Release The Dosbox Thread

[Pickle]

Im starting another thread in the new forum to discuss the port of dosbox I plan to complete as soon as possible.

I already have a toolchain setup and dosbox compiles as much as possible without the SDL library.
Well I hope to have the needed library files soon and hopefully the videos will soon follow.

I expect as many others do that with Pandora the performance will be around a low end 386. My guess was between 2500-3500 dosbox cycles.

 

[Lamb]

Interesting, thanks pickle

 

[greendots]

I never posted in the orginal thread... but why do you expect the performance to be so low?

Would Qemu + freedos be any faster? Do they share code for CPU emulator?

 

[mechanizeddeath]

I'm perfectly happy with low end 386, as I started out on a Packard Bell 386SX-16 w/ 2MB of RAM. :wacko: If I get that at the very beginning it will be spectacular.

Does anyone remember what the GP2X Dosbox was rated at? I remember SimAnt just crawled on it (pun intended!) although that may have been due to something I did or did not do.

And of course, there's always hope for improvements down the road.

 

[Rivroner]

Thank you very much Pickle p&|a

 

[skeezix]

I don't think I've posted in too many of the DB threads.. figured I'd keep my spamming down the last year

I must say though -- DosBox is one of _the_ apps for the Panda.

Thanks Pickle

jeff

 

[Cameron]

Will the port have soundblaster emulation also?
Once it is up and running, how fast do you think it will be ultimately on the Pandora platform?

This sounds very interesting.

 

[Pickle]

All the normal features of dosbox will be supported by this version. For sound that includes SB,Adlib,GUS.
Also I didnt state it in the original thread, this version has the ARM dynamic recomplier backend. Which will help with speed.

It was asked earlier why dosbox is slow. The method that dosbox uses for emulating the x86 core (if your familiar with SNES9X it has the same method) which is to look up each opcode (the benefit is portability). Although dosbox has the ability to recompile parts of the x86 code to ARM, although it wouldnt be a fast if someone wrote a x86 to ARM recomplier backend.

 

[sold]

I was just looking at the psp slim dosbox videos on youtube and I noticed that the performance seemed similar to pc dosbox at 3500-4000 cycles. At least the performance I was getting out of an eeepc at that cycle speed using normal dosbox core.

I realise that psp uses a different soc (mips r4000 or something, right?) but I've also read that the pandora will be something like 4 times as powerful (in layperson's terms), although I've found nothing solid to prove that.

Would that mean there is a chance of better performance or more cycles on pandoras dosbox port? Because the psp slim had fairly impressive performance. Also, will full or dynamic dosbox cores work, and would they improve performance?

 

[Kyosys]

I downloaded me some good 'ol dos games for this!

 

[Pickle]

I was just looking at the psp slim dosbox videos on youtube and I noticed that the performance seemed similar to pc dosbox at 3500-4000 cycles. At least the performance I was getting out of an eeepc at that cycle speed using normal dosbox core.

Thats good it think everyone expects the Pandora to be much better in performance than the PSP

I realise that psp uses a different soc (mips r4000 or something, right?) but I've also read that the pandora will be something like 4 times as powerful (in layperson's terms), although I've found nothing solid to prove that.

From the final burn numbers i thought it was more like 2.5x

Would that mean there is a chance of better performance or more cycles on pandoras dosbox port? Because the psp slim had fairly impressive performance. Also, will full or dynamic dosbox cores work, and would they improve performance?

See above, and all of the cores should work, the only one I want to test would be the ARM dynamic core.
[More performance] Dynamic, Simple , Full [Less performance]

 

[GoblinX]

I'm praying to see Floor13 work on this Dosbox. For those who have not played it, or Shadow President, both outstanding games with alot of power in your hands. How appropriate to play them on the most powerful handheld

I do know for those of you with your old copies of the Wolf game, that might work alright. Ditto to PT-109. Both great games, with lower end requirements. Especially PT-109. Awesome awesome game.

 

[Bosbeetle]

here's me with a strange n00bish idea isnt it possible to boot dos on pandora?

probably not x86 vs arm etc. Just needed to ask

 

[PoisonedV]

no, but some people, for whatever reason, talked about installing windows 3.1 through dosbox.
anyway, been hitting up HOTU and abandonia for a bunch of DOS games. cant wait.

 

[Bosbeetle]

Me to hopefully ScummVM also gets ported soon. Point n click galore on the pandora

 

[Pickle]

Me to hopefully ScummVM also gets ported soon. Point n click galore on the pandora

DJwillis has gotten ScummVM working a long time ago.

 

[conrad.matt]

I'm looking forward to carrying around the old AD&D gold box games - I KNEW there was a reason I kept those old CDs!

 

[yonder711]

Dosbox should be killer. There will be tons of flash backs that im looking forward to. I hope this works well enough for a little Tex Murphy:The Pandora DIrective. **Pun intended** Some of the best puzzles ever.

Question though, on the Pandora projects page it has Dosbox listed for Zodttd. Have we heard about any progress on this version?
[Zodttd->DOSbox]

 

[sixstringmonk]

I'm looking forward to carrying around the old AD&D gold box games - I KNEW there was a reason I kept those old CDs!

I plan on playing these too. An Amiga emulator may be the better way to go for these games as I have heard that the Amiga versions were the best. I don't have any experience first hand however, since I played them on the c64 and PC.

 

[GoblinX]

Amiga Barbarian was pretty darn awesome if I remember.