Chip-8 emu

**ShendoXT** · March 26th, 2008, 01:44

If you reached this thread in order to download my emu then proceed here where you can find the newest version.

The old emulator was inaccurate, slow and a resource hog. The new one is much better.
Also the "Chip 8 emu" name was changed to "NetChip8".

Last edited by ShendoXT; August 18th, 2010 at 21:12..

TheCloudOfSmoke · March 26th, 2008, 05:23

Best of luck with your emulation projects. It's good to see more aspiring emu authors out there. It gives me hope for the scene. I hope to see a really awesome emu from you one day Shendo.

Good luck. Sorry if my post didn't help you whatsoever.

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**blueshogun96** · March 26th, 2008, 06:14

Okay, there's not much out there related to emulating sound and you'll soon find out the google is not your friend on this subject. I'll do my best to answer your question.

1. Before learning about sound emulation, it's highly recommended that you learn about how sound works (if you don't know already). First learn a low-level sound API such as DirectSound, OpenAL or XAudio (which is still in beta stages) and create some sound programs that can output sound by sending some raw data to a sound buffer. DirectSound is so far the most prominent while sound emulation with OpenAL is rather hard and XAudio... I don't know because I haven't seen it used for anything yet. Finding tutorials on low level sound APIs are very hard to find (except OpenAL which is more for 3D games) and once again Google might not be your friend on this subject. If you want you can either read the docs on the sound API such as the microsoft SDK documentation or MSDN. If you need tutorials on DirectSound, ask me and I will write them for you personally.

2. As far as tutorials on how to emulate sound, this is the best I can find to date: Blargg's Video Game Sound Emulation
Here's another: How to write an emulator It's an overall tutorial on emulation, but the sound emulation section is the largest and it shows some actual DirectSound code being used.

3. Be sure to have the documentation on the sound hardware you're trying to emulate!

4. I'm not sure how far indepth you want to get with sound emulation, but let me tell you this, emulating sound [usually] gets harder and harder as the console gets more advanced VERY quickly (sometimes more then the CPU itself). While GameBoy, SpaceInvaders, and NES usually aren't so bad, other old consoles such as Atari2600 and SNES have certain issues to be dealt with (for Atari usually has to deal with Pitfall II, for SNES the DSP) in order to get accurate emulation. The newer consoles and arcade hardware such as SegaSaturn/Titan Video, GC, PS2 have very advanced audio systems with either more than one core or advanced and undocumented DSPs. Instead of using basic PSG or FM based audio chips that generate simple waveforms (i.e. sin and cos for wave generation), these are APUs that create more complex audio effects and uses more complex methods (i.e. envelopes, KON/KOF, attack - sustain - decay rates, etc.). So far the most complex audio system I've seen [actual] specs on to date is Xbox1 with(at least 3 DSPs, an AC'97 Audio codec, and an NVIDIA SoundStorm APU. I know that PS3's audio system is the most advanced (where every object can have it's own sound channel!), but I don't think you'll be trying to emulate anytime soon (or even in your lifetime)

Anyone can feel free to correct me if I'm wrong about any of this.

So if you need anything else, feel free to ask me anytime. Know this, I don't know everything

And about your emulator, what APIs are you using? btw, nice debugger! Looking great!

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Last edited by blueshogun96; March 26th, 2008 at 06:42.. Reason: Added more information that might be useful, informative, or overall educational for that matter.

Phil · March 26th, 2008, 06:21

well direct sound is not supported in Vista...only XP downwords..stick with OpenAL

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**blueshogun96** · March 26th, 2008, 06:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Phil

well direct sound is not supported in Vista...only XP downwords..stick with OpenAL

Yes it is. DirectSound only can be used in software mode, but it still works just fine. EAX support has been resurrected but only for the Creative Audigy users. I wouldn't recommend using OpenAL for sound emulation for beginners because it's harder for beginners to grasp it.

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Phil · March 26th, 2008, 06:54

that's what i meant. A card using directsound will have to run on software mode...which sucks as i was going to get the Auzentech Prelude specifically for it's hardware mode...I still might get it....just waiting till Auzentech sorts out Creative's drivers

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**blueshogun96** · March 26th, 2008, 06:59

But for emulation it's not too critical, unless the hardware you're trying to emulate uses features that can only be emulated in hardware (which so far no situation like that has come up yet afaik). Besides, using low-level DirectSound is still great for beginners to learn because the APIs and interfaces are usually self explanatory.

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Phil · March 26th, 2008, 07:04

you have a point...

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**@ruantec** · March 26th, 2008, 11:01

Looks like you progressed well since last time we talked about it

Directsound should be fine to reproduce the sounds and it works with Vista. i don´t know if you worked with directsound before.... but i think it shouldn´t be a problem for you

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**refraction** · March 26th, 2008, 12:24

when i first made a chip8 emu with sound, i basically sent a load of rubbish in to the SDL buffer, but it made random buzzes, as the original system only had a buzzer, so it was no need to be impressive

altho my current (newest) one isnt quite as advanced as yours, it works pretty well, you can see it here with games and source ;p
RefChip8 - Chip8 Emulator

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Phil · March 26th, 2008, 12:41

Ref i love the deflicker system.

Nice (if basic) emu though

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**ShendoXT** · March 26th, 2008, 14:42

@TheCloudOfSmoke: Thanks. Though it will take a lot of time before/if I even make something that can be measured with other emulators.

@blueshogun96: Thank you for the links, I'll check them out.
As for API it's GDI+. That probably is not suited for emulation but in this case I think it's ok.

@@ruantec-Man: Yeah I got rid of the most graphic glitches.

@refraction: Nice emu.

**refraction** · March 26th, 2008, 17:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Phil

Ref i love the deflicker system.

Nice (if basic) emu though

cheap as hell but i worked

Chip8 is very simplistic, so it uses 1 frame to draw the sprites, then the next to clear them, then the next to draw them in the new location, etc.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shendo

@refraction: Nice emu.

thanks, i know its nothing special, but i literally threw it together for an australian magazine thingy, so budding authors have something to go off. But if it helps with your emu thats all that matters

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**@ruantec** · March 26th, 2008, 17:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by refraction

cheap as hell but i worked

Chip8 is very simplistic, so it uses 1 frame to draw the sprites, then the next to clear them, then the next to draw them in the new location, etc.

thanks, i know its nothing special, but i literally threw it together for an australian magazine thingy, so budding authors have something to go off. But if it helps with your emu thats all that matters

i think we shouldn´t understimate a Chip8 emulator........ indeed is nothing special(in comparation to emulators for consoles etc) but if you think what we learn from it then you will realize is actually very special because most of us started with a chip8 emulator that help us get the idea how emulation works.

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**refraction** · March 26th, 2008, 17:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by @ruantec-Man

i think we shouldn´t understimate a Chip8 emulator........ indeed is nothing special(in comparation to emulators for consoles etc) but if you think what we learn from it then you will realize is actually very special because most of us started with a chip8 emulator that help us get the idea how emulation works.

that was the whole concept i worked on

i did intend on commenting it more but i couldnt be arsed lol. But the idea was keep it reasonably simple so people can work out for themselves how the emulator actually works.

can you see the copy and pasta from sdl tutorials? *hides*

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Dont PM me for help, use the forums, thats what its for!

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**@ruantec** · March 26th, 2008, 17:39

"Copy and pasta" that was a good one

anyways i think every chip8 emula8r is another step to a better emulation world

btw nice chip8 emu

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**refraction** · March 27th, 2008, 00:20

thx ;p but really, i think it sucks

it just does the job lol

ill appreciate it more if people learnt from it

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Dont PM me for help, use the forums, thats what its for!

My Chip16 Emulator RefChip16 http://code.google.com/p/refchip16/

**cottonvibes** · March 27th, 2008, 02:51

cool emulators, i might try to make one for the learning experience as well. (well, thats after i become more familiar with c++ :/)

Shendo do you mind posting links to the documentation you used?

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**ShendoXT** · March 27th, 2008, 02:59

Chip 8 instruction set
CHIP8 documentation by David Winter.

There is also a great thread at EmuTalk which contains a lot of information.

**blueshogun96** · March 27th, 2008, 03:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by refraction

thx ;p but really, i think it sucks

it just does the job lol

ill appreciate it more if people learnt from it

Obviously you haven't seen my chip8 emulator. If you think yours was bad, mine was 100x worse! Remember ChipAint?

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March 26th, 2008, 01:44	#1
ShendoXT Moderator Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Croatia Posts: 4,548	Chip-8 emu If you reached this thread in order to download my emu then proceed here where you can find the newest version. The old emulator was inaccurate, slow and a resource hog. The new one is much better. Also the "Chip 8 emu" name was changed to "NetChip8". __________________ Shendo's software blog Core i5 2400 3.1 Ghz \| ASRock H67M \| GTX460 768Mb \| 8GB DDR3 1333 \| 1500 Gb HDD Grundig VLC 7121 C (1080p) 32" \| Razer DeathAdder \| Logitech G110 \| Windows 7 x64 Don't PM or ask me about VMP-MCR conversions. I will ignore you if you do. Last edited by ShendoXT; August 18th, 2010 at 21:12..

March 26th, 2008, 12:24	#10
refraction PCSX2 Coder $refraction's Avatar$ Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Plymouth, UK Posts: 10,037	when i first made a chip8 emu with sound, i basically sent a load of rubbish in to the SDL buffer, but it made random buzzes, as the original system only had a buzzer, so it was no need to be impressive altho my current (newest) one isnt quite as advanced as yours, it works pretty well, you can see it here with games and source ;p RefChip8 - Chip8 Emulator __________________ http://www.pcsx2.net Intel i7 920 @ 3.4Ghz, POV GTX 570 1.3Gb, 1.8Tb HD space, 6Gb OCZ Reaper PC3-14400 Triple Channel Dont PM me for help, use the forums, thats what its for! My Chip16 Emulator RefChip16 http://code.google.com/p/refchip16/
$refraction is offline$

March 27th, 2008, 00:20	#17
refraction PCSX2 Coder $refraction's Avatar$ Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Plymouth, UK Posts: 10,037	thx ;p but really, i think it sucks it just does the job lol ill appreciate it more if people learnt from it __________________ http://www.pcsx2.net Intel i7 920 @ 3.4Ghz, POV GTX 570 1.3Gb, 1.8Tb HD space, 6Gb OCZ Reaper PC3-14400 Triple Channel Dont PM me for help, use the forums, thats what its for! My Chip16 Emulator RefChip16 http://code.google.com/p/refchip16/
$refraction is offline$

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March 26th, 2008, 06:14	#3
blueshogun96 Last Xbox Emu Author Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Seattle, WA, USA Posts: 5,843	Okay, there's not much out there related to emulating sound and you'll soon find out the google is not your friend on this subject. I'll do my best to answer your question. 1. Before learning about sound emulation, it's highly recommended that you learn about how sound works (if you don't know already). First learn a low-level sound API such as DirectSound, OpenAL or XAudio (which is still in beta stages) and create some sound programs that can output sound by sending some raw data to a sound buffer. DirectSound is so far the most prominent while sound emulation with OpenAL is rather hard and XAudio... I don't know because I haven't seen it used for anything yet. Finding tutorials on low level sound APIs are very hard to find (except OpenAL which is more for 3D games) and once again Google might not be your friend on this subject. If you want you can either read the docs on the sound API such as the microsoft SDK documentation or MSDN. If you need tutorials on DirectSound, ask me and I will write them for you personally. 2. As far as tutorials on how to emulate sound, this is the best I can find to date: Blargg's Video Game Sound Emulation Here's another: How to write an emulator It's an overall tutorial on emulation, but the sound emulation section is the largest and it shows some actual DirectSound code being used. 3. Be sure to have the documentation on the sound hardware you're trying to emulate! 4. I'm not sure how far indepth you want to get with sound emulation, but let me tell you this, emulating sound [usually] gets harder and harder as the console gets more advanced VERY quickly (sometimes more then the CPU itself). While GameBoy, SpaceInvaders, and NES usually aren't so bad, other old consoles such as Atari2600 and SNES have certain issues to be dealt with (for Atari usually has to deal with Pitfall II, for SNES the DSP) in order to get accurate emulation. The newer consoles and arcade hardware such as SegaSaturn/Titan Video, GC, PS2 have very advanced audio systems with either more than one core or advanced and undocumented DSPs. Instead of using basic PSG or FM based audio chips that generate simple waveforms (i.e. sin and cos for wave generation), these are APUs that create more complex audio effects and uses more complex methods (i.e. envelopes, KON/KOF, attack - sustain - decay rates, etc.). So far the most complex audio system I've seen [actual] specs on to date is Xbox1 with(at least 3 DSPs, an AC'97 Audio codec, and an NVIDIA SoundStorm APU. I know that PS3's audio system is the most advanced (where every object can have it's own sound channel!), but I don't think you'll be trying to emulate anytime soon (or even in your lifetime) Anyone can feel free to correct me if I'm wrong about any of this. So if you need anything else, feel free to ask me anytime. Know this, I don't know everything And about your emulator, what APIs are you using? btw, nice debugger! Looking great! __________________ Official Website of Shogun3D's RyuAwai! Shogun3D Game Development Blog Zengjük a Dalt: Manliest Song Ever! Last edited by blueshogun96; March 26th, 2008 at 06:42.. Reason: Added more information that might be useful, informative, or overall educational for that matter.

March 26th, 2008, 06:21	#4
Phil 339.9 Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: USA Posts: 14,777	well direct sound is not supported in Vista...only XP downwords..stick with OpenAL __________________ Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others

March 26th, 2008, 06:54	#6
Phil 339.9 Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: USA Posts: 14,777	that's what i meant. A card using directsound will have to run on software mode...which sucks as i was going to get the Auzentech Prelude specifically for it's hardware mode...I still might get it....just waiting till Auzentech sorts out Creative's drivers __________________ Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others

March 26th, 2008, 06:59	#7
blueshogun96 Last Xbox Emu Author Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Seattle, WA, USA Posts: 5,843	But for emulation it's not too critical, unless the hardware you're trying to emulate uses features that can only be emulated in hardware (which so far no situation like that has come up yet afaik). Besides, using low-level DirectSound is still great for beginners to learn because the APIs and interfaces are usually self explanatory. __________________ Official Website of Shogun3D's RyuAwai! Shogun3D Game Development Blog Zengjük a Dalt: Manliest Song Ever!

March 26th, 2008, 07:04	#8
Phil 339.9 Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: USA Posts: 14,777	you have a point... __________________ Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others

March 26th, 2008, 11:01	#9
@ruantec Crazy GFX coder Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: Dominican Republic/Austria Posts: 8,115	Looks like you progressed well since last time we talked about it Directsound should be fine to reproduce the sounds and it works with Vista. i don´t know if you worked with directsound before.... but i think it shouldn´t be a problem for you __________________ Current development tools: Visual C++.net, Visual C#.net Visual VB.net, Visual Webdeveloper.net Bloodshed Dev C++, Borland C++ Visual Basic 6

March 26th, 2008, 12:41	#11
Phil 339.9 Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: USA Posts: 14,777	Ref i love the deflicker system. Nice (if basic) emu though __________________ Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others

March 26th, 2008, 14:42	#12
ShendoXT Moderator Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Croatia Posts: 4,548	@TheCloudOfSmoke: Thanks. Though it will take a lot of time before/if I even make something that can be measured with other emulators. @blueshogun96: Thank you for the links, I'll check them out. As for API it's GDI+. That probably is not suited for emulation but in this case I think it's ok. @@ruantec-Man: Yeah I got rid of the most graphic glitches. @refraction: Nice emu. __________________ Shendo's software blog Core i5 2400 3.1 Ghz \| ASRock H67M \| GTX460 768Mb \| 8GB DDR3 1333 \| 1500 Gb HDD Grundig VLC 7121 C (1080p) 32" \| Razer DeathAdder \| Logitech G110 \| Windows 7 x64 Don't PM or ask me about VMP-MCR conversions. I will ignore you if you do.

March 26th, 2008, 17:39	#16
@ruantec Crazy GFX coder Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: Dominican Republic/Austria Posts: 8,115	"Copy and pasta" that was a good one anyways i think every chip8 emula8r is another step to a better emulation world btw nice chip8 emu __________________ Current development tools: Visual C++.net, Visual C#.net Visual VB.net, Visual Webdeveloper.net Bloodshed Dev C++, Borland C++ Visual Basic 6

March 27th, 2008, 02:51	#18
cottonvibes You're already dead... Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: Planet Vegeta Posts: 5,387	cool emulators, i might try to make one for the learning experience as well. (well, thats after i become more familiar with c++ :/) Shendo do you mind posting links to the documentation you used? __________________ "It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it." - Albert Einstein check out my blog

March 27th, 2008, 02:59	#19
ShendoXT Moderator Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Croatia Posts: 4,548	Chip 8 instruction set CHIP8 documentation by David Winter. There is also a great thread at EmuTalk which contains a lot of information. __________________ Shendo's software blog Core i5 2400 3.1 Ghz \| ASRock H67M \| GTX460 768Mb \| 8GB DDR3 1333 \| 1500 Gb HDD Grundig VLC 7121 C (1080p) 32" \| Razer DeathAdder \| Logitech G110 \| Windows 7 x64 Don't PM or ask me about VMP-MCR conversions. I will ignore you if you do.