1-chip mods required parts

So my 1chip arrived! It was a console without a power supply, and initially I was quite frustrated when realising that a very slight increase in the AC adapter socket made it incompatible with all my NES/SNES AC adapters… except for the one I bought with my french NES, which plugged in just fine due to being just slightly thicker (works with the usual NES/SNES consoles too, but wiggles a little). This minor difference in the AC adapter pins sure is a curious thing.

Anyway, the picture from the OSSC now looks pretty amazing! It is quite bright, so would benefit from the brightness fix I suppose – but at the moment I’m not too bothered by the brightness, just being impressed with the pixel-perfect 5x image coming out of the OSSC. The colours do have that ugly composite checkerboard patterns – but this should all go away once I replace my cheap RGB cable with a packapunch one.

But given how great the picture already looks with the OSSC, I’ve started wondering whether I actually need the RGB amp, or if I’d be fine just with the SuperCIC mod itself.

Looking at the picture that explain the advantage of the RGB bypass amp, it seems that the main advantage is getting rid of a pixel blur of the 1chip. A blur that looks way less severe than on a 2chip, but is still present.

And I can definitely see how it would improve the picture in the standard 4:3 mode, given that the amount of samples the OSSC takes would likely be capturing part of this lowpass curve between pixels.

But assuming that the 256×240 optim mode is enabled, the signal should be sampled at the centers of the PPU pixels – provided that the sampling phase has been adjusted accordingly, and because the blur is not as severe, perhaps the RGB bypass amp is just overkill if using the OSSC?

I’ve read that the RGB bypass amp should also help with the bright vertical line in the middle of the screen… and I remember this ugly vertical line from my youth when playing the SNES with just an RF cable. But I cannot see it at all from the output of the OSSC when trying it out this one-chip with SMW or any other games… it could be that the composite colour artifacts are hiding it a bit. But even when fading between black and white screens, I cannot observe any bright vertical line no matter how hard I look…

So if I intend to use the SNES with OSSC set to the 256×240 optim mode, is there actually any advantage to the RGB amp that I’ve missed?

Or am I better off just getting a SuperCIC board, and a decent (PAL) sync-on-luma RGB cable?

Careful! If you attach an original PAL region SNES PSU to a Japanese or American console you will fry it, since these PSUs output AC rather than DC.

Yes, I’ve read about the Famicom and SFC not being compatible due to expecting DC. But it is news to me that an american SNES would be problematic too. Are you sure about this? It surprises me, because to my knowledge PAL NES power supplies and PAL SNES power supplies have been interchangeable between my PAL NES and PAL SNES units, and have also worked fine on NTSC NES consoles.

But looking closer,the french adapter (with the slightly different form factor which does fit the 1chip console) does have slightly different ratings:
MODEL NO NES-002ED
INPUT AC 220V 50Hz 17W
OUTPUT AC 9V 1.3A

Whereas my other NES adapters (that I have been using for loads of years with both NTSC and PAL NES consoles, and with my 2chip SNES console) says:
AC ADAPTER: NES-PAL-002
INPUT: AC 220V-230V/50Hz
OUTPUT: 9.8V 1.3A

And finally, an authentic US NES power supply I own (which I’ve never actually plugged in to anything) says:
MODEL NO : NES-002
INPUT AC 120V 60Hz 17W
OUTPUT AC 9V 1.3A

…so assuming there’s no rounding error in the printed specs, I guess the french NES power supply outputs a slightly lower voltage than the standard?

I also found a photo of an official UK SNES power supply. Interestingly, the console-side-plug has the same blue colour that the french power supply with the alternate form factor also has, but is rated at 9V output like my other power supplies:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Official-NES-SNES-Super-Nintendo-Console-UK-Mains-AC-Power-Supply-PSU/202112457157?hash=item2f0ed759c5:g:Gg0AAOSwxixaH–1

I am considering getting an RGB amp just for completion. But I am wondering whether I will actually gain anything from it, and it doesn’t look like a trivial mod. The cheap RGB cable makes my assessment somewhat limited, but I’m not so keen on ordering a proper packapunch cable for PAL, if it is not at all usable if the RGB amp mod is done. Is there any way to adapt the RGB amp to a cable wired for PAL?

Anyway, the 1chip SuperCIC parts still seems to be out-of-stock. Any idea on when they will be available again?

Cheers,
Michel