Update of /cvsroot/arcem/webpages/manual
In directory sfp-cvs-1.v30.ch3.sourceforge.com:/tmp/cvs-serv3767/manual
Modified Files:
index.html
Added Files:
arcem-1.50.html
Log Message:
Update for 1.50 release
Index: index.html
===================================================================
RCS file: /cvsroot/arcem/webpages/manual/index.html,v
retrieving revision 1.2
retrieving revision 1.3
diff -u -d -r1.2 -r1.3
--- index.html 21 Sep 2012 09:52:10 -0000 1.2
+++ index.html 16 Dec 2012 22:40:01 -0000 1.3
@@ -34,6 +34,7 @@
<li><a href="../manual/">User Manual</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="../manual/arcem-1.00.html">ArcEm 1.00</a>
+<li><a href="../manual/arcem-1.50.html">ArcEm 1.50</a>
<li><a href="../manual/development.html">Development</a>
</ul>
</li>
@@ -62,6 +63,7 @@
<p>We preserve user manuals from all our releases, as well as for the latest
version currently in development. Please choose the appropriate manual from
the following list:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="arcem-1.00.html">ArcEm 1.00</a></li>
+<li><a href="arcem-1.50.html">ArcEm 1.50</a></li>
<li><a href="development.html">Development version (CVS HEAD)</a></li>
</ul>
--- NEW FILE: arcem-1.50.html ---
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<title>ArcEm Development Version Manual</title>
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<body>
<h1>ArcEm – The Acorn Archimedes Emulator</h1>
<p id="version">ArcEm 1.50 Manual <a
href="http://arcem.sf.net/";>http://arcem.sf.net/</a></p>
<h2 id="contents">Contents</h2>
<ul>
<li><a href="#requirements">System requirements</a></li>
<li><a href="#install">Installing ArcEm</a></li>
<li><a href="#compiling">Compiling ArcEm</a></li>
<li><a href="using">Using ArcEm</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#romimages">ROM Images</a></li>
<li><a href="#mouseinput">Mouse Input</a></li>
<li><a href="#floppies">Using floppies</a></li>
<li><a href="#HDimages">Using HD images</a></li>
<li><a href="#commandline">Commandline options</a></li>
<li><a href="#arcemrc">arcemrc file</a></li>
<li><a href="#riscosemu">RISC OS emulation</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#riscosemuhostfs">HostFS</a></li>
<li><a href="#riscosemuscrollwheel">Mouse Scrollwheel support</a></li>
<li><a href="#riscosemuextramodes">Extra Screen Modes</a></li>
<li><a href="#riscosemusupport">ArcEmSupport module</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><a href="#riscosusage">RISC OS specific usage</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#riscosusagecommandline">Commandline options</a></li>
<li><a href="#riscosusagetweakmenu">Tweak menu</a></li>
<li><a href="#riscosusageperformance">Performance options</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#riscosusageperformanceautoupdateflags">Display auto
UpdateFlags</a></li>
<li><a href="#riscosusageperformanceupdateflagsframeskip">Display uses
UpdateFlags, Display frameskip</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><a href="#x11usage">X11 specific usage</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#x11environmentoptions">Environment options</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><a href="#issues">Known Issues and bugs</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#knownall">All platforms</a></li>
<li><a href="#knownX">Unix/X Windows</a></li>
<li><a href="#knownWIN32">Microsoft Windows</a></li>
<li><a href="#knownOSX">Mac OS X</a></li>
<li><a href="#knownRO">RISC OS</a></li>
<li><a href="#knownAMIGA">Amiga</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="requirements">System requirements</h2>
<dl>
<dt>Unix/X Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span></p>
</dd>
<dt>Microsoft Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span></p>
</dd>
<dt>Mac OS X</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span></p>
</dd>
<dt>RISC OS</dt>
<dd>
<ul>
<li>Iyonix or better (ARMv5+ CPU). BeagleBoard-xM/PandaBoard recommended for
best performance.</li>
<li>Between 8MB and 64MB of RAM, depending on options</li>
<li>SharedSound if you want sound</li>
<li>SharedUnixLibrary</li>
</ul>
</dd>
<dt>Amiga</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span></p>
</dd>
</dl>
<h2 id="install">Installation</h2>
<p>Follow the instructions appropriate for your system:</p>
<dl>
<dt>Unix/X Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p>Download the src archive and follow the compilation instructions below.
Once compiled copy the arcemrc file to your home directory as .arcemrc. When
run there is some output on the console.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Microsoft Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p>Extract the archive and supply a ROM image, the program is called ArcEm.exe.
Create a shortcut to this file if you want to add it to your start menu or
desktop.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Mac OS X</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span></p>
</dd>
<dt>RISC OS</dt>
<dd>
<p>Extract the archive to any directory you choose. Once you have a ROM image
to use (see below), save it as the file 'ROM' within !ArcEm.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Amiga</dt>
<dd>
<p>Extract the archive to any directory you choose, just add a file called ROM
as described below.</p>
</dd>
</dl>
<p><strong>Note:</strong> Once installed all versions require a <a
href="#romimages">ROM image</a> file.</p>
<h2 id="compiling">Compiling ArcEm</h2>
<p>Follow the instructions appropriate for your system:</p>
<dl>
<dt>Unix/X Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p>The X windows version compiles up using the 'Makefile' contained in the root
of the source package. If you have a big endian processor, such as Sparc or
PowerPC edit the HOST_BIGENDIAN=no to HOST_BIGENDIAN=yes near the top of the
Makefile. Use the following command:</p>
<pre>$ make</pre>
</dd>
<dt>Microsoft Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p>ArcEm will build under <a
href="http://sources.redhat.com/cygwin/";>Cygwin</a>. It builds a version which
is independent of Cygwin (unlike the previous version of ArcEm for Windows), so
you will also need to ensure you have mingw-runtime library installed (from
Cygwin setup). Use the following command:</p>
<pre>make SYSTEM=win</pre>
<p>Additionally, ArcEm will build in Microsoft Visual C 6. Project files are
provided for this in the 'vc' directory. There are also project files in 'vc'
for Microsoft Studio 2005.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Mac OS X</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span></p>
</dd>
<dt>RISC OS</dt>
<dd>
<p>ArcEm builds with GCC. You should use the following command:</p>
<pre>*make SYSTEM=riscos-single</pre>
<p>It is possible to build with Leo White's RiscXLib if you really want to make
an X Windows version under RISC OS, but that is beyond the scope of this
guide. Finally, it is also possible to cross compile it using <a
href="http://hard-mofo.dsvr.net/gcc/";>GCCSDK</a>. e.g.:</p>
<pre>$ CC=/home/riscos/cross/bin/gcc make SYSTEM=riscos-single</pre>
<p>The desktop version of ArcEm has not been developed yet, and will not
build.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Amiga</dt>
<dd>
<p>You will need the official Amiga OS4 SDK and GCC, then build with the
following commands:</p>
<pre>
stack 500000
make SYSTEM=amiga
</pre>
<p>It will not compile with anything other than the OS4 includes. GCC 3.4.4 and
4.0.2 are known to work.</p>
</dd>
</dl>
<h2 id="using">Using ArcEm</h2>
<h3 id="romimages">ROM images</h3>
<p>As ArcEm is only a hardware emulator to make it do anything useful you need
an operating system ROM. ArcEm has been tested with and is known to work with
ARM Linux, RISC OS 3.10, RISC OS 3.11 and RISC OS 3.19. ARM Linux ROMs are
freely available, check the website. RISC OS 3.1x ROMs can be extracted from a
real Acorn machine using the following commands on RISC OS.</p>
<pre>
*save :0.$.ROM1 3800000 3880000
*save :0.$.ROM2 3880000 3900000
*save :0.$.ROM3 3900000 3980000
*save :0.$.ROM4 3980000 3a00000
</pre>
<p>Copy these files to your host operating system, RISC OS 3.1x supports DOS
formatted floppy discs so you can use them to transfer the files. ArcEm needs
the ROM file to be in one part (rather than the four you just created) so join
them back together using the appropriate command for your system:</p>
<dl>
<dt>Unix/XWindows</dt>
<dd>
<p>From a shell prompt:</p>
<pre>$ cat ROM1 ROM2 ROM3 ROM4 > ROM</pre>
</dd>
<dt>Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p>From a cmd.exe command prompt:</p>
<pre>copy /b ROM1+ROM2+ROM3+ROM4 ROM</pre>
</dd>
<dt>Mac OS X</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span></p>
</dd>
<dt>RISC OS</dt>
<dd>
<p>From the command line:</p>
<pre>
*print ROM1 { > ROM }
*print ROM2 { >> ROM }
*print ROM3 { >> ROM }
*print ROM4 { >> ROM }
</pre>
</dd>
<dt>Amiga</dt>
<dd>
<p>From the commandline</p>
<pre>join ROM1 ROM2 ROM3 ROM4 as ROM</pre>
</dd>
</dl>
<h4>Alternate sources of ROM images</h4>
<p>you can download a copy of the RISC OS 3.10 ROM image as a support file from
the <a href="http://home.tiscali.nl/~jandboer/";>!A310emu website</a>, it's in
the file <a
href="http://home.tiscali.nl/~jandboer/support2.zip";>support2.zip</a> and is
called ro310, you should rename ro310 to ROM before using it with ArcEm.</p>
<h3 id="mouseinput">Mouse Input</h3>
<p>Some of the platforms require specific instructions to let you move the
mouse around.</p>
<dl>
<dt>Unix/X Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p>Whilst the Main display window has the focus, press the + key on the numeric
keypad to 'capture' the mouse. To 'free' the mouse again for use with the rest
of your X desktop press numeric keypad + again.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Windows</dt>
<dd>
<p>Although there is some mouse movement when you move the cursor over the
display window, you can use the Unix/XWindows style numeric keypad + toggle to
'capture' and 'free' the mouse for better performance. Currently mouse handling
on the Windows build is very poor.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Mac OS X</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span></p>
</dd>
<dt>RISC OS</dt>
<dd>
<p>The RISC OS version runs full-screen and captures all mouse input until you
quit the program. You can quit ArcEm from the menu you can bring up by pressing
both Windows keys, or by pressing Alt-Break.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Amiga</dt>
<dd>
<p>The Amiga version runs full-screen and captures all mouse input until you
quit the program. You can quit ArcEm from the menu you can bring up with the
Left Amiga key.</p>
</dd>
</dl>
<h3 id="floppies">Using floppies</h3>
<p>All the platforms support using .adf format floppy disc images. A disc image
is a binary dump of the contents of a floppy disc. ArcEm has no support for
directly using the host computers real floppy disc drive.</p>
<p>The basic support for floppy discs is to allow you to have the following
floppy disc images in the current working directory of the ArcEm executable:</p>
<ul>
<li>FloppyImage0</li>
<li>FloppyImage1</li>
<li>FloppyImage2</li>
<li>FloppyImage3</li>
</ul>
<p>These are then available under RISC OS as the four disc drives ADFS:0 to
ADFS:3. On Linux they are accessible as <span class="todo">TODO</span>.</p>
<p>Some platforms provide extra support for using floppy discs:</p>
<dl>
<dt>Unix/XWindows</dt>
<dd>
<p>Whilst the control pane window has the focus, pressing 0, 1, 2 or 3 will
eject/insert floppy disc images, those images still have to be named as above,
but with moving of images around you should be able to change discs at run
time.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Mac OS X</dt>
<dd>
<p><span class="todo">TODO</span> Mention the GUI method of selecting disc
images.</p>
</dd>
<dt>Amiga</dt>
<dd>
<p>A menu to change the disc in drive 0 can be called up with the LAmiga key</p>
</dd>
</dl>
<h3 id="HDimages">Using HD images</h3>
<p>ArcEm supports up to four Harddiscs, hard disc images are binary files that
represent a hard drive's contents. ArcEm support the ST506 disc interface from
Archimedes computers allowing it to support drives up to 64MB in size. Hard
drive images should be placed in the current working directory of ArcEm and be
named:</p>
<ul>
<li>HardImage0</li>
<li>HardImage1</li>
<li>HardImage2</li>
<li>HardImage3</li>
</ul>
<p>You also need to specify the hard drive "shape" in the arcemrc
config file. The "shape" lists the number of Heads, Cylinders,
Sectors and the Record Size, these four numbers multiplied together are equal
to the size in bytes of the hard drive image.</p>
<p>When emulating RISC OS, you will also need to use the !Configure application
to set the number of hard drives within the OS.</p>
<h3 id="commandline">Commandline options</h3>
<p>ArcEm supports commandline options under Unix/X Windows and other platforms.
The Amiga version will also accept them as tooltypes.</p>
<table>
<tr><th>Option</th><th>Meaning</th><th>Allowed values</th><th>Default
Value</th></tr>
<tr><td>--help</td><td>Display list of available options and exit</td></tr>
<tr><td>--version</td><td>Display version number and exit</td></tr>
<tr><td>--rom <value></td><td>Specify the name of a romimage other
than ROM</td><td>Path from place of execution to ROM image</td><td>ROM</td></tr>
<tr><td>--extnromdir <value></td><td>Specify the directory to use as
the extnrom directory</td><td>Path from place of execution for extnrom
dir</td><td>extnrom/</td></tr>
<tr><td>--hostfsdir <value></td><td>Specify the directory to use as
the base of hostfs</td><td>Path from place of execution to base of
hostfs</td><td>hostfs/</td></tr>
<tr><td>--memory <value></td><td>Change the amount of memory the
emulated machine has</td><td>256K 512K 1M 2M 4M 8M 12M 16M</td><td>4M</td></tr>
<tr><td>--processor</td><td>Change the emulated machine's
processor</td><td>ARM2 ARM3 ARM250</td><td>ARM250</td></tr>
</table>
<h3 id="arcemrc">arcemrc file</h3>
<p>The arcemrc files stores information about the number and 'shape' of
harddisc's attached to the emulated machine. Here is an example arcemrc:</p>
<pre>
MFM disc
1 1024 8 32 256
MFM disc
2 612 4 32 256
</pre>
<p>The five numbers represent the following:</p>
<ol>
<li>Hard drive number: 0 to 3 inclusive.</li>
<li>Number of Cylinders: 1 to 1024 inclusive.</li>
<li>Number of Heads: 1 to 256 inclusive.</li>
<li>Number of Sectors per track: 1 to 256 inclusive.</li>
<li>Sector Length: 256, 512, 1024, 2048, or 4096.</li>
</ol>
<p>For the premade hard drive images available on the website the shape
information should be available. For your own harddiscs that you have imaged
you should check the Harddrive itself, as the number of cylinders, sectors and
heads is normally printed on it.</p>
<h3 id="riscosemu">RISC OS emulation</h3>
<p>This section details functionality that is only relevant when ArcEm is
running RISC OS, it does not apply for ARM Linux.</p>
<h4 id="riscosemuhostfs">HostFS</h4>
<p>Make sure the files hostfs,ffa, hostfsfiler,ffa and support,ffa are copied
or 'sym-linked' from their support_modules sub directories into the 'extnrom'
directory.</p>
<p>Create a directory called 'hostfs' in your executable directory, if it does
not exist already. This directory is the root of the 'virtual harddisc'. (You
can override this directory and put it in a different place with a commandline
option).
<p>When you boot up RISC OS 3.1x there should be a HostFS icon in the bottom
left of the screen, clicking this will open up the host filing system and
behaves in the same manner as a real Archimedes harddisc.</p>
<p>Simply copy files on your host into the hostfs directory and they will be
available to RISC OS.</p>
<p>For non-RISC OS hosts:</p>
<ul>
<li>RISC OS filetypes are written to the host in the style of NFS mounts on
Unix with a ,XXX on the end, eg a spritefile would appear to be
spritefile,ff9.</li>
<li>Files copied into the hostfs directory are unlikely to have their RISC OS
filetypes, use the RISC OS 'set type ' function in the filer.</li>
<li>Extracting archives (zip, etc) within emulated RISC OS will preserve RISC
OS filetypes automatically.</li>
</ul>
<p>Known Issues:</p>
<ul>
<li>Files on the host side are not allowed to have dollars in the filename, eg
'textfile$' would not work, but 'textfile' would be fine.</li>
<li>Errors that occur when performing actions on the host filing system are
often not well reported under RISC OS.</li>
</ul>
<h4 id="riscosemuscrollwheel">Mouse Scrollwheel support</h4>
<p>Make sure the file scrollwheel,ffa is copied or 'symlinked' from the
'support_modules/scrollwheel' directory into the 'extnrom' directory.</p>
<p>Spinning the scrollwheel up and down in RISC OS over windows that are
vertically scrollable works in the way you'd expect.</p>
<p>Known Issues:</p>
<ul>
<li>Only works in the Unix/X Windows, MS Windows and Amiga builds of ArcEm.</li>
</ul>
<h4 id="riscosemuextramodes">Additional Screen modes</h4>
<p>Make sure the file ArcemModes,ffa is copied or 'symlinked' from the
'support_modules/modes' directory into the 'extnrom' directory.</p>
<p>Once the module is loaded these modes can be chosen in the normal RISC OS
way, by typing:</p>
<pre>*wimpmode <number></pre>
<p>Here's a list of provided modes</p>
<table>
<tr><th>Mode Number</th><th>X</th><th>Y</th><th>colours</th></tr>
<tr><td>32</td><td>800</td><td>600</td><td>256</td></tr>
<tr><td>100</td><td>1024</td><td>768</td><td>2</td></tr>
<tr><td>101</td><td>1024</td><td>768</td><td>4</td></tr>
<tr><td>102</td><td>1024</td><td>768</td><td>16</td></tr>
<tr><td>104</td><td>1280</td><td>1016</td><td>2</td></tr>
<tr><td>105</td><td>1280</td><td>1016</td><td>4</td></tr>
<tr><td>108</td><td>1152</td><td>864</td><td>2</td></tr>
<tr><td>109</td><td>1152</td><td>864</td><td>4</td></tr>
<tr><td>112</td><td>1400</td><td>520</td><td>16</td></tr>
<tr><td>120</td><td>1600</td><td>600</td><td>16</td></tr>
<tr><td>122</td><td>240</td><td>320</td><td>2</td></tr>
<tr><td>123</td><td>240</td><td>320</td><td>4</td></tr>
<tr><td>124</td><td>240</td><td>320</td><td>16</td></tr>
<tr><td>125</td><td>240</td><td>320</td><td>256</td></tr>
</table>
<p>Known Issues:</p>
<ul>
<li>Modes larger than 800x600 will only work under Unix/X Windows, Amiga and
RISC OS builds of ArcEm, however modes 32, 122, 123, 124 and 125 will work on
all platforms.</li>
<li>Mode 122 is slightly buggy and looks very odd.</li>
</ul>
<h4 id="riscosemusupport">ArcEmSupport module</h4>
<p>Make sure the file support,ffa is copied or 'symlinked' from the
'support_modules/support' directory into the 'extnrom' directory.</p>
<p>The ArcEmSupport module is a simple module that provides the *command
ArcEm_Shutdown that allows the emulator to kill itself and return to the host
OS. This *command is also available via the SWI ArcEm_Shutdown (&56AC0).</p>
<h2 id="riscosusage">RISC OS specific usage</h2>
<h3 id="riscosusagecommandline">Commandline options</h3>
<p>In addition to the main command line options listed above, the RISC OS
version supports the following additional options:</p>
<table>
<tr><th>Option</th><th>Meaning</th><th>Allowed values</th><th>Default
Value</th></tr>
<tr><td>--display <value></td><td>Select the display driver to use
on startup. 'pal' selects the palettised display driver, which uses the least
amount of memory and provides the best performance. However it doesn't support
the use of mid-frame palette swaps (as used by games such as Lotus II &
Lemmings 2). For these games it's recommended you use the 'std'
driver</td><td>pal, std</td><td>pal</td></tr>
<tr><td>--rbswap</td><td>Swap red & blue in 16bpp mode (e.g. for Iyonix
with GeForce FX)</td></tr>
<tr><td>--nolowcolour</td><td>Prevent ArcEm from trying to use 1/2/4bpp modes.
Recommended for Iyonix users with Aemulor running (it's quicker for ArcEm to
use an 8bpp mode directly than to go via Aemulor's low-colour
emulation)</td></tr>
<tr><td>--noaspect</td><td>Disable aspect ratio correction</td></tr>
<tr><td>--noupscale</td><td>Disable upscaling. Recommended for best
performance.</td></tr>
<tr><td>--minres <x> <y></td><td>Specifiy minimum screen
resolution to use. Any modes with a resolution lower than this won't be used by
ArcEm. Use this to filter out any low-res modes (e.g. 320x256) which have
entries in your MDF but don't really work properly with your monitor.</td></tr>
<tr><td>--lcdres <x> <y></td><td>Specify the native
resolution of your monitor. If specified, ArcEm will only ever use screen modes
that will scale perfectly to fit your monitor, so you won't have ugly LCD
scaling artifacts.</td></tr>
<tr><td>--lcdres <a> <b></td><td>Specify the key numbers
of the two keys used to access the tweak menu. These are "lowl-level
internal key numbers" - for a reference, see the <a
href="http://www.riscosopen.org/wiki/documentation/show/Low-Level%20Internal%20Key%20Numbers";>ROOL
wiki</a>.</td><td>0-255</td><td>104 105 (Left & right Windows
keys)</td></tr>
</table>
<h3 id="riscosusagetweakmenu">Tweak menu</h3>
<p>The tweak menu can be accessed by simultaneously pressing both Windows keys
on the keyboard. This menu allows you to change the following options:</p>
<ul>
<li>Switch between the two display drivers (--display command line option)</li>
<li>Toggle red/blue swapping in the 16bpp modes (--rbswap command line
option)</li>
<li>Control the display driver performance options (see below)</li>
<li>Enable/disable aspect ratio correction & upscaling (--noaspect and
--noupscale options)</li>
<li>Enable the ability to take screenshots when Print Screen is pressed.
Screenshots will be saved to the directory !ArcEm is in.</li>
<li>Toggle the display of some stats to the top-left corner of the screen. The
stats show (from left to right):
<ul>
<li>The emulator performance in MHz</li>
<li>The resolution, refresh rate, and bits-per-pixel of the Arc display</li>
<li>The display scale factors</li>
<li>The estimated framerate of whichever game is running</li>
</ul>
Note that games or software which doesn't make use of multiple screen banks
will report a framerate of zero. If the UpdateFlags option is on, the framerate
counter will also drop if the frameskip value is set too high (since you will
no longer be seeing all the frames that the software is attempting to display).
</li>
</ul>
<p>To resume the emulator from the tweak menu, press 'R'. To quit the emulator,
press 'Q'.</p>
<p>The --menukeys command line option can be used to change which keys are used
to open the menu (e.g. if your keyboard doesn't have both Windows keys).</p>
<h3 id="riscosusageperformance">Performance options</h3>
<p>As mentioned above, there are several options available in the tweak menu to
help boost the performance of the display driver. These options are:</p>
<h4 id="riscosusageperformanceautoupdateflags">"Display auto
UpdateFlags"</h4>
<p>Setting this to "On" will boost the performance of many games.
However it
may not work properly with some games/software (screen updates may be
somewhat irratic), so by default it's set to "Off".</p>
<h4 id="riscosusageperformanceupdateflagsframeskip">"Display uses
UpdateFlags", "Display frameskip"</h4>
<p>If the "auto UpdateFlags" option is on, these options will be set
and
adjusted automatically by the emulator, and must be left alone.</p>
<p>If the "auto UpdateFlags" option is off, you can set these values
manually
to fine-tune performance. Briefly, the UpdateFlags option controls whether
ArcEm redraws the entire screen or only the changed areas. Turning it on
selects the latter, but causes some memory writes to have a significant
performance overhead, since ArcEm must track all writes to screen memory.
In games which make use of multiple screen banks, it's usually best to turn
this option off, as it will avoid the unnecessary performance penalty of
tracking memory writes (since the entire screen will have to be redrawn
each time the game switches screen banks). However if the option is off the
correct frameskip value must be set otherwise you won't see any performance
benefits.</p>
<p>The frameskip option behaves slightly differently depending on whether the
UpdateFlags option is on or off. If the UpdateFlags option is on, the
frameskip value acts like the frameskip value you'd find in any other
emulator. A value of 0 causes the screen to be updated every frame; 1
causes it to be updated every 2nd frame, etc. E.g. if you're in a 50Hz
screen mode, and a game is running at 25fps, a frameskip value of 1 will
give you a slight performance boost without hurting framerate. Values of 2
or more will give greater performance boosts, but will result in the screen
being redrawn less often.</p>
<p>If the UpdateFlags option is off, then there are generally two situations
in which the screen will be redrawn: when the running game switches to a
different screen bank, or when the frameskip counter runs down. Assuming
the game keeps running and keeps swapping screen banks, the frame skip
counter is irrelevant, as it will never run down. However if the game stops
running, or switches to a mode where it doesn't use multiple screen banks
(e.g. in menu screens) the screen will stop being redrawn. This is where
the frameskip counter becomes important. If you're in a 50Hz mode, and
the game is running at 25fps, a frameskip counter of 2 would likely be
the most appropriate. This means that ArcEm will only force the screen to
be redrawn if the framerate drops to below 17fps.</p>
<h2 id="x11usage">X11 specific usage</h2>
<h3 id="x11environmentoptions">Environment options</h3>
<p>In addition to the main command line options listed above, the X11 version
may be tuned using the following environment variables:</p>
<table>
<tr><th>Option</th><th>Meaning</th><th>Value</th></tr>
<tr><td>ARCEMXSYNC</td><td>Use Synchronous X protocol</td><td>Enabled when
defined</td></tr>
<tr><td>ARCEMNOWARP</td><td>Don't attempt to use XWarpPointer</td><td>Enabled
when defined</td></tr>
<tr><td>ARCEMXMOUSEKEY</td><td>Change key used to claim mouse
pointer</td><td>Default is Keypad + when not defined. Other values from
X11/keysymdef.h</td></tr>
</table>
<h2 id="issues">Known Issues and bugs</h2>
<h3 id="knownall">All platforms</h3>
<ul>
<li>256K RAM emulation is currently disabled as we haven't been able to confirm
its operation with any versions of RISC OS.</li>
<li>All interlaced modes are displayed at their logical resolution, this means
displays in some modes appear to be half the height they would appear on real
monitors.</li>
<li>Unknown emulation bugs result in the following software not working:
<ul>
<li>!ArctDemo</li>
<li>!Diggers (original Arc version)</li>
<li>!Symposium</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Sound may break up if there are sudden changes in emulator
load/performance, or when performing slow operations via HostFS</li>
<li>Software which adjusts the size of the display/border areas might not look
correct. E.g. SR2000, Warlocks</li>
<li>Formatting floppies seems to be broken.</li>
<li>Empty floppy drives aren't emulated correctly.</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="knownX">Unix/X Windows</h3>
<ul>
<li>?</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="knownWIN32">Microsoft Windows</h3>
<ul>
<li>The version 1.00 binary is very unstable and crashes regularly.</li>
<li>The only menu items that do anything are Quit and About.</li>
<li>The mouse handling is very poor.</li>
<li>The Windows version has no diagnostics if anything goes wrong and will
quite without warning (unless you rebuild with a console).</li>
<li>ARM Linux does not currently work in the Windows version of the emulator.
There is an unknown issue with harddrive access.</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="knownOSX">Mac OS X</h3>
<ul>
<li><span class="todo">TODO</span></li>
</ul>
<h3 id="knownRO">RISC OS</h3>
<ul>
<li>Sound quality isn't great if ArcEm has to mix down to a lower sample
rate</li>
<li>Music tempo tends to fluctuate a bit with some music players</li>
<li>Sometimes there'll be a lot of audio lag, which doesn't clear up, even
after a few seconds. Opening & closing the tweak menu should fix it.</li>
<li>If the emulator can't find a suitable screen mode, it will quit.</li>
<li>If the display is being scaled, the mouse pointer image may not always be
scaled correctly, or (due to improper scaling) the hotspot may not be in the
correct position.</li>
</ul>
<h3 id="knownAMIGA">Amiga</h3>
<ul>
<li>There is no error output when run from Workbench (it appears to do nothing
when ROM is not found). You can get the error output by starting it from the
Shell.</li>
<li>ArcEm always opens an 8-bit screen even if the emulation requests a lower
depth.</li>
<li>There is intentionally no keyboard remapping, keys are mapped based on
position.</li>
<li>It will only run full screen, not windowed.</li>
</ul>
</body>
</html>
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