Sega OutRun hardware

Sega OutRun hardware
Manufacturer: Sega
Release Date RRP Code

Sega's OutRun hardware was released in 1986 with the driving game OutRun. It is a successor to their Hang-On hardware, making it the second in Sega's Super Scaler series of three-dimensional arcade hardware. It was succeeded by the Sega X Board in 1987.

The OutRun hardware, like the Hang-On hardware, has specifications similar to those of the System 16, with the addition of a second 68000 processor and a separate video board which allowed for an extra graphics layer for the road as well as sprite/texture scaling capabilities. The OutRun hardware can do everything the Hang-On hardware can do, but its processors are clocked higher (allowing for quicker calculations), it has more memory, and the video board's capabilities have been expanded, capable of drawing two roads (the Hang-On hardware can only draw one) and rendering sprites/textures using a framebuffer system with a higher fillrate (the Hang-On hardware used a line-buffer system). At the time, the OutRun hardware was a very powerful but expensive arcade board, with arcade operators advised to charge twice as many credits than for regular arcade machines.

Three games made use of the hardware, all of which are driving games. However, only OutRun and Turbo OutRun are truly for this hardware, as Super Hang-On was also released for the Hang-On hardware in a mostly identical form.

Technical Specifications

• Board composition: CPU Board, Video Board
• CPU:
  • Main CPU: 2× Motorola 68000 @ 12.5 MHz (16-bit & 32-bit instructions @ 4.375 MIPS)
  • Sound CPU: Zilog Z80 @ 4 MHz (8-bit & 16-bit instructions @ 0.58 MIPS)
• Sound chips:
  • FM synthesis chip: Yamaha YM2151 @ 4 MHz (8 FM channels)
  • PCM sampling chip: SegaPCM (315-5218) @ 4 MHz (stereo output, 16 PCM channels, 12-bit audio, 31.25 kHz sampling rate)
• GPU: Sega Super Scaler chipset
  • Graphics board: Sega 837-6064 / 171-5377 VIDEO Board @ 25.1748 MHz (315-5197 Sega Custom Tilemap Generator, 315-5211 Sega Custom Sprite Generator, 315-5242 Sega Custom Color Encoder)
  • Road graphics chips: 315-5155 Sega Road Bit Extraction, 315-5222 Signetics PLS153N Road Mixing
• Memory: Up to 3758.25 KB
  • RAM: 750.25 KB, including 670 KB high-speed SRAM (Static RAM)
    • Main RAM: 64 KB (32 KB work, 32 KB shared)
    • Video RAM: 684 KB
      • CPU Board: 84 KB (4 KB sprites, 8 KB colors, 64 KB tiles, 4 KB text, 4 KB roads)
      • Video Board: 600 KB SRAM (512 KB dual sprite framebuffers)
    • Sound RAM: 2.25 KB
    • SRAM speed: 0-45 nanoseconds
  • ROM: Up to 3008 KB (672 KB main, 1888 KB video, 448 KB sound)
    • Up to 640 KB EPROM and 1024 KB Mask ROM
  • Video memory: 2572 KB (684 KB video RAM, 1888 KB video ROM)
• Video resolution: 320×224 (display), 400×262 (overscan), progressive scan
  • Scanlines: 224 (display), 262 (overscan)
  • Framebuffer resolution: 512×256 pixels
• Refresh rate: 60.0543 Hz (V-sync)
  • Frame rate: 30 frames per second
• Color palette: 98,304
  • 16-bit color palette: 15-bit RGB high color depth (32,768 colors) and 1-bit shadow & highlight that triples up to 98,304 colors.
• Colors on screen: 12,288
• Graphical planes:
  • 2 tilemap layers: System 16B tilemap system, row & column scrolling, parallax scrolling
  • 1 text layer
  • 1 sprite layer: Hardware sprite-scaling/zooming
  • 1 road layer: Can draw 2 roads at once, 512×256 pixels each, tiled bitmaps
  • Translucent shadows
• Sprite/texture capabilities: Frame-buffered sprites/textures with zooming capabilities, 128 on-screen sprites per frame, 7680 sprites/textures scaled per second, 16 colors per sprite/texture
  • Video clock cycles: 25.1748 MHz (60.0543 Hz refresh rate)
  • Sprite pixel/texel fillrate: 25.1748 million pixels/texels per second, 419,199 pixels/texels per frame/refresh, 1600 sprite pixels/texels per scanline, 128 sprites/textures per scanline

Gallery

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  CPU board (top)

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  CPU board (bottom)

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  Video board (top)

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  Video board (bottom)

List of Games

• Out Run (1986)
• Super Hang-On (1987)
• Turbo OutRun (1989)
• Limited Edition Hang-On (1991)

Sega arcade boards
Originating in arcades
77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 VIC Dual G80 Zaxxon VCO Object System 1 LaserDisc Appoooh Hang-On System 2 System 16 OutRun Gigas X Board Y Board System 24 System 18 System 32 Model 1 Model 2 H1 Board Model 3
Console-based hardware
84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 SG-1000 System E System C Mega-Tech System Mega Play Sega Titan Video NAOMI Hikaru NAOMI 2 Atomiswave System SP Chihiro Triforce
PC-based hardware
05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 Lindbergh Europa-R RingEdge RingWide RingEdge 2 Nu Nu 1.1 Nu 2 ALLS