SNES consoles face gameplay issues due to inconsistent hardware

The TASBot community has found that Super NES consoles are not operating consistently due to a cheap ceramic resonator in the Audio Processing Unit (APU). This causes variations in the expected clock rates, affecting gameplay output. While Nintendo's documentation states the APU should run at a steady rate, real-world factors like heat and age lead to inconsistencies. This results in higher pitch sounds for casual players but creates significant issues for TASBot's precise speedruns. Allan Cecil from TASBot first identified the APU's impact in 2016. He discovered that his console's APU ran faster than specified, leading to unpredictable lag frames and desynchronization between actual hardware and emulators.