Editing Sega CD (section)

==History==
===Development===
Soon after the [[Sega Mega Drive]] was launched in 1988, [[Sega]] began creating a CD-ROM add-on. In addition to relatively short loading times, it was planned to implement features similar to that of Sega's arcade systems.

The Mega Drive's processor was too slow to handle the Sega CD's new graphical capabilities, and thus an additional CPU was incorporated into the add-on. This second CPU was clocked at a speed of 12.5MHz, faster than the regular 7.67MHz CPU in the Mega Drive. The Sega CD's RAM access speed was initially too slow to run programs effectively, and the developers had to focus on increasing the speed. [[Sega/Sega of America|Sega of America]] was not informed of the project details until mid-1991, being given just preliminary technical documents earlier in the year. The American staff were frustrated by the Sega CD's construction, with games requiring more data than the CD drive was designed to provide.

===Launch===
[[Sega]] announced the release of the Mega-CD in Japan in June 1991 at the Tokyo Toy Show. It was later titled the "Sega CD" for North America's scheduled release of 1992. It launched in Japan on 12 December 1991 for ¥49,800.<ref name="segafp"/> North America would see a release on 15 October 1992 for $299.99 USD<ref name="RetroinspectionCD"/> and Europe received the console add-on in April 1993,<ref name="UK"/> starting with the United Kingdom on 2 April 1993.<ref name="UK"/> Initial sales were good, although third-party game development suffered due to Sega taking a long time to release dev-kits. This resulted in only two games being released at launch and only five more put out in the first year of sales.

Sega released a second model, titled the "Mega-CD 2", on 23 April 1993 in Japan<ref name="segamcd2"/> and in June of the same year for North America, though called the "Sega CD 2".<ref name="allgame"/> Europe would, once again, see the latest release of the peripheral, with it debuting in September 1993.<ref name="cvg"/> Designed to bring down the cost of the peripheral, this model featured a spring-loaded lid instead of the CD tray.

===Decline===
The Sega CD saw dwindling sales in all regions by the end of 1993. With Sega shifting its focus to the [[Sega Saturn]] in 1995, the advertising for the [[Sega Mega Drive]] and its add-ons was discontinued, thus ending the life of the Sega CD.