by Jadam » Jun 29, 2002 @ 7:44pm
on a pocketpc, it would be very very hard to emulate a n64. As you see, right now, our emu is very slow, but then again, thats because we are using an interpreter.
look at it this way.
N64 uses a 90mhz R4300i 64bit superscalar processor
4mb VRAM and the RCP and bunchas of other stuff.
now psx, has a 33mhz R3000a 32bit processor, with 1mb VRAM, GTE, cop0, GPU, SPU.
which do you think would be easier to emulate. not to mention, what is the minimum requirements for those n64 emulaters and what are the minmum requirments for psx emus. PLUS n64 emulators use something called HLE. where, when they are doing graphics, instead of trying to emulate the actual video hardware, the graphics are just rerouted towards the video card that you have. Like, if your given a 3d model, instead of trying to emulate the 3d hardware and then display it on the screen, those emus just send the 3d model straight to the video card and handle it as native video code. thats the only reason they can have such speed. The only time we will see N64 emulators is when we have dedicated 3d hardware and 600+mhz XScale chips. and that is the bare minimum.
And dont forget, ALL of those N64 emulators use dynamic recompilers, which ARE NOT compatible with any other processor. I am writing a dynamic recompiler as we speak, but for now we are stuck with the interpreter. but once i get the dynarec finished, we should see a 100-200% increase in speed.