Neo SD Pro - Not Compatible With SOME 5V Consoles?

[@travisbowmanmusic]

It turns out that we have two confirmed cases of the regular non-pro Neo SD working just fine with "NEO-AES" 5V consoles. I think this is enough evidence to warrant Terraonion to take action and warn the community, and at least make an attempt to fix this. Hopefully this video helps get the word out. Stay tuned for a follow up video with more information.

[@esar8183]

Thanks for the video. I’m going to reach out of Stone Age gamer and try to get a non pro aes to see if it works.

[@ncc1701p]

5V system here: my 1st cart was a dude cuz of a flash issue. but cart #2 replacement via SAG = success. I might have a random game glitch here and there but its rock solid on the current latest firmware that you can only obtain via discord.

[@11Eighty6]

@ncc1701p is the firmware version 1.08 R07 on the website, not the latest?

[@esar8183]

@@11Eighty6 if you look at the actual file it’s the R06 version. There should be a newer file than R07 that was released but you can only get it if you message Alex. I have the R08 version. I got it from Stone Age gamer because Alex ignored all my messages. This was months ago so I don’t know what version they have. I gave up trying to get SD pro to work

[@juanbermudez964]

You could mod your console to make it 9v. But maybe you already send the pro back and get a non pro!!

[@normynorm9503]

Hey Travis. Seeing your video for the first time. I am “the gentleman who sent in the Neo sd pro and aes to stoneage.” That took four months to work to troubleshoot this issue! Talk about frustrating!

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Oh yeah, it definitely has been. For now, I'm happy with my 5V Neo Geo and the Neo SD.

[@Larry]

Some of the Neo Geo Multi-Carts AlIexpress sells, come with a new AC charger. So they must have known about this, surely?

[@acem7749]

Interesting never knew that.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

I didn't know that either. I got my 161-in-1 second hand.

[@mehdila1988]

Hello from Singapore, I’ve just received mine. It was already updated with the latest firmware and it’s working flawlessly (I have a 9v console - POW3). I hope they’ll fix the issue for some consoles soon. To me, despite the price, this is a great product. I don’t have any original game; this is my only cartridge.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Yeah, I decided to keep my AES and the Neo SD (not the pro). It works well!

[@MintCroydonGamer]

I am so glad you made this. I have a 9V console that worked perfectly with my NeoSD Pro for 3 years but recently it started having under voltage issues. The console was then recapped and original carts work fine, but the NeoSD Pro just refuses to boot consistently anymore. No idea what is going on.

[@onidensetsu3721]

I tried a TO product once in 2017 or so. I bought it from SAG. I had an issue & it damaged my console in a few ways. Scratched my units case all up too. Had to return the product to SAG & had zero issue with a full refund. TY SAG! I did join the TO fourm back then & the things i saw were not cool or what a retro company should do to their customers or fans... They acted like they would help you but was clear it was to keep their sale at all cost & would tell you whatever they had too. They even let me know they were salty for me getting my money back. These days I don't even consider buying any products they offer. Once you buy a TO product you are on your own.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

"Once you buy a TO product you are on your own". Couldn't have said it better myself. Funnily enough I think they've blacklisted me. Never once heard from them about any of these issues.

[@PeterChen-gy2gf]

I face the same problem, but a bit more serious, on top of graphic glitches, the audio will gone after play for like 15mins then the console will shut down, i thought my neosd pro is faulty, thank you for your help to let me know the truth

[@travisbowmanmusic]

That's really strange. What revision is your console?

[@acem7749]

I don't have a flash cart but I have other issues due to my 5v neogeo. Issues with Kruat Busters and the Bluetooth adapter. I have to do odd tricks like cold boots no power plugged in to the system until first start of KB, and start a game first then push in the BT adapter... I bought new power supplies no difference. Everything else works fine other homebrew, multi carts all OG games. I hear there is a 12v mod for 5v systems.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

That's really strange. I have no issues with the NeoBT adapter on my console.

[@acem7749]

@@travisbowmanmusic it maybe the combination of game. OG, 161 in 1 or kraut buster, or other aftermarket titles

[@matelpatel2233]

I personnaly am very happy with my neosd pro, but I did encounter the problems dicribed in this video. I have two "5v" AES consoles, one has 27k serial number (with the earliest revision mother board), and the other is a 80k. The 27k console was quite unstable with larger games (like ms3 or motw), showing some light glitches, sometimes hardly booting games, and I had never managed to have Furrtek MVS converter working properly. I openned the console to mesure the 5V on the different IC components inside (called Vcc), and it barely reach 4.8v with a 5V 3A AC adapter. This tension is obtained not directly from the AC adapter, but via a zeiner diode circutry. This circuit is not good at all when there is a sudden need for power rise, and can cause problems with high power need cartridges. Since then, I removed this zeiner diode circuit (some resistors, the zeiner diode and some capacitors), build a regulated power circuit replicating the one that is in the 9-10V AES consoles. Today I have no more issues with this 27k console. For the 80k serial console, which mother board is a bit different, I just had to use an AC adapter that provides more voltage, arround 5.4v when unplugged (with 3A, which is more than needed for a neogeo system), and now I have a 5.0x, almost 5.1V Vcc feeding the console when plugged, which is great. It's absolutely useless to have 7A current available if Vcc in your console is too low. I also want to mension that I also have a Darksoft Multi AES, and you'll get almost exactly the same issues with 5v consoles, especially with the first revision mother boards.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

These issues and the lack of customer support from Terraonion have made me pretty much give up on the AES.

[@that1crzywhtguy]

@matelpatel2233 Can you follow up with details/a guide for this?! I'd love to try the 9v mod you describe on the early rev NEO-AES. I have a 19k serial I'd really love to make this attempt on!

[@justinmoravetz4544]

@@that1crzywhtguy Same

[@nelsonretrogaming]

very helpful. I have the same setting as you: newly recapped console serial 30k, with the same motherboard... I have similar glitches and very severe glitches with NGdev's Razion.... the common point between Razion and NeoSDPro is that they are "demanding" cartridges in terms of power. Razion is the largest game on Neo Geo I believe (1400 megs)... so it seems that the conclusion you reach at the end is the correct one that this particular revision of the console is not powerful enough.

[@sindicatoretrogamer]

There’s a way to rebuild the 9v line on 5v consoles

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Yeah I've heard about that. It's getting to be a bit much for me to justify it anymore. I'm likely going to just sell my AES and move on.

[@RetroTuna]

I have a 5v console and the neosd works ok but kraut buster would not work and had the same graphic issues but they were worse, think its best i dont upgrade to a neosd pro.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Yeah man, I think I'm going to move on from the AES in general. Too many headaches.

[@RetroTuna]

@@travisbowmanmusic There is always mister or emulation if you move from real hardware.

[@11Eighty6]

is there a way to know whether you have a 5V or 9V revision without opening the console? i have one on the way and i made sure to get a power supply that matched the specs on the bottom sticker POW3. from what i have researched i think this will be a 9V board

[@travisbowmanmusic]

The only way to know 100% is to open it up. Yeah, you might be able to find out on the shell, but who knows if it's been swapped in the past. Tbh they're super easy to open, just a few screws.

[@clemb1623]

To be honest i kind of the same issue with a 5v AES bit without the neosd. Not sure if oower supply issue or hdmi adapter. Did you try on a crt with composite cable?

[@travisbowmanmusic]

I only used RGB SCART cables. I'm having this issues on both displays.

[@456gt59]

I have exactly the same problem and video glitches with certain games on my 5V AES and a 165-in-1

[@travisbowmanmusic]

If the Chinese multicart is giving you issues, it could just be a problem with your AES. Are you able to test any other games? Sometimes the Chinese multicart has a few graphical glitches every now and then, but it's never game breaking.

[@aeroburger]

We desperately need an affordable AES flash cart

[@travisbowmanmusic]

I agree but keep in my mind the work behind it in some cases, and it's a single purchase for a very niche thing.

[@richm4100]

You'd have thought by now that someone would have released a better quality version of the Chinese 161-1 cart with all the ganes on it for say £100?

[@travisbowmanmusic]

I suspect we are going to see massive developments on this in 2025... Hopefully soon!

[@kennylee2590]

Any news on if these will ever be back in stock? Or is there a readily available, dependable alternative?

[@travisbowmanmusic]

These come in batches and every time that a new one comes out, there's a rumor that it's the last batch. I jumped on it as soon as I saw they were available, and I guess they're out of stock now. Apparently someone is working on essentially reverse engineering the Chinese 161-in-1 cart. Hopefully that will turn out to be the end all flash cart for the AES.

[@Chill_Valentine]

A $600 flash cart is a war crime. Too bad there’s only one other alternative to TerraOnion’s NeoSD AES which is also expensive and frequently out of stock.

[@karlhanso]

have you heard about darksoft multi catridge ehh

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Yep, Darksoft isn't coming back anytime soon according to their website. There's gotta be someone out there that can do this for an affordable price. I'd pay $250 or $300 for a decent flashcart, as long as there were firmware updates and decent customer service. C'mon, Krikkz!

[@jdigitalseven7]

Getting roms converted/ finding correct ones that will run and wont crash can be a big pain too. Original carts are by far the best option still. The vortex carts are an in between the 1-161 and these SD carts. They aren't perfect either though, original game carts are still.

[@RetroRockGamer]

I wonder why Krikzz doesnt make a Neo Geo everdrive, and price it at $150. Hed make a killing.

[@djexotic07]

sound to me that the 5v doesn't have enough amps powering the chips on the board or the flash cart. i don't own the neo geo aes console also the flash cart, but it sound to me the way you are saying it after you say you plug in multiple 5v plugs is that the flash cart is taking up all the amps of the consoles it need to power rest of the system. they need to fix what ever wrong with that flash cart, because if it drawing more power outta the console just to play it is not good. i am afraid it also harming the console of the flash cart you have of the pro version. that just my through's

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Yep, it's definitely something serious that needs attention from Terraonion. We likely won't see a fix for quite some time, if ever.

[@Neodestro]

i have Neo Geo AES PRO-POW3 model. soon i buy Neo SD i hope work for me

[@karlhanso]

he broke the rules he connect a chinese multi catridge mvs with a converter to the aes, those catridge can damage the console

[@travisbowmanmusic]

@karlhanso broke the rules...?

[@justinmoravetz4544]

Add me to the list of graphical glitches. Mine are much more severe. Only text renders correctly. Everything else looks sliced up. I have a 5v 20k model number. No voltage regulation. Unibios 4.0. 161-in-1 works just fine. Going to dig deep into this problem. Any pointers you find, send them my way. I'm quite good with soldering.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

I was never able to get the Pro version working on my system. No response from Terraonion. I ended up just using the regular Neo SD instead.

[@turbinegraphics16]

Thats too bad, I have a bunch of Terraonion stuff including the neo sd pro that I use with my 9V console and I've just never had an issues. Looks like you have a video issue at the top of the image too so maybe your console is messed up. I think having higher value capacitors in some areas could help too. For people getting into neogeo those recent consolized systems look better to me.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

No, that wavy mess is due to the RetroTink 5X upscaler not having a good time figuring out the sync on this AES. That's a thing that Mike Chi has at least acknowledged. Unfortunately you just have to mess with the settings on the RetroTink and hope for the best. Another reason why I'm considering selling the AES and just moving on.

[@Grooveraider]

Screw Terraonion ! Where's the competition ??? It would be nice if someone else comes up with their version of a cheaper NEO SD. THIS what happens when there's no competiton. Terraonion doen't feel obligated to fix their products on time . The fact Alex left you hanging on this situation is very unprofessional. I will not deal with Terraonion, EVER !

[@djexotic07]

ain't terraonion also had a issue with their pc engine/turbo grafx 16 flash system not working properly nad require a slight mod to get the picture and sound right on the early version of their flash cart, right after they release the second model to fix those issues.

[@juanbermudez964]

Dude you can erasy mod your console to be a 9v

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Worth jotting that down, thank you for your comment.

[@juanbermudez964]

@ no problem, if you need any info let me know

[@esar8183]

I have the same issue. My aes is 5V. Several months ago I went to their discord to get help. I was never rude but for some reason Alex ignored all my messages and figured he had blocked me. I bought the game from Stone Age gamer. I got the firmware update from them but the pro still doesn’t work.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Yeah, he ignored my requests for help too. That whole Discord server is full of people reaching out for help with these $650 carts, and it seems like Alex just wants to accuse the customer of doing something wrong instead of attempting to resolve the issues.

[@juanbermudez964]

And yes Terra onion it’s garbage for costumes service but you can get the item delete from your account so a new person can make a new account to get firmware updates, I had a problem with my thing for the pc engine but it was the old version the one only with RGB, and yes they don’t want nothing to do with me And even with that problem I bought a NeoSD pro, and for me it’s was $900 Canadian dólares 🙃

[@ferrellsl]

I'd rather just skip the Neo Geo hardware altogether and use PC emulation.

[@RetroRockGamer]

PC emulation is great...I usually use a MiSTer, it's 100% perfect.

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Any other time I'd probably disagree with you.. but this stuff is just way too expensive to have these issues all the time. In addition to the Neo SD Pro not working properly with ZERO help from Terraonion, the console has sync issues with a few upscalers.

[@scottblews1680]

I would avoid at all costs if you own a 5v system

[@travisbowmanmusic]

Can confirm that the Neo SD (not the pro) works just fine on my 5V NEO-AES board revision