What are your thoughts on the new game themed pi cases being released?

Alturis

I think they look pretty slick if you plan on having your RetroPie in your living room entertainment center. I do worry that if they became too popular and started eating into Nintendo's market share of the SNES Classic it may bring the eye of Sauron around unnecessarily to crack down on RetroPie and its "grey" area of copyright law.

mediamogul

@sgtjimmyrustles

I just wish they'd spread the love around a little bit. We're gonna have 918 NES and SNES cases, but no 2600, Intellivision, Colecovision, etc. Outside of converting a slick looking USB hub, do we even have any Genesis/MegaDrive options available? Still, I can't say I'm too put out by it. I have my Lego NES case that I'm very fond of and I'm not looking to change things up anytime soon.

Alturis

Also, it does make me think that maybe I need to start a new build of RetroPie specifically designed to fit into such a case and live in my living room. I was playing some SNES titles on my arcade unit like Secret of Mana and thinking man I really need to be relaxing on a couch as I play this not standing or sitting on a stool. Some games just demand a longer period of attention to enjoy them properly.

kikinaak

I'm skeptical. I was looking at the Nespi case, one which is apparently very popular. The thing looks great. But it powers the pi through the gpio pins, bypassing a lot of the protections and fuses, and it seems the "functioning power and reset buttons" it hypes for sales pitch simply interrupt the power and dont trigger a proper software shutdown. So it sounds like a recipe for corrupt SD cards and burned pi. Caveat emptor and all that.

Ranma

I love them. Just recently bought this one, even though I prefer the Euro/SFC look, I was really taken aback by how nice this is in the flesh. I agree though that there aren't enough alternatives to the Nintendo ones. I would love a Mega Drive one. Desperately!

SgtJimmyRustles

@kikinaak said in What are your thoughts on the new game themed pi cases being released?:

I'm skeptical. I was looking at the Nespi case, one which is apparently very popular. The thing looks great. But it powers the pi through the gpio pins, bypassing a lot of the protections and fuses, and it seems the "functioning power and reset buttons" it hypes for sales pitch simply interrupt the power and dont trigger a proper software shutdown. So it sounds like a recipe for corrupt SD cards and burned pi. Caveat emptor and all that.

That's why companies like Rasptendo and the iuniker case, as well as the super kuma 9000 have those safe shutdown scripts.

lilbud

I want a reproduction PC Engine Pi case with functioning power switch and usb controller port

kikinaak

@sgtjimmyrustles said in What are your thoughts on the new game themed pi cases being released?:

@kikinaak said in What are your thoughts on the new game themed pi cases being released?:

I'm skeptical. I was looking at the Nespi case, one which is apparently very popular. The thing looks great. But it powers the pi through the gpio pins, bypassing a lot of the protections and fuses, and it seems the "functioning power and reset buttons" it hypes for sales pitch simply interrupt the power and dont trigger a proper software shutdown. So it sounds like a recipe for corrupt SD cards and burned pi. Caveat emptor and all that.

That's why companies like Rasptendo and the iuniker case, as well as the super kuma 9000 have those safe shutdown scripts.

I love the look on the super kuma and that heatsink is a beast. I wonder how it compares to the flirc case for cooling.

SgtJimmyRustles

@kikinaak said in What are your thoughts on the new game themed pi cases being released?:

I love the look on the super kuma and that heatsink is a beast. I wonder how it compares to the flirc case for cooling.

Joe showed off his new work in project, which got me excited about his upcoming SNES Pal case as he's working on getting front USB ports.

kikinaak

The case with front usb ports has my interest. The Nespi has those which makes the case larger, leaving room to put wireless keyboard dongles and such in the remaining ports on the pi while keeping them out of sight inside the case. I like that. I dont like cases that are too tiny just for the sake of being cute. The ones that look like consoles are not really intended for portability, so they dont really have to slide into a pocket. Being able to route wires to the usb ports internal to the case plus a little extra room to slip my seagate ultraslim 2TB hard drive in somewhere would open up loads of possibilities while still keeping things neat and preserving the look from the outside.

SgtJimmyRustles

@kikinaak

I totally agree with you there. That's why I seek out those cases rather than the ones that use just the Pi's USB ports on the side.

SgtJimmyRustles

Honestly, after Trying out the Basstop Case and such, I'm really leaning back towards my rasptendo case. It's currently the best one I've got so far.

Rion

@kikinaak Mini-mods sells open-source pcb's based upon mafe72 designs that fixes those problems.

Lite bit pricey but a good alternative to those that are not so tech savvy.

SgtJimmyRustles

@rion

Speaking of that

http://retroflag.com/Beware-of-fake-NESPi-Case.html

I didn't even know they had this. It's hilariously full of misspellings and improper English.

quicksilver

@sgtjimmyrustles I just checked my nespi case, it is the original. I still had voltage issues with mine. Never saw the lighting bolt onscreen, but one of the N64 emulators kept freezing. Turns out it was the nespi case causing it. Just ordered the super Kuma 9000 last night as a replacement. Looks like it is better engineered.

SgtJimmyRustles

@quicksilver

Joep would be glad to hear it. Several people who got it say that it's good. I can't wait for his European SNES style case. It will even support front USB Ports.

ExarKunIv

yea i have not been happy with the case. dont get me wrong the good ones do look great, but they are all the same. I was a Sega kid so i wanted a Sega Genesis case. sadly no one has made a good looking one yet.

so i went with a wood and plexy case. added a blue LED and it looks tight.

SgtJimmyRustles

@exarkuniv said in What are your thoughts on the new game themed pi cases being released?:

yea i have not been happy with the case. dont get me wrong the good ones do look great, but they are all the same. I was a Sega kid so i wanted a Sega Genesis case. sadly no one has made a good looking one yet.
so i went with a wood and plexy case. added a blue LED and it looks tight.

You got a link to what you did? I'd love to see it. And yeah, no Genesis case except for that mod with the genesis usb hub.

ExarKunIv

alt text

case on amazon

quicksilver

@sgtjimmyrustles someone mentioned on youtube that the kintaro guys are looking into other cases like the Sega Genesis/megadrive. Could be just a rumor but im sure there is a market for it.