List of Sega arcade system boards - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Sega G80

Arcade system board

An arcade system board is a dedicated computer system created for the purpose of running video arcade games. Arcade system boards typically consist of a main system board with any number of supporting boards...

released by Sega

Sega

, usually styled as SEGA, is a multinational video game software developer and an arcade software and hardware development company headquartered in Ōta, Tokyo, Japan, with various offices around the world...

in 1981. The G80 was released in both raster

Raster graphics

In computer graphics, a raster graphics image, or bitmap, is a data structure representing a generally rectangular grid of pixels, or points of color, viewable via a monitor, paper, or other display medium...

and vector

Vector graphics

Vector graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves, and shapes or polygon, which are all based on mathematical expressions, to represent images in computer graphics...

versions of the hardware.

G80 Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Z80
Zilog Z80
The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes...
Sound CPU: 8035
Display Resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

:
Colors: 256

Sega System 1

Sega System 1 was a type of arcade

Arcade cabinet

A video game arcade cabinet, also known as a video arcade machine or video coin-op, is the housing within which a video arcade game's hardware resides. Most cabinets designed since the mid-1980s conform to the JAMMA wiring standard...

hardware used in various Sega

Sega

arcade machines from 1983 until 1987. For most of its run it coexisted with Sega System 2 (1985–1988) and as a result had many similar features (the only major difference being that System 2 had two separate circuit boards instead of one). In its four year span it was used in some 20 different arcade games including Choplifter
Choplifter
Choplifter is a 1982 Apple II game developed by Dan Gorlin and published by Brøderbund. It was ported to other home computers and, in 1985, Sega released a coin-operated arcade game remake, which in turn received several home ports of its own...

, Flicky
Flicky
Flicky is an arcade game made by Sega. First released in arcades in 1984, Flicky was also released at the time for the SG-1000, and then ported to the MSX and Japanese computers Sharp X1, Fujitsu FM-7 and NEC PC-8801. It was later ported to the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis in 1991...

, Pitfall II: Lost Caverns
Pitfall II: Lost Caverns
Pitfall II: Lost Caverns is a platforming video game originally released for the Atari 2600 video game console in 1984. It is the sequel to the popular Pitfall!. Both games were designed and written by David Crane and published by Activision...

, Wonder Boy
Wonder Boy (video game)
is a 1986 video game published by Sega and developed by Escape...

and Wonder Boy in Monster Land

Wonder Boy in Monster Land

Wonder Boy in Monster Land is an action role-playing platform video game developed by Westone. It was released by Sega for the arcades in 1987 and for the Sega Master System in 1988; Activision released the game for the Amiga, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, and Atari ST...

System 1 Specifications

Main CPU: Z80
Zilog Z80
The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes...

@ 4 MHz
Sound CPU: Z80 @ 4 MHz
Sound Chips: SN76496 @ 4 MHz and SN76496 @ 2 MHz
Video resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

: 256 x 224
Arcade components were contained on one circuit board.
Featured the use of 2 layer backgrounds, sprites, and hardware collision detection.

Sega System 16

The Sega System 16 is an early 16-bit

History of video game consoles (fourth generation)

In the history of computer and video games, the fourth generation began on October 30, 1987 with the Japanese release of Nippon Electric Company's PC Engine...

arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1985. Over its lifespan, roughly forty games were released on this hardware, making it one of Sega's most successful arcade platforms. It was produced in two variants, the System 16A and System 16B. Some games released using this hardware include: Shinobi

Shinobi (arcade game)

is a side-scrolling action game produced by Sega originally released for the arcades in . In Shinobi, the player controls a modern day ninja named Joe Musashi who goes on a mission to rescue his kidnapped students from a group of terrorists...

, Golden Axe

Golden Axe

Golden Axe is a side-scrolling beat 'em up and hack & slash arcade video game released in 1989 by Sega for the System 16-B arcade hardware. It is the first game in the Golden Axe series....

, Altered Beast

Altered Beast

Altered Beast is a 1988 beat 'em up arcade game developed and manufactured by Sega. The game is set in Ancient Greece, and follows a centurion who is resurrected by Zeus to rescue his daughter Athena, and to do so become able to turn into beasts such as the werewolf with usage of power-ups...

and Dynamite Dux

Dynamite Dux

Dynamite Düx is a side-scrolling 'beat 'em up' arcade game, created by Sega-AM2 and released by Sega in 1989 for their successful Sega System 16 arcade board, the same board that was used for hits like Golden Axe and Altered Beast...

.

In order to prevent piracy

Copyright infringement of software=The copyright infringement of software refers to several practices which involve the unauthorized copying of computer software. Copyright infringement of this kind varies globally...

, as well as illegal bootleg games, many System 16 boards used an encryption

Encryption

In cryptography, encryption is the process of transforming information using an algorithm to make it unreadable to anyone except those possessing special knowledge, usually referred to as a key. The result of the process is encrypted information...

system. A Hitachi

Hitachi, Ltd.

is a Japanese multinational conglomerate headquartered in Marunouchi 1-chome, Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. The company is the parent of the Hitachi Group as part of the larger DKB Group companies...

FD1094 chip, containing the main CPU

Central processing unit

The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

as well as the decryption key, was used in place of a regular CPU.

The System 16's pairing of a Motorola 68000 CPU and a Zilog Z80 coprocessor would prove to be a popular and durable arcade hardware configuration well into the 1990s. Capcom's CPS-1 and CPS-2 boards were built on a similar foundation, as was SNK's Neo Geo

Neo Geo (console)

The is a cartridge-based arcade and home video game system released on July 1, 1991 by Japanese game company SNK. Being in the Fourth generation of Gaming, it was the first console in the former Neo Geo family, which only lived through the 1990s...

hardware. Sega would later use the 68000/Z80 combination to power its Genesis/Mega Drive home console.

System 16 Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Motorola 68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

@ 10 MHz
Memory: 16kB + 2 kB (System 16A)
Sound CPU: Zilog
Zilog
Zilog, Inc., previously known as ZiLOG , is a manufacturer of 8-bit and 24-bit microcontrollers, and is most famous for its Intel 8080-compatible Z80 series.-History:...

Z80
Zilog Z80
The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes...

@ 4 MHz (5 MHz in System 16B)
Sound Chip: Yamaha YM2151
Yamaha YM2151
The YM2151, aka OPM is an eight-channel four-operator sound chip. It was Yamaha's first single-chip FM synthesis implementation, created originally for the Yamaha DX series of keyboards....

@ 4 MHz (+ NEC uPD7759 ADPCM
Adaptive DPCM
Adaptive differential pulse-code modulation is a variant of differential pulse-code modulation that varies the size of the quantization step, to allow further reduction of the required bandwidth for a given signal-to-noise ratio....

decoder in System 16B)
Display Resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

: 320 x 224
Colors: 4096
Graphical Capabilities: 128 onscreen sprites
Sprite (computer graphics)
In computer graphics, a sprite is a two-dimensional image or animation that is integrated into a larger scene...

, 2 tile layers, 1 text layer, 1 sprite layer, sprite scaling. Note only System 16B supports sprite scaling.

Sega X Board

The Sega X Board is an arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1987. It was noteworthy for its sprite manipulation capabilities, which allowed it to create high quality pseudo-3D visuals. This trend would continue with the Y Board and the System 32, before the Model 1 made true 3D arcade games more financially affordable.

X Board Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: 2 x MC68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

@ 12.5 MHz
Sound CPU: Z80 @ 4 MHz
Sound Chip: YM2151
Yamaha YM2151
The YM2151, aka OPM is an eight-channel four-operator sound chip. It was Yamaha's first single-chip FM synthesis implementation, created originally for the Yamaha DX series of keyboards....

4 MHz & SegaPCM @ 15.625 MHz
Display Resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

: 320 x 224
Board composition : Single Board
Hardware Features : 256 Sprites on screen at one time, 4 tiles layers, 1 text layer, 1 sprite layer with hardware sprite zooming, 1 road layer, can draw 2 roads at once, translucent shadows

Sega Y Board

The Sega Y Board is an arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1988. Just like the X Board before it, the Y Board was known for its sprite manipulation capabilities.

Y Board Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: 3 x MC68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

@ 12.5 MHz
Sound CPU: Z80 @ 4 MHz
Sound Chip: YM2151
Yamaha YM2151
The YM2151, aka OPM is an eight-channel four-operator sound chip. It was Yamaha's first single-chip FM synthesis implementation, created originally for the Yamaha DX series of keyboards....

4 MHz & SegaPCM @ 15.625 MHz
Display Resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

: 320 x 224
Board composition: CPU board + Video board
Hardware features: a sky gradient; a first sprite layer, which plugs into a full-screen rotation; a second sprite layer on top of them, which has priority; full sprite zooming and scaling on both sprite planes.

Sega System 18

The Sega System 18 is an arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1989. System 18 had a very short run of games but most boards on this hardware were JAMMA standard. Most of these games also have the "suicide battery" as associated with Sega's System 16 hardware.

System 18 specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Motorola 68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

@ 10 MHz
Sound CPU: Zilog
Zilog
Zilog, Inc., previously known as ZiLOG , is a manufacturer of 8-bit and 24-bit microcontrollers, and is most famous for its Intel 8080-compatible Z80 series.-History:...

Z80
Zilog Z80
The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes...

@ 8 MHz
Sound Chip: 2 x Yamaha YM3438
Yamaha YM2612
thumb|right|Yamaha YM2612The YM2612, aka OPN2, is a six-channel sound chip developed by Yamaha. It belongs to Yamaha's OPN family of FM synthesis chips used in several game and computer systems. Developed as a stripped-down version of the YM2608, it lacks its larger sibling's ADPCM channel,...

@ 8 MHz + Ricoh
Ricoh
or Ricoh, is a Japanese company that was established in 1936 on February 6th, as , a company in the RIKEN zaibatsu. Its headquarters is located in Ricoh Building in Chūō, Tokyo....

RF5c68
Ricoh RF5c68
The RF5c68 is an eight-channel sound chip developed by Ricoh. It was notably used in the Fujitsu FM Towns computer system, along with Sega's System 18 and System 32 arcade game machines....

@ 10 MHz (8 Channel PCM chip, remarked as Sega Custom 315)
Display Resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

: 320 x 224
Colors: 4096
Board composition: Main board + ROM board
Graphical Capabilities: 128 Sprites on screen at one time, 4 tile layers, 1 text layer, 1 sprite layer with hardware sprite zooming, translucent shadows

Sega System 24

The Sega System 24 was an arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1988. It was produced for coin-operated video arcade

Arcade game

An arcade game is a coin-operated entertainment machine, usually installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars, and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games, and merchandisers...

machines until 1996. Some games released using this hardware include: Bonanza Bros.
Bonanza Bros.
is a 1990 3D-style, 2D shooting platform arcade game by Sega. It is one of the earliest arcade games powered by the arcade system board, the Sega System 24.-Gameplay:Bonanza Bros...

, Hot Rod
Hot Rod (computer game)
Hot Rod is an top-down arcade racing game by Sega, released in 1988, it was later developed and published in 1990 by Activision for the Amiga, ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 and Atari ST.-Summary:...

, and Gain Ground
Gain Ground
Gain Ground is a 1988 action-strategy arcade game with real-time strategy elements, later ported to the Sega Master System, Mega Drive/Genesis, and PC Engine . In 2004, it was re-released in Radica Games' TVPlay Legends Vol. II TV Games compilation. It was remade in the PlayStation 2 title Sega...

.

Sega System 24 Specifications

The System 24 used two Motorola 68000

Motorola 68000

The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

processors at 10 MHz. One was for booting, while the other was used by the game. The board holds of RAM and of ROM

Read-only memory

Read-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...

. It was the first Sega arcade system that required a medium resolution arcade monitor. The color palette

Palette (computing)

In computer graphics, a palette is either a given, finite set of colors for the management of digital images , or a small on-screen graphical element for choosing from a limited set of choices, not necessarily colors .Depending on the context In computer graphics, a palette is either a given,...

was 4352 selectable from . The system could support up to 2048 sprites on-screen at once.

Sound was driven by a YM2151

Yamaha YM2151

The YM2151, aka OPM is an eight-channel four-operator sound chip. It was Yamaha's first single-chip FM synthesis implementation, created originally for the Yamaha DX series of keyboards....

at 4 MHz; it was capable of delivering 8 channels of FM sound in addition to a DAC

Digital-to-analog converter

In electronics, a digital-to-analog converter is a device that converts a digital code to an analog signal . An analog-to-digital converter performs the reverse operation...

used for sound effects and speech synthesis

Speech synthesis

Speech synthesis is the artificial production of human speech. A computer system used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or hardware...

. Early System 24s loaded their program from floppy disk

Floppy disk

A floppy disk is a disk storage medium composed of a disk of thin and flexible magnetic storage medium, sealed in a rectangular plastic carrier lined with fabric that removes dust particles...

s. Later, some games such as Bonanza Bros.
Bonanza Bros.
is a 1990 3D-style, 2D shooting platform arcade game by Sega. It is one of the earliest arcade games powered by the arcade system board, the Sega System 24.-Gameplay:Bonanza Bros...

used CD-ROM

CD-ROM

A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....

s or hardware ROM boards to store games. No matter which storage device was used, a special security chip was required for each game an operator wanted to play.

Sega Mega-Tech

The Sega Mega-Tech was an arcade system developed by Sega

Sega

Europe in 1989. It is based on Mega Drive/Genesis hardware

Computer hardware

Personal computer hardware are component devices which are typically installed into or peripheral to a computer case to create a personal computer upon which system software is installed including a firmware interface such as a BIOS and an operating system which supports application software that...

, and more or less identical. Its operation ability is similar to Nintendo

Nintendo

is a multinational corporation located in Kyoto, Japan. Founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it produced handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....

's PlayChoice-10

PlayChoice-10

PlayChoice-10 was an arcade machine which could consist of as many as 10 different games previously available only on the Nintendo Entertainment System home console...

, where the credits bought give the user a playable time period rather than lives (usually 1 minute per credit), and can switch between games during playtime.

A few things were omitted, such as the expansion hardware

Expansion card

The expansion card in computing is a printed circuit board that can be inserted into an expansion slot of a computer motherboard or backplane to add functionality to a computer system via the expansion bus.One edge of the expansion card holds the contacts that fit exactly into the slot...

allowing for Sega CD or Sega 32X

Sega 32X

The Sega 32X, codenamed Project Mars, is an add-on for the Mega Drive/Genesis video game console by Sega. Its aim was to increase the lifespan of the aging Mega Drive/Genesis system, which was facing stiff competition from the SNES...

as these were not developed at this point, so would not likely be offered as an arcade

Video arcade

An amusement arcade or video arcade is a venue where people play arcade games such as video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games, merchandisers , or coin-operated billiards or air hockey tables...

expansion. The PCB

Printed circuit board

A printed circuit board, or PCB, is used to mechanically support and electrically connect electronic components using conductive pathways, tracks or signal traces etched from copper sheets laminated onto a non-conductive substrate. It is also referred to as printed wiring board or etched wiring...

for the Mega-Tech also includes the ability to display to a second monitor

Computer display

A monitor or display is an electronic visual display for computers. The monitor comprises the display device, circuitry, and an enclosure...

, which contains a list of the games installed in the machine and also displays instructions for controlling the game, 1 or 2 player information, and a short synopsis of each game. The second monitor also displays the time left for playing.

Since the machine was basically a Mega Drive with timer control for arcade operations, porting

Porting

In computer science, porting is the process of adapting software so that an executable program can be created for a computing environment that is different from the one for which it was originally designed...

games to the Mega-Tech was an easy task and so many games were released, most of them popular titles such as Streets Of Rage

Streets of Rage

Streets of Rage, known in Japan as , is a side-scrolling beat 'em up released by Sega in 1991 for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis. It is the first installment of the Streets of Rage series which was followed by Streets of Rage 2 and Streets of Rage 3. The game was also converted over to Sega's Game...

, Revenge Of Shinobi, Golden Axe

Golden Axe

Golden Axe is a side-scrolling beat 'em up and hack & slash arcade video game released in 1989 by Sega for the System 16-B arcade hardware. It is the first game in the Golden Axe series....

, Sonic The Hedgehog

Sonic the Hedgehog (16-bit)

is a seminal 16-bit 1991 platform video game developed in Japan by Sega and published for the Sega Genesis. It is the first installment in Sega's flagship Sonic the Hedgehog video game series and the first title developed by Sonic Team. The game was released in 1991 in North America, Europe, and...

and many more. The ability was also added for the machine to play Sega Master System

Sega Master System

The is a third-generation video game console that was manufactured and released by Sega in 1985 in Japan , 1986 in North America and 1987 in Europe....

titles, though fewer Master System titles were ported than Mega Drive titles. Some include the original Shinobi, Outrun and After Burner

After Burner

is a 1987 Japanese flight simulator arcade game by Sega. It is one of the first games designed by Yu Suzuki. The player flew an F-14 using a specialized joystick , and the game spawned several sequels.-Gameplay:...

.

The Sega Mega-Tech was released in Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, and Asia

Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

(including Japan), but not in North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

Sega Mega-Play

The Sega Mega-Tech system was soon replaced by its successor, the Mega-Play, a JAMMA based system. This system utilized only 4 carts instead of 8. This version also utilizes traditional arcade operations, in which credits bought are used to buy lives instead.

Like the Mega-Tech, The Sega Mega-Play was released in Europe

Europe

, Australia

Australia

, and Asia

Asia

(including Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

), but not in North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

Sega System C-2

Sega

's System C-2 is a Jamma PCB

Printed circuit board

used in arcade game

Arcade game

s. This hardware is based closely on the Sega Genesis hardware, the main CPU, the sound processor and the graphics processor being the same. The CPU clock speed is slightly faster (10 MHz instead of 8 MHz), there is no Z80

Zilog Z80

The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes...

, and the sound chip is driven by the CPU. The DAC

Digital-to-analog converter

In electronics, a digital-to-analog converter is a device that converts a digital code to an analog signal . An analog-to-digital converter performs the reverse operation...

is also replaced by a UPD7759, the same as the System 16 hardware. 17 known games were created for the System C-2 hardware.

System C-2 Specifications

Main CPU: MC68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

@ 8.948862 MHz
Sound chip: YM3438
Yamaha YM2612
thumb|right|Yamaha YM2612The YM2612, aka OPN2, is a six-channel sound chip developed by Yamaha. It belongs to Yamaha's OPN family of FM synthesis chips used in several game and computer systems. Developed as a stripped-down version of the YM2608, it lacks its larger sibling's ADPCM channel,...

@ 7.670453, SN76496 @ 3.579545
Optional Sound Chip: UPD7759 @ 640 kHz
Video resolution: 320x224
Hardware Features: Line scroll, column scroll and a raster interrupt
Raster interrupt
A raster interrupt is a computer interrupt signal that is used for display timing purposes. It is usually, though not always, generated by the system's graphics chip....

with 2 background planes (one with an option window), a sprite plane and several levels of priority
Board composition: Single Jamma board.

Sega System 32

System 32 was an arcade platform released by Sega

Sega

in 1991. It succeeded Sega System 24 with a 32-bit RISC processor at 16 MHz. Notable titles included Golden Axe: The Revenge of Death Adder
Golden Axe: The Revenge of Death Adder
Golden Axe: The Revenge of Death Adder is a side-scrolling arcade hack 'n' slash game released in 1992 by Sega. It was the first 32-bit game in the series. It still remains an arcade exclusive as of 2011....

, Rad Mobile
Rad Mobile
Rad Mobile is a video game developed by Sega-AM2 and published by Sega. This game was first released in arcades in 1991, then it was ported to the Sega Saturn in 1994 under the name Gale Racer...

, Outrunners
OutRunners
OutRunners is a racing video game developed by AM1 and released by Sega in 1992. It constitutes the third release in the arcade Out Run series and was ported to the Mega Drive by Data East in 1994.-Description:thumb|OutRunners two-player cabinet...

, and SegaSonic the Hedgehog
SegaSonic the Hedgehog
is an isometric platform game in the Sonic the Hedgehog series, released by Sega for Japanese arcades in June 1993. The game supported three players playing simultaneously, and possessed a unique track ball set up for moving on-screen characters. The only other control input was a single button,...

.

There was also another version of this hardware, called System Multi 32. This was similar to the original, but had dual monitors

Computer display

A monitor or display is an electronic visual display for computers. The monitor comprises the display device, circuitry, and an enclosure...

for each game.

System 32 Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: NEC V60
NEC V60
The NEC V60 was a CISC processor manufactured by NEC introduced in the late 1980s. It had a 32-bit internal bus and a 16-bit external bus with a 24-bit address bus. A relatively obscure design, it was a radical departure from NEC's previous V-series CPUs , most of which were based on the Intel x86...

@ 16.107950 MHz
Sound CPU: Zilog
Zilog
Zilog, Inc., previously known as ZiLOG , is a manufacturer of 8-bit and 24-bit microcontrollers, and is most famous for its Intel 8080-compatible Z80 series.-History:...

Z80
Zilog Z80
The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog and sold from July 1976 onwards. It was widely used both in desktop and embedded computer designs as well as for military purposes...

@ 8.053975 MHz
Sound Chip: 2x Yamaha YM3438
Yamaha YM2612
thumb|right|Yamaha YM2612The YM2612, aka OPN2, is a six-channel sound chip developed by Yamaha. It belongs to Yamaha's OPN family of FM synthesis chips used in several game and computer systems. Developed as a stripped-down version of the YM2608, it lacks its larger sibling's ADPCM channel,...

@ 8.053975 MHz + Ricoh
Ricoh
or Ricoh, is a Japanese company that was established in 1936 on February 6th, as , a company in the RIKEN zaibatsu. Its headquarters is located in Ricoh Building in Chūō, Tokyo....

RF5c68 @ 12.5 MHz
Display Resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

: 320 x 224
Colors: 16384

Sega Model 1

The Sega Model 1 is an arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1992. During development of the system, Sega went to General Electric Aerospace (which would become part of Martin Marietta

Martin Marietta

Martin Marietta Corporation was an American company founded in 1961 through the merger of The Martin Company and American-Marietta Corporation. The combined company became a leader in chemicals, aerospace, and electronics. In 1995, it merged with Lockheed Corporation to form Lockheed Martin. The...

, later Lockheed Martin

Lockheed Martin

Lockheed Martin is an American global aerospace, defense, security, and advanced technology company with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta in March 1995. It is headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, in the Washington Metropolitan Area....

) for assistance in creating the 3D hardware. The first game for the system, Virtua Racing

Virtua Racing

Virtua Racing or V.R. for short, is a Formula One racing arcade game, developed by Sega-AM2 and released in October 1992. Virtua Racing was initially a proof-of-concept application for exercising a new 3D-graphics platform under development, the "Model 1". The results were so encouraging, that...

, was designed to test the viability of the platform and was never intended to be released commercially, but it was such a success internally that Sega did so anyway.

However, the high cost of the Model 1 system meant only six games were ever developed for it; among them the popular fighting game

Fighting game

Fighting game is a video game genre where the player controls an on-screen character and engages in close combat with an opponent. These characters tend to be of equal power and fight matches consisting of several rounds, which take place in an arena. Players must master techniques such as...

Virtua Fighter.

Model 1 Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: NEC V60
NEC V60
The NEC V60 was a CISC processor manufactured by NEC introduced in the late 1980s. It had a 32-bit internal bus and a 16-bit external bus with a 24-bit address bus. A relatively obscure design, it was a radical departure from NEC's previous V-series CPUs , most of which were based on the Intel x86...

@ 16 MHz
Graphics Coprocessor
Coprocessor
A coprocessor is a computer processor used to supplement the functions of the primary processor . Operations performed by the coprocessor may be floating point arithmetic, graphics, signal processing, string processing, or encryption. By offloading processor-intensive tasks from the main processor,...

: Fujitsu
Fujitsu
is a Japanese multinational information technology equipment and services company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is the world's third-largest IT services provider measured by revenues....

TGP MB86233 FPU
Floating point unit
A floating-point unit is a part of a computer system specially designed to carry out operations on floating point numbers. Typical operations are addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and square root...

@ 16 Mega-FLOPS
FLOPS
In computing, FLOPS is a measure of a computer's performance, especially in fields of scientific calculations that make heavy use of floating-point calculations, similar to the older, simpler, instructions per second...
Sound CPU: Motorola 68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

@ 10 MHz
Sound Chip: 2 x Sega 315-5560 Custom 28 channel PCM
Pulse-code modulation
Pulse-code modulation is a method used to digitally represent sampled analog signals. It is the standard form for digital audio in computers and various Blu-ray, Compact Disc and DVD formats, as well as other uses such as digital telephone systems...
Sound Timer: Yamaha YM3834 @ 8 MHz
Display Resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

: 496 x 384
Color Depth
Color depth
In computer graphics, color depth or bit depth is the number of bits used to represent the color of a single pixel in a bitmapped image or video frame buffer. This concept is also known as bits per pixel , particularly when specified along with the number of bits used...

: 16-bit
Graphical Capabilities: Flat shading, Diffuse reflection
Diffuse reflection
Diffuse reflection is the reflection of light from a surface such that an incident ray is reflected at many angles rather than at just one angle as in the case of specular reflection...

, Specular reflection
Specular reflection
Specular reflection is the mirror-like reflection of light from a surface, in which light from a single incoming direction is reflected into a single outgoing direction...

, 2 layers of background scrolling, Alpha blending
Geometric performance: 180,000 polygons/sec.

Sega Model 2

The Sega Model 2 is an arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1993. Like the Model 1, it was developed in cooperation with Martin Marietta

Martin Marietta

, and was a further advancement of the earlier Model 1 system. The most noticeable improvement was texture mapping

Texture mapping

Texture mapping is a method for adding detail, surface texture , or color to a computer-generated graphic or 3D model. Its application to 3D graphics was pioneered by Dr Edwin Catmull in his Ph.D. thesis of 1974.-Texture mapping:...

, which enabled polygons to be painted with bitmap images, as opposed to the limited monotone flat shading that Model 1 supported.

Despite its high pricetag, the Model 2 platform was very successful. It featured some of the highest grossing arcade games of all time: Daytona USA
Daytona USA (arcade game)
Daytona USA is a 1993 racing video game by Sega. Considered one of the highest grossing arcade games of all time, Daytona USA was Sega's first title to debut on the Sega Model 2 arcade board, and at the time of its 1993 introduction, was considered the most visually detailed 3D arcade racing game...

, Virtua Fighter 2
Virtua Fighter 2
is a fighting game developed by Sega. It is the sequel to Virtua Fighter and the second game in the Virtua Fighter series. It was created by the Sega's Yu Suzuki-headed AM2 and was released in the arcade in 1994. It was subsequently ported to the Sega Saturn in 1995 and Microsoft Windows in 1997...

, Cyber Troopers Virtual-On
Cyber Troopers Virtual-On
was released in arcades and for Sega Saturn and PC, all in both America and Japan. There were actually two PC versions released, a normal version for North America and a 3D accelerated version for Japan. There were also two-player online versions of the game released in America and Japan for the...

and The House of the Dead
The House of the Dead (arcade game)
The House of the Dead is a first-person, light gun arcade game developed in 1996 and released in 1997 by Sega.Players assume the role of agents Thomas Rogan and "G" in their efforts to combat the products of the dangerous, inhumane experiments of Dr. Curien, a madman.-Gameplay:The House of the Dead...

to name a few. A Model 2 Emulator was made available as a free download to play most model 2 games on the PC.

Model 2 has four different varieties, commonly referred to as Model 2, Model 2A-CRX, Model 2B-CRX and Model 2C-CRX. While Model 2 and 2A-CRX use a custom DSP with internal code for the geometrizer, 2B-CRX and 2C-CRX use well documented DSPs and upload the geometrizer code at startup to the DSP. This, combined with the fact that some games were available for both 2A-CRX and 2B-CRX, led to the reverse engineering of the Model 2 and Model 2A-CRX DSPs.

Model 2 Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Intel i960
Intel i960
Intel's i960 was a RISC-based microprocessor design that became popular during the early 1990s as an embedded microcontroller, becoming a best-selling CPU in that field, along with the competing AMD 29000...

@ 25 MHz
Graphics Coprocessor
Coprocessor
A coprocessor is a computer processor used to supplement the functions of the primary processor . Operations performed by the coprocessor may be floating point arithmetic, graphics, signal processing, string processing, or encryption. By offloading processor-intensive tasks from the main processor,...

: 5 x Fujitsu
Fujitsu
is a Japanese multinational information technology equipment and services company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is the world's third-largest IT services provider measured by revenues....

TGP MB86234 FPU
Floating point unit
A floating-point unit is a part of a computer system specially designed to carry out operations on floating point numbers. Typical operations are addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and square root...

(Model 2/2A-CRX) or 2 x Analog Devices
Analog Devices
Analog Devices, Inc. , known as ADI, is an American multinational semiconductor company specializing in data conversion and signal conditioning technology, headquartered in Norwood, Massachusetts...

SHARC FPU (Model 2B-CRX) or 2 x Fujitsu TGPx4 MB86235 FPU (Model 2C-CRX)
Sound CPU: Motorola 68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

@ 10 MHz (Model 2) or Motorola 68000 @ 12 MHz (Model 2A-CRX/2B-CRX/2C-CRX)
Sound Chip: 2 x Sega 315-5560 custom 28 channel PCM
Pulse-code modulation
Pulse-code modulation is a method used to digitally represent sampled analog signals. It is the standard form for digital audio in computers and various Blu-ray, Compact Disc and DVD formats, as well as other uses such as digital telephone systems...

(Model 2) or SCSP (Model 2A-CRX/2B-CRX/2C-CRX)
Sound Timer: Yamaha YM3834 @ 8 MHz (Model 2 only)
Display Resolution
Display resolution
The display resolution of a digital television or display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube , flat panel or projection...

: 496 x 384
Color Depth
Color depth
In computer graphics, color depth or bit depth is the number of bits used to represent the color of a single pixel in a bitmapped image or video frame buffer. This concept is also known as bits per pixel , particularly when specified along with the number of bits used...

: 16-bit
Graphical Capabilities: Flat shading, Perspective correction
Texture mapping
Texture mapping is a method for adding detail, surface texture , or color to a computer-generated graphic or 3D model. Its application to 3D graphics was pioneered by Dr Edwin Catmull in his Ph.D. thesis of 1974.-Texture mapping:...

, Texture mapping
Texture mapping
Texture mapping is a method for adding detail, surface texture , or color to a computer-generated graphic or 3D model. Its application to 3D graphics was pioneered by Dr Edwin Catmull in his Ph.D. thesis of 1974.-Texture mapping:...

, Diffuse reflection
Diffuse reflection
Diffuse reflection is the reflection of light from a surface such that an incident ray is reflected at many angles rather than at just one angle as in the case of specular reflection...

, Specular reflection
Specular reflection
Specular reflection is the mirror-like reflection of light from a surface, in which light from a single incoming direction is reflected into a single outgoing direction...

, Alpha blending
Geometric performance: 300,000 polygon/s at up to 60 frame/s

Sega ST-V

ST-V (Sega Titan Video game system) was an arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1995. Departing from their usual process of building custom arcade

Arcade game

hardware, Sega's ST-V is essentially identical to the Sega Saturn

Sega Saturn

The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...

home console system. The only difference is the media; ST-V used ROM-cartridges instead of CD-ROM

CD-ROM

s to store games. Being derived from the Saturn hardware, the ST-V was presumably named after the moon Titan

Titan (moon)

Titan , or Saturn VI, is the largest moon of Saturn, the only natural satellite known to have a dense atmosphere, and the only object other than Earth for which clear evidence of stable bodies of surface liquid has been found....

, a satellite of Saturn

Saturn

Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second largest planet in the Solar System, after Jupiter. Saturn is named after the Roman god Saturn, equated to the Greek Cronus , the Babylonian Ninurta and the Hindu Shani. Saturn's astronomical symbol represents the Roman god's sickle.Saturn,...

.

The majority of ST-V titles were released in Japan

Japan

only, but a notable exception was the port of Dynamite Deka, which became Die Hard Arcade
Die Hard Arcade
Die Hard Arcade is the licensed North American, European and Australian version of the Japanese videogame . The game is a beat 'em up with loose ties to the Die Hard movie series of the same name....

. Games released for the ST-V includes the arcade version of Virtua Fighter Remix, Golden Axe: The Duel
Golden Axe: The Duel
is a fantasy-themed competitive fighting game produced by Sega based on their Golden Axe series. It was originally released as a coin-operated arcade game in and later ported to the Sega Saturn...

and Final Fight Revenge
Final Fight Revenge
is a 1999 American-developed 3D one-on-one fighting game. The game was produced by the American division of Capcom , the same team that later produced Maximo: Ghosts to Glory and Final Fight: Streetwise. Final Fight Revenge was released for the arcades on July 1999 and ran on the Sega ST-V arcade...

. The shared hardware between Saturn and ST-V allowed for very "pure" ports

Porting

for the Saturn console.

ST-V Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: 2x Hitachi
Hitachi, Ltd.
is a Japanese multinational conglomerate headquartered in Marunouchi 1-chome, Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. The company is the parent of the Hitachi Group as part of the larger DKB Group companies...

SH-2 @ 28.6 MHz in a master/slave configuration
Custom Saturn Control Unit (SCU): Fixed-point
Fixed-point arithmetic
In computing, a fixed-point number representation is a real data type for a number that has a fixed number of digits after the radix point...

math coprocessor
Coprocessor
A coprocessor is a computer processor used to supplement the functions of the primary processor . Operations performed by the coprocessor may be floating point arithmetic, graphics, signal processing, string processing, or encryption. By offloading processor-intensive tasks from the main processor,...
VDP1: 32-bit Video Display Processor - handles sprite and polygon drawing. Dual 256 KB framebuffers for rotate and scale effects. Texture mapping
Texture mapping
Texture mapping is a method for adding detail, surface texture , or color to a computer-generated graphic or 3D model. Its application to 3D graphics was pioneered by Dr Edwin Catmull in his Ph.D. thesis of 1974.-Texture mapping:...

, Gouraud shading
Gouraud shading
Gouraud shading, named after Henri Gouraud, is an interpolation method used in computer graphics to produce continuous shading of surfaces represented by polygon meshes...

. 512KB texture RAM
VDP2: 32-bit background and scroll plane Video Display Processor - transparency effects, shadowing, 5 simultaneous scrolling backgrounds and 2 simultaneous rotating playfields
Sound CPU: Motorola 68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...

@ 11.45 MHz
Sound Chip: Yamaha YMF292-F SCSP @ 11.3 MHz
Main RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: 2 MB
VRAM: 1.54MB
Audio RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: 512KB

Sega Model 3

The Sega Model 3 is an arcade system board

Arcade system board

released by Sega

Sega

in 1996. It was the final culmination of Sega's partnership with Lockheed Martin

Lockheed Martin

, using the company's Real3D

Real3D

Real3D, Inc. was a maker of arcade graphics boards, a spin-off from Lockheed Martin. The company made several 3D hardware designs that were used by Sega, the most widely used being the graphics hardware in the Sega Model 2 and Model 3 arcade systems. A partnership with Intel and SGI led to the...

division to design the graphical hardware. Upon release, the Model 3 was easily the most powerful arcade system board in existence, capable of over one million polygon

Polygon

In geometry a polygon is a flat shape consisting of straight lines that are joined to form a closed chain orcircuit.A polygon is traditionally a plane figure that is bounded by a closed path, composed of a finite sequence of straight line segments...

s per second. The hardware went through several "steppings," which increased the clock speed of the CPU

Central processing unit

, as well as minor changes to the board architecture.

Well known Model 3 games include Virtua Fighter 3
Virtua Fighter 3
is the third game in the Virtua Fighter series. Two new Japanese characters were added to the roster of fighters: Aoi Umenokoji, a beautiful Japanese woman and a childhood friend of Akira Yuki who used a nimble form of Aiki-jujutsu as her fighting style of choice, and Taka-Arashi, a Sumo wrestler...

(1996), Sega Super GT
Sega Super GT
SCUD Race, "Sport Car Ultimate Drive" Sega Super GT in the North America, is an arcade racing game released by Sega in 1996. It is the first racing game to be using the Sega Model 3 hardware....

(1996), Harley-Davidson & L.A. Riders
Harley-Davidson & L.A. Riders
Harley-Davidson & L.A. Riders is a Sega arcade game developed in 1997. The game was built on the Sega Model 3 arcade hardware.-Gameplay:...

(1997), Sega Bass Fishing
Sega Bass Fishing
Sega Bass Fishing is a video game published for arcade, Dreamcast, Windows and Wii. It was first developed in 1997 on the Sega Model 3 hardware....

(1997), Daytona USA 2
Daytona USA 2
Daytona USA 2: Battle on the Edge is an arcade racing game released by Sega in 1998 as a follow up to the extremely successful Daytona USA. The game featured vastly superior graphics, utilizing the Sega Model 3 hardware. The majority of Daytona USA 2 cabinets were released as deluxe models , which...

(1998), Sega Rally 2
Sega Rally 2
is a sequel to Sega Rally and is an arcade game developed and released by Sega in 1998 for the Sega Model 3 arcade board. It was ported in the following year to the Dreamcast console and later to PC systems.-Gameplay:...

(1998), and The Ocean Hunter

The Ocean Hunter

The Ocean Hunter is a 1998 light gun shooter arcade game developed and published by Sega. The Ocean Hunter runs on Sega Model 3 hardware. It was first released in October 1998.- Gameplay :...

(1998), although it is the rarest of them.

Model 3 Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: IBM
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...

PowerPC
PowerPC
PowerPC is a RISC architecture created by the 1991 Apple–IBM–Motorola alliance, known as AIM...

603 @ 66, 100, 166 MHz
Graphics Chip: 2× Lockheed Martin
Lockheed Martin
Lockheed Martin is an American global aerospace, defense, security, and advanced technology company with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta in March 1995. It is headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, in the Washington Metropolitan Area....

Real3D/Pro-1000
Sound CPU : Motorola 68EC000 @ 11.3 MHz
Sound Chip: 2× Yamaha SCSP/YMF292-F 128-step DSP
Digital signal processor
A digital signal processor is a specialized microprocessor with an architecture optimized for the fast operational needs of digital signal processing.-Typical characteristics:...

, MIDI interface, 64 voices, 4 channel, maximum of 16.5 MB ROM
Read-only memory
Read-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...

, 64 PCM
Pulse-code modulation
Pulse-code modulation is a method used to digitally represent sampled analog signals. It is the standard form for digital audio in computers and various Blu-ray, Compact Disc and DVD formats, as well as other uses such as digital telephone systems...

channels
Main RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: 8 MB
Audio RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: 1 MB
Graphical Capabilities: Texture mapping
Texture mapping
Texture mapping is a method for adding detail, surface texture , or color to a computer-generated graphic or 3D model. Its application to 3D graphics was pioneered by Dr Edwin Catmull in his Ph.D. thesis of 1974.-Texture mapping:...

, Trilinear filtering
Trilinear filtering
Trilinear filtering is an extension of the bilinear texture filtering method, which also performs linear interpolation between mipmaps.Bilinear filtering has several weaknesses that make it an unattractive choice in many cases: using it on a full-detail texture when scaling to a very small size...

, MIP mapping, Specular reflection
Specular reflection
Specular reflection is the mirror-like reflection of light from a surface, in which light from a single incoming direction is reflected into a single outgoing direction...

, Gouraud shading
Gouraud shading
Gouraud shading, named after Henri Gouraud, is an interpolation method used in computer graphics to produce continuous shading of surfaces represented by polygon meshes...

, Flat shading, Anti aliasing, Alpha blending
Geometric performance: Over 1,000,000 polygons/sec.

Sega Naomi

First demonstrated in 1998 at JAMMA

Japanese Amusement Machine Manufacturers' Association

Japan Amusement Machinery Manufacturers Association , often known as JAMMA, is a trade association based in Tokyo, Japan....

,
the Sega

Sega

Naomi (New Arcade Operation Machine Idea) is the successor to the Sega Model 3 hardware.

A development of the Dreamcast home game console, the NAOMI and Dreamcast share the same hardware components: Hitachi SH-4

SuperH

SuperH is a 32-bit reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by Hitachi. It is implemented by microcontrollers and microprocessors for embedded systems....

CPU

Central processing unit

, PowerVR Series 2 GPU

Graphics processing unit

A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...

(PVR2DC), and Yamaha

Yamaha

Yamaha may refer to:* Yamaha Corporation, a Japanese company with a wide range of products and services** Yamaha Motor Company, a Japanese motorized vehicle-producing company...

AICA based sound system. NAOMI has twice as much system memory, twice as much video memory, and 4X as much sound memory. Multiple NAOMI boards can be 'stacked' together to improve graphics performance, or to support multiple-monitor output. A special game cabinet for the NAOMI, NAOMI Universal Cabinet, houses up to sixteen boards for this purpose.

The other key difference between NAOMI and Dreamcast lies in the game-media. The Dreamcast reads game data from GD-ROM

GD-ROM

GD-ROM is the proprietary optical disc format used by the Dreamcast games console, as well as its arcade counterparts and the Sega/Nintendo/Namco Triforce arcade system...

optical disc, while the NAOMI arcade-board features 168 MB of solid-state ROMs

Read-only memory

or GD-ROMs using a custom DIMM board and GD-ROM drive. In operation, the Naomi GD-ROM is read only once at system powerup, downloading the disc's contents to the DIMM-Board RAM. Once the download is complete, the game executes out of RAM, thereby reducing mechanical wear on the GD-ROM drive.

Unlike Sega's previous arcade platforms (and most other arcade platforms in the industry), NAOMI is widely licensed for use by other game publishers. Games such as Mazan, Marvel Vs. Capcom 2, Dead or Alive 2 and Guilty Gear XX were all developed by third-party licensees of the NAOMI platform. An offshoot version of the NAOMI hardware is Atomiswave

Atomiswave

The Atomiswave is a custom arcade system board and cabinet from Sammy Corporation. It is based on Sega's NAOMI system board...

by Sammy Corporation

Sammy Corporation

was established on November 1, 1975 and is a leading developer and retailer of pachinko and pachislot systems in Japan.In 2001, Sammy Corporation created a subsidiary Sammy Entertainment, Inc. It would later change its name to Sammy Studios in 2002. Sammy Studios is responsible for developing and...

.

After nine years of hardware production, and with new game titles coming in 2008 like Melty Blood: Actress Again and Akatsuki Blitzkampf AC

Akatsuki Blitzkampf

is a Japanese dōjin 2D fighting game, developed by the dōjin circle SUBTLE STYLE for Microsoft Windows. Released on April 30, 2007, the game is a sequel to Akatsuki Shisei Ichigō...

, NAOMI is considered to be one of the longest running arcade platforms ever and is comparable in longevity with the Neo-Geo MVS.

NAOMI Specifications

CPU: Hitachi SH-4 CPU with graphic functions and 128-bit SIMD @ 200 MHz (360 MIPS and 1.4 GFLOPS)
Graphic Engine: PowerVR 2 (PVR2DC)
Sound Engine: ARM7 Yamaha AICA 45 MHz (with internal 32-bit RISC CPU, 64 channel ADPCM)
Main Memory: 32 MByte
Graphic Memory: 16 MByte
Sound Memory: 8 MByte
Media: ROM Board (maximum size of 172MBytes) / GD-ROM
Simultaneous Number of Colors: Approx. 16,770,000 (24bits)
Polygons: 5 Million polys/sec
Rendering Speed: 500 M pixel/sec
Additional Features: Bump Mapping
Bump mapping
Bump mapping is a technique in computer graphics for simulating bumps and wrinkles on the surface of an object. This is achieved by perturbing the surface normals of the object and using the perturbed normal during lighting calculations. The result is an apparently bumpy surface rather than a...

, Fog
Fog
Fog is a collection of water droplets or ice crystals suspended in the air at or near the Earth's surface. While fog is a type of stratus cloud, the term "fog" is typically distinguished from the more generic term "cloud" in that fog is low-lying, and the moisture in the fog is often generated...

, Alpha Blending, Mip-Mapping
Mipmap
In 3D computer graphics texture filtering, MIP maps are pre-calculated, optimized collections of images that accompany a main texture, intended to increase rendering speed and reduce aliasing artifacts. They are widely used in 3D computer games, flight simulators and other 3D imaging systems. The...

, Trilinear filtering
Trilinear filtering
Trilinear filtering is an extension of the bilinear texture filtering method, which also performs linear interpolation between mipmaps.Bilinear filtering has several weaknesses that make it an unattractive choice in many cases: using it on a full-detail texture when scaling to a very small size...

, Anti-Aliasing
Anti-aliasing
In digital signal processing, spatial anti-aliasing is the technique of minimizing the distortion artifacts known as aliasing when representing a high-resolution image at a lower resolution...

, Environment mapping, and Specular Effects
Specular highlight
A specular highlight is the bright spot of light that appears on shiny objects when illuminated . Specular highlights are important in 3D computer graphics, as they provide a strong visual cue for the shape of an object and its location with respect to light sources in the scene.-Microfacets:The...

.

Sega Hikaru

An evolution of the NAOMI hardware with superior graphics capabilities, the Hikaru was used for a handful of deluxe dedicated-cabinet games, beginning with 1999's Brave Fire Fighters, in which the flame effects were largely a showpiece for the hardware. The Hikaru hardware was the first arcade platform capable of effective Phong Shading.

Since it was comparatively expensive to produce, and most games did not necessarily need Hikaru's extended graphics capabilities, Sega soon abandoned the system in favor of continued NAOMI and NAOMI 2 development.

Hikaru Specifications

CPU: 2x Hitachi SH-4
SuperH
SuperH is a 32-bit reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by Hitachi. It is implemented by microcontrollers and microprocessors for embedded systems....

CPU with graphic functions and 128-bit SIMD @ 200 MHz (360 MIPS and 1.4 GFLOPS)
Graphic Engine: Sega Custom 3D
Sound Engine: 2x ARM7 Yamaha AICA @ 45 MHz with internal 32-bit RISC CPU, 64 channel ADPCM
Main Memory: 64 Mbytes
Graphic Memory: 28 Mbytes
Sound Memory: 8 Mbytes
Media: ROM Board (max 352 MBytes)
Simultaneous Number of Colors: Approx. 16,770,000 (24-bit)
Resolution: 24 kHz, 496x384, 31 kHz 640x480
Polygons: 2 Million polygons/sec
Lighting: Horizontal, Spot, 1024 lights per scene, 4 lights per polygon, 8 window surfaces.
Effects: (at least) Phong Shading, Fog, Depth Queueing, Stencil, Shadow, Motion blur
Others Capabilities: Bitmap Layer x 2, Calendar, Dual Monitor (24 kHz)
Extensions: communication, 4 channel audio, PCI, MIDI, RS-232C
Connection: JAMMA Video compliant

Sega NAOMI 2

In 2000, Sega

Sega

debuted the NAOMI 2 arcade system board

Arcade system board

at JAMMA

Japanese Amusement Machine Manufacturers' Association

Japan Amusement Machinery Manufacturers Association , often known as JAMMA, is a trade association based in Tokyo, Japan....

, an upgrade and a sequel of the original NAOMI with better graphics capability.

NAOMI 2's graphics-assembly contains two PowerVR

PowerVR

PowerVR is a division of Imagination Technologies that develops hardware and software for 2D and 3D rendering, and for video encoding, decoding, associated image processing and Direct X, OpenGL ES, OpenVG, and OpenCL acceleration....

CLX2 GPUs, a PowerVR Elan chip for geometry transformation and lighting effects, and 2X the graphics memory for each CLX2 chip. (Each CLX2 has its own 32MB bank, as the CLX2s cannot share graphics RAM). Due to architectural similarities and a "bypass" feature in the Elan device, the NAOMI 2 is also able to play NAOMI games without modification.

With the NAOMI 2, Sega brought back the GD-ROM

GD-ROM

GD-ROM is the proprietary optical disc format used by the Dreamcast games console, as well as its arcade counterparts and the Sega/Nintendo/Namco Triforce arcade system...

drive. For both NAOMI and NAOMI 2, the GD-ROM setup was offered as an optional combination of daughterboard expansion known as the DIMM

DIMM

A DIMM or dual in-line memory module, comprises a series of dynamic random-access memory integrated circuits. These modules are mounted on a printed circuit board and designed for use in personal computers, workstations and servers...

Board, and the GD-ROM drive itself. The DIMM board contained enough RAM

Ram

-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

to allow an entire game to be loaded into memory at start up, allowing the drive to shut down after the game has loaded. This heavily reduces load times during the game, and saves on drive wear and tear.

Triforce

The Triforce is an arcade system board

Arcade system board

developed jointly by Namco

Namco

is a Japanese corporation best known as a former video game developer and publisher. Following a merger with Bandai in September 2005, the two companies' game production assets were spun off into Namco Bandai Games on March 31, 2006. Namco Ltd. was re-established to continue domestic operation of...

, Sega

Sega

, and Nintendo

Nintendo

, with the first games appearing in 2002. The name "Triforce" is a reference to Nintendo's The Legend of Zelda
The Legend of Zelda
The Legend of Zelda, originally released as in Japan, is a video game developed and published by Nintendo, and designed by Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka. Set in the fantasy land of Hyrule, the plot centers on a boy named Link, the playable protagonist, who aims to collect the eight fragments...

series of games, and symbolized the three companies' involvement in the project. The system hardware is based on the Nintendo GameCube

Nintendo GameCube

The , officially abbreviated to NGC in Japan and GCN in other regions, is a sixth generation video game console released by Nintendo on September 15, 2001 in Japan, November 18, 2001 in North America, May 3, 2002 in Europe, and May 17, 2002 in Australia...

with several differences, like provisions for add-ons such as Sega

Sega

's GD-ROM

GD-ROM

GD-ROM is the proprietary optical disc format used by the Dreamcast games console, as well as its arcade counterparts and the Sega/Nintendo/Namco Triforce arcade system...

system and upgradeable RAM

Ram

modules.
The Triforce was initially believed to have twice as much 1T-SRAM

1T-SRAM

1T-SRAM is a pseudostatic random-access memory technology introduced by MoSys, Inc., which offers a high-density alternative to traditional static random access memory in embedded memory applications...

as the Nintendo GameCube (48MB instead of 24MB), but this was disproven by a teardown analysis of a Triforce board.

A few versions of the Triforce exist. The first two are the Type-1 and Type-3 units, the former using an external DIMM board (same as used on the Naomi and Naomi 2) while the latter integrates this component inside the metal casing. A custom Namco version exists which only accepts custom NAND Flash based cartridges, which has a different Media board and supposedly different baseboard. These board use the same metal case design as the Type-3 Triforce.

Triforce Specifications

Main CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: IBM
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...

PowerPC
PowerPC
PowerPC is a RISC architecture created by the 1991 Apple–IBM–Motorola alliance, known as AIM...

"Gekko"
Gekko (microprocessor)
Gekko is a 32-bit PowerPC microprocessor custom made by IBM in 2000 for Nintendo to use as the CPU in their sixth generation game console, the Nintendo GameCube.-Development:...

@ 486 MHz
Graphics: Custom ATI
ATI Technologies
ATI Technologies Inc. was a semiconductor technology corporation based in Markham, Ontario, Canada, that specialized in the development of graphics processing units and chipsets. Founded in 1985 as Array Technologies Inc., the company was listed publicly in 1993 and was acquired by Advanced Micro...

/Nintendo
Nintendo
is a multinational corporation located in Kyoto, Japan. Founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it produced handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....

"Flipper" @ 162 MHz.
Color: 24-bit Color (24-bit Z Buffer)
Hardware Features: Fog, Subpixel Anti-Aliasing
Anti-aliasing
In digital signal processing, spatial anti-aliasing is the technique of minimizing the distortion artifacts known as aliasing when representing a high-resolution image at a lower resolution...

, 8 Hardware Lights, Alpha blending, Virtual Texture Design, Multi-Texturing, Bump Mapping
Bump mapping
Bump mapping is a technique in computer graphics for simulating bumps and wrinkles on the surface of an object. This is achieved by perturbing the surface normals of the object and using the perturbed normal during lighting calculations. The result is an apparently bumpy surface rather than a...

, Environment mapping, MIP Mapping
Mipmap
In 3D computer graphics texture filtering, MIP maps are pre-calculated, optimized collections of images that accompany a main texture, intended to increase rendering speed and reduce aliasing artifacts. They are widely used in 3D computer games, flight simulators and other 3D imaging systems. The...

, Bilinear filtering
Bilinear filtering
Bilinear filtering is a texture filtering method used to smooth textures when displayed larger or smaller than they actually are.Most of the time, when drawing a textured shape on the screen, the texture is not displayed exactly as it is stored, without any distortion...

, Trilinear filtering
Trilinear filtering
Trilinear filtering is an extension of the bilinear texture filtering method, which also performs linear interpolation between mipmaps.Bilinear filtering has several weaknesses that make it an unattractive choice in many cases: using it on a full-detail texture when scaling to a very small size...

, Anisotropic filtering
Anisotropic filtering
In 3D computer graphics, anisotropic filtering is a method of enhancing the image quality of textures on surfaces that are at oblique viewing angles with respect to the camera where the projection of the texture appears to be non-orthogonal In 3D computer graphics, anisotropic filtering...

, Real-time Hardware Texture Decompression (S3TC), Real-time Decompression of Display List
Display list
A display list is a series of graphics commands that define an output image. The image is created by executing the commands....

, Embedded Framebuffer
Framebuffer
A framebuffer is a video output device that drives a video display from a memory buffer containing a complete frame of data.The information in the memory buffer typically consists of color values for every pixel on the screen...

, 1 MB Embedded Texture Cache
Cache
In computer engineering, a cache is a component that transparently stores data so that future requests for that data can be served faster. The data that is stored within a cache might be values that have been computed earlier or duplicates of original values that are stored elsewhere...

, HW 3-line Deflickering filter.
Sound DSP
Digital signal processor
A digital signal processor is a specialized microprocessor with an architecture optimized for the fast operational needs of digital signal processing.-Typical characteristics:...

: Custom Macronix 16-bit DSP @ 81 MHz
Main RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: Main Memory 24MB of MoSys 1T-SRAM
Static random access memory
Static random-access memory is a type of semiconductor memory where the word static indicates that, unlike dynamic RAM , it does not need to be periodically refreshed, as SRAM uses bistable latching circuitry to store each bit...

, Approximately 10ns Sustainable Latency.

Triforce Games

Title	Developer	Release	Media	Key Chip
Donkey Kong Jungle Fever	Capcom/Nintendo	2005	ROM Cart
F-Zero AX	Sega/Nintendo	2003	GDROM GDT0004
F-Zero AX Monster Ride	Sega/Nintendo	2004	GDROM
Gekitou Pro Yakyuu	Sega	2003	GDROM GDT0008C	3170371JPN
Mario Kart Arcade GP Mario Kart Arcade GP Mario Kart Arcade GP is an arcade-only iteration of Nintendo's Mario Kart series, developed by both Namco and Nintendo. Designed for the Triforce arcade board , players can race as one of eleven characters in twenty-four tracks...	Namco / Nintendo	2005	ROM Cart	3175109COM
Mario Kart Arcade GP 2	Namco / Nintendo	2007	ROM Cart
Star Fox (planned, but not released)	Namco / Nintendo	2004-05
The Key of Avalon : The Wizard Master (server)	Sega	2003	GDROM GDT0005A/C/F/G
The Key of Avalon : The Wizard Master (client)	Sega	2003	GDROM GDT0006A/C/F
The Key of Avalon Ver 1.3 (server)	Sega	2004	GDROM GDT0009C
The Key of Avalon Ver 1.3 (client)	Sega	2004	GDROM GDT0010C
The Key of Avalon 2 (server)	Sega	2005	GDROM
The Key of Avalon 2 (client)	Sega	2005	GDROM GDT0017B
Virtua Striker 2002 Virtua Striker The Virtua Striker video games are arcade-style soccer games by Sega. Originally developed by Sega AM2, the series moved to Amusement Vision with Virtua Striker 3... (Japan)	Sega	2002	GDROM GDT0001	3170337JPN
Virtua Striker 2002 (Export)	Sega	2002	GDROM GDT0002	3170337EXP
Virtua Striker 4 (Japan)	Sega	2005	GDROM GDT0013E	3170391JPN
Virtua Striker 4 (Export)	Sega	2005	GDROM GDT0015	3170393EXP
Virtua Striker 4 Ver.2006 (Japan)	Sega	2006	GDROM GDT0020D
Virtua Striker 4 Ver.2006 (Export)	Sega	2006	GDROM GDT0021

Sega Chihiro

The Sega Chihiro system is a Sega

Sega

arcade system board

Arcade system board

based on the architecture of the Xbox

Xbox

The Xbox is a sixth-generation video game console manufactured by Microsoft. It was released on November 15, 2001 in North America, February 22, 2002 in Japan, and March 14, 2002 in Australia and Europe and is the predecessor to the Xbox 360. It was Microsoft's first foray into the gaming console...

. The 733 MHz Intel Pentium III

Pentium III

The Pentium III brand refers to Intel's 32-bit x86 desktop and mobile microprocessors based on the sixth-generation P6 microarchitecture introduced on February 26, 1999. The brand's initial processors were very similar to the earlier Pentium II-branded microprocessors...

CPU and the Nvidia

NVIDIA

Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...

XChip graphics processor are common to both. Unlike the Xbox, Chihiro can support up to 512MB RAM through add-in memory modules. Chihiro games are distributed on Sega GD-ROM

GD-ROM

GD-ROM is the proprietary optical disc format used by the Dreamcast games console, as well as its arcade counterparts and the Sega/Nintendo/Namco Triforce arcade system...

media, instead of standard DVD-ROM used by the Xbox.

Because the Chihiro and Xbox share the same hardware architecture, porting from the Chihiro is theoretically easier than porting from a different arcade platform. In practice, the much smaller memory-capacity of the Xbox (64MB), presents a formidable challenge for home-conversions of arcade titles which use Chihiro's larger memory configuration, however the Xbox release of OutRun 2
OutRun 2
OutRun 2 is a racing game released by Sega in 2003. Although this is the first official sequel to Out Run, it is the fifth title in the Out Run series.-Gameplay:...

was able to retain the look and feel of the original 512 MB arcade version.

Chihiro Specifications

CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Pentium III
Pentium III
The Pentium III brand refers to Intel's 32-bit x86 desktop and mobile microprocessors based on the sixth-generation P6 microarchitecture introduced on February 26, 1999. The brand's initial processors were very similar to the earlier Pentium II-branded microprocessors...

@ 733 MHz, 133 MHz FSB
Front side bus
A front-side bus is a computer communication interface often used in computers during the 1990s and 2000s.It typically carries data between the central processing unit and a memory controller hub, known as the northbridge....
RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: Upgradable Module, from 64MB upwards
GPU
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...

: Nvidia
NVIDIA
Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...

XChip @ 200 MHz, (derived from GeForce 3), featuring programmable Pixel and Vertex Shaders, Hardware T&L, Quincunx
Quincunx
A quincunx is a geometric pattern consisting of five points arranged in a cross, that is five coplanar points, four of them forming a square or rectangle and a fifth at its center...

FSAA, Anisotropic filtering
Anisotropic filtering
In 3D computer graphics, anisotropic filtering is a method of enhancing the image quality of textures on surfaces that are at oblique viewing angles with respect to the camera where the projection of the texture appears to be non-orthogonal In 3D computer graphics, anisotropic filtering...

, Bump mapping
Bump mapping
Bump mapping is a technique in computer graphics for simulating bumps and wrinkles on the surface of an object. This is achieved by perturbing the surface normals of the object and using the perturbed normal during lighting calculations. The result is an apparently bumpy surface rather than a...
Sound: Cirrus Logic
Cirrus Logic
Cirrus Logic is a fabless semiconductor supplier specializing in analog, mixed-signal, and audio DSP integrated circuits . They are presently headquartered in Austin, Texas. Their audio processors and audio converters are found in many professional audio and consumer entertainment products,...

CS4630 Stream Processor, Nvidia nForce
NForce
The nForce is a motherboard chipset created by Nvidia for AMD Athlon and Duron microprocessors. The chipset shipped in 3 varieties; 220, 415, and 420. 220 and 420 are very similar with each having the integrated GPU, but the 220 only has a single channel of memory available whereas 420 has the...

with 5.1 Dolby Digital
Dolby Digital
Dolby Digital is the name for audio compression technologies developed by Dolby Laboratories. It was originally called Dolby Stereo Digital until 1994. Except for Dolby TrueHD, the audio compression is lossy. The first use of Dolby Digital was to provide digital sound in cinemas from 35mm film prints...

decoding
Media: GD-ROM
GD-ROM
GD-ROM is the proprietary optical disc format used by the Dreamcast games console, as well as its arcade counterparts and the Sega/Nintendo/Namco Triforce arcade system...

Sega Lindbergh

The Sega Lindbergh arcade system board

Arcade system board

is a Montavista Linux embedded PC (The Lindbergh Blue system used Windows Embedded

Windows Embedded

Windows Embedded is a family of operating systems from Microsoft designed for use in embedded systems. Microsoft makes available four different categories of operating systems for embedded devices targeting a wide market, ranging from small-footprint, real-time devices to Point of Sale devices like...

instead). Sega had initially planned to use Microsoft's Xbox 360

Xbox 360

The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...

as the basis for the arcade board, but instead opted for an architecture based on standard PC hardware.

According to Sega-AM2

Sega-AM2

Sega Amusement Machine Research and Development Department 2 is a research and development team for the video game company Sega. Originally known as "Sega Amusement Developing Section 8", AM2 was previously headed up by famed designer Yu Suzuki...

president Hiroshi Kataoka, porting Lindbergh titles (such as Virtua Fighter 5

Virtua Fighter 5

is the latest game in Sega's Virtua Fighter series and direct sequel to Virtua Fighter 4: Final Tuned. The original version was released on July 12, 2006 into Japanese arcades and in February 2007 in European arcades...

) to Sony's PlayStation 3

PlayStation 3

The is the third home video game console produced by Sony Computer Entertainment and the successor to the PlayStation 2 as part of the PlayStation series. The PlayStation 3 competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...

is generally easier than porting to Xbox 360, because the Lindbergh and PS3 use a GPU designed by the same company, Nvidia

NVIDIA

Lindbergh Specifications

CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Pentium 4
Pentium 4
Pentium 4 was a line of single-core desktop and laptop central processing units , introduced by Intel on November 20, 2000 and shipped through August 8, 2008. They had a 7th-generation x86 microarchitecture, called NetBurst, which was the company's first all-new design since the introduction of the...

HT 3.0E (3.0 GHz, 1 megabyte L2 Cache
CPU cache
A CPU cache is a cache used by the central processing unit of a computer to reduce the average time to access memory. The cache is a smaller, faster memory which stores copies of the data from the most frequently used main memory locations...

, Hyper-Threading
Hyper-threading
Hyper-threading is Intel's term for its simultaneous multithreading implementation in its Atom, Intel Core i3/i5/i7, Itanium, Pentium 4 and Xeon CPUs....

, 800 MHz FSB
Front side bus
A front-side bus is a computer communication interface often used in computers during the 1990s and 2000s.It typically carries data between the central processing unit and a memory controller hub, known as the northbridge....

)
RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: 184 pin DDR SDRAM
DDR SDRAM
Double data rate synchronous dynamic random access memory is a class of memory integrated circuits used in computers. DDR SDRAM has been superseded by DDR2 SDRAM and DDR3 SDRAM, neither of which are either forward or backward compatible with DDR SDRAM, meaning that DDR2 or DDR3 memory modules...

PC3200(400 MHz) 512 MB × 2 (Dual)
GPU
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...

: NVIDIA
NVIDIA
Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...

GeForce 6800
GeForce 6 Series
The GeForce 6 Series is Nvidia's sixth generation of GeForce graphic processing units. Launched on April 14, 2004, the GeForce 6 family introduced PureVideo post-processing for video, SLI technology, and Shader Model 3.0 support .-GeForce 6 Series features:-SLI:The Scalable Link...

AGP (NV40), 256 Bit GDDR3
GDDR3
Graphics Double Data Rate 3 is a graphics card-specific memory technology, designed by ATI Technologies with the collaboration of JEDEC.It has much the same technological base as DDR2, but the power and heat dispersal requirements have been reduced somewhat, allowing for higher performance memory...

256 MB, compatible with Vertex Shader 3.0 & Pixel Shader 3.0
Sound: 64 channel, 5.1 ch SP-DIF
S/PDIF
S/PDIF is a digital audio interconnect used in consumer audio equipment over relatively short distances. The signal is transmitted over either a coaxial cable with RCA connectors or a fiber optic cable with TOSLINK connectors. S/PDIF interconnects components in home theaters and other digital high...
LAN
Län
Län and lääni refer to the administrative divisions used in Sweden and previously in Finland. The provinces of Finland were abolished on January 1, 2010....

: On board, 10/100/1000 BASE-TX. JVS I/O Connector
Serial
Serial port
In computing, a serial port is a serial communication physical interface through which information transfers in or out one bit at a time...

: 2 Channel (can switch one channel between 232C and 422)
Other: USB port x 4, high-definition
High-definition video
High-definition video or HD video refers to any video system of higher resolution than standard-definition video, and most commonly involves display resolutions of 1,280×720 pixels or 1,920×1,080 pixels...

output (DVI and VGA out), S-Video out, DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....

Drive Support, Sega ALL.NET online support
Operating System: Montavista Linux
Protection : High Spec original security module.

The Sega Lindbergh standard universal sit-down cabinet uses a 1360x768 WXGA LCD display.

Aside from the standard Lindbergh system (Lindbergh Yellow), Sega developed a Lindbergh Red and Lindbergh Blue system, which have different specifications.

The Lindbergh has been superseded by the Ring series (RingEdge and RingWide), so there will be no new arcade games developed for this system. The last game to run on Lindbergh was MJ4 Evolution.

Sega Europa-R

The Sega Europa-R is an arcade system board

Arcade system board

developed by Sega

Sega

Amusements Europe.

Sega chose a PC-based design for this arcade board.

Europa-R Specifications

CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Intel Pentium D 945 (3.4 GHz, dual-core)
RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: 8 GB (2x 4 GB modules)
GPU
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...

: Nvidia
NVIDIA
Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...

GeForce 8800
GeForce 8 Series
The GeForce 8 Series, is the eighth generation of NVIDIA's GeForce line of graphics processing units. The third major GPU architecture developed at NVIDIA, the GeForce 8 represents the company's first unified shader architecture.-Naming:...
Other: Compatible HDTV
High-definition television
High-definition television is video that has resolution substantially higher than that of traditional television systems . HDTV has one or two million pixels per frame, roughly five times that of SD...

(High Definition), DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....

Drive Support, Sega ALL.NET online support
Protection: High Spec original security module.

Sega Ring series

The Ring series of arcade machines are also based on PC architecture. Initially announced models include RingEdge and RingWide. The 2 pieces of hardware have Microsoft

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...

Windows Embedded

Standard 2009 as their operating system

Operating system

An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...

, mainly so other third-party companies would find it easier to produce games for the system. The first game for the Ring platform is Border Break

Border Break

, is an action arcade game developed by Sega. It is the first title to run on Sega's new RingEdge arcade board and it was released on September 9, 2009. It was released in Hong Kong on January 25, 2010 and in Taiwan on April 1, 2010.-Gameplay:...

, running on the RingEdge. Border Break does not take full advantage of the graphics card on the Ringedge, but introduces touch-screen functionality and a special controller system. It allows players to play next to each other in the same arcade or against others in another arcade using Sega's ALL.NET feature. Also in Fall 2009 an image appeared around the web of what was apparently a leaked RingEdge BIOS and it appears the disc drive supports the now defunct HD DVD

HD DVD

HD DVD is a discontinued high-density optical disc format for storing data and high-definition video.Supported principally by Toshiba, HD DVD was envisioned to be the successor to the standard DVD format...

. In 2009, Sega stated that they planned to revive the arcade business with these machines.

RingEdge

The RingEdge is the main console of the Ring Series. It has better graphics and larger storage than the RingWide. It sports a better graphics card than the Lindbergh system, allowing for a higher performance graphically, all while costing less to produce. The use of an Intel Pentium Dual-Core (1.8Ghz per core) processor delivers better performance than Lindbergh's Pentium 4 (3.0Ghz) processor. A solid-state drive

Solid-state drive

A solid-state drive , sometimes called a solid-state disk or electronic disk, is a data storage device that uses solid-state memory to store persistent data with the intention of providing access in the same manner of a traditional block i/o hard disk drive...

greatly reduces wear-and-tear due to a lack of moving parts, and also has much higher transfer rates than a hard disc drive, leading to better performance and loading times. The Ringedge also supports 3D game capability.

RingEdge specifications

CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Intel Pentium Dual-Core E2160 (1.8 GHz)
RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: 1 GB DDR2
DDR2 SDRAM
DDR2 SDRAM is a double data rate synchronous dynamic random-access memory interface. It supersedes the original DDR SDRAM specification and has itself been superseded by DDR3 SDRAM...

SDRAM (PC-6400)
GPU
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...

: Nvidia
NVIDIA
Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...

GeForce 8800GS
GeForce 8 Series
The GeForce 8 Series, is the eighth generation of NVIDIA's GeForce line of graphics processing units. The third major GPU architecture developed at NVIDIA, the GeForce 8 represents the company's first unified shader architecture.-Naming:...

with 384 MB GDDR3
GDDR3
Graphics Double Data Rate 3 is a graphics card-specific memory technology, designed by ATI Technologies with the collaboration of JEDEC.It has much the same technological base as DDR2, but the power and heat dispersal requirements have been reduced somewhat, allowing for higher performance memory...

SDRAM (Shader
Shader
In the field of computer graphics, a shader is a computer program that is used primarily to calculate rendering effects on graphics hardware with a high degree of flexibility...

Model 4.0)
Output: 2 DVI ports
Storage: 32GB SSD
Networking: Gigabit Ethernet
Gigabit Ethernet
Gigabit Ethernet is a term describing various technologies for transmitting Ethernet frames at a rate of a gigabit per second , as defined by the IEEE 802.3-2008 standard. It came into use beginning in 1999, gradually supplanting Fast Ethernet in wired local networks where it performed...

(1000BASE-T)
OS
Operating system
An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...

: Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...

Windows Embedded
Windows Embedded
Windows Embedded is a family of operating systems from Microsoft designed for use in embedded systems. Microsoft makes available four different categories of operating systems for embedded devices targeting a wide market, ranging from small-footprint, real-time devices to Point of Sale devices like...

Standard 2009
Other: 3 USB ports, 5.1 channel HD Audio, Sega ALL.NET online support

RingWide

The RingWide is more basic than the RingEdge, and only has 8 GB (Compact Flash) of storage, while RingEdge has a 4 times larger storage (because of the use of the RAM Drive and SSD

SSD

-Computing:* Solid-state drive, a type of data storage device which uses memory rather than rotating media* Seven-segment display, a display which uses 7 segments to display mostly numbers* System sequence diagram, a type of UML software engineering diagram...

). The RingWide will be used to run games that are less graphics-intensive and that require less high-end specifications in order to cut down costs. Sega

Sega

also appears to be poised to be designing a streaming hybrid for use with household TVs similar to OnLive

OnLive

OnLive is a cloud gaming platform: the games are synchronized, rendered, and stored on remote servers and delivered via the Internet.The service is available using the OnLive Game System, PCs running Microsoft Windows and Intel-based Macs with OS X 10.5.8 or later...

from the system's hardware as shows this patent that was issued by them on November 17, 2009.

RingWide specifications

CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...

: Intel Celeron 440 (2.0 GHz)
RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...

: 1 GB DDR2 SDRAM
DDR2 SDRAM
DDR2 SDRAM is a double data rate synchronous dynamic random-access memory interface. It supersedes the original DDR SDRAM specification and has itself been superseded by DDR3 SDRAM...

(PC-5300)
GPU
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...

: ATI
Ati
As a word, Ati may refer to:* Ati, a town in Chad* Ati, a Negrito ethnic group in the Philippines* Ati-Atihan Festival, an annual celebration held in the Philippines* Ati, a queen of the fabled Land of Punt in Africa...

Radeon HD 2xxx
Radeon R600
The graphics processing unit codenamed the Radeon R600 is the foundation of the Radeon HD 2000/3000 series and the FireGL 2007 series video cards developed by ATI Technologies...

with 128 MB GDDR3
GDDR3
Graphics Double Data Rate 3 is a graphics card-specific memory technology, designed by ATI Technologies with the collaboration of JEDEC.It has much the same technological base as DDR2, but the power and heat dispersal requirements have been reduced somewhat, allowing for higher performance memory...

SDRAM (Shader
Shader
In the field of computer graphics, a shader is a computer program that is used primarily to calculate rendering effects on graphics hardware with a high degree of flexibility...

Model 4.0)
Output: 1 DVI port
Storage: 8 GB CF
Networking: Gigabit Ethernet
Gigabit Ethernet
Gigabit Ethernet is a term describing various technologies for transmitting Ethernet frames at a rate of a gigabit per second , as defined by the IEEE 802.3-2008 standard. It came into use beginning in 1999, gradually supplanting Fast Ethernet in wired local networks where it performed...

(1000BASE-T)
OS
Operating system
An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...

: Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...

Windows Embedded
Windows Embedded
Windows Embedded is a family of operating systems from Microsoft designed for use in embedded systems. Microsoft makes available four different categories of operating systems for embedded devices targeting a wide market, ranging from small-footprint, real-time devices to Point of Sale devices like...

Standard 2009
Other: 2 USB ports, 5.1 channel HD Audio, Sega ALL.NET online

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