it now. The QMTECH also has 128MB of SDRAM built-in which is a nice touch.
I've just double checked AliExpress and it's not in-stock at the moment though
I've just double checked AliExpress and it's not in-stock at the moment though
My QMTECH arrived today. Not had chance to fire it up, but the build quality of the case is much better than the photos on Ali. They looked like the case had been properly hacked together.
There was a small heatsink in the box with the psu and cables. Where is it supposed to be installed?
There was a small heatsink in the box with the psu and cables. Where is it supposed to be installed?
Has the FPGA (Altera Cyclone V) already got a heatsink on it? If not, then there, otherwise I'm not sure tbh
Soldato
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I believe you can optionally replace the fan with the heat sink if you wished. I've left mine as is.