ODROID-GO Advance

[mad_ady]

Or you can use the uart on the 10 pin header and redirect boot messages there.

[joy]

Or you can use the uart on the 10 pin header and redirect boot messages there.

That's good idea.
even though some codes are adjusted or a new SW interface is needed, easier than soldering for users.

[maker_gamer]

I've read many of the posts here regarding feature requests about the Odroid Go Advance and as much as I'd like a second analog stick, double shoulder bumpers, built-in wifi & bluetooth, I can total see & accept why HardKernel went with this design:

* Keeping to a pocket standard, it's modeled after a PSP but with improvements of extra ports, interfaces, open standards, etc. I don't want a DS-sized device as it won't fit in any of my pockets.

* Adding any radio (wifi/bt) raises FCC certification efforts & costs for circuit & design, BOM, larger size potentially - board & case, energy usage -- at 250~350mA with a display, the Go Advance draws as much or a smidge more than a Pi Zero (which doesn't have a display). More energy equals less play time.

* Having extra ports, including a standard USB 2.0, you can do anything you want from adding bluetooth with a wire/less controller (like a 8bitdo Pro, PS3/4 or XBO) to using USB tiny "Gyro"/motion sensor for racing, GPS, SDR, etc.

* Plus, HK has provided the schematics, pin outs and other details on their Wiki. This makes sense for the community to push this unit to it's limits in new ways. It also gives the product more potential for a long life span.

At $55 US, the Odroid Go Advance is a basically a RPi 2B (4 core,1GB RAM) with a screen, controllers & bunch of I/O at a commercial build quality -- much better than what I could hack together or spend.

I think this unit is *awesome* -- especially that it runs mainline Ubuntu aarch64. I'm looking forward to getting under the hood to contribute to the community.

HK gets my applause & appreciation for the Odroid Go Advance. Here, take my money. My (pending) Odroid Go Advance is the upgrade to my GP2X Wiz which I still use occassionally today (despite having RetroArch on Android).

BTW, for those software developers out there, be sure to swing by https://openhandhelds.org/ - the software & sourcecode archive site for all GP2X handhelds, the first Pandora, Dingoo & Tapwave's Zodiac. I'm sure there's some treasures there looking to be revived.

Cheers, MG

[NativeCode]

At $55 US, the Odroid Go Advance is a basically a RPi 2B (4 core,1GB RAM) with a screen, controllers & bunch of I/O at a commercial build quality -- much better than what I could hack together or spend.

In fact, this is more powered than a RPI 3B because the RAM is faster and the GPU is more modern, supporting OpenGL ES 3.2 and Vulkan.

I think this unit is *awesome* -- especially that it runs mainline Ubuntu aarch64. I'm looking forward to getting under the hood to contribute to the community.

That is another point for this because there are some pretty cool aarch64 dynarecs for emulation like mupen64plus.

[nadenislamarre]

proud to announce you that batocera is running on odroid go advance
see viewtopic.php?f=187&t=37256&p=276916#p276916

[Slaminger]

I'm one of the community developers working on this project. I'm from The Retro Arena / Lakka / Slash TV Android OS dev teams.
I've been able to build and run retroarch on the device and map the buttons in. Was also able to build and run a full mate desktop experience. There is a lot of potential waiting to be unlocked inside this device.

[rooted]

@odroid Any idea how much WiFi module 1 affects battery life if not downloading? Just if it's connected to WiFi but idle? I think I could disconnect the battery and use the Smart Power to determine but I don't want to keep removing the screws for fear of stripping the holes.

I would also love to see a little compartment in the case that could hold the dongle when not in use. There is room behind the buttons or between the battery and SD slot.

[Paspartout]

@odroid Any idea how much WiFi module 1 affects battery life if not downloading? Just if it's connected to WiFi but idle? I think I could disconnect the battery and use the Smart Power to determine but I don't want to keep removing the screws for fear of stripping the holes.

I think its possible to measure current consumption and voltage of the battery using the rk817 pmic.
Not sure where, but when the driver is loaded there should be a file somewhere in /sys that shows you the current and a file showing the voltage. Together you can probably calculate the power consumption. When you write a small script for logging you can compare consumption with and without wifi stick.

[rooted]

The PMIC can measure the battery sink/source current only.
So you might need a USB power meter to measure the WiFi module power consumption.
I guess the module might consume around 50mA in idle mode.

[GldRush98]

Ah man, this thing looks cool! Of COURSE I just ordered one of the New PocketGo units a couple weeks ago. Maybe I'll give that to my daughter and get one of these, however my wife may not be pleased.

[maker_gamer]

I did think of one hardware "mod" request ... The Gamepad ABXY buttons ... is there any recommendations (other than using a Sharpie pen) for labeling the buttons. This handheld will have the following buttons emulator layouts used:

B A : NES, GB/GBC
Y X, B A : SNES, GameCube
X Y Z, A B C : Sega, while Dreamcast (&Xbox) lack the Z & C. The bumpers could be mapped to the Z & C for Sega games.
Square Triangle, X Circle : PSX, PSP

It would super sweet if there was a community (or odroid) suggestion / recommendation. If the buttons are embossed SNES style, possibly offer to sell a set in PSP style if enough folks request them.

One thought that crossed my mind is to have the PSX/PSP symbols printed on a transparent cellophane "overhead" sheet, then cut it to fit and place it inside of the case so I have both SNES & PSP style. Or sell one directly made by HardKernel. That only works though if you maintain a clear case (like I do).
(controller pics at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamepad)

Thoughts? Cheers, MG

[Slaminger]

Has anyone solved how to fix the screen rotation? I can install and run retroarch 1.8.3 but the orientation won't go back to the way to should be.

[odroid]

Has anyone solved how to fix the screen rotation? I can install and run retroarch 1.8.3 but the orientation won't go back to the way to should be.

Did you look into the github links in this thread?
viewtopic.php?f=194&t=37203

There must be some hardware accelerated rotation bitblit engines.

[jutleys]

Hi where bios files are placed on odroids advance file structure?

[gyth]

Looks great so far! Will definitely get one when it becomes available to the general public.

About the wifi problem, I think it would be trivial to make an expansion board to add a pre-certified (Ampak, etc.) radio module (single band Broadcom/RealTek WiFi + BT) in there. WiFi uses SDIO, and the UART Bluetooth can simply be wired to the 2nd UART interface available on the expansion header. These crappy radio modules might require a 32768Hz clock, so we either need another GPIO for this, or we can just generate this clock on the carrier board.

AP6335 seems to be a decent choice, it's a 1T1R 802.11ac + Bluetooth 4.0 module and is somewhat supported by the mainline kernel. It's rather difficult to find a suitable module because SDIO modules typically have *incredibly* poor support from the mainline kernel. As terrible as it is, brcmfmac is still pretty much the best bet we've got. A very small portion of Ampak (mostly if not all of them have Broadcom chips) modules does have decent Linux support if the proper firmware is provided.

[crashoverride]

where bios files are placed on odroids advance file structure?

The location depends on the distribution being uses. For the official test image, I have noted the BIOS requirements here:
viewtopic.php?f=195&t=37342

[Slaminger]

One thing I noticed is that if I change the es.cfg and don't set permission back to read only, sometimes the logs about the xml gamedata ends up posted in the cfg which causes it to break, I'm not sure why yet. Also if I resize the SD card using gparted there is an error about the block size that persists in console. I've been able to build retroarch 1.8.3 and map in the controls, but I can't seem to get the screen to go back to the correct orientation, have been reading through the git. Has anyone else experienced any of the above?

[crashoverride]

@moderator,
Probably a good idea to move the above post and this one into the "Issues" subforum.

if I change the es.cfg and don't set permission back to read only, sometimes the logs about the xml gamedata ends up posted in the cfg which causes it to break

What fork of EmulationStation are you using?

if I resize the SD card using gparted there is an error about the block size that persists in console.

What is the error message?

[crashoverride]

I've been able to build retroarch 1.8.3 and map in the controls, but I can't seem to get the screen to go back to the correct orientation

This thread may provide more info:
viewtopic.php?f=193&p=277148#p277117

[Slaminger]

@moderator,
Probably a good idea to move the above post and this one into the "Issues" subforum.

if I change the es.cfg and don't set permission back to read only, sometimes the logs about the xml gamedata ends up posted in the cfg which causes it to break

What fork of EmulationStation are you using?

if I resize the SD card using gparted there is an error about the block size that persists in console.

What is the error message?

I'm using the emulationstation that came with the test unit, but I did add emulators and modify the es_systems.cfg. sometimes at startup I get a message the config needs to be fixed by hand, and when I open it, the stuff that should be logged is in the cfg.
For the error message in console I think it's gparted causing the issue, it left a tiny bit of space on the card and Ubuntu doesnt like it.
I also can't get my module 1 wifi adapter to get a connection, but module 5 works fine.

[crashoverride]

I'm using the emulationstation that came with the test unit, but I did add emulators and modify the es_systems.cfg. sometimes at startup I get a message the config needs to be fixed by hand, and when I open it, the stuff that should be logged is in the cfg.

The only modification to file behavior was here and it only affects "es_input.cfg", not "es_system.cfg":
https://github.com/OtherCrashOverride/e ... c9ba610667

There may be filesystem or image damage.

[Slaminger]

I'm using the emulationstation that came with the test unit, but I did add emulators and modify the es_systems.cfg. sometimes at startup I get a message the config needs to be fixed by hand, and when I open it, the stuff that should be logged is in the cfg.

The only modification to file behavior was here and it only affects "es_input.cfg", not "es_system.cfg":
https://github.com/OtherCrashOverride/e ... c9ba610667

There may be filesystem or image damage.

I'll try a reflash with no resize. Is adding stand alone emus the same as cores? Or do stand alones need to be included in the retrorun? I've been able to boot about 10 cores outside what came in the build, but none of the stand alones, I tried to match the PPSSPP setup.

[lordhardware]

About the wifi problem...

In the end, the most important thing is that people program for this with the expectation that others WILL use wifi, as there is no dedicated connectivity, so there will be no consistency.

[crashoverride]

Is adding stand alone emus the same as cores? Or do stand alones need to be included in the retrorun?

Retrorun is a libretro frontend. It only works with libretro cores. It currently only supports libretro's 2D API (not 3D).

The PPSSPP emulator is an example of a stand-alone emulator (its not libretro based). Modifications were made to support the GO-Advance platform: libgo2 replaces SDL. Other developers are using SDL, but all my work will be based on libgo2 to take advantage of hardware features not supported by SDL such as RGA2 (blitter).

[Slaminger]

Is adding stand alone emus the same as cores? Or do stand alones need to be included in the retrorun?

Retrorun is a libretro frontend. It only works with libretro cores. It currently only supports libretro's 2D API (not 3D).

The PPSSPP emulator is an example of a stand-alone emulator (its not libretro based). Modifications were made to support the GO-Advance platform: libgo2 replaces SDL. Other developers are using SDL, but all my work will be based on libgo2 to take advantage of hardware features not supported by SDL such as RGA2 (blitter).

Ok, thank you.

[meveric]

Just a few things "cause it works" no other reason:

Video booting into X11 desktop with EGL/GLESv2 acceleration:
https://oph.mdrjr.net/meveric/other/Videos/GO2/go2.mp4

X11 supports scaling, so you can also do something like this - glmark2-es2 running on a desktop:
https://oph.mdrjr.net/meveric/other/Vid ... esktop.mp4

Or also through scaling (640x480 required) we can run for example Hedgewars with OpenGL -> OpenGL ES wrapper in Window mode.

[NativeCode]

Those glmark2-es2 numbers are incredible, they are about 4 times faster than a Raspberry Pi 3!

[mad_ady]

@meveric do share your xorg config for scaling and acceleration. Bonus points for using the analog joystick as a mouse!

[meveric]

@meveric do share your xorg config for scaling and acceleration. Bonus points for using the analog joystick as a mouse!

xorg config is the same as for the N1.
scaling was done by xrandr X11 is VERY versatile even if people seem to forget it in favor of Wayland, GBM and other things.

Code: Select all

xrandr --output DSI-1 --scale 1.5x1.5

or

Code: Select all

xrandr --output DSI-1 --scale 2x2

I haven't mapped the analog stick directly as a mouse pointer yet, but using antimicro you can map any controller you want as a mouse. including mouse clicks with L and R buttons.

[gyth]

About the wifi problem...

In the end, the most important thing is that people program for this with the expectation that others WILL use wifi, as there is no dedicated connectivity, so there will be no consistency.

Keep in mind that I'm buying this as a highly portable Linux toy, and I'm certainly not the only one. Odroid products are not only for retro gamers, there are other people who just like to tinker with Linux stuff on the forum as well. I like Linux based game consoles only because they typically have excellent physical buttons. Wireless is definitely useless for emulation, except to make transferring ROM images easier for the end user.

[mad_ady]

xrandr --output DSI-1 --scale 1.5x1.5

Been using Amlogic SOCs for so long that I forgot xrandr was a thing...

[rooted]

Wireless is definitely useless for emulation, except to make transferring ROM images easier for the end user.

That remains to be seen, wireless will likely be used for multiplayer in the future. And fingers crossed someone comes up with a way to play on a big screen by way of wireless (or USB Ethernet).

[meveric]

Been using Amlogic SOCs for so long that I forgot xrandr was a thing...

For me it is the other way around. I rarely touch any of the AmLogic boards as they just cause more trouble than anything else.
Although I use the N2 to test my libretro cores at the moment.

[lordhardware]

[Wireless is definitely useless for emulation.

Pokemon trading.
Multiplayer card games.
Real Time Strategy.
Couch Co-Op experiences.

Replicating these are something I've wanted in emulation for a long time but not been able to do outside of the original Xbox.

I REALLY hope your opinion is a limited one.

[Slaminger]

[Wireless is definitely useless for emulation.

Pokemon trading.
Multiplayer card games.
Real Time Strategy.
Couch Co-Op experiences.

Replicating these are something I've wanted in emulation for a long time but not been able to do outside of the original Xbox.

I REALLY hope your opinion is a limited one.

I don't agree it's useless. It's very beneficial in more than one way. Also, what do I need to do for the USB port inside of the test ES to recognize a keyboard?

[meveric]

Just played RVGL between the ODROID Go Advance and an ODROID N2.
And it worked perfectly fine, which also means it would work fine between two ODROID Go Advance as well.
Which makes Wireless network very interesting

[gyth]

[Wireless is definitely useless for emulation.

Pokemon trading.
Multiplayer card games.
Real Time Strategy.
Couch Co-Op experiences.

Replicating these are something I've wanted in emulation for a long time but not been able to do outside of the original Xbox.

I REALLY hope your opinion is a limited one.

I have very little experiences with retro games so I thought it wasn't possible to get networking on emulators. Either way I'm very interested in making a SDIO wifi module for the odroid-go advance. If it works in Linux, people can do whatever they want with it. I'll do more research on this after I get the hardware next month, and if I did end up making one, the board will be open source. I want to use SDIO because their throughput is good enough for such a machine, and they don't take up the only available USB port or stick out of the case.

[pmprog]

Also, what do I need to do for the USB port inside of the test ES to recognize a keyboard?

Well, don't know about you, but I can use it for a keyboard with C64, Amiga and ZX Spectrum emulation; and to actually using the GO-Adv as a linux box

[Slaminger]

Also, what do I need to do for the USB port inside of the test ES to recognize a keyboard?

Well, don't know about you, but I can use it for a keyboard with C64, Amiga and ZX Spectrum emulation; and to actually using the GO-Adv as a linux box

I'm trying with amistrad cpc on the test image, I'll try amiga

[mad_ady]

I just assembled my Advance. It arrived last week, but I was on leave. Screen assembly is fine, but joystick ribbon is a bit tricky to install. I recommend HK posts some high def pictures with close ups of the connectors/ribbons so users get an idea if they are fully inserted or not.
But man, boot times and shut down are fast! Fastest linux I've seen.
Good job! And thanks for the package (and complementary screwdriver).

Forgot to mention - it does boot and run without battery attached - if anyone wants to use it always plugged in so it doesn't swell.

[rooted]

Forgot to mention - it does boot and run without battery attached - if anyone wants to use it always plugged in so it doesn't swell.

Thanks for verifying.

[jutleys]

Two of the best handhelds ever I am proud to be a part of odroidgo devices

[Slaminger]

@crashoverride
How do I disabled the save state feature? I must have missed it in the docs. When playing cps3 the game works fine from a fresh launch, but when it closes and resumes textures are missing. It needs to launch fresh every time.

[crashoverride]

How do I disabled the save state feature?

Currently, there is no option to disable it. This feature can be added to retrorun in the future. An interim workaround is to delete the %ROM%.sav that is generated in /home/odroid/

[Slaminger]

How do I disabled the save state feature?

Currently, there is no option to disable it. This feature can be added to retrorun in the future. An interim workaround is to delete the %ROM%.sav that is generated in /home/odroid/

Yes that fixes it, but has to be done each time. Fine for testing but rough on the end user. I tried to make the directory read only but then es will not launch. Will you also be working with the retroarch 3d API? N64 is playable on the device.

[crashoverride]

Fine for testing but rough on the end user.

I agree that it should be a 'first class' feature; however, the current software is for developer testing and feedback to identify issues such as this. The feature will be added.

Will you also be working with the retroarch 3d API?

I do plan to add 3D API support to retrorun in the future. The blocking issue was debugging a 32bit (armv7) process on 64bit (aarch64) userland.

N64 is playable on the device.

Yes, N64 was tested early on with very good results. A stand-alone (not libretro) version will be provided in the future.

[crashoverride]

An interim workaround is to delete the %ROM%.sav that is generated in /home/odroid/

I should clarify that this can be added to es_systems.cfg before retrorun is called. Alternatively, a batch file that does it can be called instead.

[Slaminger]

An interim workaround is to delete the %ROM%.sav that is generated in /home/odroid/

I should clarify that this can be added to es_systems.cfg before retrorun is called. Alternatively, a batch file that does it can be called instead.

That's very helpful. Thank you.

[rooted]

RTC sleep works but it breaks networking and sound, I guess the hardware isn't resetting.

[notime2d8]

Is the screen portion of the case open? If it is would a touchscreen overly fit?

I'm wondering if I can do a overly and wire it to the I2C test points.