Emulating The Gp2x

[Mithrildor]

Im sure there won't be many games on the Pandora in the first months. So I thought what if we emulate the gp2x , too play all those great games (cave story , no chance that will hit the pandora without gp2x emulation).

So is it possible to emulate GP2x and gp32x?

 

[Butterman]

You're in luck. GP2X (not sure about GP32X) binaries will run directly on the Pandora without modification.

No, they will not - Squidge.

 

[Mithrildor]

Wow really? I didnt know that. Soz for the nooby question , just something I didnt know yet.

/me is super happy right now.

 

[Stouffa]

would there not be problems with the screen resolution being too small for the Pandora without doubling?

 

[notaz]

You're in luck. GP2X (not sure about GP32X) binaries will run directly on the Pandora without modification.

No they won't. Where did you get that?

 

[fiveseven]

A lot of gp2x games are open source, so hopefully all they'll require is a recompile.

 

[cbox]

I don't see what the point of emulating the gp2x, both consoles are ARM so recompiling binaries should be trivial.

 

[Butterman]

You're in luck. GP2X (not sure about GP32X) binaries will run directly on the Pandora without modification.

No they won't. Where did you get that?


I read that you could compile .gpe binaries (using the exact same development environment as for the GP2X) and they would run on the Pandora for now, until a proper SDK is released.

 

[Username]

But Cave Story isn't open source, so you can't recompile it, can you?

 

[Mithrildor]

Oh , me is less happy.

Well I would like to have a gp2x at/close to really of the Pandora. I have seen some really great games on the gp2x and Id like to play them with ease.

Found this:

For the simplest development environment, you can use the same as the GP2X, which means the same compiler.

Yes, the Pandora will run .gpe files. In fact, if you use the gp2x build environment then your programs will run under both the gp2x and Pandora (the exact same executable) without modification.

Obviously, if you use Gp2X specific things like the arm940, or depend on the 320x240 screen rather than asking the OS about the screen size then your bound to have problems when running your app on the Pandora, but since you are targetting the P anyway, you are unlikely to make those kind of mistakes.

You will however need a Pandora version of SDL, which isn't released yet. You can use the GP2X one for now (for testing on a GP2X) and just swap the library over and recompile for the Pandora.

Found it here: http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?showt...mp;#entry692529

 

[skeezix]

Without reading that at all, suffice to say..

If its Linux and ARM, of course it will 'run' (Filename is irrelevent, so .pe .. not relevent to discussion.) The important thing is the libraries, assumptions, etc.

Saying a ".gpe" (implying gp32x application) will run is ... premature or naive. It _could_ run if various conditions are met, or if the pandora environment is highly forgiving (yet to be seen.)

ie: If a .gpe depends on a lib that is not ported or not included or an incompatible version, it won't run 'out of box', but that case could be solved with porting the lib/etc.

If the gpe makes hardware assumptions about timing, registers, screen rwez, etc, it could be work.

jeff

 

[Username]

Shame, I hope Cave Story will still work. I remember from before people telling me that it was unlikely that there would be a Pandora-specific port of the game.

 

[Mithrildor]

So a Emu is a no?

 

[cbox]

So a Emu is a no?

Emulating a gp2x on the pandora is like saying i want a 486 emulator for my pentium

 

[skeezix]

Emulating an emu is always fun (ie: multiple levels of indirection)

I think a distinction between _port_ and _emulate_ is needed, but I shant bother. Suffice to say they are not interchangable words.

Also, the jump of logic to 'so an emu is no' is way wrong; as I said, it depends on a lot of factors, and its a per application thing; some emus might be really tight to hardware, others not.

For instance, some apps don't bother to ask the system timer or registers for timing, they just assume based on usage certain loops will work out to certai times, say. That sort of thing totally fails when you run it on other platforms, even if the binary is compatible. You never know what apps make things like that an issue until you try.

So its ont an easy yes or no question.

Suffice to say most good apps will get fast ports, then later better ports. Some might 'just work' as is.

Making a gp2x emu is not ideal imho.

jeff

 

[Butterman]

Without reading that at all, suffice to say..

If its Linux and ARM, of course it will 'run' (Filename is irrelevent, so .pe .. not relevent to discussion.) The important thing is the libraries, assumptions, etc.

Saying a ".gpe" (implying gp32x application) will run is ... premature or naive. It _could_ run if various conditions are met, or if the pandora environment is highly forgiving (yet to be seen.)

ie: If a .gpe depends on a lib that is not ported or not included or an incompatible version, it won't run 'out of box', but that case could be solved with porting the lib/etc.

If the gpe makes hardware assumptions about timing, registers, screen rwez, etc, it could be work.

jeff

Thanks for clearing that up.

EDIT: That gives me an idea. Wouldn't a WINE style system be possible then? We just control all of the GP32X specific stuff by catching those calls, then run the rest of the code like normal. I may look into this.

 

[skeezix]

Its 'hard' to do that for register access and such, but that is limited; its very easy for shared libs to just put in a translator lib, and things.

You have to break apps into categories..

- ones that will be replaced.. ie: you don't care about. Likely music players and video players will be around, so you needn't worry about old ones, except really cool ones.

- apps that can be ported (ie: source is avail, or the dev is still around and will do it himself)

- apps that will not be ported, but are still worth the trouble to overcome this problem.

The third category you're talking about.

Is it large enough a group of apps to be worth suffering over? (That depends on the individual reading the question.. its very personal.)

jeff

 

[Squidge]

The problem is that most 2x binaries attack the hardware, even if the author doesn't. The reason being is that 99% of apps use either SDL or Minilib, and both those libraries attack the hardware for speed (and are usually statically linked due to GPH's crappy choice of obsolete libraries).

 

[ldesnogu]

Emulating a gp2x on the pandora is like saying i want a 486 emulator for my pentium

Which is what you do when you use dosbox because windows and/or your harware won't run old games

(and are usually statically linked due to GPH's crappy choice of obsolete libraries).

Even if the programs are dynamically linked, they won't work since the gp2x is using OABI, isn't it?

 

[notaz]

(and are usually statically linked due to GPH's crappy choice of obsolete libraries).

Even if the programs are dynamically linked, they won't work since the gp2x is using OABI, isn't it?

I'm thinking about enabling OABI compatibility option in pandora's kernel, but I've read this may cause some kind of problems (still need to do more research on this).