ODROID GameStation Turbo with Kodi for XU3/XU4

by **aric1979** » Wed Nov 01, 2017 6:58 am

I installed new skins for kodi and that messed up the rom browser. Is there a way I can uninstall kodi and reinstall it? It says it does not have a config file for it now. ( the rom browser)

Please help I am a noob at this.

by **meveric** » Wed Nov 01, 2017 8:03 am

well I preconfigured Rom Collection Browser, it doesn't come out of the box with all the emulators preset.. so deleting Rom Collection Browser, really doesn't do you any good.

You can try re-installing setup-ogst-odroid as a package

Code: Select all: su - apt-get install --reinstall setup-ogst-odroid

but if that doesn't work you have to reflash the image.

by **Phoenixkonsole** » Wed Nov 01, 2017 10:58 pm

your vice build depends on libva1 >=1.7.1 .. we are sitting on 1.4.1-1 : )

by **meveric** » Wed Nov 01, 2017 11:00 pm

nope backports has 1.7.1 do a

Code: Select all: apt-get install -t jessie-backports vice-odroid

by **Phoenixkonsole** » Wed Nov 01, 2017 11:31 pm

ouch... face palm to myself : )

by **meveric** » Wed Nov 01, 2017 11:36 pm

you can always check on available version with

Code: Select all: apt-cache policy <package-name>

You can also see which repos they come from that way

by **Phoenixkonsole** » Wed Nov 01, 2017 11:49 pm

Hmm.. did you get sound output? For me it is mute. Default is ALSA and I tried to switch to pulse.

by **Phoenixkonsole** » Wed Nov 01, 2017 11:50 pm

ouch.... sound playback was "off"

by **Phoenixkonsole** » Thu Nov 02, 2017 12:27 am

Works much better now

by **meveric** » Thu Nov 02, 2017 12:58 am

There are a lot of settings that need to be adjusted, the default is rather bad.. especially joystick setup.. by default there is NONE

Also I like to enable disk sounds (I'm doing the same on the Amiga Emulator) has a nice nostalgic touch to it that I just prefer.
You can also check into the "warp" feature, which is a fast forward, when it's loading stuff.

by **aric1979** » Fri Nov 03, 2017 2:31 pm

Thanks that fixed it for me.

by **bardem** » Sun Nov 05, 2017 2:52 am

Hey everyone,

Want to start off by thanking the wonderful meveric for supporting this image for so long and helping so many folks over the years.

I picked up an XU4 both to learn some about Linux and to put together a little emulation machine. Having some trouble. When I launch Emulation Station, it crashes immediately. Same for Reicast for some reason. PPSSPP games appear to run slowly.

Things I've done, first to last:
1) Flashed img to 64 GB EMMC
2) Expand partition, reboot
3) Run update, reboot
4) Installed Bluetooth Manager, connected keyboard/mouse remote and PS4 pad
5) Created symlink to ROMS folder on SD card (I copied almost the exact structure of the folder that comes with the img) by typing "ln -sf /media/odroid/SDEXT/ROMS /home/odroid/ROMS"

I just reflashed the image and set everything up again; same problem. But, I noticed Emulation Station doesn't crash before I created the symlink, it just can't find the roms. Now that I've created the symlink, it crashes during the loading screen. Any tips?

I'm sure I'm doing something stupid, I'm completely new to Linux.

by **meveric** » Sun Nov 05, 2017 2:59 am

bardem wrote:Things I've done, first to last:
1) Flashed img to 64 GB EMMC

So far so good

bardem wrote:2) Expand partition, reboot

It's doing an automatic resize, so theres no need to do this manually.

bardem wrote:3) Run update, reboot

Make sure you do a dist-upgrade as well, as only that will update Kernel and some software that might have changed dependencies.

bardem wrote:4) Installed Bluetooth Manager, connected keyboard/mouse remote and PS4 pad

Nothing wrong here, although I haven't tried PS4 pad yet.

bardem wrote:5) Created symlink to ROMS folder on SD card (I copied almost the exact structure of the folder that comes with the img) by typing "ln -sf /media/odroid/SDEXT/ROMS /home/odroid/ROMS"

Make sure you have correct permissions on that folder, means that the user odroid can read and write in that folder.

bardem wrote:But, I noticed Emulation Station doesn't crash before I created the symlink, it just can't find the roms.

That sounds like a permission issue. EmulationStation should not crash, but if it can't find any roms, it will automatically close itself.
Make sure the ROMS folder on the SD card has the correct permissions and folder structure (at least one folder + 1 game is required for EmulationStation to start).

by **bardem** » Sun Nov 05, 2017 3:04 am

Ah, thank you, looks like we're onto something here. Checked permissions for my SD card (via the file browser) and it says "The permissions of SDEXT could not be determined." How do I give OGST full permissions for the card?

Also appreciate the speedy reply!

by **meveric** » Sun Nov 05, 2017 3:09 am

open the terminal and type:

Code: Select all: su - chown -R odroid:odroid /home/odroid/ROMS

If the SD card can store any permissions that should fix it. If not, then maybe you have a foreign format such as FAT32 or NTFS that can't store Linux permissions.
In that case you have to MOUNT the SD card with the correct permissions I think.

by **bardem** » Sun Nov 05, 2017 12:45 pm

Thaaat did it! The card was indeed formatted in FAT32. I spent the rest of today after your hint transferring all of my files to another SD card, reformatting it to EXT4, then transferring everything back. Looks like a couple of systems are missing for some reason, but the software boots up like a charm now! Much appreciated!

Got your Quake 2 port working in the interim. Once I figure out how to get my steam controller working, I'll start tackling more of those old school FPS's.

Thanks for the help!

by **Phoenixkonsole** » Wed Nov 08, 2017 5:21 am

One question again : )
Can I run zipped WHDLOAD games with FS-UAE on the odroid?

by **meveric** » Wed Nov 08, 2017 7:07 am

the fs-uae-launcher has buildin whdload support (starter for fs-uae) you can install that from Debian directly:

Code: Select all: apt-get install -t jessie-backports fs-uae-launcher

I think you basically give the .zip file as a HDD file for it to be found automatically as WHDLoad game.

BTW I just tested Jim Power with amiberry and uae4arm.
Both amiberry and uae4arm are laggy at the intro as well especially the amiberry was quite a lot slower than fs-uae in the scrolling intro.
Still both amiberry and uae4arm can play the intro and music in "full-speed" if you activate frameskipping (and only then it works).

Sadly fs-uae doesn't offer frameskip, would be interesting though wonder if frameskip would allow "full-speed" CD32 emulation on the Exynos 4 series.

Edit:
I found that the fs-uae emulator has an option for frameskipping as well, but the one that should be used doesn''t work. I could easily create a binary with hardcoded frameskip and that was working perfectly fine.
That way even fs-uae could play the Jim Power start screen without slow down in sounds.
I wonder if I can come up with an easy way to include a new config parameter for this and then integrate it into the image.

I also wonder if I can come up with an easy way to integrate WHDLoad files... but I have to try this first.

Edit2:
NVM, with the latest version of fs-uae no frameskip is required, the emulator is fast enough for Jim Power, I'll test a little more and probably upload a new version soon.

by **Thiago Pires** » Wed Nov 08, 2017 9:53 pm

Can someone help me? I did everything right but I have this problem.

by **meveric** » Wed Nov 08, 2017 11:28 pm

Thiago Pires wrote:Can someone help me? I did everything right but I have this problem.

If everything was right, there wouldn't be an issue would it?

The system complains that you do not have any ROMs in the system folder.
Most likely that means under /home/odroid/ROMS/<SYSTEM> you either don't have any ROMs at all, or the ROMs are in the wrong folders, or have the wrong file extension.
Either one of the above, or you have deleted the system settings and now have no configuration that matches the ROMs.

by **Thiago Pires** » Thu Nov 09, 2017 2:31 am

meveric wrote:
Thiago Pires wrote:Can someone help me? I did everything right but I have this problem.

If everything was right, there wouldn't be an issue would it?

The system complains that you do not have any ROMs in the system folder.
Most likely that means under /home/odroid/ROMS/<SYSTEM> you either don't have any ROMs at all, or the ROMs are in the wrong folders, or have the wrong file extension.
Either one of the above, or you have deleted the system settings and now have no configuration that matches the ROMs.

Thanks!

by **aric1979** » Fri Nov 10, 2017 5:15 am

Is there a game station turbo image for the U3. I love this on my xu4 and I have a U3 collecting dust I would love to put this awesome build on it also. Thank you for all your hard work you make owning an Odroid special.

by **meveric** » Fri Nov 10, 2017 5:40 am

The first ever GameStationTurbo image was released for the U2 so yeah, there is a U3 image and it works very good

http://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=2684
make sure to pick Debian Jessie.

by **Thiago Pires** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 2:28 am

Can you update the kodi? how should I do?

by **meveric** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 2:39 am

Code: Select all: su - apt-get install -t jessie kodi-next-odroid

by **Thiago Pires** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 3:11 am

meveric wrote:
Code: Select all
su - apt-get install -t jessie kodi-next-odroid

by **meveric** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 3:23 am

hmm, that's new.. can you show me the output of apt-cache policy libtinyxml2.6.2v5?
If I do this on my odroid it's working fine.
Try using apt-get update first to be sure you have the latest package list.

by **Thiago Pires** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 3:33 am

meveric wrote:hmm, that's new.. can you show me the output of apt-cache policy libtinxml2.6.2v5?
If I do this on my odroid it's working fine.
Try using apt-get update first to be sure you have the latest package list.

by **Thiago Pires** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 3:50 am

meveric wrote:hmm, that's new.. can you show me the output of apt-cache policy libtinxml2.6.2v5?
If I do this on my odroid it's working fine.
Try using apt-get update first to be sure you have the latest package list.

The first thing I did was use apt-get update

by **meveric** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 5:40 am

It's spelled "tiny". Sorry if I spelled that wrong.
That is what it should look like:

Code: Select all: root@gamestation-turbo:~# apt-cache policy libtinyxml2.6.2v5 libtinyxml2.6.2v5: Installiert: (keine) Installationskandidat: 2.6.2-4~bpo8 Versionstabelle: 2.6.2-4~bpo8 0 100 http://oph.mdrjr.net/meveric/ jessie/backports armhf Packages

that's what it should look like.

by **Thiago Pires** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 9:37 am

meveric wrote:It's spelled "tiny". Sorry if I spelled that wrong.
That is what it should look like:
Code: Select all
root@gamestation-turbo:~# apt-cache policy libtinyxml2.6.2v5 libtinyxml2.6.2v5: Installiert: (keine) Installationskandidat: 2.6.2-4~bpo8 Versionstabelle: 2.6.2-4~bpo8 0 100 http://oph.mdrjr.net/meveric/ jessie/backports armhf Packages

that's what it should look like.

by **meveric** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 9:56 am

so it is available... wonder what else it's complaining about...

try

Code: Select all: apt-get install -t jessie kodi-next-odroid libtinyxml2.6.2v5

see what else comes up, if it still complains about a missing package add it to the line until you find one that really does not exist, or until it works.

by **Thiago Pires** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 10:12 am

meveric wrote:so it is available... wonder what else it's complaining about...

try
Code: Select all
apt-get install -t jessie kodi-next-odroid libtinyxml2.6.2v5
see what else comes up, if it still complains about a missing package add it to the line until you find one that really does not exist, or until it works.

Many thanks friend. Updated to 17.3, then I will try to upgrade to version 17.4.

by **meveric** » Sat Nov 11, 2017 10:24 am

Well you can't update to 17.4 I have to do it, unless you compile it yourself

by **crooked** » Mon Nov 13, 2017 4:21 am

Anyone know how to fix the CEC crash when exiting retroarch?

it happens every time I exit back to RCB to pick a different rom.

a simple fix would be allowing gamepad support in kodi, but even with that option selected the xbox 360 pad wont navigate kodi.

thoughts?

by **meveric** » Mon Nov 13, 2017 6:10 am

I'm using XBox 360 controller to control XBMC/Kodi ever since XBMC 11 and 12, in fact I modified some versions of Kodi to bring back Joystick support, as some crazy people thought ARM board do not need Gamepad support.
I even skipped on Kodi 14 due to the fact it was not supporting Gamepads at all to navigate.
Apparently Kodi 17 also does not work with Gamepads currently which sucks.
One problem that I encountered is that you have to activate the gamepad BEFORE you start Kodi.
That's also the reason why I stick with the old xpad driver, cause the new one will unregister the gamepad if it turns into standby mode, and if the device is unregistered and you turn the controller back on exit the game and go back to Kodi, Kodi won't recognize the controller anymore.

One thing you could do, to use the controller inside Kodi as well, is using antimicro and map your keyboard keys to the gamepad and just use your gampead like a keyboard inside Kodi, that should work fine as well.

by **crooked** » Mon Nov 13, 2017 10:33 am

Got the pad working fine. Just not cec which kills the ability to use kodi without a reboot

Wonder if I can make an exit script when retro exits to reboot cec. But that's tricky cause it's kodi stopping cec

by **meveric** » Mon Nov 13, 2017 4:19 pm

you could kill and restart Kodi with CTRL + ALT + K. But CEC hanging is a well known issue for CEC on ODROIDs... the CEC device never disconnects and Kodi waits for ever to exit.
That's why I don't use CEC for Kodi.

by **crooked** » Tue Nov 14, 2017 3:17 am

Are there any handles for refreshing CEC? instead of scripted refresh of Kodi upon retroArch exit?

by **meveric** » Tue Nov 14, 2017 3:39 am

The handles don't work that's why Kodi doesn't work properly either (at least as far as I know).

by **crooked** » Tue Nov 14, 2017 5:16 am

understood, thank you sir.

I will do a restart kodi script or just live with gamepad until next reboot.

maybe a button mash to restart kodi idea or something. will play around.

by **meveric** » Tue Nov 14, 2017 6:00 am

As you can control Kodi with gamepad, why do you need CEC? If you disable CEC Kodi and retroarch works fine just using a Gamepad (at least with XBox360) or are you using Kodi 17?

by **crooked** » Tue Nov 14, 2017 9:12 am

meveric wrote:As you can control Kodi with gamepad, why do you need CEC? If you disable CEC Kodi and retroarch works fine just using a Gamepad (at least with XBox360) or are you using Kodi 17?

my family harps on me to use the tv remote...i get it.
wireless gamepads eat through batteries.

but no worries, i will use the remote and the pad when cec dies.

by **dstair** » Fri Nov 17, 2017 12:31 pm

Hi, I am new to Linux and the Odroid world. Love this image, after weeks messing around with Ubuntu and a lot less hair, I am impressed with how well this system works.

My question, is there an easy way to change the graphics driver or modify the open GL? I installed Minecraft with the optifine mod and my XU4 should be screaming fps, but it was only at 3 to 6 fps and it kept saying there was an open GL error 1280 (Invali enum).

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to update and or accelerate the graphics?

by **meveric** » Fri Nov 17, 2017 4:25 pm

dstair wrote:My question, is there an easy way to change the graphics driver or modify the open GL?

No, Graphics drivers are closed source and only binary blobs can be downloaded.. The available blobs won't change much though, especially not too much in performance.
ODROIDs do NOT have native OpenGL, as they are embedded devices they only have OpenGL ES.

dstair wrote:I installed Minecraft with the optifine mod and my XU4 should be screaming fps, but it was only at 3 to 6 fps and it kept saying there was an open GL error 1280 (Invali enum).

Minecraft is a OpenGL application, ODROIDs only support OpenGL ES. So screaming FPS is not expected here. The highest FPS we got due to configuration was about 12~15FPS I believe. With more likely closer to around 10 FPS.

dstair wrote:Does anyone have any suggestions on how to update and or accelerate the graphics?

As ODROIDs do not support OpenGL we use an OpenGL -> OpenGL ES wrapper that can translate "some" OpenGL function into OpenGL ES and with that allowing to play different OpenGL Games on ODROIDs anyway including Minecraft.
It's been quite a while since "Minecraft for ODROID" was released and since then a lot of changes happen in the OpenGL -> OpenGL ES wrapper. So using a newer version might give some improvements, although it's not a given that it will work at all.
I just tried to use a newer version of the wrapper without much changes and I could get about 20 FPS, but I had a graphical issue, that all textures were missing.
I'll talk to the developer of the wrapper and see if we can figure something out.
Currently with what you have a value of 10 FPS should be considered best that you can get.

by **dstair** » Wed Nov 22, 2017 12:14 am

Do you have any suggestion on the following error I am getting after restarting after upgrading to the new kernel?

Daemon autostart failed. Error:
g-dbus-error-quark: Error calling StartServiceByName for net.sf.cdemu.CDEmuDaemon: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.Spawn.ChildExited: Process net.sf.cdemu.CDEmuDaemon exited with status 255 (25)

I also have another question, I am using a usb wifi dongle and the wifi will not reconnect after rebooting either? This was an issue before I installed the new kernel

by **meveric** » Wed Nov 22, 2017 12:41 am

dstair wrote:Daemon autostart failed. Error:
g-dbus-error-quark: Error calling StartServiceByName for net.sf.cdemu.CDEmuDaemon: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.Spawn.ChildExited: Process net.sf.cdemu.CDEmuDaemon exited with status 255 (25)

I'm not quite sure, it's been a while since I tested 4.9 but it was always working for me. cdemu uses a DKMS module to compile itself against the Kernel installed. As long as the headers are installed it should always work.
Although I'm not sure if the error is the Kernel module or something else.
Can you try: apt-get install --reinstall vhba-dkms and check if t he building of the DKMS module throws any issues?

dstair wrote:I also have another question, I am using a usb wifi dongle and the wifi will not reconnect after rebooting either? This was an issue before I installed the new kernel

Not exactly sure what exactly you expect here.
I know that if you setup a WLAN connection it normally asks for a keystore password to store the entered information (WLAN ID and password).
If you enter a password here, the WLAN can not auto-connect unless you enter the password.
If you set a blank password, it will store the WLAN ID + password without encryption and can auto-connect.
You might have to remove the gnome-keyring store for this, to reset the password.
If it doesn't connect to the WLAN at all, then I don't know what to do, never had that issue. But I'm using a hidden WLAN anyway so I have to setup my WLAN manually and with that it always tries to connect to it automatically.

by **dstair** » Wed Nov 22, 2017 5:12 am

Thanks for the input. You have done a fantastic job. I will give the DKMS install a try when I get home tonight.

On the wifi, I select the remember password and it remembers the password, just like on any other computer. I just have to click on the icon and select my home network connection and it connects. I had Ubuntu installed on my XU4 before GSTurbo and it connected every time I restarted. I will look up the gnome- keyring and see if there is something there.

I forgot 1 other thing. I was checking out the settings for the OS on the desktop and noticed that on my system I cannot enable the compressed memory, it says it is missing the files. What is the compressed memory for? What do you suggest to install the missing files?

by **meveric** » Wed Nov 22, 2017 5:23 am

hmm compressed RAM or ZRAM should work, at least if you've done a apt-get update at least once.
ZRAM is a variant of SWAP (virtual memory) the ODROID has roughly 2GB RAM some applications may want to use more than 2GB RAM, but that's not possible.
So similar to windows you can use a virtual memory (SWAP/PageFile, etc.) to store RAM on HDD or something similar.
But an HDD (or something similar) is much much slower than RAM, so although it's working with a SWAP file on a disk, it slows down your system.
ZRAM uses a small part of your RAM to compress data in the memory, so for example, if it uses 500MB of ZRAM and can compress the data in the memory to about 30% of the original size, you could squeeze nearly 1.5GB data in that 500MB of compressed RAM.
Since compressing and decompressing is done by the CPU it's a lot faster than writing data on a disk, therefor ZRAM is much faster than SWAP on a disk, although you loose a small section of your real RAM to compress stuff that does not fit in the normal RAM anymore.

It's helpful if you don't put too much staff in it, as too much ZRAM can reduce performance and efficiency as well.

But I'm not quite sure why the menu option wouldn't work. It simply tries to install the package zram-odroid (which you can do manually as well).

by **dstair** » Thu Nov 23, 2017 10:21 am

Thank you for the help on the memory and the login error. Reinstalled both packages and now it is fine.

I am having another interesting anomaly with the mouse cursor since the kernel upgrade, it is really jumpy and flashes and sometimes I loose it for a few seconds. DO you have any thoughts on what could be going on with that? was working perfectly before.

Other observations and interesting things going on with video. If I run GXL gears the fps is almost 180 fps. If I run it on my raspberry pi it is only 60 ish. Minecraft works better on the RPi, but Im trying to smooth it out on the odroid as well so multiple people can play at the same time. If I disable the X11 in the settings the performance increases, which seems counter intuitive to me. For some reason in my mind it seems the program would perform better with hardware graphics instead of software. I am definitely not an expert here, but definitely want to learn. I am great with electronics and programming, just not the whole system (Yet). The graphics improved with the upgrade, but something still seems not quite right on my system. I also downloaded sonic for the gameboy and it was super slow with the hardware X11 enabled. Turned it off and worked much better, still slow and there was a ghost half the time. Is there a way I can tweak the settings or a different driver I might try to help with the glitchyness?