Cool Idea For A New Machine

[Squidge]

A lot of PC graphics cards have TV out on them already, but it looks poop; I think that's what he means.

 

[Magus 86]

Yes, I understand that. I know what "looks like bollocks mean," but I was asking for specifics. HOW does the picture look bad? What exactly is wrong with it?

I've seen shitty pictures because the color was messed up. I've also seen blurry pictures and distorted pictures. Simply saying it looks bad is a bit vague.

 

[Dex]

You ask why, but at the same time you all moan f200 and it changing and not having control over the kernel source.
You all go from this project to the next, like head less chickens.
You need to stop talking so much and put yourselfs in control. If you had a open source XBOX like OS, you could code and be in full control. You need to make a open platform that you all control.

If not, do not moan that they change this that and the other.

 

[Squidge]

Yes, I understand that. I know what "looks like bollocks mean," but I was asking for specifics. HOW does the picture look bad? What exactly is wrong with it?

Do we have to explain it all to you? I'm sure you have seen composite video and S-Video outputs before, which is the default for TV output on PC's.

IF not not do not moan that they change this that and the other.

What?

 

[Magus 86]

Yes, I understand that. I know what "looks like bollocks mean," but I was asking for specifics. HOW does the picture look bad? What exactly is wrong with it?

Do we have to explain it all to you? I'm sure you have seen composite video and S-Video outputs before, which is the default for TV output on PC's.


Hey Squidge... See below:
"Just out of curiosity, since I have absolutely no experience even trying to use TV out with any device..."

The above was taken from one of my previous posts.

First of all, excuse me all to hell for asking for specifics. I'm not totally sure what composite video is, but if I had to guess, I'd probably guess you're talking about the thin rectangular plug that splits into 3 cords: a red one and a white one for audio, and a yellow one for video. If you're talking about something different, then no. I have NOT seen either one of those. However, if I'm right, then I've only seen composite video, but only from a videogame console. I haven't seen what it looks like when you connect a PC to a TV using either one of those. And in my experiences with those plugs to play videogames, I see NOTHING wrong with the picture... Therefore, the question still stands. You could have just simply answered my question or left it alone, since it wasn't directed at you in the first place. But no, you had to give me hell for asking a question at all. I'm glad to see how the atmosphere around here has changed so much for the better...

 

[Dex]

IF not not do not moan that they change this that and the other.

What?

Sorry I was in a rush, it should of been :
People should not moan if the company that makes the gp2x, changes stuff so its not 100% compatible with the previous version, but then say what's the point of having a open source ver of the xbox .
The point is, so you have controle over the whole system.

 

[trooper]

Yes, I understand that. I know what "looks like bollocks mean," but I was asking for specifics. HOW does the picture look bad? What exactly is wrong with it?

Do we have to explain it all to you? I'm sure you have seen composite video and S-Video outputs before, which is the default for TV output on PC's.


Hey Squidge... See below:
"Just out of curiosity, since I have absolutely no experience even trying to use TV out with any device..."

The above was taken from one of my previous posts.

First of all, excuse me all to hell for asking for specifics. I'm not totally sure what composite video is, but if I had to guess, I'd probably guess you're talking about the thin rectangular plug that splits into 3 cords: a red one and a white one for audio, and a yellow one for video. If you're talking about something different, then no. I have NOT seen either one of those. However, if I'm right, then I've only seen composite video, but only from a videogame console. I haven't seen what it looks like when you connect a PC to a TV using either one of those. And in my experiences with those plugs to play videogames, I see NOTHING wrong with the picture... Therefore, the question still stands. You could have just simply answered my question or left it alone, since it wasn't directed at you in the first place. But no, you had to give me hell for asking a question at all. I'm glad to see how the atmosphere around here has changed so much for the better...


Composite/Tv-out from a PC does look like crap, Though it does vary from graphic card to graphic card, But mainly you end up with colour bleeding, Zoomed/Magnified display, Very blurry picture and generally a very unstable signal. Vga, Dvi, HDMI etc are definitelly the best options, Especially now that at the very least, Vga is pretty much standard on most new (LCD, Plasma) tv`s.

Trooper

 

[Magus 86]

Well alright then... Thanks for answering my question, trooper.

 

[Squidge]

People should not moan if the company that makes the gp2x, changes stuff so its not 100% compatible with the previous version, but then say what's the point of having a open source ver of the xbox .
The point is, so you have controle over the whole system.

Yes, I agree. The xbox is a kinda standard system so you know if something works on one, it'll work on another. But that only goes so far as standard, commercial games. We all know the xbox ships with different makes and models of cd/dvd drive (which therefore reads recordable cd/dvd's differently), so your point is entirely valid. A fully open source version would hopefully use the same drive so once one person finds a compatible and reliable cd/dvd media, everyone can use the same one.

 

[IcantDeleteThisAccount]

People should not moan if the company that makes the gp2x, changes stuff so its not 100% compatible with the previous version, but then say what's the point of having a open source ver of the xbox .
The point is, so you have controle over the whole system.

Yes, I agree. The xbox is a kinda standard system so you know if something works on one, it'll work on another. But that only goes so far as standard, commercial games. We all know the xbox ships with different makes and models of cd/dvd drive (which therefore reads recordable cd/dvd's differently), so your point is entirely valid. A fully open source version would hopefully use the same drive so once one person finds a compatible and reliable cd/dvd media, everyone can use the same one.


Sorry, been out of town for a bit. The only problem is really simplicity. The gp2x in my opinion is a simple system to just get your games working on. You just drop the folder on the card and bam.. it works. My experience trying to get emulators to work on my xbox has not been fun requiring a bit to much. Maybe I was doing something wrong.. Who knows. I'd just like something that in my opinion is as easy to use as the gp2x but powerful enough to emulate anything as high as a 64. Some reason reminds me of the homebrew scene on the dreamcast. I had a lot of fun playing snes games on there granted they weren't full speed back then.. Though I haven't checked lately to see if maybe it runs better.

 

[Ravnos]

When I installed emulators on my XBox, all I did was drop them in the Emulators folder on my F drive. I don't know what's so difficult about that.

 

[___]

When I installed emulators on my XBox, all I did was drop them in the Emulators folder on my F drive. I don't know what's so difficult about that.

As far as I followed the discussion, the point really is that the xbox needs to be modded first (I did a softmod, others will have to install a chip... for some people this is really a difficult procedure) and there is no real support or guarantee that it will be usable for emulation. Also you have the problem of having to tweak your dvd drive for the xbox to properly read cd-r media. If you happen to get one with a crappy dvd drive you are out of luck though.

Now a console made specifically for homebrew games and emulation, let's say a linux box which boots from a system on a chip flash card (CF maybe?) in a couple of seconds, that is made for open source development would be perfect:
- no hacks of any kind required.
- no fiddling around with dvd drives that refuse to read your discs.
- no legal hassle, everyone can develop emulators and you wouldn't have to aquire them illegally as it is the case with the xbox (xdk is not free to use for anyone so compiled and signed binaries are only available through dark channels)
- no distorted and badly supported tv-out like when you try to connect a computer to the tv. You wouldn't have to fuck around with s-video adapters or similar on older tv-sets but instead just plug in a scart cable.
- lotsa processing power opposed to the gp2x. playstation emulation, n64 and opengl games would be a breeze.
- plug in a 500 gig harddrive to store your stuff on and use it as a ready made game and media center. The xbox with xbmc legally and with a big development scene. a dream come true.

Now, I think there is workarounds. I tried to use an old computer (750 mhz) with tv-out to do something similar. But I stumbled across crappy graphics on the TV and horrible boot times. Also the software was not made for use with a gamepad. This is why I got an xbox in the end. I went through all the hassle of softmodding it, tweaking the dvd drive and now I am able to do lots of the things I wanted. I can see though, that this is too complicated for end-users and also the barrier of the xdk being non-free and all that keeps people from developing. Now obviously this is something completely different as the gp2x. It follows the same concept but is not portable and thus more of a home console which shifts priorities quite a bit. Nice idea though.

 

[Blah]

Indie Game System @ halfbakery <-- my version

 

[thumpgun]

what about a gp2x or gp32 emulator or for windows xp

 

[Blah]

There is a GP32 emulator for Windows, but its not that good. Its called GeePee32 and it runs at the equivalent of a GP32 @ 40mhz (as in, its really slow), and theres no sound.

 

[Squidge]

There is a GP32 emulator for Windows, but its not that good. Its called GeePee32 and it runs at the equivalent of a GP32 @ 40mhz (as in, its really slow), and theres no sound.

It could be much better, but is there a need? Most of the software on the gp32 is ported from the PC anyway.

 

[thumpgun]

There is a GP32 emulator for Windows, but its not that good. Its called GeePee32 and it runs at the equivalent of a GP32 @ 40mhz (as in, its really slow), and theres no sound.

It could be much better, but is there a need? Most of the software on the gp32 is ported from the PC anyway.


i have an old pentiuim 3 dell laptop and think it would be an awesome gp2x...lol

 

[IcantDeleteThisAccount]

When I installed emulators on my XBox, all I did was drop them in the Emulators folder on my F drive. I don't know what's so difficult about that.

As far as I followed the discussion, the point really is that the xbox needs to be modded first (I did a softmod, others will have to install a chip... for some people this is really a difficult procedure) and there is no real support or guarantee that it will be usable for emulation. Also you have the problem of having to tweak your dvd drive for the xbox to properly read cd-r media. If you happen to get one with a crappy dvd drive you are out of luck though.

Now a console made specifically for homebrew games and emulation, let's say a linux box which boots from a system on a chip flash card (CF maybe?) in a couple of seconds, that is made for open source development would be perfect:
- no hacks of any kind required.
- no fiddling around with dvd drives that refuse to read your discs.
- no legal hassle, everyone can develop emulators and you wouldn't have to aquire them illegally as it is the case with the xbox (xdk is not free to use for anyone so compiled and signed binaries are only available through dark channels)
- no distorted and badly supported tv-out like when you try to connect a computer to the tv. You wouldn't have to fuck around with s-video adapters or similar on older tv-sets but instead just plug in a scart cable.
- lotsa processing power opposed to the gp2x. playstation emulation, n64 and opengl games would be a breeze.
- plug in a 500 gig harddrive to store your stuff on and use it as a ready made game and media center. The xbox with xbmc legally and with a big development scene. a dream come true.

Now, I think there is workarounds. I tried to use an old computer (750 mhz) with tv-out to do something similar. But I stumbled across crappy graphics on the TV and horrible boot times. Also the software was not made for use with a gamepad. This is why I got an xbox in the end. I went through all the hassle of softmodding it, tweaking the dvd drive and now I am able to do lots of the things I wanted. I can see though, that this is too complicated for end-users and also the barrier of the xdk being non-free and all that keeps people from developing. Now obviously this is something completely different as the gp2x. It follows the same concept but is not portable and thus more of a home console which shifts priorities quite a bit. Nice idea though.


Exactly. Simplicity! Besides.. I sold my xbox recently... Well my friend and I owned it jointly and he needed money for gas so yeah.. Ideally everyone would have an hdtv but realistically a machine that natively ran the resolution for standard 480i televisions through either composite or S video. I've ran across this a few times, I think once on here maybe even earlier in this particular thread.. I don't know to tired to care to look back right now for this Xgamestation but the problem is these systems are even less powerful then the gp2x itself which essentially kills it for what any of want to do. Maybe in the not to distant future some one here will make this idea a reality? Untill then.. We'll just keep on wishing folks.

 

[quartercast]

I and a small team are code a OS for such a box, as well as running on a PC, there a old xbox and gp2x port in the making.
It's coded in 100% ASM.

Any particular reason why?


As in why we are coding such a OS ?, If so the answer is simple, take any good game console OS and you will find that they are all like a supper Dos like OS, as in no memory protection (eg: run in ring0 and no-paging), have direct hardware access, no-multi-tasking.
Now linux is a great desktop OS, but its no good for games, Now you may think it make little difference, but take the old xbox as a example, it a very slow Intel Celeron 733 PC, but it can run game much faster, than much more powerfull PC, because of the way the OS is designed.
Now this is all fine, but there no free console type OS, i know because i want to use one, so me and a team code one over the past 4 years.
The more coder we get the better and fast its will be done.
If most of the coder on this forun new how easy, it is to code for the gp2x, without linux getting in the way, they would never go back to code on top of linux.

Here as a example see the old xbox spec http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1670116,00.asp

PS: Its not just for games, but for running a single program as fast as possible.


Reading this thread, this is the first time I've heard of DexOS. Sounds like a cool idea, how is the development progressing? Do you have any benchmarks on the speed gains made whilst operating under such an OS? How difficult is it for people to port existing programs to DexOS?

I'm somewhat surprised nobody else has really picked up on your points.. I, for one, am interested! :lol: