Guides, Reviews

Super Console X King Review & Guide

by Russ

Last updated: 27JUL2021

The Super Console X King is a rebranded version of the beloved Beelink GT King Android TV box, but pre-loaded with EmuELEC 4.2 and a bunch of games. Let’s see how this performs as an all-in-one retro gaming console.

Buy one here (AliExpress)
Amazon (more expensive but faster)
Directly from the vendor

Video timestamps

00:00 introduction
01:02 tech specs
02:02 unboxing and impressions
04:05 EmuELEC orientation
07:34 N64 performance
08:52 Amiga, PS1, NDS performance
09:48 Arcade performance
10:49 Sega Saturn performance
12:09 Dreamcast, Atomiswave, Naomi performance
13:49 PSP performance
16:09 adding your own games
16:50 Android TV experience and gaming
20:13 comparison with GT King & NVIDIA Shield TV Pro
22:47 summary and conclusion

Comparison with competitors

The Super Console X King is not the only high-tier Android TV box on the market. Let’s look at some of its competitors.

The original Beelink GT King TV box has the exact same specs as the Super Console X King, but doesn’t come with controllers or an SD card pre-loaded with games. However, you can flash EmuELEC to an SD card and have the same experience, although you will need to bring your own controllers, BIOS files, and game files. For more information, check out this guide for a similar Android TV box (the device tree you need for this device is called “g12b_s922x_beelink_gt_king”).

The NVIDIA Shield TV Pro is the most powerful Android TV box on the market today. Despite having an aging chipset (same one that’s found on the Nintendo Switch), its drivers are really well optimized and can play retro games with ease. However, it cannot run EmuELEC and so you will be stuck with the Android TV operating system and standalone apps (which isn’t a wholy terrible experience, just not as seamless as EmuELEC). That being said, this device is so powerful that it can play some GameCube games.

Recommended controllers

The Super Console X King comes with a couple faux PS2 controllers but they’re not great. If you have kids, let them use those controllers, and get something nice for yourself. Here are the controllers I prefer (in order of preference):

BIGBIG Won wireless controller — this controller can do bluetooth, 2.4GHz USB dongle, and wired connections. It also works really well with the Nintendo Switch. Here is my full review.

8bitdo Pro 2 — this controller is solidly built and can use either a built-in battery or AA batteries in a pinch. This has better mapping software than the BIGBIG Won but doesn’t have 2.4GHz USB dongle options. Here is my full review.

Backup your SD card

The microSD card that comes with the Super Console X King is generic and likely prone to failure over time. I recommend you back up the SD card contents and then flash them to a card of more reputable origin, like these:

128GB cards:
SanDisk Extreme
Samsung EVO Select
Samsung Pro Endurance (more reliable but pricey)
SanDisk Ultra

256GB cards:
Samsung EVO Select
SanDisk Ultra

To backup the card, use a tool like Win32 Disk Imager (PC) or ApplePi Baker v2 (Mac) to make an image of your card. From there, you can use that same tool to flash the SD card image to a new card.

Tips and tricks:

  • When first getting oriented with this device, I recommend the following tweaks in the EmuELEC main menu:
    • Main Menu > Game Collection Settings > Systems Displayed — use this to uncheck the systems you don’t want to see in the menu
    • Main Menu > Games Settings > Smooth Games > OFF — this will disable the default bilinear filtering and make the games more crisp
    • Main Menu > EmuELEC Settings > Show RetroArch FPS — this will allow you to see the frames per second for each game, if that’s your thing
    • Main Menu > EmuELEC Settings> Always Show Boot Video — this will disable the video that plays every time you start up the console
  • To delete a game from the SD card (and the EmuELEC menu), hold down the A button and select “Delete Game” when the menu pops up
  • Each system needs a little bit of settings tweaks that are necessary for the best performance and quality. Here is a quick summary.
    • Amiga: check out EmuChicken’s tips in this video
    • Nintendo DS: enter the DraStic settings and select Change Options > Video Options > Frame skip type > none, High-resolution 3D > Yes, and Threaded 3D > Yes
    • Sega Saturn: enter RetroArch Quick Menu (SELECT + X on the controller) and select Options > Resolution > 2x
    • Sega Dreamcast: enter RetroArch Quick Menu (SELECT + X on the controller) and select Options > Resolution > 960×720
    • Nintendo 64: enter RetroArch Quick Menu (SELECT + X on the controller) and select Options > 4:3 Resolution > 960×720
    • Sony PSP: In the EmuELEC main menu, go to Games Settings > Per System Advanced Configuration > Sony PSP > Emulator > PPSSPPDL. This will enable the standalone PSP emulator, which will have the best performance. Start up a PSP game, plug in a USB keyboard, and press the ESC key to bring up the PPSSPP menu. Navigate to the Settings > Control menu and map the “Pause” function to a button on your controller (like L3). Now when you press that button you will access the PPSSPP menu without having to use a USB keyboard. For best performance, set the PSP x2 rendering and auto frameskip of 1 (frameskip = number of frames).
  • When you boot into the Android OS for the first time, be sure to go into the “TV Box Settings” and change the resolution to 1080p (if you are using a 4K display). It will default to 4K but when you boot back into EmuELEC it will break the video output. Setting the Android side to 1080p will ensure that EmuELEC will work properly. This device does not have the DRM permissions necessary to stream 4K content on YouTube or Netflix anyway, nor can it play games in 4K, so I would recommend keeping it at 1080p anyway.

34 thoughts on “Super Console X King Review & Guide”

  2. Hi there. Only just getting into the retro scene and want to find the best send contained system to run it all without messing about and having bad performance. I’m really grateful for the effort you have put into this review and all the extra tips, info and tweaks. That is the difference between a good reviewer and a crap, half assed reviewer. You sir are in the first camp! Well done!
    Regarding sd cards- i have been seeing too many times by scum bag sellers on Amazon so i only get mine from Argos (uk) from now on.

    Also can you recommend good controllers please?

    Thanks

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  3. Mr. Russ has helped me with every retro device I have gotten since I found his channel this guy is so awesome and deserves so much respect I tip my hat to him on every video thank you Mr. Russ

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  4. Great review Russ! I picked one up based on your review. I threw a message on the youtube vid but figured it try here. I cannot seem to get any keyboard to recognize. Is there a setting or something I’m missing? Still learning this stuff, it’s only my second system after RG351P. Thank and keep up the good work!

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  5. I recently purchased the super console x king and watched your helpful video on how to use it on you tube. I am not tech savvy and I don’t know how you got to the screen where you can add games. My unit didn’t come with very many Dreamcast or psp games and I would like to add others. Could you direct me on how to do this? Thanks

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    1. With this device, to my knowledge, you have to remove the micro SD card, put it in a card reader and plug it into your computer. I don’t think you can FTS with this one but I could be wrong. When you plug it in, 3 partitions should pop up and most say they need formatting, DON’T format them, just x out. But one should say EasyRoms. Just go in there and you’ll see folders for all the systems. Drag and drop, just make sure they’re the correct extensions for each system.

      Russ, if you read this, I know this system isn’t as popular but if you could maybe give us some tips? Like I’m trying to update my pico for Sega but can’t seem to find a way to do it. Or if you know of any custom OS?

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  6. So I’m not a Mac guy, so I don’t know how well these play with Macs. The partitions I talked about earlier I believe all run Linux, which is why Windows wants to format them. For the SD card reader, that’s just a USB dongle that you can insert the SD card into a USB type A. this is the one I bought: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07G5JV2B5/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1. Some computers and laptops have them built in so check (again, I don’t know anything about Macs).

    If you have the ability, back up your image and that way you have a way to restore everything if you mess something up. That’s how I’ve learned most of this, trial and error. You should really do this anyways with a new SD card cause like Russ states in many videos, the ones they come with are prone to failure. So a good Samsung or Sandisk SD and then write the image and have the original as a backup backup, if that makes sense.

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  7. The link to a better Big Won controller is wrong – it doesn’t link to a wireless Elitist S controller, but to a wired Rainbow controller, which doesn’t work on the Super Console X King :/ Had to find out the hard way. Hopefully the R90 adapter makes it work?

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    1. Sorry about that, it looks like they changed their listing and replaced it with the Rainbow controller — I made that guide/link months before the Rainbow controller even released. Yes the R90 will allow it to work on your SCX King.

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  9. I have the super console x king with the 256 gb micro but when i put it in my aspire laptop it shows empty folders. So how can i add games. what am i missing

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    1. When I put my 256GB into computer, it tries to open 3 drives (I think).
      2 open, 1 says it needs to format. NEVER format that, just cancel, close, ignore.
      The other two drives are:
      EMUELEC
      EEROMS
      The EEROMS is filled with subdirectories for all the roms for the systems.
      I drop correct formatted games into those and they show up in X KING system.

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  10. anyone know of a good FORUM for this unit? or maybe this here is it?

    trying to learn how to save the MAME Video settings for all games instead of having to adjust them each time. i dug through many menus, and tried to find info online, but not figuring it out yet. any help here? I want to turn off a couple enhancements for good.

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  11. There are subreddits for ROMS and retrogaming as well as single board gaming (listed as SBCgaming) They are pretty helpful IMO if you are stuck on something they usually have an answer. If you can’t get an answer there you could also try Launch Box’s forums I suppose (shameless plug for a product I do not have stake in, I just love them)

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  12. Hello

    I was wondering if I could plug the 2TB hardrive into the SXC King and would it work? As in could I play everything on the harddrive using the SXC King? Or would I need to use something else to run the hardrive?

    Thanks

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  15. I purchased a ‘super console x king’… I am bran-new to ‘aliExpress’ and how it works. I noticed the link in your ‘Super Console X King review’ video takes you to the AliExpress:”Unique Enjoyment Store”, but i bought mine from the “Kinhank Global Store”… Both have roughly same positive feedback and time since started…… Is it good/ok that i ordered it from the ‘K.G.S.’?
    Also, i ordered the BeTop D2E wired controller, since it was on sale from their store… Hopefully that’s a good one

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  16. When transferring/backing up your SD Card if you don’t do it right away and already have game saves and data, when you do it will it transfer and back up all that too?

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  17. I bought a good/reputable SD Card(the same size as other) to back up my S.C.X.King. Are there any videos to, or any explanations of how to easily and safely backup everything so i can use the better ‘SanDisk’ card that i bought? Idk if it’s considered “Cloning”? I know above it says to “make an image…Flash the card”… Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

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    1. You need an imaging software (Win32 or something like it) you would then READ the image you want to back up and then you have the image file. Make sure you add “.img” when saving it. They’re large, the size of the SD you’re using so they take up space but it’s worth it, especially the bios, being backed up. The principles Russ goes over in this video are the same. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZfgRavEOl4&ab_channel=RetroGameCorps

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  18. In ‘WinDiskImager’ I selected the ‘F’ drive and where to save it and named it “.img”, but got the “error 5” anytime i tried to “read” the ‘F-drive’. Tried everything, and the only solution was selecting the ‘E-drive’… Is that ok?(there were 2 options ‘E&F’) Please lmk asap anyone, thank you for the help.

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    1. So your drives assigned letter varies. You need to read the drive with the image you’re copying. Then write to the drive with the new SD card in there. Be CAREFUL. If you write to the wrong drive, you’ll erase everything. In the past, I just make a copy of the image to my computer then write that to the new card. That way you have the original in case something screws up.

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  19. Do you have to un-plug & re-plug the power cable every time you want to turn the ‘S.C.X.King’ on? If so, should I leave the power-cord plugged in when the device is off?

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  21. When mapping a controller(one that has a “mode” button like the ps3 knockoff controllers the ‘S.C.X. King’ comes with) Should you set the “mode” button as the “Hot Key”???

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  22. I recently got a ‘S.C.X. King’ and am liking it, but a handful of the games I want to play aren’t on there or are but are in a different language… I’m not very computer smart, and I know in the video he said he can’t suggest where to get the game/roms from. I just figured i’d try asking the group in case anyone can suggest where i should look or start. If not, i understand. Thanks

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