SDL or not SDL?

[Sanhime]

There are some emulators that are available is SDL and non-SDL, like vboy and boycott adv.

So what is the difference? I don't understand.

Thanks.

[yoshi]

think this mean dsl support or not.
the on with support and the one without

[Bobbi]

Answering without even reading is a bad habit .. it's SDL, not DSL or anything ... about what SDL actually is, here is a short info text made by Thorgal for our Boycott Advance SDL site :

Boycott Advance/SDL is based on the BA core, with one essential difference: it uses the Simple Direct Media Library rather than the DirectX libraries. Consequently, it can be used on many different platforms, while still using the excellent BA core. Unlike the original BA, BA/SDL doesn't have any GUI(except for the BeOS version), though for those who dislike commandline programs there are several frontends available.

Thanks for reading

[Exophase]

If you're using Windows stick with the non-SDL version.

- Exo

[Bobbi]

Originally posted by Exophase
If you're using Windows stick with the non-SDL version.

- Exo

Not necessairly ... SDL can be faster on slow PCs than their DirectX pendants - once programmed properly. Furthermore, some SDL versions have more features, so taking a look is always worth it !

[Kellicros]

Official SDL website

[Sanhime]

hmmm, now I know. And knowing is half the battle!

So you saying it's like an API? Kinda like OpenGL vs Dx3D (in that sort of sense?

[Bobbi]

Correct, it's a graphic API like DirectX is ... just with the difference, that SDL is known for working on all kind of platforms (linux, BeOS, win32 etc.), and that's exactly why SDL emus are that portable!

[Exophase]

Originally posted by Bobbi
Correct, it's a graphic API like DirectX is ... just with the difference, that SDL is known for working on all kind of platforms (linux, BeOS, win32 etc.), and that's exactly why SDL emus are that portable!

It's a WRAPPER. SDL has many video targets, and on win32 DirectX is usually used. If an SDL version of something is faster than a DX counterpart then eith the DX version is poorly coded or the SDL version has more changed than just the video surface code.

- Exo

[yoshi]

oh man

sorry for the **** i wrote

[nwagenaar]

Originally posted by Exophase


It's a WRAPPER. SDL has many video targets, and on win32 DirectX is usually used. If an SDL version of something is faster than a DX counterpart then eith the DX version is poorly coded or the SDL version has more changed than just the video surface code.

- Exo

No! It's definately not a wrapper. Yes, it uses many video targets and it uses the main hardware api's on OS' when available (video, input, audio, etc). Unlike a wrapper SDL allows low-level hardware access and thus it's more an OpenSource multimedia library of DirectX

Just to make this clear.

Regards,

Niels Wagenaar
BoyCott Advance/SDL, Cygne/SDL, Handy/SDL and NeoPocott/SDL developer.
http://sdlemu.ngemu.com

[nwagenaar]

Originally posted by Sanhime
There are some emulators that are available is SDL and non-SDL, like vboy and boycott adv.

So what is the difference? I don't understand.

Thanks.

*PHEW* Here comes a shot to explain what's the difference between the non-SDL and the SDL versions.

Mostly, the non-SDL versions requires lowlevel API's (like DirectX, GDI on WIN32) for graphics, sound, etc. Most of these versions have nifty GUI's.

The SDL versions uses the Simple Directmedia Layer which handles the API calls on the desired operating system without rewriting your sources for that specific OS (well atleast not all ), thus a recompile of the sources on that specific OS with SDL will result in the same program on an other OS. In short, SDL makes the program OS independant and can be made available for multiple operating systems.

An example is for instance the BoyCott Advance/SDL series. It's available for BeOS, Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD (pre-beta), QNX (pre-beta) and WIN32. And I only needed to change small portions in the source to make it compile on all these operating systems (allthough lu_zero is busy with the QNX version).

Speaking for the SDLemu releases, most of these releases have additional features on top of the official WIN32 versions of those emulators. For instance several graphical filters (2xSAI, SuperEagle, etc), OpenGL rendering and YUV rendering (on top of SDL rendering). Also I heard from numerous people that the SDL version of BoyCott Advance runs faster then the official WIN32 version I can play commercial games with 100% GBA speed on my Celeron 400 with a simple Voodoo 3 and it's definately not choppy.

Regards,

Niels Wagenaar
BoyCott Advance/SDL, Cygne/SDL, Handy/SDL and NeoPocott/SDL developer.
http://sdlemu.ngemu.com