Odroid-Go v2

[lordhardware]

Is there any plans to continue the ESP line of products with the Odroid?

With the huge increase of RAM shown with the ESP32-S2 there is a possibility for a device that slots very neatly between the original Odroid (retaining compatibility with existing software) and the Odroid-Go Advance (without creating an underpowered android device).

Something with the above chip, with the same form factor as the original Go
- two additional buttons on the back
- a dedicated DAC and a headphone jack
would be absolutely perfect.


Does HardKernel have any plans for this SoC?

[crashoverride]

With the huge increase of RAM shown with the ESP32-S2 there is a possibility for a device that slots very neatly between the original Odroid (retaining compatibility with existing software) and the Odroid-Go Advance (without creating an underpowered android device).

Ironically, it turns out to be the exact opposite:
* ESP32-S2 has only 1 core instead of 2 in ESP32. The emulators are very dependent on the additional core.
* ESP32-S2 has less RAM than ESP32. It only has 320K instead of 520K (IRAM). While it can address more external PSRAM, that memory is slow (SPI).

https://www.espressif.com/en/news/ESP32 ... production

The ESP32-S2 chip is equipped with a 240 MHz Xtensa® 32-bit LX7 single-core processor with 320 KB of SRAM

[lordhardware]

With the huge increase of RAM shown with the ESP32-S2 there is a possibility for a device that slots very neatly between the original Odroid (retaining compatibility with existing software) and the Odroid-Go Advance (without creating an underpowered android device).

Ironically, it turns out to be the exact opposite:
* ESP32-S2 has only 1 core instead of 2 in ESP32. The emulators are very dependent on the additional core.
* ESP32-S2 has less RAM than ESP32. It only has 320K instead of 520K (IRAM). While it can address more external PSRAM, that memory is slow (SPI).

https://www.espressif.com/en/news/ESP32 ... production

The ESP32-S2 chip is equipped with a 240 MHz Xtensa 32-bit LX7 single-core processor with 320 KB of SRAM

Well butter my buns, looks like I was looking at old rumour pages.

[sydarn2]

I am bumping this thread as the esp32-s3 was announced by espressif:
https://www.espressif.com/en/news/ESP32_S3

I am not expecting any miracles. But it would be cool if there were a new revision of the GO. One which solves some problems with the existing one:
1. Properly attenuated speaker. It is way to loud.
2. Improved d-pad which makes it easier to do diaglonals.
3. More bandwidth to the display.

[crashoverride]

esp32-s3 was announced

I plan to take a look at this when the S3 devkits start shipping. Preliminary review of the announcement suggests that it would still be challenging to implement a high speed display interface. The reason is same for the compromises required for the original ESP32: lack of GPIO. While 10 new pins were added, the SPI was increased to octal SPI (from quad). This means there are likely still not enough pins to provide a 16bit data path to a display.

[lordhardware]

One can dream Crash.


One can dream...

[ducalex]

I plan to take a look at this when the S3 devkits start shipping. Preliminary review of the announcement suggests that it would still be challenging to implement a high speed display interface. The reason is same for the compromises required for the original ESP32: lack of GPIO. While 10 new pins were added, the SPI was increased to octal SPI (from quad). This means there are likely still not enough pins to provide a 16bit data path to a display.

It would be fantastic if you could find a way to use the parallel LCD interface, but even just having more addressable RAM and separate SD/LCD buses would open up the door for so many more games!

[mad_ady]

You guys just hate Linux with a passion, don't you?

(kidding)

[crashoverride]

If I remember correctly, the LX7 has Linux support.

The main points of interest in ESP32-S3 are:
1) Vector processor - Theoretically able to process multiple pixels simultaneously.
2) XIP PSRAM - Theoretically able to run code from PSRAM. This means much larger programs can be used and/or features can be added. This was the primary issue with the GBC emulator and the reason for the 'creative' sprite/tile caching code I wrote for it. It potentially could also allow the Bluetooth stack to be used for gamelink or headphones.
3) RISC-V ULP - A full featured ULP could potentially allow offloading of more tasks such as battery monitor and input polling. The ESP32 ULP was extremely limited and lacked features such as branching.
4) USB - Potential first class USB device support and firmware flashing. This would enable scenarios not possible with the USB-UART in ODROID-GO.

[sydarn2]

It potentially could also allow the Bluetooth stack to be used for gamelink or headphones.

The esp32-s3 only provides Bluetooth LE 5.0, while Bluetooth LE Audio exists it is fairly new and at least certain features requires version 5.2 according [3]. That said I am not sure the S3 can't support it, but it seems less likely to do so out of the box.

Some interesting reading about Bluetooth LE Audio:
[1] https://www.bluetooth.com/learn-about-b ... /le-audio/
[2] https://www.bluetooth.com/learn-about-b ... fications/
[3] https://blog.nordicsemi.com/getconnecte ... h-le-audio

[kelbot]

A revised Go with bluetooth audio and some other minor improvements would be great. It sounds like there is some potential for worthwhile improvements in a number of areas. I know a lot of people are thrilled with the new Advance and Super and I like them as well (I have an Advance 1.0) but I still really love my Odroid Go and use it a lot. The small size and dead simple operation of it make it still very worthwhile to me.

[ducalex]

2) XIP PSRAM - Theoretically able to run code from PSRAM. This means much larger programs can be used and/or features can be added. This was the primary issue with the GBC emulator and the reason for the 'creative' sprite/tile caching code I wrote for it. It potentially could also allow the Bluetooth stack to be used for gamelink or headphones.

BT audio already works on the GO. BT needing more of the internal ram causes some performance degradation but the real problem is the binary size. Each emulator is then +1.5MB and the lag of their stack is pretty bad

USB-OTG is certainly very exciting, it would allow user to see a virtual mass storage device for firmware updates/rom transfer. And JTAG-over-USB would be fantastic for us developers! (It doesn't work very well on the S2 but I'm sure they'll have it ironed out for the S3 )

[crashoverride]

I am thinking this will make a fun summer project (21Q3). Based on the timing of the ESP32-S2 from announcement (2019-09-3) to actual production (2020-02-28), the ESP32-S3 is likely 6 months away from being generally available.
https://www.espressif.com/en/news/espre ... -wi-fi-mcu
https://www.espressif.com/en/news/ESP32 ... production

The ESP32-S2 was pretty much ignored by me. The limited RAM, lack of Bluetooth, and introduction of cmake to the build system made it a "dead on arrival" part. However, since the S2 and S3 appear to share a lot of design, I began looking at the S2 datasheet to see what was possible.

Particularly relevant to this discussion is the new octal SPI that first appeared in S2. Although its not immediately obvious, there is a "mode" added to this hardware block for "8080 bus" communication with a LCD controller/panel. This uses 8 pins for data instead of the 16 required for RGB. It is the same protocol currently used over SPI in GO, just much faster. Furthermore, the LCD controller provides a "TE" (Tearing Effect) output that can signal when VBLANK has occured. The combination of these two offers the possibility of high speed, tear free rendering. I have ordered a S2 to explore whether this will work beyond theory.

[odroid]

Very interesting discussion since we've discontinued the original ODROID-Go last week due to very low demands these days.
Once you find a way to implement a tear free parallel 8bit 8080-ish LCD interface, let's consider relieving my favorite handheld ODROID.
Meanwhile, I will try sourcing a 2.4" IPS-grade LCD module which has a 8bit data bus for the summer project festival.

[sydarn2]

Very interesting indeed!

According to this article the esp32-s2 is supported by linux:
https://lwn.net/Articles/838807/

According to Cadence the LX7 improves common controller performance by 15%, I can only assume that it is compared to LX6:
https://ip.cadence.com/ipportfolio/tens ... stomizable

I really like the form factor of the original GO, but since @ducalex already have a snes emulator. Maybe it is worth considering snes button compatibility? And maybe form factor can still be retained...

Thoughts:
1. The 2 rubber buttons above A and B could be dropped to make space for additional 2 front facing buttons (system menus can be entered by combined pushing of the remaining 2 rubber buttons)
2. Perhaps the LR2 solution from the oga-be would be cheap enough to implement while still retaining the form factor. My preferred placement would be on the top part of the sides.

[ducalex]

In my benchmarks the ESP32-S2 (LX7) is pretty similar to the ESP32 (LX6) but memory access is faster. We can probably expect the same thing from the S3.
SNES is certainly more viable on the S3. It can address more ram and, if crashoverride is right, the executable PSRAM means I can write a dynarec .

[lordhardware]

The beauty of the original Go was its simplicity.

I kept going back to it because it couldn't do everything.

Although it would be great to play SNES games, SNES needs 4 extra buttons, not two.

I'd rather any replacement Go be able to play 2-button games well, not 4-button games ok.

I'd rather the dynarec make Neo Geo Pocket more possible, and decrease the latency which could make multiplayer more viable.

Apart from that it does everything I want and it does it well.

[sydarn2]

By looking in the product selector/product comparison you can get a few more details about the esp32-s3:
http://products.espressif.com:8000/#/product-comparison

Sadly the DAC is still 8-bit.

The selector also says that SOC is sampling, but module is not available yet.

[ducalex]

I agree that from a gamer's perspective another ESP32-based system would be a weird choice. It wouldn't be that much cheaper than a retroarch/opendingux/etc-based one and yet be far less capable. That's why I'm not too hopeful that we'll get another one .

PS: Glad to catch you here, did you stop working on neogeo and is your progress available somewhere? I was considering picking up the port eventually.

[lordhardware]

I agree that from a gamer's perspective another ESP32-based system would be a weird choice. It wouldn't be that much cheaper than a retroarch/opendingux/etc-based one and yet be far less capable. That's why I'm not too hopeful that we'll get another one .

PS: Glad to catch you here, did you stop working on neogeo and is your progress available somewhere? I was considering picking up the port eventually.

I was basing it on

https://github.com/8bitpsp/race

I got it as far as running, but was struggling to get the display working, only reason I know it ran was I had a sfx line in the code after the display to test that and it played.

I'd be happy to send you what I had, but probably won't help much haha.

[millim]

may I also join the discussion here..

I like the Odroid GO, and what is all in it and about it. To me, it is exactly what it should be. A kit, making fun to assembly, learn hardware, software and System-on-Chip architecture, a kit getting more out of it not *Just* playing a game. The ESP32 is widely used and the software can be easily adapted. Maybe there is a smart watch version coming, playing games with gesture control? With the ESP32, one can do endless projects.

In case this is not the aim all of it, I would go for a second hand PC, install a Linux distro, install all the free emulators, done. Or even better, purchase a commercial solution of one of the big gaming providers. Or just take the mobile with all the processing power.

Maybe it is time to think about how we can motivate kids stepping into electronics shaping our future new. It is not just playing a game on a console, it is more about playing the game of life.

Sadly to hear, that the Odroid GO vision dies...

Regards
millim

[lordhardware]

Looking at how incredibly interesting things like Mario Kart Live Circuit and other AR based solutions are made me extra excited about the prospect of Open Source gaming.

Sadly, without an easily accessible ESP32 emulator this doesn't particularly have the broadest appeal.

However it's a sight more exciting to build for than the OGA for me which is in essence a slow android chipset with an OK controller.

[sydarn2]

Sadly to hear, that the Odroid GO vision dies...

Wait a bit before declaring it dead.
If there is a new GO it needs advantages compared to the old one. Lets see what crashoverride finds out.
If a new GO based on S3 improves on the following I would certainly buy it, and maybe even 2 pcs.
* 50/60Hz tear free display
* Performance improvement by vector instructions, utilizing ULP core, faster memory...
* Solve small issues: sound attenuation, d-pad diagonals