RetroArch Android - READ if you have crackling audio/bad video

RetroArch Android devices
#33

Worked for me too on the S3 GT19300. I was having real problems before doing this. The refresh rate with power saving on was around 40Hz. Changing the forced rate to this clearly didn’t work. With power saving off the refresh rate was calculated at 59.99Hz and now the PSX works excellently. Dark Forces plays great. Going to try a few more today and update.

CC

edit Tomb Raider I/II goes blank screen after intro/options screen. Abe’s Odysee runs perfectly. Genesis Plus GX working fine so far.[/quote:28mazdae]

The next version of PCSX ReARMed will tell you at startup whether you are loading with a ‘real BIOS’ or whether it is using the HLE emulated BIOS.

If PCSX ReARMed is using the HLE emulated BIOS, then you should expect compatibility to suffer severely. There is a very big chance that once you use the real BIOS files, all those PS1 games you can not get to run now will just work.

With regards to phones and power saving - yeah, aggressive power management policies are all the rage now in CPU engineering land - considered even more important than raw speed. For apps like RetroArch you really want no ‘smart power management throttling’ going on since even a tiny spike in performance will crush framerates.

#34

Hello, I’m getting getting crackling audio and slow video for anything Super Nintendo and above. Nintendo and Game Boy Color run smooth at most parts with a only very few lags here and there.

I’m using a Samsung Galaxy Duos which runs a single core 1.0 Ghz processor, correct me if I’m wrong but I think GBA should be playable here, and that’s with Advanced Mobile Care’s Game Booster on.

I did use the Calibrate refresh rate feature quite a few times too, and it jitters a little bit, from 58.7 to 59.1

On another topic, I feel like the controls aren’t super responsive or maybe they have a small register area, is there a way to make them bigger without making them go off-screen?

Thanks in advance.

#35

@grincho That’s about right, performance-wise. Full speed GBA is borderline on top-of-the-line Android phones.

You can edit the hitboxes on the overlays. This document gives some details:

#36

Well that’s a bummer, thanks a lot though!

#37

Hi, I’m new here…I using Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini, last night just download the latest version v1.0.0.1 from Google Play and this is my 1st time using RetroArch. I try some Wonderswan, SNES, NDS and GBA ROM games but all get crackling audio/bad video, even I try follow the setting from here, and yet I still get the same problems. Please Help.

P/S: Sorry for my bad English.

#38

Hi guys I have scoured the internet and found no solution so I thought Id ask here. Previously I had retroarch on my galaxy S3 and it worked perfectly - I play PS1 games using a sixaxis ps3 controller linked via usb and it made being out a lot better. After the 4.3 android update my controller key tasking got messed up - for some reason X and square swapped, as well as triangle and circle. I tried to manually assign the keys - and it showed they were all assigned correctly but still when actually using it with retroarch the key remained mis-matched.

So I uninstalled retroarch, hoping to reinstall it and see if that helped - only to find it had been removed from the play store. Eventually it came back to I reinstalled it - only to find that now retroarch wont run my games smoothly anymore. The video and sound is extremely choppy and it literally makes all of my games unplayable and unbearable. I have tried doing the auto calibration of frame rate thing - which improved it slightly - but it still does not run smoothly as it used to and again games are still unplayable like this. I also tried to force the refresh rate to 59.9 as suggested by an earlier post only to find that was slightly worse than the calibrate refresh rate value of 59.3 something. Also energy saving is off as I never have it turned on.

Anyone got any ideas? I considered getting another emulator but I love retroarch and if I can get it to work as it used to then I will stick with it. Thanks

#39

If you’re using an external gamepad, do you have overlays disabled? Some people are reporting significantly worse performance with them turned on since overlays were reworked.

I assume you’ve also tried ‘threaded video’?

#40

No I have overlay enabled - but it used to work with the overlay on without any performance issue. I have tried disabling/enabling threaded video with no result :confused:

#41

Tried disabling it - had no effect

#42

well i stumbled into the refresh problem with a Photon Q. i was pretty happy with the phone until i tried out emulators… they worked awfully and sound was completely distorted

i immediately installed retroarch and checked the refresh rate… calibration reports something like 56.6xxxxx which is a terrible value. the best i could attain was either good video + very bad audio or good audio (but still not perfect) and very very bad video

so uh, stay away from that phone if you care about emulation :frowning:

#43

i solve my problem with my Samsung S5 using Threaded Video Disable.

#44

Good information for the android users.

#45

Interesante. Igual resulta todo un kilombo solo por no tener como saltar 2 o 3 cuadros… aguante retroarch! :wink:

#46

Not saying this would be easy, but why don’t you program something to detect crackling audio, and have an option to automatically cycle through 60 to 0 until the audio stops crackling? Maybe you could also have some kind of debug mode that plays a sine wave, so it will be easy to detect the crackle.

#47

Hello!

I have a Nvidia shield tv (nougat) and when I try psx roms (Chrono cross, star ocean and others) I got audio crackling. I tried the suggestion but I always​ get crackling. Any tips to get it fix?

Thanks

#48

This might seem like a silly question, but how do I lower the refresh rate? It seems like I can only increment and reset to default.

I am using the most recent build.

#49

greetings! new here. I have crackling audio when I use vsync. it goes away when I turn it off but then I have video stuttering. I have tried many combinations (using vsync/audiosync/threaded video/hard gpu sync/and that 2048 sample thing) but I always have one problem or another. any suggestions?

#50

I’m using pixelbook chromebook retroarch. I have been playing Donkey Kong super game boy on bsnes core. My audio eventually cackles after a while of playing. It’s fine at first but then it begins cackling?! My audio driver is opensl. Does bsnes Recognize it? Help!

#51

bsnes+sameboy SGB emulation is pretty demanding. Is it possible you’re getting thermal throttling?

#52

The core/game you are starting may be too demanding for you phone. Vsync on android is mandatory (disabling it produces those massive stutters in video). Keep threaded video on, disable Hard GPU sync and try a fast core like Final Burn Neo, with an arcade game like Street Fighter 2, Final Fight that have very low requirements.