MAME on Gamepark GP32

[jginiso]

This sounds like a great portable MAME machine. Has anyone heard of this system? Think it can run MAME?

http://english.gamepark.com/
http://www.gbax.com/gp32review.html

Thanks
James

[radiator]

i'd not heard of the GP32 until a few months ago, but apparently it's been around for a while (in Korea anyway )

as for MAME:

from http://gp32.emu.pl:

'As you remeber we have small Mame port by Craig, called Craigs 8080 Arcade All info comes from our discussion board so i just quote author here:

Just a note to say i've not abandoned my mame port, i have just been a bit busy. Today I started it again, from scratch, with the goal of porting a more recent version.
As we know from my last little demo the gp32 can run the z80 based games full speed so hopfully in the next couple of weeks i should be able to post something more complete (hahaha famous last words).

I have a version that ran a few more games (phoenix and pacman hardware) but its a mess thats why i'm starting again and i'm going to try not to hack it this time.

As you see it is very real that we play some cool MAME games soon. Dont expect those killer titles like Mortal Kombat 3 or Killer Instinct 2 but i think some older games like Xevious will be playable without any problem.
The good news is, that not only Craig works on MAME port. There are also other person who started or will start their work on porting MAME sources to GP32.'

so, looks quite promising

there are also other emulators available for the system, NES, SNES, MSX, C64, PC Engine, Spectrum, NeoGeo Pocket, MasterSystem, WonderSwan...

sounds like a pretty nice little handheld - may have to sell my GBA and get one of these

 


EDIT

goto http://207.44.176.77/~admin28/gp32emu/craigs8080.htm for a little more info on the 8080 emulator, plus a few screenshots...

[Howard_Casto]

In terms of a handheld it's extremely impressive, but not in terms of a portable mame player.  With a mere 133 mhz cpu it would even have trouble running asteriods!  A box that can't even run all of the classics isn't worth 149 bucks imho.  Now as a console emulator it's great, so don't take what I said the wrong way.  It's just if you were getting this soley for mame then realize that based on a new port of mame, maybe 30 games, tops would run on such low requirements.  

[Wade]

More of Howard's harping on processor requirements...

If someone has a minimal PC, the smart move would be to run an older version of mame anyway, right?  Why run v0.66 when it runs at 50% of the speed of v0.36 and a person with a slow PC is only going to be trying to run classics anyway?

FOR THE RECORD, my mame cab has a P133 machine with 48 megs of ram, and it runs a lot of classic games just fine.  I use DOS mame 0.36.  Right now I have about 25 games on there, all but a couple of my favorite classic games.

I'm planning to order a fast system in a few weeks so I can play newer games like the MK series.  But it really bothers me that the newer versions of mame are so much slower than the older versions, when running the same roms.  It has me thinking about staying with an older version, and DOS, even after I upgrade my PC (though I still prefer DOS for frontend reasons, too).  Does anyone know exactly when the speed fell off dramatically?

Wade

[radiator]

there is a good GP32 MAME style emulator that can run about 10 games at full speed...you just gotta remember that it's only had 1 or 2 beta releases, so it will get better as time progresses

surely, if the GP32 can run NES games, it can run most of the classic arcade games (upto 1980/82 time)?!?

and I hope "a 133 cpu would have trouble running asteroids" was sarcasm

*m

[Howard_Casto]

there is a good GP32 MAME style emulator that can run about 10 games at full speed...you just gotta remember that it's only had 1 or 2 beta releases, so it will get better as time progresses

surely, if the GP32 can run NES games, it can run most of the classic arcade games (upto 1980/82 time)?!?

and I hope "a 133 cpu would have trouble running asteroids" was sarcasm

*m

No this is not true at all.  Console emus are less on accuracy and more on playability.  In other words mame is much slower.  This wouldn't be too bad an issue except that the author plans on upgrading his emu to work with the 66 core.  The .66 core is far too bloated to run well on such minimal resources.  

Btw the crack on asteroids was not sarcasam.... vector games take far more processing power than you realize.  Take that and the fact that asteroids uses samples and it's a processor nightmare compared to most classics.  

something else.... 133mhz also includes the graphics processor from what I read (a shared resource system), so it's even less than a 133 mhz.  

[Jakobud]

Mame emulator for GP32:  

http://www.zophar.net/consoles/files/craigs8080emu.zip

[SirPoonga]

It can link wirelessly...

[rampy]

we/ll never get one now as it was featured on slashdot yesterday and all the g32's are all sold out... probably to  /. geeks to run linux on=P

rampy

[SirPoonga]

The game park has been around for quite some time.  It;s been /. before.

[rampy]

The game park has been around for quite some time.  It;s been /. before.

I know, it was just a joke =P

But I remember when Iopeners became the hip "hackable" thing and after being posted to  /.   you couldn't get to circuit city fast enough!  I ended up with a websurfer =(

*shrug* sorry back to your normally scheduled thread...

rampy

[jginiso]

If they sold out that wouldnt be a bad thing at all. The company producing the units is considering a US launch so the more they sell the better.

[AX]

whats an iopener?

[JamesMolloy]

They won't launch in the Us. They'd get slaughtered by GBA. They don't have the resources to support the machine properly.

I think the GP32 is good but in a few years pocket PCs will get cheap and powerful enough to wipe the floor with it emulation wise.

[BobA]

AX

Totally off topic but that's the way threads wander.

Here is a link to answer your questions re: Iopener

http://www.linux-hacker.net/imod/imod.html

Now since it ran Linux did it run the linux version of MAME?

BobA

[rampy]

AX

Totally off topic but that's the way threads wander.

Here is a link to answer your questions re: Iopener

http://www.linux-hacker.net/imod/imod.html

Now since it ran Linux did it run the linux version of MAME?

BobA

well IIRC it ran QNX... and I'm guessing linux mame wouldn't work on it ( does linux mame require x-windows?)

But, if you shlopped a notebook drive (or any drive you could get to fit in it) you could run any OS/mame you wanted...  although the screen was a little washed /cheezy/ghosty ....''

*shrug*  

rampy

[BobA]

It may have run QNX as its normal op sys but the first thing the boys did was fix it up to run Linux.  If you look at the link I posted it shows it running Linux.

BobA

[rampy]

It may have run QNX as its normal op sys but the first thing the boys did was fix it up to run Linux.  If you look at the link I posted it shows it running Linux.

BobA

I know ...  I've been there before... there forums were awesome resource back in the day...  I did say

"But, if you shlopped a notebook drive (or any drive you could get to fit in it) you could run any OS/mame you wanted... "

which is what they did...  *shrug*  

guess we're talking about the same thing really =P

rampy

[DeathMonk]

something else.... 133mhz also includes the graphics processor from what I read (a shared resource system), so it's even less than a 133 mhz.  

Also, this is no Intel or AMD processor.  This is an ARM processor, which even at 133Mhz it isn't going to work to the same effect as the former.

[Howard_Casto]

Finally, someone has listened to the fact that it's a bad mase to start with in the first place.  

To play various protable games, yeah it's great, but you guys are talking linux and mame.  That's just crazy talk.