GP32 Palmos

[Ruune]

Hi everyone

It occured to me, while i was choosing between Palm and PPC, that PalmOS has almost NO emulation. That cant be right, why do handhelds with 2-3-400mhz processors 32mb of ram and really great screens have NO emulation???? AHHHHH!!!

So here is my idea! Since the GP32 uses the ARM cpu and so do the new PalmOS 5 PDA's, would it not be possible to port some of our wonderful emulators to palmOS?

I cannot code. At all. But if for nothing else, some talented coder would be hailed as a fucking GOD if they were to port a SNES emulator. You could even sell it like Liberty or Morphgear.

This is really a request, but i am willing to learn a thing or two so that I can port some emu's myself if need be....

So, what do all you programming guru's thinks about this? I know there was one person who did an Atari ST emu for palmOS (I think...) who participates on this board. All info is appreciated. Thanks all.

 

[Akuma no Houkon]

I dont know what sites you goto, but PalmOS has every emulator from Atari to PSX and everything in between. Look up PocketSNES, Morphgear (which is MANY emulators in one), FPSX etc...

 

[DJWillis]

Don’t forget Kronos (Excellent intelligent fiction engine from the guy who did CastAway for the GP32) and ScummVM. Both are great on the Palm and both are free and open source.

There are some very active PalmOS developers and a lot of new emulators are on the horizon thanks in no small part to the Zodiac, even thought the Zodiacs launch may have been very luke-warm it has drawn a lot of developers into the Palm platform.

Still, I am sticking with hacking about the GP32, I do the odd bit of Palm coding at work so I don’t want to do it at home also .

 

[Ruune]

Akuma no Houkon, i dont know what the hell your smoking, but PocketSNES is for PocketPC and GBA ONLY! NOT PALM! Get your OS's right!

 

[Dozer]

erm, zodiac runs on palm. I don't think they'd b happy if they had no emulators... :huh:

 

[nerd of nerds]

I dont know what sites you goto, but PalmOS has every emulator from Atari to PSX and everything in between. Look up PocketSNES, Morphgear (which is MANY emulators in one), FPSX etc...

ummm, iirc there is no psx emulator for palm os, its for pocket pc...i would love to see this emulator running...my parents just got matching pda phones (pocket pc) and i could try it on those but i don't have any games that will fit..even after i shrink em...grrrr h34r:

 

[Nightripper]

Akuma no Houkon, i dont know what the hell your smoking, but PocketSNES is for PocketPC and GBA ONLY! NOT PALM! Get your OS's right!

Actually, the PocketSNES is for PocketPC, just like Akuma said. The PocketSNES for the GBA has changed name to SNESAdvance to avoid confusion between the two.

EDIT: And the GBA isn't an Operating System, neither is the PocketPC
EDIT 2: Ignore this post, I got it all wrong (as usual) <_<

 

[Akuma no Houkon]

PalmOs, PocketPC, same damn thing.

I just picked random emulator names from portables, I didnt look up what portable OS they ran on, I am sure there are MANY more out there for both PalmOS and PocketPC though.

 

[abigsmurf]

The upcoming grametrac uses a 400mhz ARM processor and uses win CE so it looks like it should easily handle full speed snes and MD emu.

No word yet on wether it can run unsigned code or if it will be less than £200 though...

 

[skeezix]

Palm OS has a fair number of emus, but not as many as GP32; the reason is easy.. Palm OS itself is historically designed for long battery life, small processors, and very lightweight hardware; ie: PDA functionality with light gaming. An emu is the antithersis of this.. beefy processor needed ie: Until Palm OS 5, the average device was 33MHz or less, and low resolution (160x160); Palm OS 5 is where things got interesting, with the first OS5 device being 132MHz give or take (Palm Tungsten T original), but even that provided a mesely 700k of heap (runtime RAM). Remember, being a PDA, the T|T1 had 16MB of RAM, but only 700k of it was runtime.. the rest was for storage of data, apps, etc. That was Oct 28th 2002 if I recall right. 2003 saw the real machines.. all the other OS5 units rock. The T|T3 is 400MHz with 64MB of RAM with 8 or 10 MB for heap; the Zodiac with 128MB of RAM (w00t!), and cray stuff like that. So its only ben the last 18months or less (depending where you look, what caliber of emu you want) that its been really feasible; ie: I made CaSTaway for Palm OS when the T|T3 and Zodiac came around.. needed the heap RAM. (ie: Earlier devices hadf the prcoessor, but not enough heap RAM...)

So nowadays, Palm OS have stunning machines, but the GP32 had the 8MB heap ram long before Palm OS did.. since Palm OS is a PDA OS, not a gaming OS.. until recently.

Pocket PC has had large RAM and such for awhile, so also has very many emus.

jeff

 

[RomHacker316]

Just a minor correction. The PSX emulator is currently only for PocketPC but LDChen the developer said he was porting it to PalmOS and GP32. Morphgear is only for PocketPC but the developer has it on his forum under what he plans to do that he will make it for palm and that means NES, GBA, GBC, SNES, GENESIS, PCE are coming when he does. The reason they were not made for Palm in the first place is as jeff said above, they just didnt have the specs to do what was needed. Just thought Id give that info out for anyone who needs or wants it.

 

[Ruune]

hmm, heap ram.....

I was seriously considering the T|T1 because of its OMAP processor (floating point is good for emu it think...) but the teeny-weeny heap ram may be a problem....

 

[BaDToaD]

I like my Clie T675c. The last of the OS 4.1 Clies only a 66mhz motorola but awesome 360 x 360 16 bit hi res screen. It gives a good compromise between functionality and battery life. Plus the built in MP3 player is excellent. I bought several for work. When launched they were 380 quid but just 7 months later I got them for 160. Even convinced them I should have one as I said my own palm wasn't up to the job anymore hehe.

I also have a Palm 3xe that I mainly use for ebook reading. Under clocked to 10mhz I get 30 hours out of a set of decent batteries if I don't use the backlight.

PS Akuma don't ever let a die hard palm os fan hear you say that Pocket PC and Palm are the same thing. You'll get shot That's like saying Windows and Mac OS are the same thing.

 

[NiN^_^NiN]

That's like saying Windows and Mac OS are the same thing.

They are right? *BANG* my...tummy...hurt......:wacko:



h34r:

 

[Akuma no Houkon]

PS Akuma don't ever let a die hard palm os fan hear you say that Pocket PC and Palm are the same thing. You'll get shot That's like saying Windows and Mac OS are the same thing.

I have never used a PDA of any sort, so PalmOS and PocketPC look like the same damn thing to me . And its not like comparing Windows to MacOS, its more like comparing Windows to Linux, and beleive it or not, I have had many people come over, use my PC for nearly everything including high end games, and never realize they were in linux.

So a comparision like that would be reasonable for someone who isnt a die hard PDA fan.

 

[StoneThrower]

Akuma no Houkon wrote:
"I have never used a PDA of any sort, so PalmOS and PocketPC look like the same damn thing to me."

The better comparison would be:
"I have never used a handheld game platform of any sort, so GP32 and Zodiac look like the same damn thing to me."

(Just kidding .....i.e. adding more oil to the fire ... :blink: ...)

I have rather generic question:
Why forums like this always turned to be a pile of someone's crap?
In another words: Why Windows users tend to start yet another religious war agains Linux user and/or Mac-users?

Get a life, men....

 

[Akuma no Houkon]

I have rather generic question:
Why forums like this always turned to be a pile of someone's crap?
In another words: Why Windows users tend to start yet another religious war agains Linux user and/or Mac-users?

Get a life, men....

This comes from the simple fact that everyone, male, female, or other, likes to beleive themself either superior to everyone or with a superior group. You see this in war, you see this in religion (oops I repeated myself..), you see this in your country, in your house, you see this all over the world in every facet of life.

If someone disagrees with you, they are wrong, dead wrong. And you feel obligated to explain why you are superior and are part of this superior group. Doesnt matter if the "facts" you have are completely untrue. If someone points out that these facts are untrue, basically calling you stupid or a moron for believing in them, you get defensive, like a badger backed into a corner, you fight, you attack the other persons beleifs/group/whatever, in the hopes that you can convince them (and maybe even yourself) that you/your group really is superior.

But mostly, people fear change. They fear being left behind by change. Or that people will see them as less because they are not part of this new, better, group.
Take the zodiac for example you will see it alot in this forum, people "fear" the zodiac, fear that it will take away all of our developers, etc..., rather than embrace it and live side by side, we attack it, try and find some reason that it must be worse, etc...)

Although none of this has anything to do with "forums like this" you will see that on every forum you ever go to, and in every facet of life, if you look close enough.

We just have a bit too much free time here while waiting for new games (or taking a break from making those games) that we find anything to chat about, and arguments generate alot of traffic. Just remember, 99% of the time, if we have an argument like that in these forums its just for the sake of the argument, something to do, no personal attacks intended