Gp2x Upgrade Petition Idea

[Crazy Goat]

yeh thats true well anywayz i want to ask to you guys whats better PSP or GP2X do any of you have both?

I knew you didn't even own one - and just wanted something that could make it a tad more appealing than a PSP. Why would you bother creating a petition for something you haven't even seen, in favor of an idea that not only wouldn't work - but if futile to discuss at all...

If you even consider the PSP a gaming platform, or a homebrew device - the GP2X is not for you. Go play with your action figures.

 

[xinfernoofdantex]

I consider the psp as a gaming platform and homebrew device :unsure:

 

[nem]

and Sony sells PSPs at a loss, plus they don't rely on third-party manufacturers as much as GPH

How does that affect the consumer? His point was that less people would buy a GP2X if it cost more than a PSP.

Haha, don't mind me. I completely read the original post wrong. My mistake ;-)

 

[Magnulus]

Do I have too? Maybe it isn't nice, but he is clearly wrong. How can a battery be 'special' when I can buy it anywhere for a very reasonable price and get a charger included? (I did however put a strike through the dumbass remark, it was a bit harsh, I hate stupidity so much)

Being indirect is still being a dick in my book.
However, I'm still just a "newbie" in these forums, even though my post-count says otherwise, so It might be that this is normal conduct around here, even though it seems it's you and gamefan999 standing behind most of these personal attacks.

 

[nubie]

Do I have too? Maybe it isn't nice, but he is clearly wrong. How can a battery be 'special' when I can buy it anywhere for a very reasonable price and get a charger included? (I did however put a strike through the dumbass remark, it was a bit harsh, I hate stupidity so much)

Being indirect is still being a dick in my book.
However, I'm still just a "newbie" in these forums, even though my post-count says otherwise, so It might be that this is normal conduct around here, even though it seems it's you and gamefan999 standing behind most of these personal attacks.

I am irritable because I have a fever.

I was technically inaccurate, I have since changed my post to read ignorant. I have no concrete data on whether he is stupid (cannot or will not learn) or ignorant (has not yet learned). So I have changed it to ignorant.

I don't know what you mean by "standing behind personal attacks", I simply don't want these boards full of inaccurate information, they are constantly filling with untrue crap such as this accusation of "special batteries" not available in stores. That is a complete falsehood. I need to be loud and contradict it because many who come here won't notice otherwise and just believe people who say things like that.

I have as proof the fact that I have been here since before the Pre-orders of the GP2X shipped and have seen recently with the "media release" and second-edition models that the boards are filling with silly questions (that have been asked months ago and answered fully) and are being answered with complete mis-information by people who are still wet on these forums themselves.

I particularly like the guy who picked a fight with DaveC, a helpful member of these boards (while sometimes a mite pessimistic, or as I like to call it: accurate), over such a ridiculous thing as n64 emulation. We got him calmed down, but the next day there were 5 more topics, even one on Jaguar emulation, he hadn't learned anything.

I suppose I am quite irritable lately, but I don't know about justification, I notice that only 2-4 people have complained so far, none of them mods or hardware/software developers, and they are the ones with the power anyway. And dozens complain about DaveC being negative, while I regard his comments only as accurate.

Edit: why have a dick if you can't be a dick :lol: (needed to add some humor, just to sooth my psyche)

 

[Magnulus]

heh. I can see where you're coming from with this. I just thought the shout didn't need the "dumbass" addition. A simple clarification of the error would be enough, and I'm not going to object to it being big and bold if you at least keep it civil. ^_^

 

[Epicenter]

I would like to see an enhanced version of the '2x come out someday with a custom SoC from MagicEyes (they do offer this service), e.g. a custom MMSP2 with a faster-rated ARM920T and their 2D accelerator core added. Raising the amount of RAM to 128MB isn't a bad idea although not fully necessary. I'd like to see a decent normal USB port running to the Host connections on the MMSP2 on the unit itself, and a video output jack on there as well. I would hope that revision had a better stick too (microswitched, or just swapped for a D-pad).

But, I may have to keep dreaming. Maybe they'll take my advice when the next console comes out, if another one does. At which point I'd just recommend going all-out and having MES add an ARM11 with FPU/Vector processing, and the 3D core as well.

 

[DaveC]

I would like to see an enhanced version of the '2x come out someday with a custom SoC from MagicEyes (they do offer this service), e.g. a custom MMSP2 with a faster-rated ARM920T and their 2D accelerator core added. Raising the amount of RAM to 128MB isn't a bad idea although not fully necessary. I'd like to see a decent normal USB port running to the Host connections on the MMSP2 on the unit itself, and a video output jack on there as well. I would hope that revision had a better stick too (microswitched, or just swapped for a D-pad).

But, I may have to keep dreaming. Maybe they'll take my advice when the next console comes out, if another one does. At which point I'd just recommend going all-out and having MES add an ARM11 with FPU/Vector processing, and the 3D core as well.

Fuck 3D. What is it with everyone and gaddamn 3D these days. Go buy a PSP or DS if you want 3D so bad, or wait for the XGP. We have enough 3D already. 3D is not even very practical with a small screen anyway. The benefit of 3D is that it is immersive, but you can't be too immersive with a small handheld screen. 3D does not come across well on portables. It is much more suited for home consoles and PCs.

The GP2X was good as it is not just another me too 3D PSP clone and has a niche in 2D and emulation of classic 2D systems. Money is not infinite, if you add 3D something else will be cut, likely some 2D features/memory. You can't just expand the chip die to include everything you want or else cost and power consumption go up too much. It will be a trade off. We would be better of with a real full featured 2D feature set then half assed 3D (XGP). Plus what goes along with 3D? Analog sticks. So we would then be stuck playing emus with sloppy analogs. I have done that and it sucks. Why ruin all emulation and 2D to do something that is already being done by everyone else, it doesn't make sense.

I certainly hope they don't listen to your suggestion for making it yet another 3D portable. If they do the GP2X will be one of the last 2D portables around. Isn't the DS, PSP,XGP enough 3D for you? Do we need EVERYTHING to be the same? Please stop hounding GPH to become another me too device, some of us may want a choice.

 

[nubie]

heh. I can see where you're coming from with this. I just thought the shout didn't need the "dumbass" addition. A simple clarification of the error would be enough, and I'm not going to object to it being big and bold if you at least keep it civil. ^_^

Agreed, dumbass = personal attack.

I should not resort to childish name calling.

 

[Epicenter]

I would like to see an enhanced version of the '2x come out someday with a custom SoC from MagicEyes (they do offer this service), e.g. a custom MMSP2 with a faster-rated ARM920T and their 2D accelerator core added. Raising the amount of RAM to 128MB isn't a bad idea although not fully necessary. I'd like to see a decent normal USB port running to the Host connections on the MMSP2 on the unit itself, and a video output jack on there as well. I would hope that revision had a better stick too (microswitched, or just swapped for a D-pad).

But, I may have to keep dreaming. Maybe they'll take my advice when the next console comes out, if another one does. At which point I'd just recommend going all-out and having MES add an ARM11 with FPU/Vector processing, and the 3D core as well.

Fuck 3D. What is it with everyone and gaddamn 3D these days. Go buy a PSP or DS if you want 3D so bad, or wait for the XGP. We have enough 3D already. 3D is not even very practical with a small screen anyway. The benefit of 3D is that it is immersive, but you can't be too immersive with a small handheld screen. 3D does not come across well on portables. It is much more suited for home consoles and PCs.

The GP2X was good as it is not just another me too 3D PSP clone and has a niche in 2D and emulation of classic 2D systems. Money is not infinite, if you add 3D something else will be cut, likely some 2D features/memory. You can't just expand the chip die to include everything you want or else cost and power consumption go up too much. It will be a trade off. We would be better of with a real full featured 2D feature set then half assed 3D (XGP). Plus what goes along with 3D? Analog sticks. So we would then be stuck playing emus with sloppy analogs. I have done that and it sucks. Why ruin all emulation and 2D to do something that is already being done by everyone else, it doesn't make sense.

I certainly hope they don't listen to your suggestion for making it yet another 3D portable. If they do the GP2X will be one of the last 2D portables around. Isn't the DS, PSP,XGP enough 3D for you? Do we need EVERYTHING to be the same? Please stop hounding GPH to become another me too device, some of us may want a choice.

First off, relax. Let me break this down to you ...

#1, The reasoning behind my interest in some sort of hardware rendering engine is twofold, and neither interest has anything to do with making the GP2X a primarily 3D machine-- I'm a strong supporter of the superiority of 2D for its benefits to gameplay over 'pretty polygons' everywhere. I mark the end of the great age of gaming when 3D consoles arrived, for god's sake. My reasons are:

- The Quake engine, and Quake 2 engine. HydraLancer and I have been developing a first-person shooter for a long time that we intended to bring over to the GP2X, and compared to initial performance projections by Craig, performance has been nowhere near what we had hoped for-- e.g. the concept of using a scanline-inteleave rendering method with the ARM920T and 940T working in tandem apparently never came to fruition-- we've had to scale things back a LOT to make a port to the '2x feasible. It involves a lot of belt-tightening and probably a good bit of overclocking; and we all know how much you hate overclocking. But with a disgusting task like software rendering on an Integer-only processor, the result won't be pretty framerate-wise without a lot of creative management of graphics and scaling back more and more and more. This isn't necessary with even a weak GPU to take the load off the 920T.

- A good 3D engine is a good 2D engine. Not only can you execute OpenGL functionality on them, which you probably know has loads of great 2D features-- but you can put sprites on polygons and move them about, providing scaling/rotation without immediate 2D support, so forth.

#2, Adding a 3D core doesn't just spontaneously remove 2D functionality. MES offers a 2D and a 3D accelerator that are distinct units and don't somehow borrow resources from each other. Heat and power wouldn't be an issue if the cores are disabled when not in use. Do you think they're caught in an infinite loop sucking up loads of juice when doing NOTHING? Does the 940T? Does the MPEG4 decoder? Nope.

Stop being so overdramatic. Just because 3D functionality could be offered doesn't mean no one would develop software in 2D. There are also lots of 2D titles coming out for the PSP all the time, and it's primarily marketed with 3D titles in mind. As for analog sticks? Who says one has to come with a 3D chip? Hell, GPH doesn't even think the '2x has appeal beyond being a media player. Adding an analog stick doesn't seem one of their major priorities.

 

[DaveC]

First off, relax. Let me break this down to you ...

#1, The reasoning behind my interest in some sort of hardware rendering engine is twofold, and neither interest has anything to do with making the GP2X a primarily 3D machine-- I'm a strong supporter of the superiority of 2D for its benefits to gameplay over 'pretty polygons' everywhere. I mark the end of the great age of gaming when 3D consoles arrived, for god's sake. My reasons are:

- The Quake engine, and Quake 2 engine. HydraLancer and I have been developing a first-person shooter for a long time that we intended to bring over to the GP2X, and compared to initial performance projections by Craig, performance has been nowhere near what we had hoped for-- e.g. the concept of using a scanline-inteleave rendering method with the ARM920T and 940T working in tandem apparently never came to fruition-- we've had to scale things back a LOT to make a port to the '2x feasible. It involves a lot of belt-tightening and probably a good bit of overclocking; and we all know how much you hate overclocking. But with a disgusting task like software rendering on an Integer-only processor, the result won't be pretty framerate-wise without a lot of creative management of graphics and scaling back more and more and more. This isn't necessary with even a weak GPU to take the load off the 920T.

#2, Adding a 3D core doesn't just spontaneously remove 2D functionality. MES offers a 2D and a 3D accelerator that are distinct units and don't somehow borrow resources from each other.

Well one of your main points is about quake, FPSs, and 3D shooters etc and how they are weak on the GP2X because of the lack of a 3D GPU. Yes you are right there but I don't argue that 3D on the GP2X is weak and would be better off with a 3D GPU.

The point is why bother with 3D at all? As I said there are PLENTY of platforms out there that have 3D games, Quake etc. The PSP is perfect for those, get a mod chip, port Quake, have fun. Also that those games aren't that great on a small screen anyway. If I want 3D I will use a console or PC with a much bigger screen. 3D FPS games on a small screen aren't that great anyway as you lose the immersion.

As for having everything in one chip well if you do that the die size goes up and so does cost. There is this thing about yield, the more crap you stuff on a chip the harder to make, the greater possibilities of defects, the more expensive (that is why Sony has been cutting cores on the PS3, they strted with 9 and are down to 7, yield and cost).

So with that yes something will be removed to make room for the 3D crap. Look at MES offerings now the one with the v-render removes the second core. If what you say is true why not have both cores PLUS v-render? Why did MES put a smaller cache and remove the MMU in the SOC used in the GP2X? Why? see above.

My point is that those transistors would be better put to use making the most kickass 2D GPU in a handheld, rather than a half assed attempt to clone the PSPs 3D hardware. Have a second ARM like now only rather than cripple it, give them both an MMU, a 128K cache, and their own work RAM. With that setup you could emulate any 2D system. If they had a better 2D GPU you would have all of your tiling, alpha channel, scaling/rotation etc as easy clean functions, not some kludge of mapping sprites on polys.

It sounds to me that you really want an XGP. That is fine, buy one of those but why try to turn the next GP3X into a clone of that? Keep them different.

 

[nubie]

First off, relax. Let me break this down to you ...

#1, The reasoning behind my interest in some sort of hardware rendering engine is twofold, and neither interest has anything to do with making the GP2X a primarily 3D machine-- I'm a strong supporter of the superiority of 2D for its benefits to gameplay over 'pretty polygons' everywhere. I mark the end of the great age of gaming when 3D consoles arrived, for god's sake. My reasons are:

- The Quake engine, and Quake 2 engine. HydraLancer and I have been developing a first-person shooter for a long time that we intended to bring over to the GP2X, and compared to initial performance projections by Craig, performance has been nowhere near what we had hoped for-- e.g. the concept of using a scanline-inteleave rendering method with the ARM920T and 940T working in tandem apparently never came to fruition-- we've had to scale things back a LOT to make a port to the '2x feasible. It involves a lot of belt-tightening and probably a good bit of overclocking; and we all know how much you hate overclocking. But with a disgusting task like software rendering on an Integer-only processor, the result won't be pretty framerate-wise without a lot of creative management of graphics and scaling back more and more and more. This isn't necessary with even a weak GPU to take the load off the 920T.

#2, Adding a 3D core doesn't just spontaneously remove 2D functionality. MES offers a 2D and a 3D accelerator that are distinct units and don't somehow borrow resources from each other.

Well one of your main points is about quake, FPSs, and 3D shooters etc and how they are weak on the GP2X because of the lack of a 3D GPU. Yes you are right there but I don't argue that 3D on the GP2X is weak and would be better off with a 3D GPU.

The point is why bother with 3D at all? As I said there are PLENTY of platforms out there that have 3D games, Quake etc. The PSP is perfect for those, get a mod chip, port Quake, have fun. Also that those games aren't that great on a small screen anyway. If I want 3D I will use a console or PC with a much bigger screen. 3D FPS games on a small screen aren't that great anyway as you lose the immersion.

As for having everything in one chip well if you do that the die size goes up and so does cost. There is this thing about yield, the more crap you stuff on a chip the harder to make, the greater possibilities of defects, the more expensive (that is why Sony has been cutting cores on the PS3, they strted with 9 and are down to 7, yield and cost).

So with that yes something will be removed to make room for the 3D crap. Look at MES offerings now the one with the v-render removes the second core. If what you say is true why not have both cores PLUS v-render? Why did MES put a smaller cache and remove the MMU in the SOC used in the GP2X? Why? see above.

My point is that those transistors would be better put to use making the most kickass 2D GPU in a handheld, rather than a half assed attempt to clone the PSPs 3D hardware. Have a second ARM like now only rather than cripple it, give them both an MMU, a 128K cache, and their own work RAM. With that setup you could emulate any 2D system. If they had a better 2D GPU you would have all of your tiling, alpha channel, scaling/rotation etc as easy clean functions, not some kludge of mapping sprites on polys.

It sounds to me that you really want an XGP. That is fine, buy one of those but why try to turn the next GP3X into a clone of that? Keep them different.

Interesting ideas from both corners, I think all of us want the same goal, but have different means to an end.

As I have said before, is there any other option, besides mesdigital, for a good SoC? I am just curious here.

How much of the transistors are unused in the current MMSP2? I notice 6(?) cores or so, and we only use maybe 2 or 3 of them? I think there is room for something, even if not a 3D chip then maybe just a second 920T with an MMU for the full effect, and maybe the 2D chip and some kind of FPU wouldn't hurt.

The Camera core, needed? not really.

And I must heartily disagree on the 3D side of things, many of the first 3D titles were 320x240 and were fine that way (n64, PSX and actually my favorite games Descent and Descent II to name names, and the source is out there), I think DaveC that maybe you confuse the crap "EA style" of 3D with the innovative stuff that Interplay was doing with Descent back in the glory days of 486 and pentium gaming.

 

[nubie]

Looking at the mesdigital product table (first link in my sig) I think maybe a dual Soc design might be called for, because the stuff they have doesn't really get the blood pumping at all.

Maybe a MMSP2 AND a Vrender 3D would be sweet . Wait that idea sucks. While great for keeping the full-speed Divx I can't help but think we don't need it.

So how about a 400mhz ARM9 seperate and then a Vrender 3D for the I/O and the acceleration/co-processor?

This for a theoretical GP3X or a different machine entirely. I know DaveC seems heatedly opposed to 3D, but this isn't all that intensive for 3D and includes a 2D and an audio processor and a coprocessor all in one on the Vrender 3D.

The main CPU being seperate would help with emulation or homebrew because we could use a simple solid high speed chip (maybe even an ARM11 with a FPU) and stuff would still be compilable for it if we could get a Linux install with SDL going for it.

All in all I wish somebody with better communication was making a console better suited, but that is only wishful thinking.

 

[Epicenter]

GPH probably uses MES' SoCs due to them being a Korean company and seemingly offering low-cost chips next to the bigger players in the SoC market like Samsung. Some other company's may be a better choice, though. While I agree that 3D games will inevitably not be as good as 2D ones due to all the extra 'gameplay overhead' and overcomplication of design and the community shouldn't develop nothing but 3D games, the ideal system, for me, would probably end up using a 3D GPU since it would be capable of 3D *and* incredible 2D.

DaveC is mistaken in his belief a 2D core would be magically better than a 3D one for 2D gaming, since it can perform the 3D functionality of actually pushing polygons, and run OpenGL functions or similar to a 2D end. With an API like OGL you have a wider, more open and customizable implementation, not limited functionality like the select few functions picked for the blitter in the '2x-- you have a customizably programmable procesor you can use to many ends. Hell, you could use it just to supplement the main CPU for complex floating point math work. Given these facts, having a 3D and 2D processor alongside each other isn't that logical, now that I give it some more thought.

Now, as for the remarks about 'wanting an XGP' .. the XGP doesn't exist. If GamePark builds it like I suggested, and it didn't have massive insurmountable hardware flaws, I'd want one, yes. But who knows if it ends up like that, or if it's just a GP2X with a GPU and no ARM940T. Much less interesting than were they to have MES beef up the CPU and RAM specs on the XGP/XGP-Mini. But that's not to say they'd ever replace my GP2X, the Mini's screen is too small, its D-pad is far from ideal (segmented! Ugh!) ... the XGP's analog stick would be a bit awkward for emulators (though perhaps not much more so than the GP2X's imprecise stick) and its aspect ratio would be pretty shitty. If I got an XGP it'd be for my own personal development, not for emulation of other systems, that's for sure. But it'd be exceedingly simple to compile Stargazer and Armor of Acheron to a GP2X and XGP target with differing feature sets. So it's not like developers need to abandon one platform to develop for the other .. which is why this belligent 'taking-sides' argument you keep carrying on is pretty pointless, DaveC.

 

[Iorgy77]

Tom age 14: My game idea for C&VG :
"My game is like Tomb Raider but better and have more music and two women they can fly and drive cars like BF1942 and it will play better than mario and have more puzzles than silent hill and a really cool racing section and it would be really cool if someone could make that."

:lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[nubie]

I know you don't like x86, but I dream of swapping the OS from XP to 98se to Linux to Dos for real old-school action in a handheld powered by something like this:

http://www.mini-itx.com/2006/06/29/vias-john-technology

I know, I know. But at 500mhz it only uses like 5-6 watts under load, full load (and it has auto-clocking). Also the Luke core finally has an astounding FPU instead of the crap half-speed of the C3 Nehemiah cores (why not just call it the Methuselah core and get it over with ).

Probably runs DDR or DDR2 as well so the only hold-back would be how high you need to clock the processor, I doubt much more than 400mhz even for an N64 emulator if you get a nice optimized one. Call it in at 300mhz and it should tear up any sort of homebrew.

In x86 land that is amazing.

I want a 4 or 5" 640x480 screen and the full USB 2.0 and rich feature set. I mean I can play nearly all my old PC games on it, mobile. I should just build a handheld around that, whenever it is available.

I guess I should call it the GPX86 (or GP86X has a ring of sorts) and it would be cool.

Hmm. X86 would be a perfect name, just nobody take my idea. (fine, take it, if someone marketed something based on this not much larger than a PSP for under $400 I would be hard pressed not to buy it.)

 

[-Jihadisoul-]

I didnt expect this topic thread to still be active lol this is a really active forum, in alot of forums like after like a day or two only like 2 or 3 ppl have posted lol

I just call my GP2X a GPX because i reckon it sounds better lol

 

[PSyMastR]

Um...
GPX is just that vaporware spelled backwards.

And this upgrade idea sucks money butt. As then people without the upgrade will be lost behind, and devs will be split and it will cause mass problems.

 

[Magnulus]

3D is not even very practical with a small screen anyway. The benefit of 3D is that it is immersive, but you can't be too immersive with a small handheld screen. 3D does not come across well on portables. It is much more suited for home consoles and PCs.

1: You're forgetting about the 100% awesome feature of TV-out.
2: I simply don't agree that 3D is wasted on handhelds.

(3: I don't think the GP2X needs an upgrade. Just flicking my tuppence.)

 

[Epicenter]

It wouldn't really 'divide' developers to have an enhanced GP2X released later-- though I would imagine it being considerably later for fiscal reasons among others (the GP2X hasn't been out THAT long.) It's pretty easy to use ifdef/endif statements to have different code automatically compile for different hardware choices in a C program, so one compile job could build a GP2X / GPWhateverTheyCallIt / XGP version all at once with or without features custom tailored to each machine.

As for the x86 idea-- not bad, but since the development scene has been working with ARM9 processors for years now and have put together so much ASM for various applications that wouldn't run on an x86 processor, it might not be the ideal approach. Also, GPH would need to engineer/have engineered an x86 board that would fit a remarkably small space with a lot of extra parts to accomodate-- a chipset, loads of controllers, etc.-- when an SoC can cram all that into a space the size of a quarter.