"New Discovery: Aging SNES Boosts Speed, Puzzles Speedrunners"

The speedrunning community is grappling with an intriguing technological phenomenon: the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) appears to be running games faster as it ages. This surprising trend was brought to light in early February by Alan Cecil, a Bluesky user (@tas.bot), who observed that the nearly 50 million SNES units sold globally might now be performing better than they did straight off the production line in the 1990s. Games like Super Mario World, Super Metroid, and Star Fox could be benefiting from this unexpected boost in performance.

The notion that a video game console could improve its performance over time might seem far-fetched, but Cecil's research points to a specific component: the audio processing unit (APU) SPC700. According to an interview with 404 Media, the official specs claim the SPC700 has a digital signal processing (DSP) rate of 32,000Hz, governed by a ceramic resonator running at 24.576MHz. However, retro console enthusiasts have noted that this rate varies slightly, influenced by factors such as temperature. This variance affects how audio is processed and sent to the CPU, subtly impacting game speed.

Cecil's investigation took a deeper turn when he asked SNES owners to record data from their consoles. The responses, numbering over 140, revealed a trend of increasing DSP rates over time. Previously recorded averages from 2007 pegged the DSP rate at 32,040Hz, but recent data suggests it has climbed to 32,076Hz. While environmental factors like temperature do play a role, they don't account for the entire increase. In a follow-up Bluesky post, Cecil shared that, based on 143 responses, the average SNES DSP rate now stands at 32,076Hz, with a rise of 8Hz from cold to warm environments. This led him to question why temperature has a lesser impact and how this affects gameplay, mysteries that remain unsolved.

Despite the fascination, Cecil acknowledges that more research is necessary to understand the extent of the speed increase and its causes. Historical data from the console's early years is scarce, but the SNES is showing signs of aging gracefully as it approaches its 35th anniversary.

The speedrunning community is buzzing with the implications of these findings. If the SPC700 is indeed processing audio faster, it could theoretically reduce load times in certain game sections. This could challenge over three decades of leaderboard records, although the impact on speedruns like Super Mario World is not straightforward. APU speeds don't directly translate to visual game speed, and the most extreme scenarios might only shave off less than a second from an average speedrun. The effects on longer speedruns are still under investigation, but the consensus is that the community has little to worry about for now.

As Cecil delves further into what makes the SNES tick, the console continues to perform robustly into its 30s. For those interested in its legacy, the SNES holds a prominent place on the list of best-selling consoles of all time.