From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia CIC (Nintendo)
CIC (Nintendo)
to use that cartridge’s CIC lockout chip for authentica-
tion.
Tengen (Atari’s NES games subsidiary) took a differ-
ent tactic: the corporation obtained a description of the
code in the lockout chip from the United States Patent
and Trademark Office by claiming that it was required
to defend against present infringement claims in a legal
case. Tengen then used these documents to design their
CIC chip from Super Mario Bros. / Duck Hunt cartridge Rabbit chip, which duplicated the function of the 10NES.
Nintendo sued Tengen for these actions. The court found
The CIC is a lockout chip designed for the American that Tengen did not violate the copyright for copying the
version of Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) video portion of code necessary to defeat the protection with
game console It had three main purposes:- current NES consoles, but did violate the copyright for
• To give Nintendo complete control over the software copying portions of the code not being used in the com-
released for the platform munication between the chip and console. Tengen had
• To prevent unlicensed (pirate) game cartridges from copied this code in its entirety because future console re-
running leases could have been engineered to pick up the discrep-
• To prevent games importing (See regional lockout) ancy. On the initial claim, the court sided with Nintendo
Improved designs of the CIC chip was also used in the lat- on the issue of patent infringement, but noted that Nin-
er Super Nintendo Entertainment System and Nintendo tendo’s patent would likely be deemed obvious as it was
64, although running an updated security program which basically U.S. Patent 4,736,419 with the addition of a reset
performs additional checks. pin, which was at the time already commonplace in the
world of electronics. Therefore, while Nintendo was the
winner of the initial trial, before they could actually en-
Design force the ruling they would need to have the patent hold
The system consisted of two parts, a Sharp Corporation up under scrutiny, as well as address Tengen’s antitrust
4-bit microcontroller in the console (The "lock") that claims. Before this occurred, the sides settled.
would check the inserted cartridge for authentication, A small company called RetroZone, the first company
and a matching chip in the game cartridge (The "key") to publish games on the NES in over a decade, uses a
that would give the code upon demand. If the cartridge multi-region lockout chip for NTSC, PAL A, and PAL B
did not provide the authentication, then the CIC would called the Ciclone which was created by reverse engineer-
reset the CPU during every cycle until a game with the ing Tengen’s "Rabbit" chip. It is the only lockout chip in
authorization chip was inserted. The constant resetting existence that will allow games to be played in more than
of the CPU would stop the console from booting up. one region. It is intended to make the games playable on
The program used in the NES CIC was called 10NES older hardware that uses the 10NES lockout chip and the
and was patented under U.S. Patent 4,799,635 The source two other regions, although the top-loading NES does not
code was copyrighted; only Nintendo could produce the use a lockout chip. The Ciclone chip is the first lockout
authorization chips. The patent covering the 10NES ex- chip to be developed after the patent for the 10NES had
pired on January 24, 2006, although the copyright is still expired.
in effect. Because the 10NES in the model NES-001 Control
Deck occasionally fails to authenticate legal cartridges, a
common modification is to disable the chip entirely by
Circumvention cutting pin 4 on the Control Deck’s internal 10NES lock-
out chip.
Nintendo Entertainment System
Most unlicensed companies created circuits that used a Super Nintendo Entertainment System
voltage spike to knock the authentication unit offline. Towards the end of the SNES lifespan the CIC was cloned
A few unlicensed games released in Europe and Aus- and used in pirate games. Often the clone CIC chip would
tralia (such as HES games) came in the form of a dongle be rebranded with an inconspicuous brand/part number
that would be connected to a licensed cartridge, in order to prevent detection by authorities.
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia CIC (Nintendo)
See also • Patent Arcade "Case: Atari v. Nintendo (N.D. Cal.
1993) [C,P] Atari Games Corp. v. Nintendo of
• 10NES America, Inc. 30 U.S.P.Q.2d 1401 (N.D. Cal. 1993)
• Lock-out chip (Atari II)." Accessed on July 12, 2006
• "Ed Logg (Atari) interview" discussing Tengen lock
References chip
• US 4799635 Nintendo patent for "determining
• Segher. "The weird and wonderful CIC." Accessed on authenticity of an external memory".
May 18, 2010. • US 5004232 Macronix patent for "game cartridge
• Kevin Horton. "The Infamous Lockout Chip." security circuit" that causes the Nintendo "game
Accessed on August 22, 2010. console to accept the cartridge".
• U.S. Court of Appeals, Federal Circuit. “Atari Games • Ciclone lockout chip Information from RetroZone
Corp. v. Nintendo of America Inc..” Digital Law • Disabling the NES "Lockout Chip (Archived
Online. Accessed on April 19, 2006. 2009-04-29) (rev. 0.5 26-Dec-97)
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=CIC_(Nintendo)&oldid=469757390"
Categories:
• Hardware restrictions
• Nintendo hardware
• Nintendo Entertainment System
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