Windows 95 and Linux now for PSP

[JTI2K]

And it isnt a lame conversion, Im talking of the full PC version running on a normal PSP.

How? simple, they ported the Bochs x86 emulator for the PSP and now you can run any x86 OS like FreeDOS, Linux, DLX Linux, NetBSD, OpenBSD, PicoBSD, Pragma Linux, Debian 3.0r0 and 2.2r5, and any other disk images with pre-installed systems on them



Obviously the only Win95 game that can run at a normal speed with a fully operational GUI is solitaire (well, maybe not that bad, but you wont be running quake). But with the OS running in the background you could run DOS games, emus (Snes9x, Gens, Project64) and other apps, like POP clients or even Skype :smt023

Want to try it? go here

[AntiPasta]

Oh my! This is so... cool in a weird way.

They stole the idea though... 2 years ago I was considering the possibility of emulating an 8086 on the PSX... of course the idea never got anywhere :p

Edit: now if only it could play Wing Commander 3 :dance
(of course there's no space for 4 CDs, but still I dream)

[RyanGamerGoneGrazy]

well with 2 gig duo cards coming soon.....you might be able to play wing commander

[JTI2K]

Even with 2gig Duo sticks you wont be abble to run it. The PSP needs to be OC to boot win95, but even games like solitaire run slow :(

Give them time man, they should come up wit something :smt023

[AntiPasta]

Yeah, if everybody stopped porting over C source and actually tried some optimization :P

(not accusing this guy of anything, in fact what he does is quite 1337, but in the DC/GP32/XB community it happens quite often that ports are done with little regard for the change in architecture, and the result is not quite what it would be had somebody bothered to optimize it a little more)

[JTI2K]

Code optimization is the most tedious part of programming, thats why nobody bothers to optimize

[g_sepp]

i read about this and they said this is emulation not a full machine but in time they will hack it out but do we really need a os running on the psp. I rather just have games for my freaking psp, or just open the thing up so we can put games on it. Sony isn't showing anything until the xbox 360 comes out.

[JTI2K]

in time they will hack it out but do we really need a os running on the psp

Not at all, but the thing is that with a stripped version of windows (like the one the Xbox has) the PSP could run any games or emus designed for windows :smt045

[AntiPasta]

Code optimization is the most tedious part of programming, thats why nobody bothers to optimize

I disagree, I think optimization is fun. I remember holding a contest with a friend who could write the fastest sprite scaler, it felt like such a personal victory to be able to eliminate one more instruction from the main loop :D

[Taemos]

I disagree, I think optimization is fun.

What little "optimization" I've done (TI BASIC), it was pretty fun. I'd rather do optimizing than bug-fixing. Looking through all of those lines of code on a screen that tiny got annoying quickly.

If anyone wants to know, TI BASIC is the only programming I'm good at :). I'll give C++ another go one of these days.

As for Windows 95 on the PSP, wouldn't running emulators on the thing be extremely slow? I mean, you're running Windows 95, which is running through an emulator, and then you want to emulate another system through that? I'd imagine there would be serious difficulties somewhere along the line...

[Paulo]

I disagree, I think optimization is fun. I remember holding a contest with a friend who could write the fastest sprite scaler, it felt like such a personal victory to be able to eliminate one more instruction from the main loop :D

We need to introduce you to life...

[babu]

I disagree, I think optimization is fun. I remember holding a contest with a friend who could write the fastest sprite scaler, it felt like such a personal victory to be able to eliminate one more instruction from the main loop :D

yeah I know that feeling. I love it to. but I'm not that in to speed optimation I like to make the programs as small as possible instead. like when I wrote my 64byte sine drawing program in asm. that was fun :)

[JTI2K]

What little "optimization" I've done (TI BASIC), it was pretty fun.

One thing is to optimize a tetris game, but when you`ve to optimize an entire engine like havoc to run with the game in a system with low resources then it sucks :-D

As for Windows 95 on the PSP, wouldn't running emulators on the thing be extremely slow?

Indeed, thats why i said the a stripped down version of windows may work better (the GUI consumes too much resources). But windows is not opensource, so a stripped version would be illegal.

I think we could get better results with linux (plus theres a lot of emus for it too)

[AntiPasta]

We need to introduce you to life...

Oh yeah, I'd love to see it! People at Neo-Geo.com say it kicks ass!

(on the other hand, who was asking who again to do his assembly assignments? ;-) )

[Paulo]

(on the other hand, who was asking who again to do his assembly assignments? ;-) )

Thats cos i have a life!!!!

oh and i cant stand assembly.