Snes cores not as smooth as they should be

RetroArch Android devices
#1

This is a tricky issue to explain properly, but I’ll do my best, and before I begin to describe, I’ll list the specs, version, etc

RetroArch version: 1.3.4 Android version: 5.1.1 Device: nVidia Shield K1 Tablet 2015 model Cores used: Snes9x Next, Snes9x, Bsnes Performance, Bsnes Mercury Performance, CatSFC

The issue, it’s indeed an odd one. So, in recent versions, the audio crackling issues I had before are pretty much gone, I don’t really notice them anymore however, there is an issue that’s been bothering me. Despite the fact the screen reads at the right refresh rate of 60.000 Hz, the smoothness of Snes games (horizontal scrolling of levels, games) isn’t smooth, and often jumpy, no screen tearing ,but not 100% smooth. A good comparison would be using Snes9x on the PC without triple buffering enabled, it will still run full speed, it’s just the full speed isn’t perfectly smooth and is a bit jittery. Is this a fault of the OS, my tablet not being powerful enough, the settings, or all the above? And if so, can any settings be changed to rectify this, or is there no hope in having the smoothness actually being smooth?

Another example is playing a fast-paced Snes game, when zooming through levels, the screen zooming by will run at 60 fps, no skipping, jittering or stutter, I’m going to record a video to show what I mean. I feel that I can change something or test a nightly build because the K1 process shouldn’t be struggling like that.

#2

Try disabling threading/multithreading as it can cause dropped frames,for example,Sonic 3 & Knuckles with a strong shader enhancement such as 5xBR set to max settings. At least caused frame jitters on a 1st gen FireTV with Jellybean the one time I looked at it. The equivalent result without threading would be normal slowdown instead of jitters.

#3

Yes, threaded video is stuttery. If you can turn it off and not have issues with audio crackling, do it. You might also try disabling audio sync and only keeping vsync enabled and let dynamic rate control handle the rest.

#4

[QUOTE=retroben;38573]Try disabling threading/multithreading as it can cause dropped frames,for example,Sonic 3 & Knuckles with a strong shader enhancement such as 5xBR set to max settings. At least caused frame jitters on a 1st gen FireTV with Jellybean the one time I looked at it. The equivalent result without threading would be normal slowdown instead of jitters.[/QUOTE] Huh, never knew Jellybean had issues with it way back when, I’ll test more settings and get back with you guys.

Okay, I’ll definitely muck around with the settings for sure, hopefully disabling audio sync won’t give me horrible Zsnes-like sound lol, and as for dynamic rate control, well, I’ll see how it fares. As it stands, default settings allow me to play without audio stutter, I hope my K1 tablet isn’t underpowered.

#5

The crackling on Android doesn’t necessarily mean that your CPU is too weak, just that we can’t get proper sync for a variety of reasons.

#6

Damn, so what are the alternatives to this, is there any remote feasibility of these being resolved? Well, at least I never moved to Marshmallow, and yes, it turns out I could install a custom ROM and go back to Kitkat for better results, but the process is pretty risky.

Edit: Preliminary testing, disabled audio sync, keeping vsync on, and disabled threaded video. The framerate is a lot smoother, no noticeable dropped frames, yes, there is minor audio stutter, getting rid of it seems to be a pain, not as bad as I thought it would be. Hmm. Buffer is already at 256, refresh rate is at 59.723 Hz.

#7

So, am i understanding correctly… Jelly Bean has issues with the sound in games(emus)? I am on 4.1.2 (Galaxy S2) and some emulators either give me great speed with sound cracks, or dropped frames (with MultiThreading activated) with great sound. My CPU is usually at 30% (60% with MultiThreading) so it can not be a lack of CPU power issue. Retroarch and Mame4Droid work better than most others though :slight_smile:

#8

Did more testing, and some games are working great, tested Super Mario All Stars for 45 min or so, not once did it crackle, the special chip games usually have some, Cx4 games seem to run pretty good too :stuck_out_tongue:

#10

Maybe implementing threaded audio (with stretching support) as an option would help against crackles,it works quite well on Mupen64Plus standalone in Android,but would other system cores like SNES support it?

#13

My shield tablets reports 59.80 hz of screen refresh rate, and vídeo is a bit jerky too. That maybe the reason for the issue. Older devices i have, like gpd xd report 59.94 hz, which is buttery smooth in comparison with shield tablet. So, my guess is that refresh rate is what matters most if you want smooth scrolling.

#14

If you disable threaded video, audio sync, but keep v-sync on, the smoothness should be pretty much perfect, as I’ve managed to achieve that. The only remaining issue is crackling audio in some cases, esp. with games that use the GSU-1 (Super FX chip), whether it be Snes9x or Snes9x Next. Normal games without chip seem to run pretty much perfectly, you also need to manually adjust the refresh rate so somewhere around 59.700 Hz or so.

#15

[QUOTE=Radius;38641]lol I don’t really understand why do you get so many issues… I don’t even use the tablet, I just use my shield portable and I can play several games even in bsnes perf.

In TMNT IV sewer level scrolling seems to be perfectly smooth[/QUOTE]

How the deuce would I know on why it works the way it does? If it did work the way it was supposed to, I wouldn’t be wasting my time making seemingly false bug report threads that do nothing but end up pissing off developers >.< Funny you should mention that, I get perfect smooth scrolling, actually, I even tested many Genesis/Megadrive games earlier today and none of them crackled. Sonic 2, Sonic 3 and Knuckles, Contra: Hard Corps, Castlevania Bloodlines, and even Sparkster: Rocket Knight Adventures. I’ll be recording some videos to prove to the dev team that I’m neither crazy nor making up false reports. I have NV recorder (I believe that’s the name), captures at 60 fps.

The scrolling is fine, it’s the audio that’s going apeshit in certain games, esp. games that use enhancement chips, I will prove to you that I’m not crazy or imagining them. But hey, who am I kidding, my reporting these issues or showing videos won’t change anything anyway lol.

Forget it, there’s no way they’d want to implement that, it might break the emulator even more for me, since I’m the only one in the world with these issues it seems rolls eyes

Edit: Anyways, yes, Genesis seems to be running absolutely flawlessly, smooth scrolling, no audio issues, Snes is… I just don’t get this at all.

#16

Yeah, that might not be it.

I ran into the same problem with PCSX ReARMed on a Fire TV 2.

Same version of the core, Retroarch 1.3.0 - and Tekken 3 plays smooth. Updated to 1.3.4, again - same core - and Tekken 3 plays very oddly.

The behavior seems not to impact input lag (or lack there of) - as I can still quickroll on reaction, but the whole game feels slower and swimmy.

FPS never dips below 60fps, threaded graphics on or off doesnt inpact it at all, neither does vsync - and by the way, I came to those results, BEFORE reading this thread.

Also when I downgraded back to 1.3.0 - ALL those issues were gone again (default settings, so threaded graphics are on).

So something is messed up structurally - and again people are blaming device fragmentation and settings, when something went wrong in the codebase. Typical Retroarch support problem.

Idk - look into it, it does ruin Retroarch, yet again.

#17

[QUOTE=harlekin;38724]So something is messed up structurally - and again people are blaming device fragmentation and settings, when something went wrong in the codebase. Typical Retroarch support problem.

Idk - look into it, it does ruin Retroarch, yet again.[/QUOTE]

Harsh words guys, but I understand your frustration. I run / test RetroArch on four Android devices and they definitely don’t behave the same; I’m going to try reverting to v1.3.0 to see what effect this has on a couple of issues (not the same as yours), just out of interest.

v1.3.4 fixes an input bug that had led me to all but abandon RetroArch on Android until a few days ago, so I’ve been hoping it’s a good, stable release for everyone. It’s not looking good is it?

#18

I’m not trying to be harsh, I’m trying to prove that I’m not imagining these issues, but clearly, I’m the only user, out of possibly hundreds of thousands, if not millions, who is having these special case issues. Why? I don’t know. And the sad part is, no one knows if it can be fixed or if it’s even worth the time and effort to be looked into. Because yet again, I’ve made another lovely thread that’s nothing but a false bug report, a false positive, and the fact others can’t reproduce it just makes me feel like a fool -_-

I might have to roll back to 1.3.0 or a nightly build at this point, 2 GB RAM and a Tegra K1 CPU just doesn’t cut it, I blame Android Lollipop.

#21

Maybe you can try AZ Screen Recorder or Mobizen,both support 60fps recording and from the looks of it are both completely free without forced watermarks and don’t even need root. Only a suggestion,in case you want 60fps recording badly enough.

#22

[QUOTE=retroben;38752]Maybe you can try AZ Screen Recorder or Mobizen,both support 60fps recording and from the looks of it are both completely free without forced watermarks and don’t even need root. Only a suggestion,in case you want 60fps recording badly enough.[/QUOTE]

Unfortunately, AZ Screen Recorder (Free version), doesn’t capture sound from emulators, only ShadowPlay does that as far as I know, but is capped at 30 fps. I can however, enabled the frame counter for the emulator and record that too.

#23

I tried v1.3.0 to see if it fixed some jitteriness I’m getting on my JXD (stock Android 4.4.4 firmware). It didn’t. Turning off threaded video and audio sync doesn’t help either, so I don’t think it’s related to your issue. Happens on all cores, so I’m thinking I’ll raise a new thread about that.

Sometimes it feels like I spend more time tweaking RetroArch than playing any games. I kind of enjoy it in an odd way, only wish I had some developer skills!

#24

[QUOTE=Modeler;38771]I tried v1.3.0 to see if it fixed some jitteriness I’m getting on my JXD (stock Android 4.4.4 firmware). It didn’t. Turning off threaded video and audio sync doesn’t help either, so I don’t think it’s related to your issue. Happens on all cores, so I’m thinking I’ll raise a new thread about that.

Sometimes it feels like I spend more time tweaking RetroArch than playing any games. I kind of enjoy it in an odd way, only wish I had some developer skills![/QUOTE]

Huh, that’s really weird, my Nexus 7 has Android 4.4.4 as well and RetroArch ran perfectly, though I believe it was version 1.0.0.2, haven’t updated that in a long time. I can try to go back to RA 1.2.2 on my Shield tablet and see what happens.

#27

I don’t think anybody mentioned the audio latency option,try raising that a bit.