Post by Kazuya_UK on Oct 6, 2003 14:23:01 GMT -5
Basically the only way to tell a boot is to physically open up the cart and look at the boards/chips inside. Looking at either the carts case or label doesn't really tell anything as a lot of the time people replace the labels with homemade ones and I have also seen people swap cases over for whatever reason - sometimes its because a game may have come in a clear case or whatever and the person decided he wanted his collection to be all black cases.
Look at the boards and make sure they have SNK markings on them, as all official carts should say "SNK" on there, and make sure there is no dodgy wiring or soldering... if you spot tonnes of wires then it is likely to be a bootleg. A lot of people also think that eeproms (the chips with a little window in the middle) mean that a cart is a boot, and although this can be true it doesn't necessarily mean the cart is fake as SNK has used them in the past. Sometimes they were put in there to repair a cart or whatever, and I know some of my carts (which I definitely know are legit) have eeproms.
Basically, I'd advise anyone to stay away from bootlegs - apart from the obvious legal issues a lot of them can be bad quality. I have seen boots with glitches in the graphics/sound, and also many that have stopped working correctly after a while, probably due to cheap construction.
Hope that helps,
Kaz
Look at the boards and make sure they have SNK markings on them, as all official carts should say "SNK" on there, and make sure there is no dodgy wiring or soldering... if you spot tonnes of wires then it is likely to be a bootleg. A lot of people also think that eeproms (the chips with a little window in the middle) mean that a cart is a boot, and although this can be true it doesn't necessarily mean the cart is fake as SNK has used them in the past. Sometimes they were put in there to repair a cart or whatever, and I know some of my carts (which I definitely know are legit) have eeproms.
Basically, I'd advise anyone to stay away from bootlegs - apart from the obvious legal issues a lot of them can be bad quality. I have seen boots with glitches in the graphics/sound, and also many that have stopped working correctly after a while, probably due to cheap construction.
Hope that helps,
Kaz
