Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?

tashman

I've ordered one to fuel my raspberry pi addiction.

tpo1990

Typically it is the CPU and the GPU where the biggest change will be for emulation. More memory usually means better multitasking at opening more windows and processes.

matchaman

It will make an even greater mini-PC, keeping up with the times. For example facebook's scripts are heavier than ever, gmail has become a memory hog, etc. When using it for RetroPie/emulators, I don't really see a benefit. But if you plan on a hybrid, It's definitely recommended.

Clyde

@matchaman said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

For example facebook's scripts are heavier than ever, gmail has become a memory hog, etc.

Maybe it's time to stop using those, then … 🧐

joyrider3774

also on 32bit os one process is only able to allocate 3GB of memory but not sure any emulator needs more (i doubt it)

matchaman

@Clyde said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

@matchaman said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

For example facebook's scripts are heavier than ever, gmail has become a memory hog, etc.

Maybe it's time to stop using those, then … 🧐

Oh yes, that would be ideal :D

To be honest, games aside, social media and google stuff are the only reason to have more than 4GB of RAM on any everyday system. Their services keep getting heavier for no apparent reason.

Clyde

@matchaman That is an ugly fact with many online services. In my case, I've stopped my at least weekly visits to GOG.com since their website reboot a couple of years ago which made it a creeping mess. No online service is that unique for me that I'd buy more expensive hardware just to keep up for the next couple of years.

Offline things like butter-soft ootb Playstation emulation like my brand new Pi 4 does offer me are a completely different matter, of course. 😉

quicksilver

Anyone else see that raspbian is now going to be called raspberry pi OS?

barbudreadmon

With their team barking at users on their forum when someone asks for 64-bits OS support (for those who don't know : 64-bits is required for an application to handle more than 3GB), i really think raspberrys are turning into a really sad joke at this point...

mitu

@quicksilver said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

Anyone else see that raspbian is now going to be called raspberry pi OS?

Yes - that's quite the change, though I don't see the name change applied in the update. /etc/os-release reports Raspbian still.

George Spiggott

I guess that this is their response to two new competitors to the Pi 4 arriving in the last few of weeks. I am surprised that they've chosen to reintroduce the three different models when they had effectively reduced the line to two and that they have maintained the price points.

quicksilver

@barbudreadmon said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

With their team barking at users on their forum when someone asks for 64-bits OS support (for those who don't know : 64-bits is required for an application to handle more than 3GB), i really think raspberrys are turning into a really sad joke at this point...

You are definitely a glass half empty kind of guy aren't you? ;)

8gb of ram would help when running multiple tasks though right? The 3gb limitation is only per process right?

grant2258

@barbudreadmon said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

With their team barking at users on their forum when someone asks for 64-bits OS support (for those who don't know : 64-bits is required for an application to handle more than 3GB), i really think raspberrys are turning into a really sad joke at this point...

@barbudreadmon said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

With their team barking at users on their forum when someone asks for 64-bits OS support (for those who don't know : 64-bits is required for an application to handle more than 3GB), i really think raspberrys are turning into a really sad joke at this point...

Linux can handle more than 3gb limit in 32 bits with pae (as can windows) just in case you didnt know

George Spiggott

Link to the announcement on their website.

https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/8gb-raspberry-pi-4-on-sale-now-at-75/

grant2258

@George-Spiggott said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

Link to the announcement on their website.

https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/8gb-raspberry-pi-4-on-sale-now-at-75/

It cant be a bad thing having more memory available again depends what you are using the pi for at the end of the day. In poorer country's will mean kids can do more with it as a desktop.

George Spiggott

There may be some benefits to running Retropie over a 64 bit OS. Dolphin, Citra and WinCE Dreamcast all require a 64 bit OS. Assuming any of these will run at anything approaching playable speed on a PI4 is another matter entirely.

quicksilver

@George-Spiggott in the comments section of that post did you see Eben said some vulkan news was coming soon? Pretty exciting!

barbudreadmon

@quicksilver said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

The 3gb limitation is only per process right?

Yes, more like per-app than per process afaik, which makes this pretty useless, in the first place the only use cases i can see for having 8GB are those :

servers, which will always benefit from allocating more RAM to web server or whatever
desktop, the browser i'm using to write those lines is currently using 4.5GB of RAM...

4GB+ computers should have 64 bits OS, period. Seeing their team arguing that it would be useless, sometimes in a pretty harsh way, even after releasing pi4 4GB, is disappointing, and they are already talking about pi4 16GB.

Also, might be worth mentioning that there are emulators known for working faster on 64-bits, flycast is one (actually it's also required for wince iirc), yabasanshiro is another. Actually i heard even FBNeo is running faster on aarch64 vs arm with the same device

George Spiggott

@quicksilver said in Emulation benfit to new 8GB Pi4?:

@George-Spiggott in the comments section of that post did you see Eben said some vulkan news was coming soon? Pretty exciting!

I do now, thanks. Good news for PPSSPP and Flycast. I also heard that Beetle PSX's dynarec runs better on a 64 bit OS but I don't possess a device capable of testing this at the moment.

I also found this "For example, the 64-bit OS now uses KMS (Kernel Mode Switching) for display management, which Upton says could result in problems during beta, but will ultimately lead to a more efficient OS." Here: https://www.tomshardware.com/uk/amp/news/raspberry-pi-4-8gb-tested

Retro

The 8GB model will only really benefit users who use the Pi as a desktop PC and users wanting to run more resource-intensive programs. There is little benefit to using an 8GB model over a 2/4 GB model for emulation. CPU and GPU upgrades are what you want to watch out for when it comes to better emulation.