FS-UAE on MacOS X 10.5 (PPC G4/G5)

[Jacques]

Hello everyone,
what's the best, quickest and most stable version of FS-UAE to be used on PowerPC Mac (e.g. PowerBook G4) with MacOS X 10.5 (Leopard)? PPC Amiga emulation is not required, just trouble-free and quick Motorola 68k emulation.

Could someone advise, point to the installation binary or upload into the zone, please?

[SnakeCoils]

Hello,
the most usable version of FS-UAE for mid-spec PowerMacs is the 2.4.1 stable, if you need RTG graphics then 2.5.20dev is still usable but do not use the built-in uaegfx because has wrong colors on 16, 24 and 32 bit screens, at the time I found a quick fix using the Picasso IV emulation that has not this issue.
Starting from that version the system requirements have been increased and only a G5 machine can handle a good emulation.
I am going to upload the two binaries above in The Zone! but do not expect too much in term of speed, we can only hope that someday a JIT 68k recompiler for PPC hosts will see the light :-)

[Jacques]

Thank you!

[Jacques]

Sorry to bother again...

What about configuration GUI/launcher that would work on 10.5 MacOS X PPC?
It's not included with uploaded FS-UAE versions.

[SnakeCoils]

Some times ago I also tried to build the FS-UAE Launcher but the resulting executable never worked well on PPC, the crash was always around the corner so in the end I abandoned the frontend to better focus on testing the FS-UAE main program.
Personally I found more convenient to have a config file for every Amiga program I use, the automation inside FS-UAE is good enough for an optimal experience of the emulator even without the Launcher.

[Jacques]

OK, I see. So launcher is a no go on my machine, but what about configuration files? Running FS-UAE you've uploaded to the zone, FS-UAE starts with A500 emulation, created all it's directgories under FS-UAE directory in user's path, but e.g. configuration directory is empty. Why is that? How could I create default configuration file to later manipulate with, to create more configs for A1200, etc? Or is there a way to save default config from within FS-UAE (I only saw saving and loading savestates in F12 menu).

[SnakeCoils]

All the infos you need are inside the online Documentation, some parts does not apply to the OSX PPC port (for example the JIT recompiler options) but all the rest is there.
The config file is nothing but a text file with the ".fs-uae" extension after the name and containing a sequence of options followed by a value, for example here is the config file I use for launching the ECS demo "Arte" on my dual G4 MDD:

[config]
amiga_model = A500+
accuracy = -1
floppy_drive_volume = 0
video_sync = off
fullscreen = 1
viewport = * * * * => 0 0 752 574
floppy_drive_0 =/Volumes/Calderone/Emulatori_ROM/Amiga/Floppy/Arte.adf

Usually I duplicate this for every new game or demo I need to launch. The configuration for the same demo on my intel MacMini is little different because the most powerful CPU allow a greater level of accuracy and if I switch the desktop resolution to 50 Hz refresh the scrolling becomes perfect without tearings or stuttering:

[config]
amiga_model = A500+
accuracy = 1
floppy_drive_volume = 0
video_sync = auto
fullscreen = 1
keep_aspect = 1
viewport = * * * * => 0 0 752 574
floppy_drive_0 =/Volumes/Calderone/Emulatori_ROM/Amiga/Floppy/Arte.adf

The main difference is the accuracy happily increased to the max, the video sync flag and the "keep_aspect" control, absolutely needed when you run FS-UAE on display sets with an aspect ratio different from 4:3.

Of course you need also true kickstarts ROMs, when placed in the right FS-UAE directory (stored in /Documents/FS-UAE/Kicstarts/) the emulator will choose the right one accordingly to the Amiga model you specified in the config file.