Overview

• The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) has been observed to run slightly faster as it ages, with its audio processing unit (APU) showing increased DSP rates over time.
• Originally designed to run at 32,000 Hz, recent measurements show some SNES consoles now operating at rates as high as 32,182 Hz, a phenomenon attributed to changes in the ceramic resonator's performance.
• This speed increase has minimal impact on gameplay, with effects limited to faster audio processing and slightly quicker transitions, such as room-to-room loading in games like Super Metroid.
• Speedrunning experts, including TASBot administrator Alan Cecil, have noted that the changes are unlikely to significantly affect human speedruns but may influence tool-assisted speedrunning (TAS) precision in the future.
• Researchers and retro gaming fans are crowdsourcing data to better understand the phenomenon, with experiments showing that environmental factors like temperature can temporarily alter console performance.