FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
There is a new MSX emulator in town!
Last couple of months, several people have been working on a brand new MSX
emulator, called openMSX. It has been build from scratch, based on some new
concepts regarding communication and synchronisation between the various
processors in the MSX. The new approach towards the internals of a real MSX
has resulted in an architecture that allows high accuracy, and has a modular
and object oriented design. Due to modularity and the open source filosophy it
is much opener to new developers and contributors then the other emulators.
It's first public showing will be at Tilburg 2002, this Saturday 20th of April.
This project is probably the first jointly developed MSX emulator and this
approach has already paid of. In less then the year that the project has been
launched we have already a lot of hardware emulated; Z80, MSX2 vdp, PSG, SCC,
MSX Music, MSX Audio, ...
Although the current emulator isn't perfect, it is has the potential to become
so. The internal structure with its connector/plug-in structure allows for
independent development of new features and easy run-time switching of
joysticks/mouses/printers/disks/roms/vdp-renderer etc.
There are still glitches in openMSX and the rewrite towards pixel perfect is
still going on, just as the DAC sound isn't completely perfect but we are
getting there.
A lot of stuff can be emulated already that has never been emulated before:
* Moonblaster stereo
* multiple SCC's (up to eight is no problem)
* the scope part of Unknown Reality works (Although there are glitches)
* interlace as in a normal or 100Hz-TV mode
* full-screen support / openGL support / ASCII art output
* correct sound pitch even if the emulation is to slow
You'll definitely hear more about this project in the near future.
David Heremans
PS: If you find a stand at the Tilburg fair with people only running old
MSX software, that could be us ;-)
--
"Never assume malice when results can be explained
through incompetence"? -- Napoleon Bonaparte --
In the case of M$, the distinction can be a difficult one to make
--
For info, see http://www.stack.nl/~wynke/MSX/listinfo.html
