Bought the HDD, can't pass up a gem like this. I physically do not have the time to download 60k games one by one and 2TB space itself is worth it. Thanks for the review!
I was interested in this device until I saw the PS2 performance. I'm over here running PS3 games on my PC and my OneXPlayer perfectly and to see PS2 performance like this saddens me. But then you showed GameCube performance, and I loved that device, even had the Gameboy Advance attachment, and I too didn't get to play it much back then. To be able to play it all over again, and some games I haven't, is a must buy in my book. The fact that it's about 1/8th the size of a GameCube makes it even better. Thanks for the video, Russ!
The PS2 needs single thread performance. Preferably, with a score above 2000. That Intel Celeron has around 1170 which is abysmal for PCSX2. A slightly larger system to fit a modern Ryzen 5 CPU would easily fix the problem. Hell, it would offer decent PS3 - RPCS3 performance too.
@@Manic_Panic is there anything that plays PS2 better than this? And is this the absolute best retro console? I'm wanting to play everything older especially SNES, PS1, Gamecube and N64 mainly. Thanks!
@@jimsolmer1292 You should build your own custom PC with a mini PC tower to turn it into a hybrid console. Like I said, a Ryzen 5000 series CPU (Ryzen 5600 is enough). Add 2 8GB RAM sticks and pair it with a mini GTX 1660TI. Finally, an SSD on top of it and you will have an emulation beast capable of even running 360, Switch and PS3 emulation. It won't be as tiny as the PC shown in this video but it will performs 100 times better.
I got a LarkBox (1st edition) last year, and it plays everything up to PS1 + some N64 games. I recently did a Batocera build onto an external SSD and it works great.
Started watching you about 6 months ago and love the content, one of the reasons I brought my first retro handheld 2 months ago which is the Evercade and I would love to hear your opinion on the system as I’ve personally been loving it and with it having officially licensed games on it, using old school style cartridges makes it so unique to me.
I started started watching this video ASAP. I’m so excited to see something of this caliber. I just couldn’t wait to write a comment. Thank you so much, Russ!
@@RetroGameCorps Russ, I’d like to make the leap and buy this from Amazon, but I’m hesitant because it doesn’t show that awesome cassette looking for external drive. Are you positive the Amazon version had that drive included just as the AliExpress version does? If I make the purchase, I’ll use your affiliate links without a doubt to help the channel. Thank you sir!
@@mvanalst2003 hi, so the Amazon link is fulfilled by the same company that packages everything together, so it should be the same. They’re the ones who gave me that link 😎
@@RetroGameCorps I cannot hardly believe how fast you replied to my question! Man, you’re really the best. This is why I am a loyal fan of the channel and watch/support however and whenever I can. Thank you so much!
@@RetroGameCorps I took a look at the seller’s profile and it appears they offer a 8gb ram mini PC with the same setup. Is there any reason to believe the extra ram in the “better” unit would perform significantly better? Perhaps be able to play more of those PS2 games that wouldn’t work well on this reviewed unit?
F-ZERO GX is actually one of the most intensive GC games. I remember it only running at full speed on Vulkan on a rig that could run GC games at full speed mostly
Geez, my heart sunk a bit when I saw this notification because I was planning to start the Batocera flash drive process soon after i got all my games in order and when my 8bitdo controller comes in the mail lol
For sure, there’s a breakdown near the end of the video. There's a cost associated with the convenience of having all the games at your fingertips, and you can definitely do it for cheaper if you have the time and inclination. For everyone else, there's this thing :)
Well it doesn’t take a genius to do a quick amazon check on the pc being used. The 2tb drive piqued my interest and will save a ton of time in my new build.
@@RetroGameCorpsOutstanding video! I am going to buy just the cool HD because I don't have the time or patience to figure out getting games. Can you do a future vid for us subbies of your choice of the cheapest Windows mini PC w/ specs we can actually run All games on HD?
At worst, this is less than 50% more expensive than the Larkbox Pro. Not 200% more. This is because it includes the controllers and the external hard drive with all that amazing content.
Did I need to spend $100+ on a 2TB hdd? No. But I was planning to use it for emulation purposes anyway, so this video came at the perfect time. Thanks for making me spend money on stuff I don't need. I hope you're happy with yourself. Lol. Love the content! Also, you're the reason I have a rg351v.
I've bought that same game hard drive a few days ago! What a synchronism! I already have a gamer mini PC that has a Ryzen 5 processor and 32GB of RAM! Thanks for this GREAT video, and the best video intro ever! RETRO GAME CORPS Forever!
@@IcoKirov Sure. If it can boot from SD cards as well, it's the same procedure to create a bootable USB drive or SD card, so the same RGC video applies.
I have to agree that the most valuable part of this pack is the external HDD. Sadly the J4123 is pretty weak, on par with 9th gen intel i3 APU graphics wise but much weaker CPU speed and if you're willing to make some compromises you can buy old office PCs with that kind of power dirt cheap. Old office PCs one of the main cheap solutions for emulation and low spec gaming for a reason and these miniPCs in the cheaper range have very little to offer except size or maybe power consumption when competing against them.
Yep I love the old office PC I got for $100 for my son -- thew in a couple hundred dollars' worth of RAM, SSD, and GPU, and it can play 1080p Wii U no problem.
Bought the whole set up, this week for less that £300..HDrive £84/Chuwi £166/bag £3:16/controller £24 & finally USB hub £2:50. I’ve bought it because i work away and stay in hotels, so it a small but powerful game setup
@@MichaelReineke that’s the pacing and flow of my videos. I show off what the thing is, then what it can do, and then talk about its pros and cons. It’s not intentional, but I can see your perspective. I do mention that it’s expensive in the beginning, and did consider doing a segment about its cost and value at the beginning too, but I wanted to shave down the video to under 30 mins.
@@MichaelReineke Both ain‘t scammers! This was a well made and detailed review with all products Pro‘s and Con‘s in it. No one is selling a product here, so how can you call this scam? I get your point about this product being overpriced and i agree here with you, but this is definitely not a scam video!
I have the same computer, with a 1tb SSD and a 4tb USB external drive added. I use it mostly as a Plex server and it works great, at least up to 1080p.
What’s funny is I’m watching him talk about the resolution of OutRun 2006 and he says something like now let’s try at 500xp and then perfectly timed TH-cam cut to a Hyundai commercial…I was like damn that does look great 🤣
The best deal if you don't have the time to set up your own hard drive is to buy the hard drive separately from the mini-PC. The hard drive itself will be easy to clone to as many 2TB hard drives as you like. The loaded hard drive is actually a decent deal while the combo is drastically over-priced.
Thank you for this comment. I have been looking into this a lot lately. I have a pretty solid pc already. Just can't decide which loaded drive to go with. I'm finding prices around 500 too which is higher than I expected. Any suggestions?
I installed Batocera on a ACEPC with the same CPU, 8GB DDR4 RAM and a 256GB m.2. So I added a 256GB SSD to install Botcera on but sadly I'm having issues. Can't copy games to the Share, pre-installed games won't boot. Not sure what I did wrong so I guess I'll redo it all. I'm a 23 year IT Admin and this seems a pain in the arse!!! All this so I can have a cool small portable retro gaming unit. Wish me luck!
Great video Looking FWD to seeing you give the Nvidia shield tv some love. Would also like to see light gun games with a actual light guns via emulation, especially android if it is possible.
Do not get why the thumbs down on this...love this content and your dedication to these reviews.Thanks for all you do!! About how much space is left on the 2tb HDD ? I would assume they only put the lower end games on the newer consoles
I am very intrigued by the idea of utilizing the hard drive alone with another PC. In fact, I am curious if it would be possible to use it in conjunction with the Xbox Series X or S. I would welcome any feedback that others may have to offer. Thanks so much for the time and effort you put into your reviews, it has opened an entirely new world of interaction for my children and I. Have a wonderful day.
I believe all the xbox consoles don't allow booting a separate Linux OS from USB. In fact MS intentionally locked the hardware so you can't even run Windows on it for the general public. Hackers of course is another different matter.
The hard drive is great, and the enclosure is awesome. I added a link to just the enclosure to the video description, since people were asking about it :)
i wouldnt reccomend the series s or x cuz you have to pay for developer mode but the steam deck can emulate more then this and its cheaper and portable
This actually looks like a real good option for most people who want a plug-and-play emulation machine right out of the box. But around halfway through the video, I realized that at a price tag of $400, you could invest another $200 to build a higher-end PC that could emulate any console up to the ps3 with 0 issues. To put it blatantly, wouldn't using a $600-$800 PC be a more viable option overall? I'm not knocking the idea of this console at all, but the fact that most ps2 games have issues running is kind of a downside. Overall, I think if you want to emulate ANY console released pre-2010, you'd be better off building a higher-end PC yourself. Reply with any thoughts, I'm interested in seeing what people think of this.
Form factor, I've a decent pc. But i also bought a i5 8500t mini pc and stuck it in a bar top arcade.(£200)People just don't want a big box in the lounge. Ps3 is hit and miss on mine, despite having a ryzen 7 5800x and a 1070. Though most is perfect tbh. But on the whole I'm happy with my mini pc.Took a age to set up with a front end, and not every ps2 game works, but im happy with it. Certainly better for emulation than my nvidia shield. Though that's 5 years old and has been great
The purpose would likely be to make it more portable. You can take it to a friend's house or if your parents are separated then you can bring it with you between houses. I just use a gaming laptop though they are pretty expensive. But I could totally see my Dad getting this for me instead of a laptop if I was swapping houses back in elementary school.
Oh definitely, and there are higher end Super Console X options out there, too. Some of the mini PCs that are coming out in this space are pretty compelling, this is just at the very low end of the spectrum. For $600 you can build something much better. I took an old office PC that I got on craigslist for $100, spent about $250 on a new SSD, RAM, and video card and now it's my son's primary PC -- he can play Minecraft and emulate up to Wii U at 1080p no problem! This box is more for people who want a small form factor (like Westley said, a bartop arcade is a great idea) or want something plug-and-play. For the rest of us, there is some real savings to be had if you're willing to experiment and tinker :)
@@RetroGameCorps @Retro Game Corps Thanks for the reply! I completely agree with all of you on the form factor part. I hadn't originally considered that a big part of the luxury with this device is based on the form factor. I could totally see myself throwing this into a backpack, and going to a friends house with it. Though, I did find that this exact device can be found on amazon for only $200 under the name "CHUWI LarkBox Pro". This happens often with these emulation devices made in china. But with such a significant price difference, I think that's the more cost effective solution if someone plans on buying this device.
Recently got a uses sff with an i3 4130. It's way bigger, ridiculously cheaper, didn't have time recently to finish everything I wanted, but it seems comparable, a bit slower in some things, bit faster with others. But oh man, it's actually a lot of work, that hdd is really a treasure trove. Even if you get it out of the enclosure and put it into an sff, the sheer amount of work will probably overwhelm anyone who doesn't really enjoy diying things like this. Gonna try putting in a GT 730 DDR3 when I get time and see how the performance changes.
@@wolffactor56 I've tried PS2, but it's a really mixed bag. I can even upscale dmc, ffx as well, while God of War for example is a complete stuttery mess. I didn't notice much of a difference with opengl and software renderer either, but frameskip breaks the graphics completely. You'd probably have way better luck with rx550 than I had. Gamecube is a mixed bag for me, some games work great, some don't but I didn't have much time to really try and make them work. Xenoblade chronicles is the only wii game I've tried and that one runs fine. But that igpu really does have compatibility issues with some emulators.
@@acejon2162 true I been getting that issue with my i5-7500T with GTX 1070. Quad core but the base clock sucks and stutters horribly with Wii-u games even though it has a GTX 1070 8gb Mobile gpu inside :(
Hi - great channel and vid. Based on your review I took the plunge and have just received mine from Ali Express. I appreciate the way you explain quite slowly at the start about the booting process. The one thing you don't touch on is how you are bringing up the settings to chose 1x/2x resolution etc. I can't seem to do it, yet you manage it so effortlessly. Is there any chance that you might do a second video, expanding on the shortcuts you are are using and touching on the simple things like configuring a controller? You explain things very well. Or if any of the community has any advice on where to find such information i'd appreciate a steer, as I'm quite new to this. Thanks
Interesting device. I recently bought an old Dell microtower for about 30USD and converted it into a batocera box using parts from old pcs that I had laying around and works surprisingly well. Definitely not as tiny as that cube but it's still really small, about the size of a Nintendo Wii.
Thinking about to buy this one, because I would love to have the Saturn and Dreamcast games. But also because it plays Playstation 1, N64, and even PSP, Gamecube, Playstation 2 and Wii seemingly ok until well.
Now counting down to payday because I have just got the system ready for this harddrive, thanks for this detailed video and the links, you just won yourself a subscriber 👌🏾👍🏾👊🏾
What I would like is a mini PC like that I can stream to my hacked Vita through moonlight. That way I can play anything on my Vita anywhere as long as I have an outlet for the mini PC.
Have you seen the Retroflag NES-style HDD/SSD enclosures? It's pretty cool to have something like running off of a hard drive that looks like an actual NES game.
French games ??? J'ai jamais vu ça... I've never seen that, but then again, maybe French speaking people are watching you.... And I'm not the only one.... Awesome video packed with info and experience.
with this product I wonder if UEFI is unlocked to increase a bit more VRAM, hope that maybe that change can make PS2 games hard to emulate get to at least 30 fps. As always, nice review
VRAM size for iGPUs can be allocated dynamically by the OS so no issue there. The low end Celeron in this miniPC is not powerful enough to handle PS2 games, nothing to do with VRAM size.
Probably a silly request. But is it dumb to ask to see you plug that hard drive into your higher-end computer and see how some of the harder to run systems work for you? I thought I saw you do a breakdown of your personal computer and it seemed pretty beefy. I'm really thinking of getting the hard drive, but am torn because we actually could use a new home computer as well, our daily use computer is over 5years old and starting to show it's age. I don't do much more than web browsing, google sheets and docs, and a lot of payroll for work. Occasionally I use PHOTOPEA's web based app for drawing. I really don't do a lot of PC gaming since I have my PS3, PS4 and PS5 all in the same room when I want them. I also have an RG351v when I'm on the go! Thank you for your time and most of all thank you for everything you do on this channel, between you and Wicked Gamer (I forgot to mention I have a Pandora Games 3D because of him!) y'all have really made my retro gaming experience that much more fruitful! Thanks!
Hi, so I just popped it into my PC and everything runs like a dream -- other than the French language issue for many games. PS2 is perfect, not a hint of frame dips.
@@RetroGameCorps my goodness that was an unexpectedly fast response. Not to mention I don't usually get responses from other content creators. I think I love you 😅🤣 🥰 Keep up the awesome work.
Hi great review .So I guess if I get the Hdd plug into my Dell xps 13 intel i7 8 gb should be enough to run up to ps2 , thou I guess the standard graphics card in my lapto p is poor
There are ton's of i5/i7 used mini desktop on ebay that exceeds the spec of this model for less than 100 bucks. Just buy the harddrive with Batocera, buy a couple controllers, and call it a day. If you do not want to futs aroud with building a complete and ready made emulation system, the hard drive is a good option (currently 50 bucks on Aliexpress).
Retro Game Corps: Is there tape like in a regular cassette in that HDD Enclosure? I like the fact that it has a wired controller, so you don't have to go through batteries like crazy.
Interesting concept, but I am surprised how expensive it is given the base PC. I actually got it cheaper with the original IndieGoGo campaign, but I use it for my Plex server and it's been working great. It's an "ok" retro game device, but I feel like there's much better options. Hell, your more recent videos on the Xbox Series S prove that.
If you don't want to spend $400, the pc is just a larkbox which can be bought for $130 right now. Emulators can be downloaded for free. "Batocera" looks to just be a customized linux distro with thousands of "pirated" games preinstalled. The hard drive probably has linux on it because it doesn't cost anything and because depending on the setup it's usually less of a resource hog than windows. You can download your preferred linux distro for free onto the main drive if you don't care for windows or you already have it on another computer, saving the cost of the hard drive. Then you can just install the games you actually intend to play. 128 gigs sounds small but can go pretty far with old games, especially if you're mostly playing ps1/n64 and earlier. Once you get into ps2/gamecube era, games can be several gigabytes in size, but still much smaller than the games that are out today. As for the performance issues. I haven't tried doing this on a larkbox yet, but it's possible that some of the performance issues can be resolved by messing with the system's graphics settings, disabling vsync, and/or disabling the compositor and other unnecessary things.
Wow russ, worth the wait.. As for me great video in depth of what this thing can do but u know what russ?? Just get the hard drive n use super console x king.. Dream come true..
Hi, unfortunately the hard drive won't work with the King -- the King uses EmuELEC and is an Android box, while the hard drive uses Batocera and need to connect to a PC.
You'll need to download a version of the Batocera OS that supports the chipset used in your system and then copy the whole rom directory to a new HDD and use that in your system. The 2TB HDD of this product only supports x86 based architecture and you can connect it to any x86 miniPC, notebook, desktop etc.
Ah, so this is the Rubik's cube you were telling me about. The chuwi. Mine doesn't have the chuwi branding, it's larger than this and has 8gb of ram, but quite a bit more expensive. I believe it runs between 550-600 US. Mine shipped with the same controller in black, I also love the controller although it's not perfect. The l2 r2 buttons are a bit small and in street fighter I noticed I couldn't do special moves perfectly with the dpad. My unit will run most PS2 (some at 2x) at full speed, most GameCube at 2x full speed. However the chuwi is admirable it can run Wii and GameCube with 2gb less of ram. Did you try turning on "speed hacks" in your GameCube emulator settings? And trying games at 2x resolution? My system runs GameCube at the same speed whether in native or 2x res.
I'm impressed. Which is bad for me, because I might have to actually buy it. If you now tell me that you get to play the Game & Watch version of "Super Mario Bros." on this, I'd be very, VERY sad. And order right away. :P
@@MichaelReineke as I explain near the end of the video, it’s not the device that carries the price, but the whole package, namely 2TB of plug-and-play games at your fingertips. It can definitely be done for cheaper - $160 for the box alone, and then a hard new hard drive for $60. For those who don’t want to spend a bunch of time downloading and configuring games, the value comes from that loaded hard drive, which is also sold on its own for $110. It’s really about what people are willing to pay for, or simply do themselves. It sounds like you’re like me; I’d like to do it myself and use that money elsewhere - but it’s also part of the fun for me!
Hey man, I have a question. Trying to get familiar with the retro game world but there are so many unknown words to me: retroarch, emuelec, batocera, opendingux, etc.. Could you do a video for noobs explaining what all these things do and perhaps also a bit of background so people like me get a clearer picture how everything plays together inside a system?
Retroarch takes a bit of work since its customization options are almost endless. But it works very well. Personally, I don't like this one too much because of the lack of box art. I have box art, but not for every game. Batocera is a very easy experience as he showed in one of his latest videos. You basically just add your games to the proper folder and boot it up. Every game has box art. It looks incredible. Games run at like 100%. I use Emuelec on my handheld devices and it runs basically the same way as Batocera, but again, Batocera is more easier experience. Not sure about OpenDingux. I think I may have that one on my PocketGo. It works, but is a little ugly. Can run older PC games just fine like Quake, Quake 2, Rise of the Triad, Commander Keen, etc. I'm not as comprehensive as Russ could be but I hope this helps somewhat. Happy Gaming.
@@RetroGameCorps Do you have any idea if we subbies could get better performance with the CHUWI HeroBox Pro Windows 10 Mini PC,? I want to buy the 2tb HD on Aliexpress and buy the CHUWI HeroBox Pro on Amazon. Saving money $107 for 2TB HD and $199 for CHUWI HeroBox Pro.
Talking about the other devices in 4:06 , I believe that in terms of performance (N64, NGC...) it would be something like XminiPC > ShieldTV >>> Xking ? Right? But that extra power XminiPC has makes games playable that are not on ShieldTV ? Curiosity If I convert the prices that would pay here in Brasil (importing) to dollas, would be $448 XminiPC, $250/$330 ShieldTV/pro, $176 Xking BTW, love the quality of videos (content and choices!)
I loooove the portability of this thing, but there is no way this 2TB hard drive has 60k games on it... unless it's plagued with duplicates in every language/regions+alpha/beta versions (at least not being merged as one game title), betas, prototypes, hacks, etc...I have a Launchbox collection, no dupes/junk like that, although it has many 8bit and 16bit system hacks (in separate categories), but still, it has mostly English (including translated to English across many systems) and final version ROMs, unless it's a non-English native system, (EX: NEC PC-FX or Sharp X68000 for example), or at least divided into its own sections on a few systems, nicely organized and my collection has just over 61k games (but also includes PS3, MSDOS, Wii-U, and even newer console stuff (nothing to see here..move along); this stuff is obviously geared toward playing on dedicated PC for the later stuff)...all of this does obviously demand more space, but still....) it all requires 14.7TB...needs an external 16TB hard drive; so obviously not as "user friendly". *I noticed during the video it has over 12k Spectrum console games and over 3500 Amstrad games, and 5,600 Atari 800 games (that rarely play properly in emulation; I wonder how they overcame that?)....so that explained some of the high counts, I guess mine just has more modern platforms...although my LB collection includes over 5,500 spectrum games (amazing how many games were on that system) and over 1800 PS2, not just 200, and over DOUBLE the PSP games (not mini either like this collection, but disc games. I have 304 psp-minis in another category) , etc... Btw, you should play this video at 0.25 speed during the system scroll through to hear what he sounds like when drunk...LOL
Also, all of the many 1-4 game platforms (arcade co.) would drive me nuts...have 1 arcade category and use playlists after that, including an ALL GAMES one...I see that at least you can uncheck many extra categories in settings at least, but does Prince of Persia, 1 game really need its own category wheel? LOL (and it has 1 windows game?)...it's a very messy way to organize things. 2 Wii games only? Mine has 1,264...NEC SuperGrafx did not have 298 games, it had only 5 (and two more I found released on TG16, optimized on Supergrafx when played with it, set up in that category...)...so I wonder what is listed/broken in there to show 298? I guess that grossly incomplete sets, tiny count systems/platforms are fine for many people. I guess I'm OCD about this stuff...
How about using the "HDD external enclosure" on a low budget Wal Mart gaming laptop?! Like an acer Ryzen 5, or an HP I5 gaming laptop with Nvidia 1650gt card..? Would this be a decent travel load-out...?
@@RetroGameCorps yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and have you make a video on that 😁. Also can this mini PC be overclocked to improve performance? I think ETAPrime has reviewed this one. Thanks for everything you do!
You could install Steam on Batocera, then you would have the whole hard drive available. I expect that it would be even better than on Windows in some cases because Batocera has lower operating-system overhead. Batocera is a Linux distribution, and Steam games run well on Linux. I think that, in that case, it would be better to install a Linux distribution on the SSD instead of Windows, and have Steam games installed on the external drive along Batocera and its games (on the same partition).
If you can find that storage bag then you will find the whole thing for much cheaper and also you would not need 2tb unless you plan of playing all these systems
the amount of quality in this video is insane, i love the fact that you show so many different games, and not only the most famous ones. good job man
thank you so much, for the link to the 2TB HDD on ali. i ordered immadiately, and its on sale now (-52%). Cant wait to play with that treasure.
Stumbled on your channel a few days ago. I’m really enjoying it. Detailed reviews. Thanks bro!
Bought the HDD, can't pass up a gem like this. I physically do not have the time to download 60k games one by one and 2TB space itself is worth it. Thanks for the review!
How did you get it to boot up batocera? I still cant get it.
@@thejaimes412 in the bios settings change the boot drive so that it views that drive as the boot drive
I was interested in this device until I saw the PS2 performance. I'm over here running PS3 games on my PC and my OneXPlayer perfectly and to see PS2 performance like this saddens me. But then you showed GameCube performance, and I loved that device, even had the Gameboy Advance attachment, and I too didn't get to play it much back then. To be able to play it all over again, and some games I haven't, is a must buy in my book. The fact that it's about 1/8th the size of a GameCube makes it even better. Thanks for the video, Russ!
I had the same emotions as you -- disappointed in PS2, then pleasantly surprised by GameCube. It's a nice little gaming cube!
The PS2 needs single thread performance. Preferably, with a score above 2000. That Intel Celeron has around 1170 which is abysmal for PCSX2. A slightly larger system to fit a modern Ryzen 5 CPU would easily fix the problem. Hell, it would offer decent PS3 - RPCS3 performance too.
@@Manic_Panic is there anything that plays PS2 better than this? And is this the absolute best retro console? I'm wanting to play everything older especially SNES, PS1, Gamecube and N64 mainly. Thanks!
@@jimsolmer1292 You should build your own custom PC with a mini PC tower to turn it into a hybrid console. Like I said, a Ryzen 5000 series CPU (Ryzen 5600 is enough). Add 2 8GB RAM sticks and pair it with a mini GTX 1660TI. Finally, an SSD on top of it and you will have an emulation beast capable of even running 360, Switch and PS3 emulation. It won't be as tiny as the PC shown in this video but it will performs 100 times better.
@@Manic_Panic is it hard to build that? I've never done anything like that. I'm trying to find some DIY videos.
I got a LarkBox (1st edition) last year, and it plays everything up to PS1 + some N64 games. I recently did a Batocera build onto
an external SSD and it works great.
Started watching you about 6 months ago and love the content, one of the reasons I brought my first retro handheld 2 months ago which is the Evercade and I would love to hear your opinion on the system as I’ve personally been loving it and with it having officially licensed games on it, using old school style cartridges makes it so unique to me.
Spooling up compact cassette with pencil is just a urban legend. Every time tape had to be spooled back in, I had to do it with my index finger :)
True, I always felt like a pencil was too thin to get a good spin on the tape.
@@RetroGameCorps precisely! ✌️
@@RetroGameCorps The trick was tilting the pen at an angle to get a grip. Can confirm from personal experience. 🥸
I did the Batocera drive thing from your other video and it's basically my favorite thing ever. Thank you!
I was thinking on what to buy for christmas to my aunt, thanks man, you are awesome. 🙌🙌🙌
I started started watching this video ASAP. I’m so excited to see something of this caliber. I just couldn’t wait to write a comment. Thank you so much, Russ!
Hope it met your expectations :)
@@RetroGameCorps Russ, I’d like to make the leap and buy this from Amazon, but I’m hesitant because it doesn’t show that awesome cassette looking for external drive. Are you positive the Amazon version had that drive included just as the AliExpress version does? If I make the purchase, I’ll use your affiliate links without a doubt to help the channel. Thank you sir!
@@mvanalst2003 hi, so the Amazon link is fulfilled by the same company that packages everything together, so it should be the same. They’re the ones who gave me that link 😎
@@RetroGameCorps I cannot hardly believe how fast you replied to my question! Man, you’re really the best. This is why I am a loyal fan of the channel and watch/support however and whenever I can. Thank you so much!
@@RetroGameCorps I took a look at the seller’s profile and it appears they offer a 8gb ram mini PC with the same setup. Is there any reason to believe the extra ram in the “better” unit would perform significantly better? Perhaps be able to play more of those PS2 games that wouldn’t work well on this reviewed unit?
F-ZERO GX is actually one of the most intensive GC games. I remember it only running at full speed on Vulkan on a rig that could run GC games at full speed mostly
5:34 - He tried so hard not to say “Yeah man, I wanna do it”
He should do that at least once per video. Some say, even twice.
It cracked me up when he skipped it 😂
@@youzernejm I figure people need a break every once in a while.
@@RetroGameCorps 😂
He faked me out. Was totally expecting “Yeah, man. I wanna do it”
Geez, my heart sunk a bit when I saw this notification because I was planning to start the Batocera flash drive process soon after i got all my games in order and when my 8bitdo controller comes in the mail lol
There's many ways to skin this cat! If you already have a PC, then the flash drive process is still the most affordable and customizable :)
This is a Chuwi Larkbox Pro with readily available software installed on it and resold at over 2x the price.
For sure, there’s a breakdown near the end of the video. There's a cost associated with the convenience of having all the games at your fingertips, and you can definitely do it for cheaper if you have the time and inclination. For everyone else, there's this thing :)
Well it doesn’t take a genius to do a quick amazon check on the pc being used. The 2tb drive piqued my interest and will save a ton of time in my new build.
@@MichaelReineke Why?
@@RetroGameCorpsOutstanding video! I am going to buy just the cool HD because I don't have the time or patience to figure out getting games.
Can you do a future vid for us subbies of your choice of the cheapest Windows mini PC w/ specs we can actually run All games on HD?
At worst, this is less than 50% more expensive than the Larkbox Pro. Not 200% more. This is because it includes the controllers and the external hard drive with all that amazing content.
Did I need to spend $100+ on a 2TB hdd? No. But I was planning to use it for emulation purposes anyway, so this video came at the perfect time. Thanks for making me spend money on stuff I don't need. I hope you're happy with yourself. Lol. Love the content! Also, you're the reason I have a rg351v.
P.S. I mainly want the 2TB hdd to use when I have the Steam Deck in my possession.
This was thoughtfully made and very informative. I'm grateful for your time and effort.
You're very welcome!
You are an excellent reviewer. A very informative and enjoyable video.
This is why I love this guy and his channel freaking awesome 😎👾🕹👍🏽
You had me at 5:30 😂
I was expecting "it" ❤️
I've bought that same game hard drive a few days ago! What a synchronism!
I already have a gamer mini PC that has a Ryzen 5 processor and 32GB of RAM!
Thanks for this GREAT video, and the best video intro ever!
RETRO GAME CORPS Forever!
Great minds think alike!
Have you already tested the hard drive? what can you say about it?
@@johnnymccloud3917 The hard drive just arrived and I tested it. It´s working fine!
Btw.: Loved that nice picture-hint about the Batocera USB flashdrive and the Steam Deck. :)
I will do it with an SD card as long as it can boot from the SD card.
@@IcoKirov Sure. If it can boot from SD cards as well, it's the same procedure to create a bootable USB drive or SD card, so the same RGC video applies.
@@fryke yeah, yeah, that's how I use it on one of my old laptops for a year or two.
I have to agree that the most valuable part of this pack is the external HDD. Sadly the J4123 is pretty weak, on par with 9th gen intel i3 APU graphics wise but much weaker CPU speed and if you're willing to make some compromises you can buy old office PCs with that kind of power dirt cheap. Old office PCs one of the main cheap solutions for emulation and low spec gaming for a reason and these miniPCs in the cheaper range have very little to offer except size or maybe power consumption when competing against them.
Yep I love the old office PC I got for $100 for my son -- thew in a couple hundred dollars' worth of RAM, SSD, and GPU, and it can play 1080p Wii U no problem.
@@RetroGameCorps so if I bought a mini pc with better rom and gpu I could grab the 2TB HD and run the PS2 games just fine?
Btw, love the channel.
@@danebabbitt7381 yep, exactly this.
@@RetroGameCorps How to add games?
That was excellent. Great video, Russ.
It's russ.. it's always 👌... 😆
Bought the whole set up, this week for less that £300..HDrive £84/Chuwi £166/bag £3:16/controller £24 & finally USB hub £2:50. I’ve bought it because i work away and stay in hotels, so it a small but powerful game setup
I'd call this video "just fine" :)
🤣
Yeah man, just watch the video
A Just Fine Console.. Not super but...Just Fine;) lol
im close to considering buying this - its tempting
The next ETA Prime :) Awesome review dude!
Thanks MashTec! It took me forever to put this together, and I tried to make it as short as possible. Hey, at least it was under 30 mins :)
@@MichaelReineke that’s the pacing and flow of my videos. I show off what the thing is, then what it can do, and then talk about its pros and cons. It’s not intentional, but I can see your perspective. I do mention that it’s expensive in the beginning, and did consider doing a segment about its cost and value at the beginning too, but I wanted to shave down the video to under 30 mins.
@@MichaelReineke Both ain‘t scammers! This was a well made and detailed review with all products Pro‘s and Con‘s in it. No one is selling a product here, so how can you call this scam? I get your point about this product being overpriced and i agree here with you, but this is definitely not a scam video!
Impressive device, I may consider purchasing one
I trust Russ 100% his a top bloke who helps out his viewers all the time.
I have the same computer, with a 1tb SSD and a 4tb USB external drive added. I use it mostly as a Plex server and it works great, at least up to 1080p.
What’s funny is I’m watching him talk about the resolution of OutRun 2006 and he says something like now let’s try at 500xp and then perfectly timed TH-cam cut to a Hyundai commercial…I was like damn that does look great 🤣
The best deal if you don't have the time to set up your own hard drive is to buy the hard drive separately from the mini-PC. The hard drive itself will be easy to clone to as many 2TB hard drives as you like. The loaded hard drive is actually a decent deal while the combo is drastically over-priced.
Thank you for this comment. I have been looking into this a lot lately. I have a pretty solid pc already. Just can't decide which loaded drive to go with. I'm finding prices around 500 too which is higher than I expected. Any suggestions?
They should have made the hard drive insertable like a real cassette (sideways) to complete the illusion. Awesome little box though and great video.
Awesome i will be getting this someday 👍💯
I installed Batocera on a ACEPC with the same CPU, 8GB DDR4 RAM and a 256GB m.2. So I added a 256GB SSD to install Botcera on but sadly I'm having issues. Can't copy games to the Share, pre-installed games won't boot. Not sure what I did wrong so I guess I'll redo it all. I'm a 23 year IT Admin and this seems a pain in the arse!!! All this so I can have a cool small portable retro gaming unit. Wish me luck!
Top vid as this Explains how to get this System up and running. Super helpful.
Love the form factor of this one! Great vid my man 💪 "Cubic butt ton" 🤣
Glad you liked it! It was a long time coming, several weeks of work :)
Great video
Looking FWD to seeing you give the Nvidia shield tv some love. Would also like to see light gun games with a actual light guns via emulation, especially android if it is possible.
I'm surprised the Celeron CPU can run upscaled PSP games so well.
And they even sell the 2TB HDD full of games by itself!
Do not get why the thumbs down on this...love this content and your dedication to these reviews.Thanks for all you do!! About how much space is left on the 2tb HDD ? I would assume they only put the lower end games on the newer consoles
I dont get it on alot of videos,I think there are some people that do it no matter what,just to be shitty,just to troll,its pathetic.
21:31 look how fast those birds are flying
For a better controller get a gamesir t4w for $25. Amazing wired controller with analog triggers
I am very intrigued by the idea of utilizing the hard drive alone with another PC. In fact, I am curious if it would be possible to use it in conjunction with the Xbox Series X or S. I would welcome any feedback that others may have to offer. Thanks so much for the time and effort you put into your reviews, it has opened an entirely new world of interaction for my children and I. Have a wonderful day.
Hi Max, yeah it’ll work fine on any other PC by following this same boot process, but wouldn’t work in an Xbox.
I believe all the xbox consoles don't allow booting a separate Linux OS from USB. In fact MS intentionally locked the hardware so you can't even run Windows on it for the general public. Hackers of course is another different matter.
I want one of those cassette hard drives now
The hard drive is great, and the enclosure is awesome. I added a link to just the enclosure to the video description, since people were asking about it :)
Mini Pc looks cool and i love Tekken Games :)
I loved your videos. they're crispy clear. very delighting to watch. Good job! youre doing really great. Good reviews.
It's cool, but for the price I'd just get a steam deck or an Xbox series S or X for its emulation power
Yep, that’s one of my negatives during the summary. This is literally the price of a modern console.
i wouldnt reccomend the series s or x cuz you have to pay for developer mode but the steam deck can emulate more then this and its cheaper and portable
This actually looks like a real good option for most people who want a plug-and-play emulation machine right out of the box. But around halfway through the video, I realized that at a price tag of $400, you could invest another $200 to build a higher-end PC that could emulate any console up to the ps3 with 0 issues. To put it blatantly, wouldn't using a $600-$800 PC be a more viable option overall? I'm not knocking the idea of this console at all, but the fact that most ps2 games have issues running is kind of a downside. Overall, I think if you want to emulate ANY console released pre-2010, you'd be better off building a higher-end PC yourself. Reply with any thoughts, I'm interested in seeing what people think of this.
Form factor, I've a decent pc. But i also bought a i5 8500t mini pc and stuck it in a bar top arcade.(£200)People just don't want a big box in the lounge. Ps3 is hit and miss on mine, despite having a ryzen 7 5800x and a 1070. Though most is perfect tbh. But on the whole I'm happy with my mini pc.Took a age to set up with a front end, and not every ps2 game works, but im happy with it. Certainly better for emulation than my nvidia shield. Though that's 5 years old and has been great
The purpose would likely be to make it more portable. You can take it to a friend's house or if your parents are separated then you can bring it with you between houses.
I just use a gaming laptop though they are pretty expensive. But I could totally see my Dad getting this for me instead of a laptop if I was swapping houses back in elementary school.
Oh definitely, and there are higher end Super Console X options out there, too. Some of the mini PCs that are coming out in this space are pretty compelling, this is just at the very low end of the spectrum. For $600 you can build something much better. I took an old office PC that I got on craigslist for $100, spent about $250 on a new SSD, RAM, and video card and now it's my son's primary PC -- he can play Minecraft and emulate up to Wii U at 1080p no problem! This box is more for people who want a small form factor (like Westley said, a bartop arcade is a great idea) or want something plug-and-play. For the rest of us, there is some real savings to be had if you're willing to experiment and tinker :)
@@RetroGameCorps @Retro Game Corps Thanks for the reply! I completely agree with all of you on the form factor part. I hadn't originally considered that a big part of the luxury with this device is based on the form factor. I could totally see myself throwing this into a backpack, and going to a friends house with it. Though, I did find that this exact device can be found on amazon for only $200 under the name "CHUWI LarkBox Pro". This happens often with these emulation devices made in china. But with such a significant price difference, I think that's the more cost effective solution if someone plans on buying this device.
Just get the 2TB HDD and connect to your own PC, mich cheaper this way.
400 bucks for a miniscule PC with a 2 TB HDD, that plays GameCube and PS2 and It's also Plug and Play?
That's a really good deal
i got 2 of that mini pc from amazon for 149€ each.
@@paparansen for real, do you have a link
@@travisfield9769 it is a larkbox pro
I want those ps2 and gamecube games
Recently got a uses sff with an i3 4130. It's way bigger, ridiculously cheaper, didn't have time recently to finish everything I wanted, but it seems comparable, a bit slower in some things, bit faster with others. But oh man, it's actually a lot of work, that hdd is really a treasure trove. Even if you get it out of the enclosure and put it into an sff, the sheer amount of work will probably overwhelm anyone who doesn't really enjoy diying things like this. Gonna try putting in a GT 730 DDR3 when I get time and see how the performance changes.
I did this a year ago with same cpu, rx 550 2GB and 8gb of ram. Ran most games just fine, never tried ps2 on it. GameCube ran awesome.
@@wolffactor56 I've tried PS2, but it's a really mixed bag. I can even upscale dmc, ffx as well, while God of War for example is a complete stuttery mess. I didn't notice much of a difference with opengl and software renderer either, but frameskip breaks the graphics completely. You'd probably have way better luck with rx550 than I had. Gamecube is a mixed bag for me, some games work great, some don't but I didn't have much time to really try and make them work. Xenoblade chronicles is the only wii game I've tried and that one runs fine. But that igpu really does have compatibility issues with some emulators.
@@youzernejm yeah I was gonna use only the igpu initially. It was a stuttering mess, definitely invest in a cheap gpu if you can.
For emulation, it taxes more on the CPU side than GPU, so you need at least a decent CPU to go with whatever GPU you choose.
@@acejon2162 true I been getting that issue with my i5-7500T with GTX 1070. Quad core but the base clock sucks and stutters horribly with Wii-u games even though it has a GTX 1070 8gb Mobile gpu inside :(
Hi - great channel and vid. Based on your review I took the plunge and have just received mine from Ali Express. I appreciate the way you explain quite slowly at the start about the booting process. The one thing you don't touch on is how you are bringing up the settings to chose 1x/2x resolution etc. I can't seem to do it, yet you manage it so effortlessly. Is there any chance that you might do a second video, expanding on the shortcuts you are are using and touching on the simple things like configuring a controller? You explain things very well. Or if any of the community has any advice on where to find such information i'd appreciate a steer, as I'm quite new to this. Thanks
agreed i have the exact same problem, its been very stressful
Interesting device. I recently bought an old Dell microtower for about 30USD and converted it into a batocera box using parts from old pcs that I had laying around and works surprisingly well. Definitely not as tiny as that cube but it's still really small, about the size of a Nintendo Wii.
Thinking about to buy this one, because I would love to have the Saturn and Dreamcast games. But also because it plays Playstation 1, N64, and even PSP, Gamecube, Playstation 2 and Wii seemingly ok until well.
Now counting down to payday because I have just got the system ready for this harddrive, thanks for this detailed video and the links, you just won yourself a subscriber 👌🏾👍🏾👊🏾
Hit the subscribe button right when I heard about your deployments in early 2000s. Thank you for your service!
What I would like is a mini PC like that I can stream to my hacked Vita through moonlight. That way I can play anything on my Vita anywhere as long as I have an outlet for the mini PC.
Oh, that's a good point! You'll want to use a USB ethernet adapter like I did for stable speeds, but otherwise yeah this could definitely work.
I bought the drive it’s a stellar deal and bought the new minisforum that will run everything here
Have you seen the Retroflag NES-style HDD/SSD enclosures? It's pretty cool to have something like running off of a hard drive that looks like an actual NES game.
The nespi4 is very cool!
French games ??? J'ai jamais vu ça... I've never seen that, but then again, maybe French speaking people are watching you....
And I'm not the only one.... Awesome video packed with info and experience.
I want that hard drive
I was admittedly a little surprised at the 400 dollar price tag, but knowing it's basically a PC, that is more understandable.
It's sort of crazy how many games came on that hard drive. Assuming one had the time, how long would it actually take to finish all those games?
Just ordered the 500G HDD
From where?
Gonna have to buy the hdd at some point
with this product I wonder if UEFI is unlocked to increase a bit more VRAM, hope that maybe that change can make PS2 games hard to emulate get to at least 30 fps. As always, nice review
VRAM size for iGPUs can be allocated dynamically by the OS so no issue there.
The low end Celeron in this miniPC is not powerful enough to handle PS2 games, nothing to do with VRAM size.
Great videa- The most detailed so far!!
Probably a silly request. But is it dumb to ask to see you plug that hard drive into your higher-end computer and see how some of the harder to run systems work for you? I thought I saw you do a breakdown of your personal computer and it seemed pretty beefy.
I'm really thinking of getting the hard drive, but am torn because we actually could use a new home computer as well, our daily use computer is over 5years old and starting to show it's age. I don't do much more than web browsing, google sheets and docs, and a lot of payroll for work. Occasionally I use PHOTOPEA's web based app for drawing. I really don't do a lot of PC gaming since I have my PS3, PS4 and PS5 all in the same room when I want them. I also have an RG351v when I'm on the go!
Thank you for your time and most of all thank you for everything you do on this channel, between you and Wicked Gamer (I forgot to mention I have a Pandora Games 3D because of him!) y'all have really made my retro gaming experience that much more fruitful! Thanks!
Hi, so I just popped it into my PC and everything runs like a dream -- other than the French language issue for many games. PS2 is perfect, not a hint of frame dips.
@@RetroGameCorps my goodness that was an unexpectedly fast response. Not to mention I don't usually get responses from other content creators. I think I love you 😅🤣 🥰
Keep up the awesome work.
Hi great review .So I guess if I get the Hdd plug into my Dell xps 13 intel i7 8 gb should be enough to run up to ps2 , thou I guess the standard graphics card in my lapto p is poor
This video was very well done! Thank you for this incredible breakdown! I am definitely getting the HDD!
I'd like to see internals of this device, it is really intresting to see how they fit everything on it
Not quite fast enough. I do however like the form factor. Cool video. Thanks.
There are ton's of i5/i7 used mini desktop on ebay that exceeds the spec of this model for less than 100 bucks. Just buy the harddrive with Batocera, buy a couple controllers, and call it a day. If you do not want to futs aroud with building a complete and ready made emulation system, the hard drive is a good option (currently 50 bucks on Aliexpress).
Retro Game Corps: Is there tape like in a regular cassette in that HDD Enclosure? I like the fact that it has a wired controller, so you don't have to go through batteries like crazy.
You missed an opportunity to drop a: "yeah man, I wanna do it."
Will be interesting to see how this performance compares to a docked Odin which is cheaper. 🤔
odin is way slower than this... btw you can buy this mini pc on amazon,
i got 2 of them for 149€ each.
@@paparansen Weird, Taki had the Odin playing PS2 games well, which this doesn't seem to be able to do. Nice catch with the Mini PCs though! :)
@@RGGeek taki is a chitchatmoron like eta ;-)
@@paparansen what kind of mini PC to be exact?
@@TheVegPie it is a larkbox pro
Not too fussed about the PC, but I want that hard drive enclosure.
Link in video description.
I would like to purchase just that hard drive.
It’s linked in the video description ☺️
Interesting concept, but I am surprised how expensive it is given the base PC. I actually got it cheaper with the original IndieGoGo campaign, but I use it for my Plex server and it's been working great.
It's an "ok" retro game device, but I feel like there's much better options. Hell, your more recent videos on the Xbox Series S prove that.
Would you recommend it for using as a cheap game server?
If you don't want to spend $400, the pc is just a larkbox which can be bought for $130 right now. Emulators can be downloaded for free. "Batocera" looks to just be a customized linux distro with thousands of "pirated" games preinstalled. The hard drive probably has linux on it because it doesn't cost anything and because depending on the setup it's usually less of a resource hog than windows. You can download your preferred linux distro for free onto the main drive if you don't care for windows or you already have it on another computer, saving the cost of the hard drive. Then you can just install the games you actually intend to play. 128 gigs sounds small but can go pretty far with old games, especially if you're mostly playing ps1/n64 and earlier. Once you get into ps2/gamecube era, games can be several gigabytes in size, but still much smaller than the games that are out today.
As for the performance issues. I haven't tried doing this on a larkbox yet, but it's possible that some of the performance issues can be resolved by messing with the system's graphics settings, disabling vsync, and/or disabling the compositor and other unnecessary things.
I'll stick to my anbernic rg351v. The perfect portable console (after your tutorials running arkos) at least for me. Great vid.
Awesome review!!!
Wow russ, worth the wait.. As for me great video in depth of what this thing can do but u know what russ?? Just get the hard drive n use super console x king.. Dream come true..
Maybe u can try that russ and see the result..
Hi, unfortunately the hard drive won't work with the King -- the King uses EmuELEC and is an Android box, while the hard drive uses Batocera and need to connect to a PC.
@@RetroGameCorps dangit I forgot about that, lol.. But still can convert to something similar rite?
You'll need to download a version of the Batocera OS that supports the chipset used in your system and then copy the whole rom directory to a new HDD and use that in your system.
The 2TB HDD of this product only supports x86 based architecture and you can connect it to any x86 miniPC, notebook, desktop etc.
@@acejon2162 thanks Ace!!
This is awesome. Does it actually play normal pc games like fortnite, minecraft, roblox, and others well?
coz its Mini PC I bet this will be great for Retro PC machine, like playing 2000s FPS game, and some modern 2D game.
Excellent in-depth review. Thanks Russ 😀👍🏼
Ah, so this is the Rubik's cube you were telling me about. The chuwi. Mine doesn't have the chuwi branding, it's larger than this and has 8gb of ram, but quite a bit more expensive. I believe it runs between 550-600 US.
Mine shipped with the same controller in black, I also love the controller although it's not perfect. The l2 r2 buttons are a bit small and in street fighter I noticed I couldn't do special moves perfectly with the dpad.
My unit will run most PS2 (some at 2x) at full speed, most GameCube at 2x full speed. However the chuwi is admirable it can run Wii and GameCube with 2gb less of ram.
Did you try turning on "speed hacks" in your GameCube emulator settings? And trying games at 2x resolution? My system runs GameCube at the same speed whether in native or 2x res.
Actually people used the tape player rewind function to rewind cassette tapes
The pencil is for marking where the mounting screws go!! Rewind the cassette!! Lmfao!!
I'm impressed. Which is bad for me, because I might have to actually buy it. If you now tell me that you get to play the Game & Watch version of "Super Mario Bros." on this, I'd be very, VERY sad. And order right away. :P
Haha, I'm still on a quest to get that one running for you :) I just tested the file on this setup and sadly it still doesn't work.
@@RetroGameCorps Wow. Thanks for trying at least!
$400?! *spits out coffee*
Yeah it’s a lot. That’s why I spent so much time on this review, it’s definitely an investment that requires a lot of consideration!
@@MichaelReineke as I explain near the end of the video, it’s not the device that carries the price, but the whole package, namely 2TB of plug-and-play games at your fingertips. It can definitely be done for cheaper - $160 for the box alone, and then a hard new hard drive for $60. For those who don’t want to spend a bunch of time downloading and configuring games, the value comes from that loaded hard drive, which is also sold on its own for $110. It’s really about what people are willing to pay for, or simply do themselves. It sounds like you’re like me; I’d like to do it myself and use that money elsewhere - but it’s also part of the fun for me!
Hey man, I have a question. Trying to get familiar with the retro game world but there are so many unknown words to me: retroarch, emuelec, batocera, opendingux, etc.. Could you do a video for noobs explaining what all these things do and perhaps also a bit of background so people like me get a clearer picture how everything plays together inside a system?
Retroarch takes a bit of work since its customization options are almost endless. But it works very well. Personally, I don't like this one too much because of the lack of box art. I have box art, but not for every game.
Batocera is a very easy experience as he showed in one of his latest videos. You basically just add your games to the proper folder and boot it up. Every game has box art. It looks incredible. Games run at like 100%.
I use Emuelec on my handheld devices and it runs basically the same way as Batocera, but again, Batocera is more easier experience.
Not sure about OpenDingux. I think I may have that one on my PocketGo. It works, but is a little ugly. Can run older PC games just fine like Quake, Quake 2, Rise of the Triad, Commander Keen, etc.
I'm not as comprehensive as Russ could be but I hope this helps somewhat. Happy Gaming.
Thanks @@Cyko.. for the rundown. @Jasenkob, good idea, I'll add it to my list :)
@@RetroGameCorps Do you have any idea if we subbies could get better performance with the CHUWI HeroBox Pro Windows 10 Mini PC,?
I want to buy the 2tb HD on Aliexpress and buy the CHUWI HeroBox Pro on Amazon.
Saving money $107 for 2TB HD and $199 for CHUWI HeroBox Pro.
Talking about the other devices in 4:06 , I believe that in terms of performance (N64, NGC...) it would be something like
XminiPC > ShieldTV >>> Xking ? Right?
But that extra power XminiPC has makes games playable that are not on ShieldTV ?
Curiosity If I convert the prices that would pay here in Brasil (importing) to dollas, would be $448 XminiPC, $250/$330 ShieldTV/pro, $176 Xking
BTW, love the quality of videos (content and choices!)
BTW, the PC is a Chuwi Larkbox Pro and you can get it cheap as $149 used on Amazon.
For sure! I break it down near the end of the video.
I’m new to this stuff. So I buy the Chuwi Larkbox Pro and the hard drive and I can play all these games?
@@dumpnchase correct!
Thanks for the video, these are interesting.
Thanks for watching!
Great video!
I loooove the portability of this thing, but there is no way this 2TB hard drive has 60k games on it... unless it's plagued with duplicates in every language/regions+alpha/beta versions (at least not being merged as one game title), betas, prototypes, hacks, etc...I have a Launchbox collection, no dupes/junk like that, although it has many 8bit and 16bit system hacks (in separate categories), but still, it has mostly English (including translated to English across many systems) and final version ROMs, unless it's a non-English native system, (EX: NEC PC-FX or Sharp X68000 for example), or at least divided into its own sections on a few systems, nicely organized and my collection has just over 61k games (but also includes PS3, MSDOS, Wii-U, and even newer console stuff (nothing to see here..move along); this stuff is obviously geared toward playing on dedicated PC for the later stuff)...all of this does obviously demand more space, but still....) it all requires 14.7TB...needs an external 16TB hard drive; so obviously not as "user friendly".
*I noticed during the video it has over 12k Spectrum console games and over 3500 Amstrad games, and 5,600 Atari 800 games (that rarely play properly in emulation; I wonder how they overcame that?)....so that explained some of the high counts, I guess mine just has more modern platforms...although my LB collection includes over 5,500 spectrum games (amazing how many games were on that system) and over 1800 PS2, not just 200, and over DOUBLE the PSP games (not mini either like this collection, but disc games. I have 304 psp-minis in another category) , etc...
Btw, you should play this video at 0.25 speed during the system scroll through to hear what he sounds like when drunk...LOL
Also, all of the many 1-4 game platforms (arcade co.) would drive me nuts...have 1 arcade category and use playlists after that, including an ALL GAMES one...I see that at least you can uncheck many extra categories in settings at least, but does Prince of Persia, 1 game really need its own category wheel? LOL (and it has 1 windows game?)...it's a very messy way to organize things. 2 Wii games only? Mine has 1,264...NEC SuperGrafx did not have 298 games, it had only 5 (and two more I found released on TG16, optimized on Supergrafx when played with it, set up in that category...)...so I wonder what is listed/broken in there to show 298? I guess that grossly incomplete sets, tiny count systems/platforms are fine for many people. I guess I'm OCD about this stuff...
Great,video...thx
How about using the "HDD external enclosure" on a low budget Wal Mart gaming laptop?! Like an acer Ryzen 5, or an HP I5 gaming laptop with Nvidia 1650gt card..? Would this be a decent travel load-out...?
Woa, woa, woa, what's that tiny GBA looking thing at 4:33? 😂
It’s this little guy: www.myretrogamecase.com/products/game-mini-esp32
@@RetroGameCorps yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and have you make a video on that 😁. Also can this mini PC be overclocked to improve performance? I think ETAPrime has reviewed this one. Thanks for everything you do!
You could install Steam on Batocera, then you would have the whole hard drive available. I expect that it would be even better than on Windows in some cases because Batocera has lower operating-system overhead. Batocera is a Linux distribution, and Steam games run well on Linux. I think that, in that case, it would be better to install a Linux distribution on the SSD instead of Windows, and have Steam games installed on the external drive along Batocera and its games (on the same partition).
Yeah that would be a nice setup!
If you can find that storage bag then you will find the whole thing for much cheaper and also you would not need 2tb unless you plan of playing all these systems