The Icon Bar: The Playpen: Over the summer V: Oh god not another Rocky movie
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Over the summer V: Oh god not another Rocky movie |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79513, posted by tlsa at 07:48, 30/8/2006, in reply to message #79511 |
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Cool. 
Could the Cyclone changes be given back to the original author?
[Edited by tlsa at 08:49, 30/8/2006] |
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Adrian Lees |
Message #79518, posted by adrianl at 10:53, 30/8/2006, in reply to message #79513 |
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Cool.
Could the Cyclone changes be given back to the original author? The changes are too small to bother feeding them back just yet, but if I make any more extensive changes, I will.
TBH, this is the first CPU interpreter that I've come across that I've liked. It's really rather good (at least, given the constraints of 68K decoding). As you've seen reflected in its performance.
Of course, if the MegaDrive actually runs code from ROM, then it could be much faster still 
Edit: I think much of the time is being spent processing pixel data, though, since the MegaDrive had custom hardware for overlaying sprites according to the info you posted earlier.
[Edited by adrianl at 11:59, 30/8/2006] |
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richard cheng |
Message #79520, posted by richcheng at 11:36, 30/8/2006, in reply to message #79185 |
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I am excited about this! I will try it when I get home tonight. Crapping hell, I forgot. Tonight!
Holy crapple I forgot again! Tuesday!
I rememebered! Tried it last night. I can now use NetSurf to surf the web slowly at 800x600x256cols on the iBook in bed over wifi! Awesome! No longer do I have to put up with stupid Safari/Firefox/Camino! Great work, Phlamey!
Can't use Oregano2 though. It won't let me type anything into the URL bar or forms on pages?
Also, I think it *may* have killed my Iyonix overnight. I couldn't VNC in this morning, and I can't connect to my webserver at the mo. More details later on when I get home. |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79538, posted by tlsa at 14:03, 30/8/2006, in reply to message #79518 |
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The changes are too small to bother feeding them back just yet, but if I make any more extensive changes, I will. OK, cool.
TBH, this is the first CPU interpreter that I've come across that I've liked. It's really rather good (at least, given the constraints of 68K decoding). As you've seen reflected in its performance.  I've tested lots of ROMs now, and they all seem to run fast enough at 100% scale. Most action type games show someone else playing the game if you wait a while at the title screen. I've tried a few RPGs like Phantasy Star III and IV, but they just show story information, not in-game action.
Of course, if the Megadrive actually runs code from ROM, then it could be much faster still 
I think much of the time is being spent processing pixel data, though, since the Megadrive had custom hardware for overlaying sprites according to the info you posted earlier. OK.
Edit: Vectorman works!
Also, this site has reviews of lots of Megadrive games.
[Edited by tlsa at 15:17, 30/8/2006] |
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Adrian Lees |
Message #79562, posted by adrianl at 10:40, 31/8/2006, in reply to message #79538 |
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Updated: http://adrian.aemulor.com/downloads/picow.zip
Set your ROM images to type &57d (temporary) and double-click or drag them into !PicoDrive's dummy window. It still draws top left for now, plays slightly garbled audio through DigitalRenderer (coz I haven't sized the buffers etc etc), multitasks (you can switch this off by pressing Space when the windows has focus) plus fixes a couple of APCS violations that  either didn't know about or hoped he could get away with
Edit: oh, you want to be in a 32K mode to get decent speed atm.
- where are you btw, or rather for how long?
[Edited by adrianl at 11:45, 31/8/2006] |
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Phil Mellor |
Message #79563, posted by monkeyson2 at 10:46, 31/8/2006, in reply to message #79562 |
 Please don't let them make me be a monkey butler
Posts: 12380
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Updated: http://adrian.aemulor.com/downloads/picow.zip
Set your ROM images to type &57d (temporary) and double-click or drag them into !PicoDrive's dummy window. It still draws top left for now, plays slightly garbled audio through DigitalRenderer (coz I haven't sized the buffers etc etc), multitasks (you can switch this off by pressing Space when the windows has focus) plus fixes a couple of APCS violations that either didn't know about or hoped he could get away with
- where are you btw? Still at his parents? Maybe they don't have any internets. |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79564, posted by tlsa at 10:50, 31/8/2006, in reply to message #79562 |
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That fixes the Sonic 2 graphics corruption in the levels.
Also, the keys are:
Cursor keys: directional control (d-pad).
S, D and F: the main 3 buttons (called A, B and C)
Z, X and C: the extra three buttons on 6 button pads (called X, Y and Z)
Return: Start button |
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Adrian Lees |
Message #79567, posted by adrianl at 11:37, 31/8/2006, in reply to message #79564 |
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Z, X and C: the extra three buttons on 6 button pads (called X, Y and Z) Actually, those ones aren't mapped like that. I'm not sure how your description of the pad's buttons maps onto the two pads in the emulated hardware; the hardware seems to have two pads each with SABC+directions but nothing else. |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79569, posted by tlsa at 11:57, 31/8/2006, in reply to message #79567 |
Posts: 1097
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Actually, those ones aren't mapped like that. I'm not sure how your description of the pad's buttons maps onto the two pads in the emulated hardware; the hardware seems to have two pads each with SABC+directions but nothing else. Oh, ok. I hadn't tried Street Fighter yet.
It must only support the original 3 button joypads then. Most games just use the three buttons anyway.
I've noticed that the Sonic 2 levels are still corrupt, if you leave it to go into attract mode at the title screen, but they are OK when you actually play the game. |
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Adrian Lees |
Message #79664, posted by adrianl at 00:21, 2/9/2006, in reply to message #79569 |
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For anybody who hasn't got bored of this yet, the hedgehog-racing tool has now been DMA-accelerated. |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79667, posted by tlsa at 07:17, 2/9/2006, in reply to message #79664 |
Posts: 1097
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Wow, this one's a smidgen too fast in 16bpp.
I'd like to make a picodrive.acornarcade.com with details, screenshots, some game reviews and compatibilty info.
*tlsa prods * |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79685, posted by tlsa at 18:18, 2/9/2006, in reply to message #79667 |
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I'd like to make a picodrive.acornarcade.com with details, screenshots, some game reviews and compatibilty info. I've made a logo!
[Edited by tlsa at 19:19, 2/9/2006] |
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van Engelen Thomas |
Message #79687, posted by highlandcattle at 18:43, 2/9/2006, in reply to message #79685 |
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Posts: 78
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This is all looking very nice! What are the min specs for the Mega Drive emulator??
Not that I will use it since my actual mega drive is probably my busiest console! |
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Phil Mellor |
Message #79688, posted by monkeyson2 at 19:04, 2/9/2006, in reply to message #79687 |
Please don't let them make me be a monkey butler
Posts: 12380
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Would this be compatible with a USB joypad? (possibly requiring !HID?) |
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Adrian Lees |
Message #79692, posted by adrianl at 20:07, 2/9/2006, in reply to message #79688 |
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Would this be compatible with a USB joypad? (possibly requiring !HID?) Not yet, but supporting ye olde Joystick module would be trivial, and I guess HID/whatever should provide that API for compatibility with other games.*
* Yes, I know, both of them. |
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van Engelen Thomas |
Message #79708, posted by highlandcattle at 13:55, 3/9/2006, in reply to message #79692 |
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Posts: 78
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Why not simply use this:
http://ian.jeffray.co.uk/riscos/joypad/
Naturally using an original Sega pad would be better |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79710, posted by tlsa at 14:10, 3/9/2006, in reply to message #79708 |
Posts: 1097
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Why not simply use this:
http://ian.jeffray.co.uk/riscos/joypad/
Naturally using an original Sega pad would be better "It won't work on an Iyonix as the module's only 26bit and the Iyonix doesn't have a parallel port anyway"
I have one of those interfaces of the RiscPC, but I don't use it any more. The USB joypads I've tried have worked fine on the Iyonix, with HID. StarFighter 3000 supports the joystick interface thing. |
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van Engelen Thomas |
Message #79717, posted by highlandcattle at 16:32, 3/9/2006, in reply to message #79710 |
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rats! |
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Adrian Lees |
Message #79769, posted by adrianl at 11:16, 4/9/2006, in reply to message #79717 |
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Latest version works on A9home too now and includes further speed ups that make it playable in 32bpp modes too. RiscPC version to follow, perhaps tonight.
Also, it'd be useful to know what sort of screen size/resizing behaviour people want. The native screen resolution is 320 x 224, give or take, so it's very easy and fast for the CPU to do x1 and x2 scaling. In fact there's general scaling code in that binary (and it even works in 32bpp modes if you press Ctrl-I on the A9home) but it's not fast. Perhaps we need to do something smarter like conditional refresh of the screen.
On the Iyonix we can potentially use the graphics card to resize the image to full-screen rather than require the monitor to run in a low resolution mode (or with large black borders). On earlier machines it's more tricky.
What about window resizing? Always scale to fit window, keeping aspect ratio perhaps? Or lose the resize button and just have a x1/x2 toggle? |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79771, posted by tlsa at 11:50, 4/9/2006, in reply to message #79769 |
Posts: 1097
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Latest version works on A9home too now and includes further speed ups that make it playable in 32bpp modes too. RiscPC version to follow, perhaps tonight. Great! Sonic's getting a bit too fast now. It definatly needs some kind of speed throttle. Also, hopefully to make the desktop more usable while it's running.
Also, it'd be useful to know what sort of screen size/resizing behaviour people want. The native screen resolution is 320 x 224, give or take, so it's very easy and fast for the CPU to do x1 and x2 scaling. I think it would be best to have the window toggle between 320x240 and 640x480 and black borders could pad out the rest of the window. Or maybe it could be scaled to fill the rest of the window (as the display is meant to be 4:3).
In fact there's general scaling code in that binary (and it even works in 32bpp modes if you press Ctrl-I on the A9home) but it's not fast. Perhaps we need to do something smarter like conditional refresh of the screen. When I tried Ctrl+I on the Iyonix, it increased the height but didn't fill out to the full width. (See screenshot.)
When you run PicoDrive without a ROM, the title screen image isn't aligned with the top left og the image at the top left of the window - it's partly outside the window.
On the Iyonix we can potentially use the graphics card to resize the image to full-screen rather than require the monitor to run in a low resolution mode (or with large black borders). On earlier machines it's more tricky.
What about window resizing? Always scale to fit window, keeping aspect ratio perhaps? Or lose the resize button and just have a x1/x2 toggle? I don't think the window needs to be resizable with window furnature. It would look poor at anything other than 100%, 200%, 300%, etc without smooth scalling anyway. If it was to be made a resizable window, it should lock the aspect ratio, like KinoAMP can.
When I pause a game with START, the screen isn't updated in most games but the desktop is still really slow. Is there anyway way emulation could be paused altogether, so that the desktop remains usable? Maybe it could happen automatically if another window gets input focus.
PicoDrive needs to be able to save progress to make it useful for RPGs like the Phantasy Star series and Shining Force.
Anyway, it's really awesome, thanks! |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79773, posted by tlsa at 12:08, 4/9/2006, in reply to message #79771 |
Posts: 1097
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Oh yeah, it would be good to have an option to toggle the sound on and off. Sound doesn't work in games like Sonic 2 but while the emulator is running DigitalCD stops making any sound so I can't play an MP3 or anything.
Could it use SharedSound or something, so other apps can make noises while PicoDrive is running?
[Edited by tlsa at 13:31, 4/9/2006] |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79801, posted by tlsa at 20:44, 4/9/2006, in reply to message #79688 |
Posts: 1097
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Would this be compatible with a USB joypad? (possibly requiring !HID?) The latest version is. I can use the digital d-pad or the left analogue stick for control. |
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Adrian Lees |
Message #79811, posted by adrianl at 03:12, 5/9/2006, in reply to message #79801 |
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Further speed ups to the Iyonix version and an all-new RiscPC and A9home version. The Iyonix build will run on the A9home in 16 million colour modes, but not 32K.
A9home and RiscPC both render only every other frame, to get better performance, though the A9home's DMA channels can be probably be used to render every frame at a later date.
Oh, and if you want to run this on a RiscPC you'll definitely need a StrongARM and a 32K colour mode. Sorry, I don't think it's very practical to make it run(/walk) on earlier CPUs.
Other notes in the ReadMe file. |
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Mag. Erhard F. |
Message #79814, posted by schwarzygesetzlos at 07:17, 5/9/2006, in reply to message #79811 |
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I must say I am very amazed by this emulator! One of the rarer ones that give 'real' emulator feeling (like VICE) because of the speed! My favourite games Golden Axe 1-3 and Sonic run very smoothly and playable.
Could it be that the speed of the emulation is tied to the framerate, or am I wrong?
I think to get the best emulator-feeling, a fullscreen output would be good (perhaps at 640x480, or 320x240?), and speed throttling so one can be sure it alway runs approx. 100% the speed of a real MegaDrive
Don't think that scaling is a big issue - like Michael said, it looks bad on anything other than 100%, 200%, etc. |
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Adrian Lees |
Message #79820, posted by adrianl at 11:04, 5/9/2006, in reply to message #79814 |
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I must say I am very amazed by this emulator! One of the rarer ones that give 'real' emulator feeling (like VICE) because of the speed! The interpreter core is more efficient than most.
Could it be that the speed of the emulation is tied to the framerate, or am I wrong? The emulator runs a fixed number of 68K CPU cycles (that's the main CPU of the MegaDrive), then displays a frame, so the two are kept in-step. I then drop every other frame on the A9home/RiscPC.
I think to get the best emulator-feeling, a fullscreen output would be good (perhaps at 640x480, or 320x240?) Of course, and it's planned. It'd be very easy to achieve 320x240 output currently; the work of a few minutes to update the code. However, larger screen resolutions may not be possible on the RiscPC (which I assume you're using, since you've just joined the discussion) because of the amount of the data the processor has to move; it's emulating some complex graphics hardware to give an output data rate that's basically the same as playing a video. |
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Mag. Erhard F. |
Message #79834, posted by schwarzygesetzlos at 19:55, 5/9/2006, in reply to message #79820 |
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I think to get the best emulator-feeling, a fullscreen output would be good (perhaps at 640x480, or 320x240?) Of course, and it's planned. It'd be very easy to achieve 320x240 output currently; the work of a few minutes to update the code. However, larger screen resolutions may not be possible on the RiscPC (which I assume you're using, since you've just joined the discussion) because of the amount of the data the processor has to move; it's emulating some complex graphics hardware to give an output data rate that's basically the same as playing a video.Nope, I'm using it on my Iyonix. ;-) But will try the RiscPC port too. Emulatorwise I am very exacting in terms of speed and compatibility, so there are not much emulators on Iyonix usable for me. There are only VICE, ScummVM and DosBOX which are really usable I think. And now there's Picodrive too, with an excellent sellection of games! Peter Naulls quick 32bit-port of snes9x unfortunately doesn't really work on my iyonix and the older 26bit one doesn't run stable or fast under Aemulor.
Glad to hear that a 320x240 fullscreenmode isn't much work! The emulation feeling is MUCH better in fullscreen IMHO! Could you perhaps implement a FPS-counter oder speedmeter too? Don't know how fast the games do run on an original Megadrive but they seem too fast on the Iyonix for me.
It's a pity that the Z80 emulation isn't really implemented in the source code now, so no sound for many games at the moment... But compared to the rest of Picodrives performance it's a minor annoyance. |
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ninjah |
Message #79843, posted by ninj at 13:34, 6/9/2006, in reply to message #79811 |
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Excellent stuff. Just got the latest version running on my Risc PC. It runs very well, although the window gets drawn the wrong size.
The previous version was able to boot on my machine, but complained that I have no 16-bit sound when running a game. Now it just stays schtum, which is a big improvement.
Oh, and if you want to run this on a RiscPC you'll definitely need a StrongARM and a 32K colour mode. Is that a typo? It only works in 32b modes, right?
A9home and RiscPC both render only every other frame, to get better performance, though the A9home's DMA channels can be probably be used to render every frame at a later date.
It's hard to say how fast it's running on my machine at present. Clearly it's not running at the original 50/60Hz - you're dropping frames. It feels slightly slower than the real thing, but it's hard to tell.
Anyway, it's really impressive to see MD games running so well on my old hardware. |
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Mag. Erhard F. |
Message #79844, posted by schwarzygesetzlos at 13:49, 6/9/2006, in reply to message #79843 |
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Oh, and if you want to run this on a RiscPC you'll definitely need a StrongARM and a 32K colour mode. Is that a typo? It only works in 32b modes, right?
It works in 32K and 16M modes, which means 16b and 32b. ;-)
It's hard to say how fast it's running on my machine at present. Clearly it's not running at the original 50/60Hz - you're dropping frames. It feels slightly slower than the real thing, but it's hard to tell.
On Iyonix it runs way too fast in 32.768 colour modes, and IMHO still a bit too fast in 16mio truecolour modes. At least on the games I tried, I had that impression. So it's not too bad after all, that you've got an older machine.
On the other side my reactions could be pathetically slow, and so I only got the subjective impression of the games running too fast. ;-) |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79850, posted by tlsa at 15:16, 6/9/2006, in reply to message #79843 |
Posts: 1097
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Oh, and if you want to run this on a RiscPC you'll definitely need a StrongARM and a 32K colour mode. Is that a typo? It only works in 32b modes, right?
No, it's faster in 32 thousand colours than in 16 million colours. |
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Michael Drake |
Message #79857, posted by tlsa at 16:31, 6/9/2006, in reply to message #79844 |
Posts: 1097
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On Iyonix it runs way too fast in 32.768 colour modes, and IMHO still a bit too fast in 16mio truecolour modes. At least on the games I tried, I had that impression. So it's not too bad after all, that you've got an older machine.
On the other side my reactions could be pathetically slow, and so I only got the subjective impression of the games running too fast. ;-) Yeah, on the Iyonix it runs too fast in 32 thousand colours. In 16 million colours it's a tiny bit too fast but not much.
On a SA RiscPC it runs games quite a bit slower than a real Megadrive, even in 32 thousand colours. It's still playable on a SA though. |
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The Icon Bar: The Playpen: Over the summer V: Oh god not another Rocky movie |
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