Happy New SNES4ALL!

I just release a new version of SNES4ALL with a important speed improvement. The main changes are:
- Uses MMU (HW paging) for direct access to memory without tables and translations.
- Draws SNES tiles as PVR textures.
- CPUs assembler improvements.
- Supports SDD1 and SA1 chips.




I had to change it a lot for running it with MMU and PVR, It has been a very hard work and needs more work for patching MMU problems (use 'snes4all_secure.bin' binary for disabling MMU for games like StarOcean) and drawing all transparency cases with PVR.

Also I would like get a better sound and use ARM Dreamcast CPU for rendering sound.

Anyway, this Beta-2 version runs almost the entire SNES games with a good speed and a lot of games at full speed with sound and transparency.

MORE INFO AND DOWNLOADS AT SNES4ALL SITE

I'm back

Sorry the long delay, but I have a good news: A new release of NeoGeo emulators AES4ALL and NEO4ALL for Dreamcast and Dingoo (legacy Dingux).

Now, AES4ALL has SD-Card support (yes, MMU using SD instead CD is more fast, so more playable for large NeoGeo roms) and fixes Yamaha timmings:




NEO4ALL can load ISOs from SD-Card too but there are not CDDA tracks for now:




About Dingoo, runs same speed using a bit of overclock.

MORE INFO AND DOWNLOADS AT NEO4ALL SITE

RetroEncounter

We have been really cool this weekend in RetroEncounter. I have met to Mekanaizer and Inditek and We have formed a awesome group Dreamcast&Emulation DreamTeam: Franxis, Puck, Fox, NeoBlast, Mekanaizer, Inditek, Dr...




We have had some time for speaking and thinking about our projects and comment next steps. Also we have tested our emulators for looking for bugs and points to enhanced. Like GENS/GENS4ALL:


Download a preview for Dreamcast HERE. I hope that Inditek will release it soon.

Also I have seen problems for loading BIN with DreamShell; I use a simple SD Loader hat I built for fast coding. I shared it HERE.

DCaSTaway RC-6 for Dreamcast

I have a debt to release the latest release candidate of DCaSTaway for Dreamcast (only released for Dingoo-A320), but I need some time for coding Dreamcast SD-Card support and fix the STOP bug of FAME that delayed UAE4ALL release.

The news:
- Dreamcast SD-Card support for savestates and diskchanges.
- Latest Dingoo-A320 new features: Fast load/save savestates with Start+L/Start+R, better sound and more compatible with MFP interrupts.
- Uses latest FAME Motorola 68000 core: more faster and accurate.



MORE INFO AND DOWNLOADS AT DCASTAWAY SITE

And now... MAME4ALL

Another new beta release of a old project, MAME Arcade emulator for Dreamcast:



It uses same romset but it has SD-Card support for loading roms and save config per game, implements a file cache for fast loading and uses latest FAME Motorola 68000 core and FAZE Z80 core.

MORE INFO AND DOWNLOADS AT MAME4ALL SITE

A promise is a promise

I just released a new version of UAE4ALL for Dreamcast and Dingoo after we fix STOP problem in FAME, well, really STOP problem has not been fixed but we have reversed subversion revision that do this bug.



News in this version:
- 30% speed increased: Sound and Video render improved.
- Savestates support: The length of a savestate file is 200-300KB, so SD-Card is needed.
- Dreamcast SD-Card support.
- New option menu for screen position.
- Uses latest FAME Motorola 68000 core: More stable, fast and accurate.

Downloads and more info at UAE4ALL site.

SNES4ALL Beta-1

I just finish the new beta release of my SuperNintendo emulator for Dreamcast:



It has a very important speed increased and VMU/SD-Card support for Savestates and SRAM. At the future I want to implement a OpenGL/PowerVR tile rendering and assembler PPU code because I think that it is the way for avoid frameskip.

MORE INFO AND DOWNLOADS AT SNES4ALL SITE

In the meantime... SNES4ALL

Fox and me are trying to fix our Motorola 68000 CPU core when STOP+Interrupt happens. I have located this bug and traced it using DCaSTaway but right now Fox needs some time for fixing in FAME/SH4 generator. Guru meditation? DCaSTaway and UAE4ALL releases are waiting this fix.

And now I can not stop, so I am working on SNES4ALL since a few days. The main work is to improve the Marcus Comstedt assembler code for CPU, the sound render and the tile blitters.

I have gotten freeing 2 CPU registers for other uses and speed up using pipeline slots and cache alignment. About the sound render, I have rewrited it using 6 different methods (ALTDECODE based) but needs tune it, and the tile blitters, I am coding (trying really) a new set of blitters for drawing block by block instead by line.

Also, now supports Dreamcast SD-Card for loading ROMS and savestates, but I have to able to write savestate support for VMU yet.

I did it !

Awesome! I have could speed increase (even more) for Dreamcast and Dingoo A320:




A lot of games run very close to full speed and also it support SD cards for savestates and load/save diskimages.

The secret has been disabling the redundant code and getting that it is processing (blitter and render) only exact lines to draw. This has been more easy to say and think than to do it. I have spent years to do it finally because the architecture of Amiga machine is very complex.

Now, I need some time for releasing it because we have found a new bug on FAME Motorola 68000 CPU core. I hope that we can fix it in a few days, almost before of RetroEncounter event at April 9th.

I really love this emulator! It is the most hard that I have worked on it.

Preparing UAE4ALL

For RetroEncounter event, I intend to release a new version of UAE4ALL for Dreamcast and DINGOO-A320.


Right now I have it updated it with latest FAME (our Motorola 68000 core), Dreamcast SD-Card support including savestates and fix some small bugs like dirty sound after loading a savestate. Also Dreamcast version has been more updated because ReleaseCandidate-2 version only was released for Dingoo-A320.

But I will want more (and more) speed and I think that I will get it If I get improved blitter functions. For now I get around 2 fps but It is needed to change blitter functions table too. I hope get 5-7 fps more.

Can I get it?

Neverball for WIZ/CAANOO handhelds

After Craig Copper wrote me about the possibility of porting Neverball to WIZ/CAANOO handheld, I proposed him to open a GoogleCode project because I think that it will not be hard work if we start from the current Dreamcast port that I did it.

The GoogleCode NEVERBALL-GP2X project has been created. Do you want to participate? Visit NEVERBALL-GP2X project home.

Why not for Android too?

The main goal is convert the actual OpenGL-1.2 code to OpenGL/ES code for WIZ/CAANOO/ANDROID.

Open Blog !

I always wanted to open a blog for exposing all work doing, porting and adapting open source emulators for Dreamcast and handhelds like GP32, GP2X, WIZ, CAANOO or DINGOO. I hope that I will have enough time for writing here.

Also I have participated on others open source projects that can be searched at SourceForge and GoogleCode, and I would like continue it.

In my projects homepage can see all emulators (named like %4ALL) that I am working on it: SuperNintendo, Playstation, ZX-Spectrum, etc. But also I am working on GENS/GENS4ALL and others projects of EMUFORGE team.