OSSC Newsletter Issue 20 – Covid Component crunch chaos

Towards the end of 2021 we worked very hard to finalise the OSSC Pro, we now have completed hardware, case designs (shown below), remotes and with a few upgrades to the software we would be ready to launch. All that remained was the box design and any quick start guide pamphlets that would be included in the box.

Unfortunately, we have to deliver the news that, due to the global component shortages, we cannot bring OSSC Pro to the market at a competitive price at this time. Due to this we have had to take the disappointing decision to postpone the launch of OSSC, until the component market returns to something approaching its pre-pandemic levels of normality.

This is NOT the cancellation of the project. We are still committed to launching the unit when we can and will continue to work on firmware updates and improvements.

Inevitably, some people will be disappointed that we’re not going ahead with the launch in spite of the high cost of components. Certainly, video processors with premium price points aren’t all that unusual. Anyone building a high end home theatre setup will be familiar with names like Lumagen or DVDO, brands with products where retail prices regularly top thousands of dollars. Realistically though, the OSSC Pro has to compete with both its younger brother and other fantastic scalers that are already on the market and coming soon. While enthusiastic early adopters would pay the premium, we felt that most end users would find better value for money elsewhere.

It is certainly a shame to have invested so much time and money in a project only to see it shelved. OSSC Pro has garnered interest from users all over the world, who see its potential not only for scaling retro gaming consoles, but for flexible video processing for streaming and content creation too. We get it, you want this hardware! We will continue to try and get it to market as soon as we can.

A word on the competition

When Markus originally conceived OSSC Pro there was nothing else like it on the market, of course that’s not the situation now, but we believe OSSC Pro has many potential advantages over the competition. We have always supported Mike Chi and RetroTINK and believe that the RetroTINK 5x is an incredible achievement and a fantastic product. Because the 5x is pushing the old Cyclone 4 FPGA to its absolute limit, it is unlikely that we will see advanced features, like rotation, that were planned for the OSSC Pro appearing on the 5x. Of course, given the fantastic firmware updates Mike Chi has been delivering, you can never say never. The lack of a HDMI input and an LCD on the unit makes it a little fiddly to use for downscaling in particular, but for anyone looking for the best gaming focused video processor and scaler currently available, the 5x is the obvious winner. We hope to take delivery of a batch of RetroTINK 5x units soon for customers all over Europe.

The upcoming PixelFX Morph looks jaw droopingly brilliant too and could potentially take the crown as the worlds best gaming video processor. Although it too lacks an LCD display for easy configuration and from the recent press release it appears to need an inevitably expensive custom video switching solution to get the most out of it. Nevertheless, if you are willing to invest in this device, we expect the results to be nothing short of spectacular, particularly based on the results from PixelFX’s N64 and other HDMI mods. Again, we have always been supportive of Black Dog and Woozle, the founders of PixelFX, here at VGP and we hope to be able to offer this amazing device to our customers too.

Clearly, although they are both excellent, the OSSC Pro is still better suited to certain setups and use case scenarios than the 5x or the Morph and we hope that as soon as the component market stabilises, we will be able to deliver a fantastic product for the community.

Dexx-vd_isl – It’s still on

In the last newsletter we announced the Dexx-vd_isl, an expansion board for DE10 Nano and similar FPGA development boards which aims to turn them into a full blown retro gaming video processor.

We want to assure everyone that this project is still alive and kicking and is for now our main focus. Any software developed for this project is easy to port over to OSSC Pro too.

There was a little confusion last time regarding the unit (which was mostly my fault, sorry!). To be clear, the Dexx-vd_isl will support all the proposed operating modes that the OSSC Pro offered, that includes pure line multiplication, adaptive line multiplication and full scaler/frame buffer mode with motion adaptive deinterlacing capabilities. Our factory is currently gearing up to produce some prototype units for our evaluation before we move to a general launch.

Like everything else, Dexx-vd_isl is at the mercy of the current global component shortage but we are optimistic that, by piggy backing the FPGA development board like this, it can be delivered at a good price.

That concludes this newsletter. Unfortunately this wasn’t the newsletter we wanted to bring you this year, but we hope you all understand why we have had to make these decisions. As Dexx-vd_isl progresses we will keep you updated, as well as keep a close eye on the component market going forward. Thank you to everyone who supported the project and again, apologies for this disappointing impasse we now find ourselves at.