Picodrive 0.95 Released

[notaz]

what's new?

* Fixed a bug in sprite renderer which was causing slowdowns for some games.
+ Added command line support
+ Added optional hardware scaling for lower-res games like Shining Force.
* Sound chips are now sampled 2 times per frame. This fixed some games which had missing sounds (Vectorman 2 1st level, Thunder Force 3 water level, etc.).
+ Added another accurate 8-bit renderer which is slightly faster and made it default.

Also fiddled with the ym2612 core a bit, hope I didn't break it, at least I don't hear a difference, so someone (DaveC?) should give it a good listen. The command line support was meant for alternative more-pimped frontends.

download
source
EDIT: links

 

[ryosaeba]

Thanks, I am really glad you added command line support.
Just one thing: where are we supposed to get this? Should we wait for the archive to resurrect or is there another link?

 

[Shikaku]

*twiddles thumbs, crickets chirp*

 

[PSyMastR]

Use rapidshare.de for now.

 

[Rivroner]

PicoDrive 0.95 by Notaz

 

[PSyMastR]

Uhhh, we have to... login?

EDIT: I rememberd I cant read a word of spanish, but I managed to register there. Im uploading to rapidshare now.

EDIT2: Rapidshare.de Here

 

[Rivroner]

Sorry, i didn´t think about registration.

 

[PSyMastR]

No, its cool. I already mirrored it, for those who cant figure out how to register without knowing the language, Im still puzzled how I managed how to do it lol.

 

[dsraa]

hey whats the deal with the file archive? I can see its down, but what are the details? When is it going back up??
I just came back from a 2 week vacation, and the file archive is down.....just great....


DSR

 

[craigix]

archive: It needs a full reinstall.

 

[techFreak]

hey whats the deal with the file archive? I can see its down, but what are the details? When is it going back up??
I just came back from a 2 week vacation, and the file archive is down.....just great....


DSR

www.gp2xtr.com -> Our file archive is online here. But not in English. :rolleyes: However you can download latest files and applications here.

 

[dsraa]

www.gp2xtr.com -> Our file archive is online here. But not in English. :rolleyes: However you can download latest files and applications here.

Schweet. Thanks for the info, Craigix and Techfreak.

DSR

 

[bacteria]

Liked last version, (not tried this new one yet), quite excited about this emulator - seems faster tham DrMD (am I right?)

 

[PokeParadox]

It's not faster... it's more compatible, and supports SRM saves.

 

[geise69]

Has anyone really noticed a difference in quality between 8bit and 16bit renderer besides speed? I have yet to have the 8bit fast seem to effect any game with glitches. It's nice switching from 8bit to 16bit. It allows me to play with 44hz sound with 0 frameskip at 270mhz. I also have accurate timing on. This emulator is coming along nicely. Thanks again for the update!

 

[Wolfsclaw]

Umm, so what options are actually avaible for command line support?

 

[ryosaeba]

I think it's only the possibility to launch a rom from command line, allowing external frontends to be used with picodrive.
I tested it with gmenu2x and it works fine.

 

[Aninhumer]

I didn't think the Megadrive had any more than 8-bit colour?

 

[___]

Has anyone really noticed a difference in quality between 8bit and 16bit renderer besides speed? I have yet to have the 8bit fast seem to effect any game with glitches. It's nice switching from 8bit to 16bit. It allows me to play with 44hz sound with 0 frameskip at 270mhz. I also have accurate timing on. This emulator is coming along nicely. Thanks again for the update!

Well the difference is, that certain special effects are possible to be emulated in 16bit mode that are not possible when only using 8bits. For example the water transparencies in the sonic games.

Yeah, I think I really need to download and test this build. I haven`t done that because I was quite satisfied with DrMD but it seems that this emulator could easily get better than DrMD. Hopefully it will be a little faster in the future, the advantage of DrMD was always that it ran fullspeed with no overclocking.

 

[PokeParadox]

I run it at 240MHz but I have noticed this release adds a little to the speed.

EDIT:

Well the difference is, that certain special effects are possible to be emulated in 16bit mode that are not possible when only using 8bits. For example the water transparencies in the sonic games.

Sorry that's incorrect just tested it with sonic 1 and the water still does it thing in 8bit accurate mode.

The FAST renderrer doesn't do transparent water thinggy effects properly.