Can we expect an lr-package for dosbox some day?

BuZz

@psyke83 I already have a module for it so no need to do a PR. I'll retest it.

edmaul69

@psyke83 yeah if they got it working at normal speed it would be cool. I heard it was really slow. One issue i am curious about? I use .sh files to boot directly into games. If it ever does get fixed for speed, is it even possible with the lr-dosbox to mount disc drives and boot directly into games? I am pretty happy with standalone dosbox and im not sure how the libretro version would have any advantages since i assume it would need individual emulators.cfg or individual .sh files to run the games seperately. That then seems to make it about the same effort to get the games running.

psyke83

@edmaul69 said in Can we expect an lr-package for dosbox some day?:

@psyke83 yeah if they got it working at normal speed it would be cool. I heard it was really slow. One issue i am curious about? I use .sh files to boot directly into games. If it ever does get fixed for speed, is it even possible with the lr-dosbox to mount disc drives and boot directly into games? I am pretty happy with standalone dosbox and im not sure how the libretro version would have any advantages since i assume it would need individual emulators.cfg or individual .sh files to run the games seperately. That then seems to make it about the same effort to get the games running.

It's possible to boot directly into a game by choosing the exe. So for example, if you have wolf3d unpacked into roms/pc/wolf3d, in EmulationStation, you can navigate into wolf3d folder and then choose the wolf3d(.exe) entry, which will launch lr-dosbox with C mounted to the current directory (roms/pc/wolf3d) and automatically launch wolf3d.exe.

BuZz

@psyke83 Regarding performance - did you enable the dynamic recompilation ?

BTW see this branch for lr-dosbox - https://github.com/joolswills/RetroPie-Setup/tree/exp_modules

psyke83

I didn't. I'll re-test tonight when I have access to my Pi, using the same build configuration from your script. Perhaps that's the cause of the input bug, so it may not be fixed at all. Will let you know soon if I jumped the gun in that regard.

edmaul69

@psyke83 does it have a way of assigning a disk drive/cd drive? Both real and iso/img?

KevinsHope

@buzz I do not see the Lr-dosbox package under experimental or optional packages. Where is it listed at for instillation?

BuZz

@kevinshope it's not yet.

psyke83

@buzz said in Can we expect an lr-package for dosbox some day?:

@psyke83 Regarding performance - did you enable the dynamic recompilation ?

BTW see this branch for lr-dosbox - https://github.com/joolswills/RetroPie-Setup/tree/exp_modules

Your script doesn't enable dynarec for rpi3:

    isPlatform "armv6" && params+="WITH_DYNAREC=oldarm"
    isPlatform "armv7" && params+="WITH_DYNAREC=arm"

It will compile correctly when the following line is added:

    isPlatform "armv8" && params+="WITH_DYNAREC=arm"

Dynarec improves things. Before I could only manage 4 x 1000 cycles before audio dropouts, but now it can manage a bit under 2 x 10000 total cycles. Descent becomes playable - much much better, but probably still not at the level of the native port.

It's probably still inferior, but now I'd recommend adding this to experimental for those that want to tinker. It's definitely usable when dynarec is enabled and I haven't noticed any repeating key input issues.

I've experienced several hard crashes with the native dosbox port that I haven't seen with the libretro core, so that's one plus, at least.

KevinsHope

@buzz Being a new user to linux in general, I will eagerly wait for it to be added.

psyke83

@edmaul69 said in Can we expect an lr-package for dosbox some day?:

@psyke83 does it have a way of assigning a disk drive/cd drive? Both real and iso/img?

"imgmount" is a recognized command in lr-dosbox, so I'm assuming it will work for mounting ISOs or hard disk images.

https://www.dosbox.com/wiki/IMGMOUNT

edmaul69

@psyke83 ok. Thanks.

psyke83

Update on Doom:

It seems that Doom & Doom 2 were failing on lr-dosbox due to case sensitivity (!). Even though DOS is supposed to be limited to 8.3 filenames and case insensitive, when the wad files are named DOOM.WAD and DOOM2.WAD on the actual ext4 root filesystem (in roms/pc/doom/), the Doom executable can't find the files, but only if running via lr-dosbox (the native port is fine). Manually renaming the files to lowercase outside of the emulator fixed the issue.

Performance is acceptable in lr-dosbox with dynarec enabled, but it's definitely a bit choppier than the native dosbox version, and certainly not reaching the 35fps engine limit at all times (whereas I suspect the native dosbox version does).

edmaul69

@psyke83 is the 35fps the limit setting with pentium_slow with the cpu at "max" (95%) or setting it at "max 110%" (full speed)

psyke83

@edmaul69 said in Can we expect an lr-package for dosbox some day?:

@psyke83 is the 35fps the limit setting with pentium_slow with the cpu at "max" (95%) or setting it at "max 110%" (full speed)

The original Doom had an engine cap of 35fps - that's what I'm talking about. The speed difference I'm seeing may be due to lr-dosbox not supporting auto cycle rate detection, so whatever arbitrary CPU cycle speed you select will not be optimal compared to the native port automatically adjusting speed by default.

edmaul69

@psyke83 gotcha.

BuZz

@psyke83 thanks. re rpi3, it's an older wip branch. Not complete - just rebased it earlier to show. (Hence no pr yet) - but will go over code before doing the pr.

Brigane

Has anybody been trying the new lr-dosbox found in the experimental section yet?

hooperre

@brigane I attempted to use it, but it doesn't handle .sh files >> .conf files from what I've seen.

It'll just try to run the .sh file in Dosbox, not run the config file and run the [autoexec] section.

dudleydes

@brigane

@hooperre is correct in saying lr-dosbox will not launch games from .sh files but it will launch from .conf files. For example, to get Albion running in the lr-dosbox, I created a text file, Albion.conf, in the PC roms folder with the following contents:

[autoexec]
# Lines in this section will be run at startup.
# You can put your MOUNT lines here.

MOUNT c /home/pi/RetroPie/roms/pc
C:
cd ALBION
LAUNCH.EXE
EXIT

On the plus side, lr-dosbox , by default, maps the mouse to my PS3 controller. Mouse movement is mapped to the right analog stick. The left mouse button is mapped to the right trigger (R2) and the right button to the left trigger (L2).

On the down side, the key mapper doesn't work so games such as Abuse require a keyboard.