best setup for Saturn emulation?

BuZz

@lilbud I think you meant, you can buy a saturn and get games second hand etc from ebay. This isn't a warez forum - don't see why you feel the need to encourage / promote piracy.

dankcushions

yabause isn't the only saturn emulator - http://emulation.gametechwiki.com/index.php/Sega_Saturn_emulators

i hear good things about mednafen. however SSF is probably the best hit rate right now.

Darksavior

@spruce_m00se for an arcade cab, definitely get a pc. On the pi you need to juggle with different versions of arcade emulators because of the speed limitations of the pi. The selections will be limited too. With a pc you can get the latest mame and all games will work, including the arcade versions of Saturn and ps1 games.

Emulation Station is also available for the pc.

spruce_m00se

@lilbud I have a saturn, and I have most of the games, but i would like them to be arcade style, just the fighters etc

spruce_m00se

@darksavior I tried some of the arcade versions of the sega games, and they were running at about 1 frame per second on the pi.
I may well have to invest in a small pc for the arcade cabinet, I want to play fighters megamix and virtual on again. Athlete kings is what i really want to try out though to be honest.

spruce_m00se

@dd-indeed I had a mod chip in my saturn about 5 years ago, but followed a dodgy guide to instal it and fried my cd drive, I got another saturn and forgot about the mod chip, then in a moment of madness, when I moved abroad, I chucked the non working saturn out!!! modchip was still inside it. I didnt think about it for years and literally woke up one night having remembered the mod chip was in it, that was a bad night!

spruce_m00se

@buzz are there any good tutorials about on how to rip a rom image from a megadrive cart? I think that shoudl be made a sticky if the admin dont want people downloading roms or encouraging piracy. After all, im sure that everyone on here owns legal copies of all the games that they use retropie to play right?

BuZz

@spruce_m00se there are some threads on obtaining legal games. There is a difference between what someone does on their own and instructing others. What people do at home with RetroPie is their own business, but what happens on this forum is mine.

spruce_m00se

@buzz Really? I would genuinely love to get pointed toward a thread to allow me to learn to rom dump my carts and CD's.

BuZz

@spruce_m00se It doesn't cover that but it has some sources for obtaining games legally - https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/10918/where-to-legally-acquire-content-to-play-on-retropie (including homebrew, plus buying some games through steam etc - I believe you can purchase many of SEGA's old games)

There are other sites that deal with dumping roms and so on. BTW note that in the UK (where this site is hosted), it is actually not legal to even rip audio CDs. The law was made sensible then overturned later.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/33566933/ripping-music-and-films-illegal-again-after-high-court-overturns-new-law

spruce_m00se

I read the above link to the legal content. Im not massivly interested in that for the moment.
However it is interesting that the UK has now outlawed backups fo personal use. I understood that ever since recording was possible that making a copy for personal use was fine.
I was raised copying c64 tapes on my parents tape to tape hifi system. Thankyou commodore for making it so easy.

BuZz

@spruce_m00se Historically it was always illegal - it was made legal for a short time, then overturned. The UK music industry is happy of course - as it means you are supposed to buy the same tune multiple times for each of your devices. Seems daft to me.

I don't know if this applies to ROM dumping.

The thread I linked mentions you can get some commercial stuff via Steam (Sega roms for example).

spruce_m00se

@buzz I need to look into steam, the last time I looked at it, it was a multiplayer platform for counterstrike. I literally havent paid it any attention since.

I was more than likely misled by hearsay back in the day. But it set me in good stead for the future. I had a hallejuliah moment in 2002 when I had to buy a cd-writer for a school project, "hold on a moment" I thought. The rest I leave up to the internet to interpret as it wants, but I have to add for future legal defence that I wouldnt consider piracy.

since you are from the UK, do you remember the "video piracy is a crime" video that was on all the rentals and in the cinema?

BuZz

@spruce_m00se Steam is a game store / content distribution service. I use it for installing / playing lots of games on Linux etc.

I do remember the advert - I read about it some time ago about them basically pirating the music for it as they didn't licence/pay the musician.

BuZz

If it's the same one - I might be thinking of another.

http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2013/01/29/3678851.htm?site=galileo/newsanalysis&

spruce_m00se

@buzz

this one

BuZz

@spruce_m00se Yep. That's the one they didn't pay for the music for. In their own words - They STOLE it.

spruce_m00se

@buzz thats brilliant! I wish I had known that back in the day. the first question that is asked in that video was always a good one for me, one which my sister will never forgive me for. Oh those were the days.

drake999

@spruce_m00se In short, An i7 based PC and Mednafen. Right now, Pi is out of the question because Saturn emulation is very difficult. I don't really understand why myself though because the 32X shares a similar architecture and it's worked fine for years. I'm guessing emulating the two GPU's in the Saturn must cause most of the headaches. I would love to be educated as to why Saturn emulation is so difficult if any developers out there would care to add their two cents.

edmaul69

@drake999 there is a guy who cracked it. He has made a usb card for the saturn that allows the saturn to run roms. There is a chip that was not fully understood as there wasnt documentation on it. He ended up x-raying the chip and figured out how it works. He did this last year. Then he sent the info to saturn emulator programmers. So hopefully soon emulation will start to improve. He had a really long cool video on him doing this.