openMSX 0.5.2

by mth on 19-06-2005, 02:15
Topic: Emulation
Languages:

Shortly after the release of blueMSX 2.3, the openMSX crew have released a new version of this popular emulator. As usual a new version of Catapult, the user-friendly GUI/launcher for openMSX, has been released as well. The most important changes in this new version of openMSX:

  • Improved timing on turbo R machines
  • Improved V9990 rendering
  • Added scaler: HQ2xLite
  • Updated Okazaki YM2413 (MSX-MUSIC) core
  • Fixed a bug in the SCC emulation, which screwed up some sound effects
  • Fixed MSX-AUDIO sample RAM access
  • Fixed the timer accuracy of OPL4 and MSX-AUDIO
  • Added a DirectSound driver for Windows, this should solve some of the problems Windows users have been reporting
  • Added sound logger: writes played sound to a WAV file
  • Added disk manipulator: commands to import/export files from disk images (experimental)
  • Added several debug commands
  • Extended IPS patch support
  • Added trainers.tcl: hundreds of game trainers
  • Added a cheat finder script: create your own game trainers
  • Updated C-BIOS to 0.21
  • New default console background and font
  • New openMSX icon

Please keep in mind this are just the highlights, you can read the release notes for more details on the changes in this new release. You can download openMSX 0.5.2 here. Source and Win32 installer packages are available now, Debian packages and Win32 ZIP will come soon.

The many changes in the new version of openMSX are likely to positively affect its EmuRank in the MSX Emulator Comparison. We'll try to update the Emulator Comparison as soon as possible, it will be interesting to find out whether or not blueMSX is capable of maintaining its lead in the MRC EmuRank Charts or that this new release puts openMSX back on top.

Relevant link: openMSX Home Page

Comments (32)

By Vampier

Prophet (2409)

Vampier's picture

19-06-2005, 02:33

Hooray for this great release Big smile

Please try out the game trainers Smile

f10 to bring up the console
trainer_[gamename]
f10 to hide the console

I made it a point to train most populair games out there Smile

By Maggoo

Paragon (1217)

Maggoo's picture

19-06-2005, 09:48

Great new release ! It only keeps getting better and better.

By mars2000you

Enlighted (6442)

mars2000you's picture

19-06-2005, 10:32

Where are my boosted machines ???

http://www.msx.org/forumtopic4600.html

By Bart

Paragon (1422)

Bart's picture

19-06-2005, 11:12

OMG, new versions of the best 2 emulators within 24 hours Wink Pretty cool!

By Sama

Ambassador (2068)

Sama's picture

19-06-2005, 13:51

I still don't seem to be able to get it working Sad

By mars2000you

Enlighted (6442)

mars2000you's picture

19-06-2005, 14:02

Rikusu : use Catapult AND my boosted machines (that require the roms used by the generic MSX1-2-2+ machines and the Turbo-R FS-A1GT in blueMSX).

It's really the easy way !

By mth

Champion (507)

mth's picture

19-06-2005, 14:14

Rikusu: Explain your problem to us and we'll try to guide you through it.

By Sama

Ambassador (2068)

Sama's picture

19-06-2005, 15:50

@Mars: maybe I should try that Smile

@mth: After installing the Windows version, copying the system ROMs in the indicated directory and booting the emulator, it still seems to be using C-Bios, which apparently only handles ROMs atm, and I don't see how to change any setting. The problem can probably be solved easily by reading the manual (duhh), but I just wanted to see if I could get this new version up and running without having to read any how-to's (had some problems with older versions as well which weren't solved as easily as through reading the manual Wink). But if you're able to tell me what to do...? Smile

By snout

Ascended (15187)

snout's picture

19-06-2005, 16:22

Rikusu - are you sure you're using catapult?

By Sama

Ambassador (2068)

Sama's picture

19-06-2005, 16:33

I'm not - I don't know what Catapult looks like Wink I downloaded and installed the newest full package, isn't Catapult automatically installed?

By mars2000you

Enlighted (6442)

mars2000you's picture

19-06-2005, 16:36

If you don't have changed the default settings of the installation, Catapult is installed and you have even a shortcut in the Windows general menu.

By mars2000you

Enlighted (6442)

mars2000you's picture

19-06-2005, 16:38

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

19-06-2005, 17:10

Rikusu: if you got a GUI to launch openMSX with, you're using Catapult. At the top left, you see the setting what MSX to use ("MSX type"). By default it indeed uses C-BIOS, to make it work out of the box. Choose a machine of which you installed the ROMs in the designated dir and press Start! Smile (It's as easy as that...)

I can't believe you missed this thing, btw!

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

19-06-2005, 17:51

Notice: Win32 ZIP file now availble (but.... anyone not using the installer is a masochist ;-)

By Edwin

Paragon (1182)

Edwin's picture

19-06-2005, 18:21

So what's someone that does a cvs update/configure/make/make install then? Smile

By snout

Ascended (15187)

snout's picture

19-06-2005, 18:27

an openMSX developer Tongue

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

19-06-2005, 18:32

Edwin: I was, of course, strictly speaking about Win32 users... ;-)

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

19-06-2005, 18:34

(Who want to install a binary release...)

(Damn, I need editing of reactions!)

By mars2000you

Enlighted (6442)

mars2000you's picture

19-06-2005, 19:15

Manuel, you have 2 kinds of Win users : some prefer installers, some hate installers.

For this second category, it's not a problem to unzip correctly (with the subdirectories) the openMSX package in the directory that they have choosen (and eventually to create a shortcut to Catapult).

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

19-06-2005, 20:32

But what is the advantage of doing it? Completely none, I think... But hey, if they want it, they can get it Smile

By jr

Champion (379)

jr's picture

20-06-2005, 10:55

I just realized that openMSX does not compile out-of-the-box on Mac OS X 10.4, because the default compiler in OS X 10.4 is gcc 4.0 and openMSX seems to have some problems compiling with it. After changing the compiler in the openMSX build config to gcc 3.3 everything worked fine.

By anonymous

incognito ergo sum (116)

anonymous's picture

20-06-2005, 18:30

Hmmm... those line-interrupts does not work well yet... or at least what I do with them.
I guess I just have to wait for the next update before I can stop using the Dragon Engine Smile

By Edwin

Paragon (1182)

Edwin's picture

20-06-2005, 19:42

Line interrupts work perfectly. With pixel accuracy anyway, I don't run it any other way. Smile

By turbor

Hero (519)

turbor's picture

20-06-2005, 19:45

Hmmm... those line-interrupts does not work well yet... or at least what I do with them.
Can you elaborate on this please.
Maybe you are experiencing a known problem, or you have found a glitch in openMSX that we aren't aware of Smile

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

20-06-2005, 19:53

turbor/Edwin: he's talking about the V9990 line interrupts. They are implemented, but not completely, if I understood Wouter correctly.

jr: it seems gcc 4.0.0 which is shipped with Tiger has some compatibility problems. openMSX 0.5.2 compiles fine on gcc 4.1 prerelease. There is more software known not to compile on 4.0.0... It's a bit of a shame they shipped it with Tiger... It's just a bit buggy still.

By anonymous

incognito ergo sum (116)

anonymous's picture

21-06-2005, 11:44

Hmmm... those line-interrupts does not work well yet... or at least what I do with them.
Oops! Sorry about that. I did mean V9990 line-interrupts, anyway the thing is i rewrite the scroll control
registers during display period and that part is not supported (yet).
A anoying feature the V9990 has with rewriting the Y-scroll control regs during display period is that the
high part is ignored. By example, before the display start you write 0 in the Y-regs then wait till displayline
128 and then write 260 in the Y-regs. Now what you expect (or what I did) is the display continueing form
line 260, but this is not the case. What happens is that the display continues form line 4. So forget about
a two-player-split-screen-sonic-game if the stage is higher than 3/2 screen (if you want 2 layers that is).
Anyway looking foreward for the next updateSmile.

By witcho_paan

Supporter (9)

witcho_paan's picture

22-06-2005, 14:20

maybe Catapult has some error, the extensions selections don't made any changes in the emulation behaviour. I opened an item on sourceforge bug tracker (1225491). Beside that fact, the emulator work's very well, and i like the new improvements.

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

23-06-2005, 23:06

Bug found and probably fixed. See the bug report.... it only affects builds that use wxGTK, because it's actually a bug in wxGTK Sad

By witcho_paan

Supporter (9)

witcho_paan's picture

24-06-2005, 14:52

Manuel, thanks a lot for the fast bug-fixing.

BTW, i make a small portuguese "openMSX linux kick start with some screenshots", if someone is interested, go to

http://www.wpilon.org/emulacao/linux/openmsx.php

At this time, only portuguese version are finished.

In this site, i put the Slackware 10.1 packages for the SDL* wxGTK* and openMSX*, easy to install (download it && installpkg *.tgz), maybe this are useful for the Slackware Users, even if you don't speak portuguese.

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

25-06-2005, 15:39

Wow, very nice page!

By Manuel

Ascended (19314)

Manuel's picture

09-07-2005, 18:29

By the way, I hope that Rikusu got openMSX working now, in the mean time.... Please let us know!

By Vampier

Prophet (2409)

Vampier's picture

12-07-2005, 08:16

witcho_paan that is a very nice page Smile maybe you want to post that in the FAQ on the openMSX forum that can be found @ http://forum.openmsx.org