GP32 Gp32 Question?


OmarNawaz

Active Member
Joined
May 15, 2004
Messages
663
so all you developer type guys is the main problem with coding for the gp32 optimizations for the CPU and stuff
Also does GP32 have some special software OS that makes things easier.
 
Optmizing specifically for the CPU isn't always needed either. With the lack of an OS, the GP32's CPU is actually pretty quick.

Coding for the GP32 is done using one of the various SDKs out there, and in my experience, it is very straight forward. Everything is done by the CPU and there is no special video memory to deal with. These work as a disadvantage if you are really trying to push the system, but for those just trying to get something running, this actually helps make things very easy.
 
Optimizing for the gp32 is actually quite fun also, as since the processor is RISC based, there's only a few instructions to remember when writing your routines in assembler :)
 
So if someone was to try an port a gp32 emulator onto another ARM9 device would they have to obtain a SDK specific for the device i.e NGAGE.
 
Realistically speaking would snes emulation be possible on a device such as the Ngage
 
What processor does the NGage have, and what else is it shared with? (Eg. can you only actually use say 60% of the CPU as it needs the rest for the phone side?)
 
I believe the load on the cpu is minimal around 10%-20% depending on network conditions but when im running certain apps like emame for instance i can put the phone in a offline mode which betters performance.

Its an ARM9 running at 106mhz ram is 10mb i think need to check, it hasn't got any GPU because ngage games can run on other series 60 devices but i think the newer games uses some ngage specific API's.

a megadrive emulator is being released sometime this week i believe performance is quite good something called Picodrive, does snes emulation generally require more resources than megadrive?
 
In that case, SNES emulator is possible, but it would be slow. Run Snes9x at 100 if possible on your GP32 and the result will probably be the same as on the ngage.

Now I notice that at 133, the SNES emu is slow, so at 90Mhz (100Mhz - phone usage), it would be almost crippling. It would run a few games, just not very many of them at acceptable speed.
 
It's entirely possible, just currently slow. I'm sure you could use Nokia's SDK or potentially something from Series 60 documentation to speed it up on that particular release. Even in Airplane mode, though, I'd expect SNES emulation to be borderline (after all, the GP32 is kind of spotty at SNES emulation performance when running at normal speed).

So the take-away message is, optimize for your specific machine. :) Running the GP32's SNES emulator in a GP32 wrapper for the N-Gage seems like it would be a minimal performance overhead, but it's still something that's not taking advantage of the unique hardware inside Nokia's little beast.
 
what is the difference between the GP's firmware and an OS? Am i right in thinking that an os manages memory and application threading, or am i missing something?

Thanks

Twin.
 
The ngage runs a symbian OS so i think it supports C++ but i heard that its hard getting SDK's specific for the ngage, i think i need to do some more research. :eek:
 
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