Wow I didn't know the Neo Geo was 24-bit. I guess that means the Genesis is 24-bit, too!
I love my 24-bit Genesis. It rocks. 24-bits of SHEER POWER! But wait... I also have a Sega CD and a 32X. If we add up the "bits" like the author of this thread did for the Neo Geo processors, that makes my Genesis setup a 104 bit monster!
LOL actually the M68000 used in both the Neogeo and Genesis were 32-bit cpus with 16-bit front side bus. This is a commonplace cpu found in alot of arcade hardware in the 80ies and 90ies. The right 68000s can be overclocked easily with the proper knowhow. You can jump a Genesis model 1 deck from 7 mhz to 13 mhz and get rid of flicker and slow down. If your brave you can push well past 18mhz.
The M68000 was a fantastic compromise. When the M68000 was introduced, 16-bit front side buses were really the most practical size for usage. The 68000 was designed with 32-bit address spaces and registers .
Even though the 68000 had 24-bit addressing system supporting up to 16 MB of memory and 16-bit ALUs, addresses were always stored as 32-bit quantities, i.e. it had a flat 32-bit address space. This meant that the 68000 is a 32-bit microprocessor.
The Zilog Z80 used in both systems (Neo Geo and Genesis)is for audio co-processing.
The 24-bit marketing tout by SNK was stupid at best,and damaging at worst,because it makes them sound like they didnt even know their own hardware capabilities to extreme gamers in the know how of cpus. There wasnt a 24-bit anything except the 24-bit addressing system. Sega could have just as easily made the same bloated claims,but had the hindsite not to,instead playing the megahertz game with Nintendo later on during the "Blast Processing" phase of Sega's marketing battle. Super Nintendos Ricoh produced 5A22 ran at a measly 3 mhz.
