nes/snes retro duo! pics, review, hacking info 7/27/10

DukeNukenFourEver · Post by **DukeNukenFourEver** » Sun Mar 16, 2008 3:04 am

I'm not sure if anyone's mentioned this, but it seems like people are still jacking up the prices for this on eBay when it is actually cheaper on Amazon.com.

I finally gave in and ordered one the other night - I brought my Twin to a party and we were gunna do this awesome tournament idea with Mario Kart but the second player port decided to crap out on me. The Duo is more reliable, right?

lovablechevy · Post by **lovablechevy** » Sun Mar 16, 2008 8:34 am

DukeNukenFourEver wrote:The Duo is more reliable, right?

from my experience, yes. it is a much sturdier system and i haven't had any problems with it at all.

DukeNukenFourEver · Post by **DukeNukenFourEver** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 4:05 pm

I hope I'm one of the unlucky ones and my next unit will be fabulous, but here's my experience... I'm guessing the seller is a little shady too...

You see, I open my mailing package and there it is - my Retro Duo! Yay. I turn the box to take it out, and it seems like the sticker has been tampered with (i.e. opened already, since there was adhesive on the box where the sticker wasn't). I checked the other sides and it seemed like that was the same problem. But it didn't seem bad.

I take the box off to get a good look at the system and... scratches. Tiny little scratches all over my "new" Retro Duo. And the controllers.

Passing this all off (I assumed it could have been the box, since there was no plastic wrappings all over the system and controllers like on my other FC's I've bought lately), I plug everything in and play Donkey Kong Country 2 for a good half an hour. The SNES games work, awesome.

I put in a NES game, and it being Kirby (it's given me trouble in the past) wouldn't boot up like usual. So I'm assuming it's the cart. But one game I KNOW works, Punch Out!!, I stick in. I get past the "Round 1" screen to where the boxers actually are and... it restarts. WTF. I try again, gets to the "Round 1" screen and... restarts. Must be a kink in my cart. I pull it out, put it back in, and try again. I get past the "Round 1" screen and pummel the crap out of Glass Joe, or whatever his name is. Once the letters "TKO" appear on the screen, the Retro restarts again.

I know my Punch Out!! cart works, and I also know my Megaman II cart works as well. During random things in between levels, the Retro would restart. I tried Super Mario, because come on, IT HAS TO WORK. I get past the "select Mario or Duck Hunt" screen and BAM, my game is frozen. What the hell. I turn it off, take the cart out and put it back in... I manage to jump on a goomba and it freezes. The first goomba.

Sadly, all my games work on my FC Twin which refuses to play two players on any game. So at least I know it's the system...

I've written an email to the guy on Amazon, hopefully this was just a fluke... Or maybe he'll disapeer in a few days. D: He has over eight thousand positive feedback's, so hopefully this will work out...

Is there anything I could do to my Duo to see if there is a problem? I'll be back around 8 (mountain time), gotta go to work right now... Thanks in advance...

lovablechevy · Post by **lovablechevy** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 4:38 pm

DukeNukenFourEver wrote:I hope I'm one of the unlucky ones and my next unit will be fabulous, but here's my experience... I'm guessing the seller is a little shady too......

that is really weird.

have you tried opening the system to see if you can visually see anything wrong with it? if you can, take some pics of the inside and post them. i'll look at them and compare to mine and see if anything looks amiss.

it sounds like someone else got the system before you and either broke it themselves or it was faulty for them.

hopefully this is just a fluke! i've had great experiences with all 3 i've bought (1 for me, 1 for my portable, and 1 for my brother).

DukeNukenFourEver · Post by **DukeNukenFourEver** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:19 pm

Photobucket resizes my pictures. Know any good hosting places?

EDIT: I may as well give the store name out, since I've seen other negative feedback in his feedback comments. And forget what I said about eight thousand, I was looking at another store.

pioneer_marketing

I'll take it down if he even bothers to reply back with a solution. I checked the other day and there was a store front for him, and now he's pulling all his items. They were mostly controllers and stuff... I'm willing to bet they were also "new" but sold used.

vskid · Post by **vskid** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:35 pm

DukeNukenFourEver wrote:Photobucket resizes my pictures. Know any good hosting places?

Just change the settings, its set to resize them by default, change it to 1MB.

DukeNukenFourEver · Post by **DukeNukenFourEver** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:49 pm

Alright, will do.

Also, these things are female of the dog species to get open. Ugh.

lovablechevy · Post by **lovablechevy** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 10:33 pm

DukeNukenFourEver wrote:Alright, will do.

Also, these things are female of the dog species to get open. Ugh.

really? it's just 4 philips head screws...

DukeNukenFourEver · Post by **DukeNukenFourEver** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 12:50 am

Well, they are tiny. And my tiny screwdrivers suck ass. So maybe tomorrow when I borrow my friends.

DukeNukenFourEver · Post by **DukeNukenFourEver** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 2:45 pm

Alright, picture time.

Hopefully you guys can make out what the hell I took pictures of, and help me out.

Something else I noticed - when I switch my games around on the little selection nob (8-BIT - OFF - 16-BIT), it's really easy to switch to 8-BIT but it's kind of tricky to get it just right to turn it off or to get on 16-BIT. The button isn't aligned to what I'm doing, too; it will say it's on OFF when it's really on 8-BIT...

I guess I could throw forty more dollars on a trusted vendor and keep the pimpin' controllers.

lovablechevy · Post by **lovablechevy** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 2:58 pm

DukeNukenFourEver wrote:Something else I noticed - when I switch my games around on the little selection nob (8-BIT - OFF - 16-BIT), it's really easy to switch to 8-BIT but it's kind of tricky to get it just right to turn it off or to get on 16-BIT. The button isn't aligned to what I'm doing, too; it will say it's on OFF when it's really on 8-BIT...

check to make sure that the red power switch is in the correct way. you can pop it out and turn it 180 degrees and pop it back in. if that makes the switching worse, then i have no idea what the problem with that is. also, remember to make sure to line up the switch and the nob when putting the system back together. i find it easiest to flip the switch to the 16 bit and hold the nob down when putting it back together.

can you take pics of the bottom of the nes board...? that's where the noac is located. just want to make sure everything is good on that end. also, can you get some good close up pics of the connections between the snes and nes boards? i don't know how that could cause the problem seeing that the snes side works fine for you... but just want to make sure.

DukeNukenFourEver · Post by **DukeNukenFourEver** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 8:28 pm

The red button was in on the right side... So I dunno what the deal is.

Anyway, more pictures!

SNES board

NES board

Also, I'll just tell you right now that no matter how detailed I got with the connections between the SNES and NES board I could get, it's all hot glued together anyway. Both ribbon cords.

Joel Schmidt · Post by **Joel Schmidt** » Thu Mar 20, 2008 7:31 pm

LovableChevy, I just got home from my local Play-n-Trade. They received their order for the Retro Duo from Innex at 12pm today (finally... the owner has little interest in ordering from them again though. slow service and poor customer service). I personally tested 2 different copies of Battletoads on 3 different Retro Duo systems. All three systems and both games sucessfully played through to the 3rd level.

I honestly do not know why nickerous was unable to have success.

Incidentally, for anyone wanting a good laugh today. The company Slackers has decided to sell the Retro Duo for $79.99 and is telling customers they should make reservations as it is an extremely rare system and sells out almost immediately.

Website · Post by **Life of Brian** » Thu Mar 20, 2008 11:06 pm

Joel Schmidt wrote:Incidentally, for anyone wanting a good laugh today. The company Slackers has decided to sell the Retro Duo for $79.99 and is telling customers they should make reservations as it is an extremely rare system and sells out almost immediately.

Yikes! What a ripoff!

I really do want a Retro Duo now. If I ever come across one cheaply enough I'll snap that sucker up and have it built into a portable in no time...

lovablechevy · Post by **lovablechevy** » Fri Mar 21, 2008 7:15 am

Life of Brian wrote:I really do want a Retro Duo now. If I ever come across one cheaply enough I'll snap that sucker up and have it built into a portable in no time...

whoa, whoa, whoa! let me finish mine first! ...please...?