Details of previous updates, can be downloaded in a ZIP file - recommended reading.
MAME 0.30 is now released, and ported to the Acorn (well done Gareth - good job). It has got much larger than previous versions, and is about 2.3Mb for the Absolute code (688Kb archived). The good news however, is that MAME now supports 346 games, a very large increase on version 0.29, and sound emulation has been much improved. Take a look at the latest developments. Richard Cassidy has also updated his MAME player1 front end, but now MAME 0.30 is out, looks like it'll need updating again ;o)
*NEW* Sega Master System emulator details. Also, Gareth Moore's port of Master Gear, the 8 bit sega emulator has just released beta version 0.72 with no changes to emulation, but a bug fix in the WIMP front end which was sometimes causing lack of iconbar icon.
There is now a photo of Jasper, working on a NetStation at Acorn World, at Gareth Moore's pages. I believe that there was beta test copy of Acorn Java being given away on the Clan CD at Acorn World 97, so theoretically it is now possible to use Jasper on your Acorn, if anyone has done this, I'd be pleased to know! I've added a link to PC card compatibility pages at the Acorn 32bit gaming site. Updated link for Lazarus, the Amiga software archive. I've added a link to the NoCashGameboy emulator for the PC, on the links page, which allows you to play gameboy link up games on a PC, see the GB page for more details.
Following Steve Mumford's complaint about the sites layout, I am considering adapting it to use frames,and more specifically, an index bar down the left side of the page. But I need to know, does your browser support frames?
If you want to see some new emulators on the Acorn, one of the easiest ways is to port them from other platforms. I have spent some time recently finding source code for more emulators, that seem to be fairly portable. Unfortunately Marat Fayzulin does not seem willing to allow his iNES emulator to be ported, but there are 2 other NES emulators out there that seem portable. Marat has however released the source code for his MSX emulator, Sega Master System (MasterGear) and Colecovision emulator. There is also the BeebInC emulator, for which the source code has been previously available, and David Devenport says it will be on the site again soon. Marat has provided very nicely, highly portable code for the emulation of the Z80 and 6502 processors, which are at the heart of many 8 bit emulators, for example; Gameboy, Sega Master System, NES to name but a few. I've added links to Console hack, an archive of BIOSs for various modern consoles, playstation, N64 etc. and are needed for any emulator of these platforms. There's also a link added to a good 6502 site, with lots of cross-assemblers and documentation. I've updated the PC N64 emulator link :o) Link to v0.61 of Massage the SMS emu has been added. I've added a link on the BBC page to the 8 bit Nirvana site.
A bit off the beaten track, I discovered a page about the 50th Anniversary of the world's 1st Stored Program (ie. alike to modern technology) computer (nicknamed Baby), which was built at Manchester University in 1948. The computer (if you can call it that) has been reconstructed for the anniversary, and there is a competition going to write software for it, and the best software will be run on the computer at the time of the celebrations. In aid of this, Manchester uni have provided a cross-assembler and a simulator (emulator) of the Baby, on which users can write and run there programs before submitting them. Ironically, this simple emulator requires a pentium :o) to work, and there are no other ports. There is a Java emu in development, but I've decided to have a go at writing one myself. If you are interested, then send me an email. I'd love to see the competition won by someone using my emulator, and its fairly likely since Acorn coders are used to writing incredible software with tiny pieces of code, no virtual BASIC here please :o)
Steve Robb has sent me his list of tips for speeding up Frodo, the C64 emulator. It is a list of small things that you can do, to squeeze just a little more speed out of the emulator, by mainly reducing wastage.
I have contacted Acorn about the possibility of releasing an already patched version of 65Host, to enable it to run on the StrongARM, rather than leaving fiddly patches and so on to users - we'll have to wait and see. Many people report that even with the patches 65Host does not operate properly, and displays the characters wrong, as if from a foreign character map.
On the subject of 65Host, thanks go to Michael Koenig for sending me a copy of the RipROMs code by Darren Salt and John Doe, compiled and ready to go. It allows you to 'rip' the BBC B's BASIC and OS ROMs directly out of 65Host (version 1.61 only) and save them for use with other emulators.
The Acorn 32bit gaming pages are back, now that Gareth Moore's a little less busy, and we can all look forward to more recent updates of his pages, particularly the emulation side of it ;o)
I'm looking to provide a page about running emulators for other platforms under emulation on an Acorn, ie. is it possible to play ESNES on a PC card, or run the NOCASH multiplayer Gameboy emulator under PC emulation? If you've ever run an emulator under emulation, please drop me a line!
As many users will have noticed, the STem site has gone down (temporarily I hope). This is not due to any fault of Sam Ellis, but it appears that the entire Southampton university site has gone down. With a bit of luck it should be up and running again soon, hopefully with a new release of the emulator.
I've got to go and revise now - an A level geography module tomorrow!! :-O
Previous update: Sunday 4/1/98 (ZIP file)