I tried Demul several times, and every time, it’s the same : it’s not smooth. I have a more than decent computer (i7 3770k @ 4.5 GHz, GTX 1080, 16 GB of RAM), and I tried EVERY setting and EVERY plugin available : Demul does not deliver 60 FPS. Never. So to me, Flycast is the way to go, and I absolutely love it.
It’s probably some odd setting because i have a weaker PC (i5 4670 3.4 GHz, GTX 1060) but Demul runs full speed/60fps no matter what for me. And it syncs well even on my 240hz monitor.
Flycast runs well too but i can see more stutters and frame pacing judder in both 60 and 240hz screens.
Yeah Demul is still king. The frame pacing in flycast is a deal breaker, it’s like night and day compared to Demul.
Do you have gsync? There are issues with demul and gsync that they’re aware of and working on. If you disable gsync demul will run butter smooth.
I’m def not a stickler for accuracy, but I personally can’t stomach taking a game that was rendered internally at 320x240 and pump it up to 4096x2160. I think it’s cool we can, but I am not a fan at all.
I’m curious about this ‘frame pacing’ that keeps popping up though. I’m hesitant to ask as I haven’t noticed the issue myself, and ignorance is bliss, but what does it look like when it happens?
Imagine the camera panning at 60fps and instead of a smooth, steady motion, you can see little “jumps” like normal stutters.
This isn’t a matter of how well the game runs, it may as well run at 100% speed and all frame rate counters may report steady 60fps, no matter how heavy these stutters are. It’s a syncing issue i believe.
Even Demul has it if you are really looking for it but it’s just one frame every several seconds. In Flycast it’s much more random and common. You can clearly see those stutters in DOA, especially the arcade version. When the camera pans around showing the stages, you can see how the motion isn’t always smooth, despite the game running at 60fps on a 60hz display with vsync ON.
This is common with games that don’t run at exactly 60hz but at something like 59 and some odd number. But RetroArch usually smooth these things out.
Demul has (much) more than a decade in development and still has many mistakes. It is obsolete and heavy. The interface is a mess. It does not release the code.
Flycast has less (?) Of a year in development and works miracles.
Instead of comparing. If we focus on collaborating with the project, it will be…
(I inserted solemn tone with background ikaruga music)
The best Dreamcast emulator ever created in the history of mankind.
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I agree. That’s why i report any issue. Reporting issues is a kind of contribution, especially if you are not a programmer. Testing + feedback is important. If i didn’t care about Flycast i would ignore it’s issues and stick with Demul. But because i care about it and want to get rid of Demul, i made this topic or any other topic here.
But in the end, i only care about the end result. I want to play games as accurately as possible, with as few bugs as possible. Therefore i’m not going to sacrifice those aspects only because the other emulator is open source or it has less time for development or the author is a good guy who likes the same food as i do. These are irrelevant for the end result. Otherwise i would use all the new and immature emulators on my setup and wouldn’t be able to play anything correctly.
I think the worst thing you can do for a new project or author is ignore these kind of reports. By not listening to them and focusing only on discussing how great open source emulators are compared to closed ones and we shouldn’t criticize them, said open source emulators won’t become better than the closed ones we want to get rid off in the first place.
You have not stopped comparing Flycast with Demul. Instead of being specific, “I have an X problem with Flycast.” Demul is very good and I have used it for a long time but this forum is for Flycast, or not?
There are people who do care if it is FLOSS (free/libre and or open source software) or proprietary software and you are not very well informed.
Demul is not proprietary software (closed code), nor is it open source, it is licensed GPL.v1 is Free Software. Because Demul does not release the code, it is illegal and immoral. There are people to whom this is important.
Nice talk, but don’t forget…
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Update: I just made a new configuration of RetroArch. Try DoA2 with the wide screen hack enabled. At 1080p with “Threaded Rendering” active (loses a lot of fps). At 720p with “Threaded Rendering” disabled, at 60fps fluids. Now it works fine, it is on the average of my card with other games. Much difference. Did I have to update the core or will it be that the emulator got corrupted? Always with the “Cable Type” in VGA for 60fps.
Disable both Threaded and Synchronous Rendering, enable Fullspeed framerate, set Broadcast to NTSC (might not matter depending on the region of the game you’re playing), and set the cable type to Composite (you might be able to use RGB as well, but stay away from VGA). I did a lot of testing with the microstuttering issues, and these were the settings that got rid of them for me.
Threaded rendering has always caused stuttering at least for me, since it seems to make the framerate setting invalid (possibly by setting it to “normal” instead?). I still get performance dips sometimes with certain transparency effects and when flycast streams/loads files from the disc image. But this kind of performance issue is completely unrelated to the microstuttering issue I’m talking about. My hardware is relatively old at this point, still sporting an overclocked 2500k and a 680 gtx. 
Of course, if you have a gsync/freesync monitor that will help a ton too. Just make sure gsync/freesync is actually active. If you have NVidia CP, open it up and go to Display>GSYNC indicator. Next time you load up Retroarch, you should see an indicator on the top right for Vulkan that says “GSYNC” if it’s active. Note, I have seen Retroarch lose Gsync with Vulkan sometimes after quitting games and going back to the main menu. When in doubt, close Retroarch and reopen it again.
I highly recommend making those setting changes I mentioned above, and you should be fine.
I’m fine as I have it, I only use it to test and extract textures, that’s why I usually use PAL. The “Threaded Rendering” I only use it to test, my GPU is obsolete.
If you read the previous messages you will understand. 
That’s a misunderstanding, demul is not GPL, read their headers carefully : https://github.com/p1pkin/demul/blob/034a6cd09df1c4fa90ec03474fad839b681e856f/Aica.c#L1-L14
They are basically making a joke about GPL there by saying it is not redistributable neither modifyable under the GPL license.
Demul being closed source is perfectly legal, please respect their choice.
Demul is private now, he was born and was always free software. Even before, they released the source code.
Demul being closed source is perfectly legal, please respect their choice.
They make fun of GNU and you ask for respect? 
It is they who have to respect.
Note: you cannot change a GNU license to a private one, it is also illegal.
You can change from any license to any other license, you just need to have authorization from all authors, which they do. And again, as i said, demul never was GPL in the first place. You are throwing a tantrum for nothing here, demul being closed sources is 100% legal. Don’t start flaming projects because you don’t understand how licensing works, thanks.
(Wow I thought that the talks with Stallman at all the free software congresses had helped me.)
Discussing is a waste of time if you can use google to answer questions. Inform yourself well.
@alexb3d Exactly, google is your friend :
- p1pkin explained the misunderstanding about demul being GPL at https://github.com/p1pkin/demul/issues/398.
- the requirements for relicensing are explained at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_relicensing, with a list of software who changed licenses, including from GPL to non-FOSS license, not that it even concerns demul who was never GPL in the first place.
As a fbneo & flycast dev i know very well how relicensing work after this shitty year. If you want to flame demul over non-existing issues, do it somewhere else, we don’t need people saying that kind of bullshit on this forum, i won’t tolerate this, that was my last warning, next time i’ll just delete your posts.
First of all. Don’t tell me dumb. I am treating you with respect. I demand respect.
He tells you the same. " so we uploaded old code from sourceforge (btw, which had zero interest during all the years it was there) into GC repository, " They shared the code in GPL 2(?).
http://web.archive.org/web/20130726130912/http://code.google.com/p/demul/source/checkout
You are clearly confusing “Free Software” with “Open Source Software” You can change the open source software and you can include proprietary software. Free software NO. GLP is Free Software. The same page you gave me explains.
I have not disrespected you nor have I violated the rules of the forum. If you delete me even a letter, I denounce you with the administrators. You can be a child of God, belsebú, or trump … You can get your threats in the ass.
- The only thing that matters in licensing is the code, the headers of demul are not GPL, they never were, there is not a single thing saying it’s GPL in the code of this repository. So what ? Google says it’s GPL ? Did google write this code ?
- Any license can be revoked as long as all authors agreed, including from GPL to closed-source, but again, it doesn’t matter in this case because demul was never GPL
Talking about respect when you are flaming a project for being illegal while it’s totally legal ? Seriously ?
Alright, this discussion seems to have run its course. Locking the thread.