Hatari emulator for N800/N810
Contents:
Hatari package for N800/N810
Download the Hatari package and install it using the "Tools -> Application Manager -> Application -> Install from file..." functionality in your device:
Hatari package contains the GPL licensed EmuTOS ROMs i.e. this is one of the rare emulators where all the components are free (both in the "free as in free speech" and "free as in free beer" sense). I have also a utility for changing (selecting) the EmuTOS language.
NOTE! Never enable both "Zoom ST-low res." and "Use borders" Screen options at the same time. If you have both of them set, you cannot disable them (because screen config dialog OK button doesn't fit into screen) and SDL doesn't allow Hatari neither to start in fullscreen anymore nor to switch into it when its window is larger than screen. Only way to recover from this is to edit the ~/.hatari.cfg file by hand or replace it with a working version of the config file.
Keybindings and usage notes
These are the functionalities I've bound to the keys:
- Fullscreen
- Switches the emulator between fullscreen and windowed mode
- Decrease (-)
- Toggles sound output on/off
- Increase (+)
- Toggles between joystick modes (disabled, cursor emulation, real/USB joystick) for joystick in port 1
- 5-way rocker
- In cursor mode outputs cursor keys and Return key to the emulator, in joystick mode emulates joystick
- Back/Escape
- ESC key in emulator. Use this to skip the EmuTOS boot delay
- Menu
- Opens the Hatari options dialog
Before switching away from Hatari, I would recommend opening the Hatari options dialog so that the emulation is stopped while you don't use the emulation. This should save battery.
For more information on normal Hatari features, see: the Hatari manual.
Some notes about making Hatari run faster
The main Hatari bottleneck is the 68k CPU emulation, but there are some things that you could do to decrease the emulation load otherwise. The items are listed in the order of priority.
- In the Screen options:
- Use (large) frame skip, and/or
- Don't zoom ST-low res, or
- Select TV as monitor (draws only each other line)
- In the Sound options:
- Disable sound completely, or
- Select lowest playback quality
If games have background music, that usually skips pretty annoyingly, so it's best to switch it off from the program you're running. Sound effects work quite OK in many games and in sound effects minor glitches are not so irritating
- Disable more compatible CPU option, if the programs you run work without it
(Besides performance, another annoyance is the device "5-way rocker", it's not even close replacement for a joystick as diagonal movements are very hard with it.)
Building Hatari from source
If you want to build the Hatari package yourself for the device:
- Get the latest device SDK and install it
- Start Scratchbox and get the latest Hatari sources from CVS into Scratchbox
- Extract the Hatari N800
changes tar-file to the Hatari sources directory and apply
the patch for GCC options (workaround for the SDK ARMEL GCC v3.4.4
bug):
patch -p0 < hatari-N800.diff - Make sure that you got the latest EmuTOS binary release and put the extracted EmuTOS image also to the Hatari source directory with name emutos.img
- Run make-maemo.sh (inside Scratchbox). It will build Hatari, install it to a temporary directory, add the emutos.img + configuration files + hatari.png icon suitable for these devices and the Hildon desktop there and then packages all of these into a Debian package.