Homebrew gba emulation on Dsi / Dsi xl?

[granville]

It's slow as hell and have graphical glitches.

What's your point? The point I made was that there did exist a DC emulator for PSP, you said it could never be done. It was though. Just nitpicking on that comment. A better example for you to make would be creating a Saturn emulator for PS1.

Point is here, the N64 IS a fair bit more powerful than either DS or DSi. You just cannot emulate a more powerful system on a less powerful one, no matter how slow you could deal with it. If a system is simply incapable of faking all these things, it just can't be done. Try emulating a Gameboy Advance game on a GBC, it just doesn't work. A system has to be MORE powerful than the original system to work. Even GBA had an advantage over SNES in some specific ways, enough to make an emulator for it (SNES Advance and Snezziboy). But you could hardly attempt to make a PS1 emulator for the GBA.

Yeah, getting redundant. Point is, you can't emulate a system on another system that is less powerful than the one you're trying to emulate. If you could, it would be a port, and the code would have to be re-engineered to work on the system. And even THAT doesn't work out sometimes. Even big name companies have issues porting games.

 

[geoflcl]

DSi:
# CPU: The DSi has two ARM architecture CPUs; ARM9 and ARM7. The ARM9, the main CPU, is clocked at 133 MHz (almost twice as fast as previous NDS models).
# RAM: 16 MB of RAM (four times as much as previous NDS models)

Mann, even if it IS impossible to do anything with it at this point, those specs are really impressive compared to the old DS line.

 

[Fishaman P]

I'm sure that the the Psp can play Dream cast games

sarcasm.

Not the best way to make a point, someone did actually port nulldc to the PSP-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xV3EuUmJIZA...feature=related

@Fishaman P-

Then make it yourself if you think it can be done. Simple as that.

It's slow as hell and have graphical glitches.

That's what I'm at least expecting from the GBA/N64 on DS(i) scene! Keep up the good work.
FYI, I'm a n00b, so do stuff for me.

 

[Deleted-236924]

Nintendo have confirmed no less than 3 times now that they are not bringing a VC to DSi. It has been begged of by fans, but they flat out said no. The closest thing you'll see to DSi VC is a small handful of PORTS of games like Rayman and that Oscar in *insert place here* game series. But those aren't true VC games and they're few and far between.

Well, I think it is given that the "DS 2" will have a GBA VC, though. It's kinda like how there are no Gamecube games on Wii VC... generation skip.

So yeah, I see 0% chance of it being on the current DS.

There's a difference, though.
Wii can run Gamecube games natively. DSi can't run GBA games natively.

 

[MVBDX]

This website says iPlayer has two cpu's!
One clocked @ 200mhz and another clocked @ 400mhz!
With this info, cant we emulate N64??!

http://www.gbadsi.com/

 

[Rydian]

The second processor in that is a DSP, not a normal general-purpose ARM, so I don't know if they could even get it to aid in the emulation, my guess (which may be off, never having worked with a DSP) is that it's used for the media playing.

They try to make it sound good by directly comparing the MHZ, but you can't do that. MHZ is not a measurement of power. More mhz does not mean the processor is better in every case. Only when comparing two of the SAME processor. I'll use common desktop processors as an example.

Older Processors.
The "Intel Pentium 4" 2.26ghz processor scores 288.

Newer Processors.
The "Intel Core 2 Duo P7350" 2.00ghz processor scores 1,318.

Mhz is like RPM in cars. It describes how fast it's cycling. How much it does per cycle, however, varies between processor models, like it depends on what gear you're in in a car. Let's say you have two cars, both in second gear, doing 4000 RPM. One of the cars accelerates up to 6000 RPM, in the same gear. It is now going faster than it was previously. If the second car kept accelerating to the point that it changed gears and dropped down to 3000 RPM, it would appear to be going slower (if you only compare RPM values), but it's going faster than the first car.

The reason people think that a higher mhz rating means a processor is faster is because of this. If you raise the mhz, the processor will be going aster than it was previously. However, when comparing two different processors, you cannot compare them by just mhz.

 

[granville]

I had suspected the iplayer had a secondary CPU clocked at that rate. Knew about the 400mhz one, but i had only seen speculation about the secondary one. That, stacked on top of the DS' own specs, would put the raw speed quite high indeed. But it really is dependent on how different the DS is in terms of hardware.

Funny thing you might wonder is how the PSP is able to emulate N64 with only ~300mhz. I'm not an authority by any means on the hardware of N64 or PSP, so feel free to ignore me if i'm wrong. But I do know that the DS has ARM mobile processors. But the N64 has a MIPS processor. PSP ALSO has a MIPS processor. This surprisingly could point at some similarities in processor structure between N64 and PSP. Could also explain why PSP can play N64 at such low speeds and DS would have trouble even at huge speeds. I can tell you right now that if you have a 1ghz processor and overclock it to 2ghz, it won't magically make it twice as fast, that's for sure. Lots more at work in hardware specs than just the clock speed. You need to account for other specs such as graphics chips and memory. Otherwise, the CPU would be bottlenecked and would cap out at a certain speed.

Thing is, the iPlayer definitely has issues emulating GBA from what we've seen. Most games require a 1 or 2 frameskip, cutting the speed (smoothness) by 50%-70%. Some games won't run smooth not matter what (Golden Sun 2). I'm not sure if this is due to lack of optimization in the emulator (meaning a newer emulator could fix these speed issues) or something else. I will say that according to Normmatt (our favorite AKAIO programmer and awesome dude), the iPlayer GBA emulator is actually a port of the PSP GBA emulator, GPSP. At least that's what he told me. I hear tell that GPSP in its original form plays GBA games pretty perfectly, without any speed issues. Not sure though. But clearly, iPlayer has some issues with it.

Last thing i want to point out is that the iPlayer does not have 3D hardware support of its own, its speed is raw speed, just as if it's an overclocked version of the DS processor (which apparently it is). PSP however, does have its own 3D hardware support, and it is far far superior to the DS'. Even with the iPlayer's high clock speed, it still might be no match for the PSP in terms of 3D capability. Normmatt did tell me he thought PS1 emulation on iPlayer's specs could be possible if someone was good enough at programming.

In conclusion, i don't think we can determine at the moment what the iPlayer is truly capable of. There aren't any real documents about how it works, or development kits for most people to try to take a look at what it can do. Perhaps when the Supercard DSTWO comes out, we'll see more of what it's capable of (has the same internal hardware as iPlayer). As it is, i doubt it could do N64 emulation. MAYBE very very slowly, and with a shit ton of glitches and unplayable things. But there is more to emulation than raw CPU speed. Many emulators for the DS are made as good as they are because their authors have found clever loopholes in the DS hardware to make the emulators run better than they should. Only time will tell though...

(long post is long)

 

[Rydian]

In conclusion, i don't think we can determine at the moment what the iPlayer is truly capable of. There aren't any real documents about how it works, or development kits for most people to try to take a look at what it can do.

Actually we have all sorts of info, the iPlayer team didn't make the hardware, and at least the SoC's specs are publicly available (linked from the main GBADSI page, even).

http://focus.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/tms320dm6441.pdf

-C64x+™ DSP Clock Rate · ARM926EJ-S Core
· 405-MHz (Max) at 1.05 V or 513-MHz (Max) at 1.2 V
– ARM926EJ-S™ Clock Rate
· 202.5-MHz (Max) at 1.05 V or 256-MH (Max) at 1.2 V

So the main processor in the iPlayer is the ARM926EJ-S. The DS's is an ARM946E-S.

 

[granville]

I am referring to development documents, as in the documents, programs, and even development kits people would use to code emulators or homebrew games for the card. I did see that document, but knowing the specs of a system won't help if you want a real world idea of how it performs or plays games developed natively for it. We know the GBA iPlayer emulator developer has some sort of knowledge of the card, HOWEVER, it is speculated that he is working FOR the Supercard company. It is common knowledge that the iPlayer was actually developed by team Supercard. If he is an employee, it would make sense that he would have access to all the development tools to make such a program. We also know the Supercard DSTWO will have its own GBA emulator built in (speculated to be the same as the iPlayer one).

All this doesn't mean mainstream homebrew developers will ever be able to take full advantage of the iPlayer. Unless someone manages to reverse engineer the card or something and share all their info, or Supercard team shares their development tools.

 

[Fishaman P]

IN CONCLUSION... People should start developing for the iPlayer/SC2. Now if only we could get the iPlayer in DSi mode, then THAT would be insane. Even though what that one guy said about MHz not being comparable, the combined stats would be about 800MHz, and yes, I know you can't add them like that, it's just a figure. My laptop can get SSB64 at 50% speed with 755MHz.

 

[granville]

I already said before, the DS would still be using its own 3D hardware, the megahertz isn't the only thing important to emulation. Try playing ANY 3D game on a PC with a Core i7 processor but no 3D accelerator card (or at least, a first generation one from the 90's). If it even booted, i'd be stunned. The problem is that the PC is being bottlenecked by the graphics card (or rather, lack thereof). The processor's power would be completely squandered and would only be able to play primitive 2D games at best. It's is NOT just raw processing power that makes a system capable of emulating powerful games, it's all kinds of other factors such as graphics processing and memory.

The problem as i said before is that although we know the specs of the iPlayer/DSTWO, we can't do anything about it if they don't share the development documents or programs needed to take advantage of the specs. At least, this is what i assume to be true, and i'm pretty sure it is. One reason many video game systems end up failing from 3rd party developers is lack of documentation stating how the system works and how to take advantage of the system. Doesn't matter if the system is powerful if no one knows how the fuck to program for it. We can only hope Supercard team releases their documents or someone manages to figure it out on their own.

 

[Rydian]

Well, there are software renderers, some older games like Quake 2 and the original half-life used or included them for people without 3D cards (which weren't common back then), but they're slower (though they still allow the game to run) and cut out most, if not all, of the good graphical detail.

I just took two screenshots of the first level of Quake 2, the first in it's OpenGL renderer (which makes use of the video card), and the second in it's software renderer.

http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/7550/q2compare.jpg

You can see the addition of texture filtering and colored lighting immediately.

 

[connor_walsh]

there is no!! diffrence between iplayer on ds lite and iplayer on dsi as the iplayer runs in ds mode dsi mode isnt unlocked yet so unless someone hacks the dsi with everything unlocked nothings possible thats why theres no dsi homebrew that uses the the camera etc.

 

[granville]

Software rendering still would need a pretty powerful PC AND we're talking about native PC games there, not emulated games. For me, N64 required well over 1ghz PLUS a good graphics card to run perfectly. And even now, i can't use the software renderer at great speeds, even on a 3ghz dual core Athlon II (plus, N64 emulators don't even USE more than one core IIRC). The DS could never do such a thing.

And yes, DSi has never been hacked, and likely won't be any time soon. There are now rumors of a NEW nintendo handheld, odds are people will just forget DSi and move onto that when the time comes. Not only would DSi need to be hacked, but it would also require an all new kind of flashcard to take advantage of the extra specs, unless you could just use the SD slot some how.

 

[MVBDX]

Very interesting from DarkChen's blog on 2009 July 16.

"Hi~ I’m back. I want to continue the topic of GBA emulator for iplayer. Unfortunately, iplayer official refused to give me SDK, for considering copyright problems. But finally I have obtained SDK in other way what I’d like to keep secret. I beg you guys forgiveness."

How can a guy obtained SDK of new device only after 15 days of release?!
I think, that's clear DarkChen is one of iPlayer developers.

 

[Rydian]

How can a guy obtained SDK of new device only after 15 days of release?!

Considering people can obtain game carts a week BEFORE release, that's not unreasonable. Somebody that was given the SDK may have also had an interest in the GBA emulator so they could have passed along a copy of the SDK.

 

[Fishaman P]

All you talking about 3D renderers, etc.:

The iPlayer could do the actual data processing, while the DS does the hardware job. Don't even tell me the DS doesn't have 3D: Super Mario 64 DS, the Pokemon series, Call of Duty series, Animal Crossing, etc.

 

[spinal_cord]

I really with people would stop asking for DSi software to be made when the DSi hasn't [in any meaningful way] been hacked yet. Until all of the news sites are bursting with the news of a homebrew coder being able to use the extra features, then you should expect that it is currently impossible for someone to do what you are asking.

 

[SgtThom]

All you talking about 3D renderers, etc.:

The iPlayer could do the actual data processing, while the DS does the hardware job. Don't even tell me the DS doesn't have 3D: Super Mario 64 DS, the Pokemon series, Call of Duty series, Animal Crossing, etc.

Doesn't Pokemon diamond use a type of texture rendering to make it appear 3D?

 

[granville]

DarkChen is definitely heavily rumored to be a Supercard employee, Supercard made the iPlayer. He never even specified how he got the SDK, and his emulator is now apparently a part of the DSTWO's internal features.

DS has 3D support, but if it is considerably weaker than the N64's own hardware, there's not much you can do about it. N64 can display more polygons at once than the DS can. And comparing native games made FOR DS and emulated games is foolish. PSP has a fairly powerful 3D hardware, considerably more than DS, and it still can't play any N64 games at full speed. Graphics have a lot of glitches too. It has taken extremely powerful PC graphics cards to get the N64 emulation as good as it is today, and it's STILL not 100% perfect.