Emulation station will not start from cli (but does inside pixel???). Error creating SDL window. [Solved]

GrangerSmoth

Pi Model or other hardware: 4
Power Supply used: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07YRSYR3M
RetroPie Version Used: commit 5e79bc39935e3601cbd1250052b81428a37893cd (4.7.1 I presume I downloaded today following the guide on this site...so unless you guide people to download and install old versions....)

Built From: manual install on top of full raspbian
USB Devices connected: flash drive, keyboard and controller dongles
Controller used: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07XXQPLBW
Error messages received:

Jan 10 20:53:01 lu10: Error creating SDL window !

Could not initialize OpenGL GLES library Jan 10 20:53:01 lu10: Renderer failed to initialize!

Jan 10 20:53:01 lulo: Window failed to initialize!

(SDL restoring keyboard) pi@raspberrypi: $

Verbose log (if relevant):
Guide used: https://retropie.org.uk/docs/Manual-Installation/
File: na
Emulator: na
Attachment of config files: (PLEASE USE PASTEBIN.COM FOR LARGE LOGS) <--- this is too vague to answer. There are config files everywhere. What do you want?

How to replicate the problem: follow the manual install guide exactly. Select boot to retropie. Fail.

In fact, I've found it doesn't much matter what I do I get this error if I am trying to install retropie on raspbian. Tried several times and have lost years of my life.

Using a pre built image works, but then I have a gimped version of raspbian. Trying to 'fix' the lite version of raspbian into a full version is more maddening then this!!!!

I need to have full raspbian. I would like it to boot into retropie.

This should not be hard. I don't understand what is going wrong.

Googling the error sends my down rabbit holes of despair. Page after page of things that don't work. Or that make things worse. Or just broken in new exciting ways.

I know this isn't this hard. But it is killing me.

I why can I launch and use it from inside pixel? I thought it specifically can't do that? Is the raspbian desktop ui not pixel? (And also the performance is terrible this way)

jamespavett

@grangersmoth I am in exactly the same boat as you! Would love to be able to find some sort of resolution to this. Been scratching my head all day.

mitu

5e79bc39935e3601cbd1250052b81428a37893cd (4.7.1 I presume I downloaded today following the guide on this site...so unless you guide people to download and install old versions....)

Looks current.

Built From: manual install on top of full raspbian

Which version and variant of Raspbian ?

...
Jan 10 20:53:01 lu10: Error creating SDL window !
Could not initialize OpenGL GLES library Jan 10 20:53:01 lu10: Renderer failed to initialize!
Jan 10 20:53:01 lulo: Window failed to initialize!
(SDL restoring keyboard) pi@raspberrypi: $

Looks like the libSDL library provided by RetroPie isn't correctly installed.

Attachment of config files: (PLEASE USE PASTEBIN.COM FOR LARGE LOGS) <--- this is too vague to answer. There are config files everywhere. What do you want?

The installation from RetroPie-Setup creates a log file in $HOME/RetroPie-Setup/logs, if you upload the installation log somewhere, we can take a look to see if something has failed.
Please also attach the /boot/config.txt file.

Using a pre built image works, but then I have a gimped version of raspbian. Trying to 'fix' the lite version of raspbian into a full version is more maddening then this!!!!

The RetroPie image is based on the Raspbian Lite image, if you wish to install the desktop on a RetroPie image, then you can do so from RetroPie-Setup - https://retropie.org.uk/docs/FAQ/#where-did-the-desktop-go.

BuZz

I broke the custom sdl2 install with my recent logic change - fixing it.

BuZz

If you update RetroPie-Setup and remove / reinstall emulationstation it should pull in our custom sdl2 library which should resolve this.

phenotype

So glad I saw this post. This exact same issue was driving me crazy!

GrangerSmoth

@buzz Thanks! That worked!