GP32, and it's near future?


Muzzaro

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Hi, after finding the GP32 on Lik Sang site, and doing some research it seems this is much much more than a better designed GBA (which I own). I was thinking about getting a flash cart for the GBA so I could play some emulator games, but it seems this machine does much much more than the GBA in both emulation and also music/vids/file storage.

The only thing that kinda deters me from purchasing it asap, is it's future.

Many of the posts i've read so far have said that the company producing these machines are not very organised. Also, that they have stopped production, and couldn't come to an agreement to bring them to Europe (and possibly the UK where I reside). There is rumors of a GP64, or GP32 II, which I think was said in some post, that the company have said will be scheduled for 2007, but considering it's limited official support in hardware and software, and that the only thing holding this thing above water is the fanbase, is it worth getting? I looked at the Zodiac too, barring it's ram and graphics (and buttons) it seems to be a GP32 with a purpose, and for the price I'd probably be better with the GP32, as I prefer 2d games to all these 3d things (I have a DC, PS1 and PC and GBA for flashy 3d games).

The other thing is, it seems that people are trying to get around the hardware limitations, by expanding them. Upgrading the 8mb ram with 32mbs, some talk of upgrading the ARM processor etc. Personally I think it's amazing, that people have got to the point where they would say "Ah hit it's limits, toss it and find a new machine", and instead are ready to install a new limit onto it, but the thing that really is a downfall in my eyes, is the buttons. 2 regular, 2 shoulder. 2 buttons less than a SNES, which seems to be the golden emulation that everyone is trying to hit. Zodiac seems to have hit this problem well, even getting a thumbs up by Sega, who want to put their genesis games onto it. Would it be possible then, seeing people are messing with the insides of the machine, to somehow tag an extra button or three onto the machine? Yep I know this calls for drastic electronics, and possibly can't be done, but more buttons would give rise to better gameplay, when the SNES emulator hits it's peak. The other way, I thought would be could it be possible to make some sort of shell, that plugs into the GP32 port, and adds those extra buttons needed? I remember there was devices for the original gameboy that turned it into some kind of base-station, but then the downfall would be, the GP32 would be even chunkier, and also where to place the buttons, so that people have good access to them.

Sorry for the long post. I'm not an 'impuse' buyer, and to me the cost of a GP32 FLU is alot (currently a uni student), but the idea of programming for this machine does make me think about buying it.
 
the buttons arn't a big deal the snes emulator allows you to change the button configuration. Most games don't use all six buttons and it has support to allow multipul button presses to equal the buttons you're missing. It works much better than you would think and you won't miss the buttons once you start playing with it. As for video amd mp3 it just flat out rocks. They have not stoped production of it and game park is alive and well. They have tried twice to bring it to europe and both times their distibutor has droped it for one reason or another. That is not a reason to be hesitent to purchase one. If you get a gp32 the offical software support should not be somthing to even really concider. There are a small handfull of offical games and even a smaller handfull of those that are accutally playable due to lack of english support or that fact that a lot of them are crap. Don't get me wrong you might find three or four games that you would really enjoy but thats not where the gp32 really shines. The emulators are really well done as well as the ports. This is pretty much the heart and the sole of the system at this point and it has been a very creative and busy scene. If you dig retro games like the nes, pc engine, game gear and want to listen to mp3's and watch divx movies go for it you won't regret it. The zodiac has much more potential but is far more expensive and works as a pda as well. Its downfall is the price if you can afford it go for it. If not go for the gp32, just keep in mind what you get is going to be much diffrent than what you get out of your gba but thats a good thing. Tne GBA is good for recent stuff and is more plug and play the gp32 requires a little messing with but its not to tough to get going and is really a retro gamers machine.
 
Well I adore the older games. At the moment I have quite a few of the older consoles, but it's a pain with the cartridge purchasing, care, and then each time you slot one in, you dunno what damage is happening to the contacts. I have 70+ games on my older consoles together, but are too scared of playing most of them incase I damage them, so a machine like this would be a godsend (just a shame it doesn't do SNES well, some of the best games are on SNES).

I'm just wary about buying consoles, to find it's a holy ship, and not in the godly sense. I picked up my DC, and two weeks later, Sega announced they were not producing anymore, and it died. Same with my N64, I bought that, the month before the last ever game was produced.

The only thing that gets me is, can the machine only read up to 128mb of SMC, or do SMC only produce 128mb max? I thought there was a 256mb version hanging around, as I was pricing them up for my digital camera.

Also, can I flick out my digicam SMC into a GP32 and view the pictures?
 
la la la la
i usually answer such novel-length posts with novel-length posts of my own, and your general attitude and conceers remind me of my own when I was investigating buying this machine. anyway, I am npt in th emood ot go over all the usual pro's and cons, so I will cut right to the chase..

GP32 is an exellent machine for emulation. it's far from perfect, it's past/present/future has always been idiosyncratically sketchy (which is frustrating) and it seems just SHY of being as pwoerful as we'd all like to think it could be. That all being said, I play it almost daily since I got it nearly a year ago and my GBA does little more than gather dust anymore. There's just too many games that run (quite) well enough on this machine and it's a world of difference between the GBA's emu capabilities.

Commercial scene? sucks.
MP3 player and divx player? Never used.
Frustration over SNES/Mame/Genesis issues? Usually.

But if development stopped altogether tomorrow, I would never worry about getting bored with it. Plenty of games that I have wanted are playable on it (well-playable) for many systems (SNES included - yes, 156MHz overlocked, but still) Pc-Engine emulation sold me on it, everything else has been icing on the cake.

Give it a shot, I don't think you'll regret it. It's just affordable enough to be worth it (otherwise, just keep waiting a few more yeras perhaps for something cheaper + better. But why wait!)

If you are disappointed at the end of the day, there's always ebay. Sure you'd lose some cash in the end but like I said, very worth the gamble in my opinion. (whew - this was the SHORT version!) And there's still some surprises coming around the corner for ol' GP32, yet!
 
The GP32 runs on 3.3v SMCs, which top out at 128 MB. 5v SMCs doesn't work (it may not even fit into the SMC slot...)

As for emulators, I'll just copy and paste the list from the front page here:

Atari 2600
Atari 8 Bit
Atari Lynx
Atari ST
Chip 8
Coleco Vision
Commodore Plus 4
Commodore64
Dragon 32/64
Game Boy / GB Color
Java Virtual Machine
M.A.M.E.
Msx1 / Msx2
Multi Emulators
NeoGeo Pocket
Nes
PC Engine
Sega Genesis
SG1000/SC3000
SMS / GameGear
Super Nintendo
Vectrex
WonderSwan / WSColor
ZX Spectrum

It'll be a looooooong time before you run out of things to play on the GP32.

However, as for hardware mods/upgrades:
Necessary? Nope.
Possible? Yup.
Practical? Nope.

For SNES, there's the option of overclocking for more speed. At 156 MHz (normal limit is 133) it's almost 50% faster, nearly double at 172 MHz (The median OCing limit is around 160 MHz...some units are just better than others.)

EDIT: Forgot to mention the DivX playback and MP3 applications. I don't have any complaints with the MP3 playback (having a decent pair of headphones helps, though.) DivX movies look somewhat grainy when heavily compressed, but much improved at higher bitrates (256k+). Playback is 15 FPS by default, but overclocking makes 20 or 24 FPS possible. 16:9 widescreen is also supported.
 
"However, as for hardware mods/upgrades:
Necessary? Nope.
Possible? Yup.
Practical? Nope."

The upgrading is just a "see if I can do this" thing then? Is it possible that it will be needed in the future, and I'll have to send my GP32 off for upgrading, like with GBAs and the afterburner screens? I think someone wrote a news-clippit and was drooling over the added memory, and the possiblity of N64 emulation, but as SNES is only *just* possible now, with speed/sound loss, I doubt the N64 could be emulated without some drastic cutdowns. (Mario 64.... 2D! Looks like MarioWorld, But it's not!) Personally I'm for the hardware upgrading, because it sets a new limit. If the ARM processor and ram can be upgraded, then maybe the SNES emulators can run at 80-90% 'perfect'.

With the Divx and such movie playback, do you need to convert files to something that the GP32 can read? For example, I want to subject people to the horror of watching Sealab 2021 episodes I have, and they normally come down as .avi or .mpg in totally varied sizes to say that each episode is only X amount of time long. Also the Average file size as is, is about 115mbs in size, with the obvious deviation. If I need to convert files, will it also compress too, or am I stuck to putting 1 episode per 128mb SMC?
 
Don't worry about upgrading the memory. Right now, no emulator or program currently supports it, or has reason to. Just be aware it exists, and there might be some emulators enhanced or previously thought impossible implemented. But give up on N64 <_<

If you can look past 16-bits, then the GP32 will be all you need. Most of what makes it shine in the emulator department is 8-bits (Castaway not included because not many actually had an Atari ST), though some of those games will make you wonder exactly what's so great about the 8 extra bits.

As for movies, one episode of Sealab 2021 will probably take up ~25MB of space converted properly to the DivX format (specially encoded AVI). Cartoons and anime take up the least amount of space because you can get away with a lower frame rate without really effecting the quality.
 
Some of the best software ever was produced on 8bit, and the fact it emulates the ST (the first 'main' computer I had, that DIDNT have a cassette tape drive) is even better. Elite 2 Frontier, time to clock up more years of my life :lol:

The thing I am wondering about, is would this machine ever get a keyboard? The fact that I have to spend laptop money to get it, if there was a keyboard and some sort of note-pad program on the GP32, would be even better. (long story short, I suffer with dire handwriting from way back in school when they taught that 'right is right' and left handedness is wroooong, so I'm trying to save up for a laptop for uni, but my loan of £500 just doesn't cut it, when most decent lappys are £700-£799.)
Even more cool if someone managed to adapt one of those fold out, or roll out keyboards for it.

And even better with the encoding. Where do I get the programs to decode/encode the movies into a format the GP32 likes though, are they on this site, or...?

Thanks :)
 
I'm in almost the same situatuion as Muzzaro, gott a GBA Sp with some great games but also want a GP32. I'm also a poor student and maybe have to sell my Gba Sp to afford a Gp32!

The thing is that I just can't look behind the 16-bits emus and games. If there was a nearly perfect SNES emu I would sell my Gba and buy a GP32 right away! Can someone tell me if a fullspeed (non overclocked) SNES/Genesis emu is under development or just will be released in the near future? Gotta know!

It's not just the 16-bit gams I want to play. I'm also intrested in the Mp3 / divx support and a few SMS and Nes games (Sonic and Mario ;). Also want some comercial games.

I'm confused, really want to believe that 16-bit emulations will hapend in the near future and I'm trying to convince my self that the Mp3/divx and 8bit support is enuogh but it's hard. Can't just buy one for test when my economy are so thight. Sorry for my long 'answer' and crappy english, I'm just a confused Sweeed ;)
 
I know your pain Menion. This £500 I have in the bank is burning holes in my pocket, normally I only get £20 a week at the most. So if I do get this machine, I'll have to spend 6-7 weeks recovering the money, which is fun when christmas is around the corner. Also I really need a laptop to type notes on in lectures, or I'm going to fail Uni.

Gah. Decisions... GP32... playing Chew Man Fu again on PCE... if only the GP32 had a keyboard and word processor, that would *seeeeal ze deeeeal* :p
 
The GP32 is a fine machine, like you i am at Uni and i have used my overdraft to buy a GP32 and to be honist its well worth it.

The machine is worth the asking price to play classics like R Type and Wonderboy on the PC Engine alone.

The community from what i have seen is made up of some very strong people that are not about to turn their backs on the console so their will be plenty games to play for the next few years at least.

If anything i would say the GP32 is picking up now as the home brew peps get use to coding for the system.

However i would reccomend you get a FLU console i would be lost without FLU on my machine.

If you are looking for a place to buy then www.gbax.com is a great place, i bought my console there and they have been very very helpfull.
 
And even better with the encoding. Where do I get the programs to decode/encode the movies into a format the GP32 likes though, are they on this site, or...?

There are various tutorials around to help with encoding. The software you'll want is VirtualDub.

The thing I am wondering about, is would this machine ever get a keyboard? The fact that I have to spend laptop money to get it, if there was a keyboard and some sort of note-pad program on the GP32, would be even better. (long story short, I suffer with dire handwriting from way back in school when they taught that 'right is right' and left handedness is wroooong, so I'm trying to save up for a laptop for uni, but my loan of £500 just doesn't cut it, when most decent lappys are £700-£799.)
Even more cool if someone managed to adapt one of those fold out, or roll out keyboards for it.

Maybe, but I wouldn't expect anything this year. The programs that require a keyboard, like the text editor kEditor, does have keyboard emulation which I think works just as well. I have used PDA-style keyboards and found them woefully inadequate...but I have big hands, so maybe those with smaller hands would have better luck. Really, it depends on what you want the GP32 for...if you want to play games, it's your thing. If you want to take little notes, I've found kEditor works fine. If you want to write three pages of notes, although I think a PDA keyboard would still be insufficient, I also have to admit that definately would the GP32.
 
Sup? Turds Listen. Do most of you (the ones asking the questions) use the search function on this Forum. Because these questions have been asked SO MANY TIMES, to the pt that now i can even answer, and I haven't even recieved my gp32 yet (still waiting for lik-sang's azz to get it to me). I know I've posted a few noob questions in the past, but i took 90% them back when i realized that they have been answered before and shut my mouth. Basically ppl u buy it or u don't. Don't let someone else make ur mind of for you. We aren't your parents.

READ READ READ READ READ. Reading is your best friend, I realize that now...

-Matt (...can't stop going to Explode...!!!)

I wonder If I'll get the "Biggest gp32x.de Asshole" award this month... we'll see
 
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Well actually, Gorillazero, I do have another question ;P

I do need a laptop for uni, the problem is, is it worth purchasing both, seeing a laptop can do everything a GP32 can do, and more? :lol:
 
there is no way you can possibly compare a laptop and a gp32, laptops nowadays have the same specs as good desktop pcs and therefore can play every game on the gp32 and every game for the pc, but do you really want to be playing your laptop on a bus or in the shitter? i dont think so.
 
I do need a laptop for uni, the problem is, is it worth purchasing both, seeing a laptop can do everything a GP32 can do, and more?

Eh? A GP32 FLU costs $240 w/ one 128MB SMC. A decent laptop, if you can FIND it, costs $500. I think you're dating yourself if you think you can find a decent laptop w/ battery (many older used laptops have dead batteries which cost upwards ~$100 to replace).

Besides that, a GP32 FLU can fit inside your pocket. Try THAT with a laptop.

do you really want to be playing your laptop on a bus or in the shitter? i dont think so.

Well, why else do you think I got a laptop?
 
I know, general. The thing is, I *need* a laptop for uni. I've got problems with my hand-writing, such that I can't take notes properly, so I'm getting behind in lessons. However people dun want to read sob-stories.

I do want both... it's just I was thinking for an hour or so, that if I got a PC joypad, maybe I could satify my emulation needs with just the laptop. Then again, if I get mugged, or my hardware gets damaged, its easier to replace a GP32 than it is to replace a laptop.

I will get one. Just, I need the laptop first, but I should have a GP32 before christmas. And I can always use the laptop for my MAME emulation, and leave the 8-16bit to the GP32.
 
True, very true. Sometimes I use my own laptop more then I use my desktop computer nowadays - it's irreplacable. It was also damn expensive for a student like me, so I wrap it in bubble wrap and carry it in a backpack with a special laptop compartment (I broke my first laptop from improper handling).

If I had to choose between a laptop now or a GP32 now (assuming I had neither), I must admit that I would also pick the laptop.
 
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