Which is the best Free Emulator around. I am currently using Spectrumulator which is a free 30 day trial. Also I need it to be simple as I am not the best when it comes to computers.
The real question is why we use the emulators?
I want to have a program that will be as close as possible to the original hardware.
SpecEmu gives me that feeling.. support four bright ULA issue (and ULA plus too), passes all z80 tests, stable and bug free (after two years of use on daily basis), lightweight (no instalation and deep integration into os), win 7 compatible etc.
I think it lacks only a few small things like joystick support to be perfect..
So, if the original question was, which is the best free emulator i have no doubt that this is SpecEmu.
And of course, for those using Linux, the first and best choice is a Fuse, another brilliant and free Spectrum emulator.
And only choice? I realise that there are other *nix-based emulators, but I think it's only Fuse that I've heard about over the past few years. Whilst completely understandable, I think it's quite saddening that the Windows sector is so well supported with currently-supported emulators whereas *nix is perhaps a little too reliant on Fuse development. I'd have thought that writing emulators would have appealed more to *nix programmers rather than Windows coders.
...sadly, I think Nick is right... there are other emu's out there for *nix, as you say, but not as developed or as active in their development... Iv often used FBZX on Linux, which I personally like... I tend to find that most of the emu's for Linux are either very old or 48k based only... Sadly, Spectrum development is actually the only reason for me to continue using Windows... I think its true that for Spectrum development, emulation and tools, Windows is THE platform... I don't like that situation anymore than the next man, but thats just the way it is now...
..fortuantely, things are slowly changing... lately, we've been seeing more tools written in other languages (eg: JAVA, even RUBY) and a growing awareness for making things more cross-platform... but still, its very little in the grand scheme of things... Its a start at least however, and one that will hopefully grow...
If we want this situation to change, then we really need to commit ourselves to chosing our language and tools carefully when writing anything for Speccy development... We need to purposefully try to make things cross platform from the start of our projects... Breaking our comfortable habits in these areas isn't easy, and Im as guilty as the next man for selecting closed source single platform tools when flinging together projects, but until those habits change, Windows will remain the epso facto preferred platform for zx development....
Thanks Pegaz. I went with your option however when i try to load a game up from the archive it dont work. what am i doing wrong.
Well, if you use games from wos archive, then i assume that you are first unpacked them with winzip or similar program.
Then, for ease of use i recommend a file association in (Options / Advanced / File Associacions) and check all those empty boxes.
Now you can start almost any game with simple mouse double click on it from your file manager (i use Total Commander) and games should start automatically.
If not, go to Options/Tape and check "Auto Tape tape play/stop" and "Auto load tapes"
Optionally you can check "Edge detection" (and / or) "Flashload.." option for faster loading.
I also recommend to check first five option under Option/Display tab and "Use late timings.." for better compatibility with some games/demos.
And only choice? I realise that there are other *nix-based emulators, but I think it's only Fuse that I've heard about over the past few years. Whilst completely understandable, I think it's quite saddening that the Windows sector is so well supported with currently-supported emulators whereas *nix is perhaps a little too reliant on Fuse development. I'd have thought that writing emulators would have appealed more to *nix programmers rather than Windows coders.
Frankly, Fuse is so superior to any native *nix based emulator so its not necessary to waste much time.
Maybe only worth a try is M. Fayzullin's Speccy 1.6 (Windows version is not bad), but Fuse is clear winner here, no doubt of that.
On my Slax Linux i use Fuse and SpecEmu (under Wine) and both work great.
I think it's quite saddening that the Windows sector is so well supported with currently-supported emulators whereas *nix is perhaps a little too reliant on Fuse development.
Why's that a bad thing? Or more to the point, what do you think is going to threaten the continued development of Fuse in future? If Phil Kendall were to get hit by a bus tomorrow - or, less morbidly, gets caught up in an almighty flame war and leaves the Speccy scene forever - the Fuse project will still go on, thanks to it being an open source project.
Fuse has practically no competition on *nix, because there is no reason for any competing emulator to exist - if there's some killer feature that it lacks, then it makes far more sense to patch Fuse to implement it - as I've done myself on several occasions, and contributed my changes back to the Fuse project - rather than to build a new emulator from scratch. This isn't a flaw - it's the open source model doing what it does best.
If anything, it's the Windows community which is too reliant on a small number of developers continuing work on their projects, as we've seen with RealSpectrum and now (it seems) SPIN.
Why's that a bad thing? Or more to the point, what do you think is going to threaten the continued development of Fuse in future? If Phil Kendall were to get hit by a bus tomorrow - or, less morbidly, gets caught up in an almighty flame war and leaves the Speccy scene forever - the Fuse project will still go on, thanks to it being an open source project.
I wouldn't call being open source a bad thing, and certainly the Fuse project will go on for as long as people are interested in it. I just believe that having multiple projects, you get multiple viewpoints, multiple approaches, and a competition between emulator authors to make their emulators better.
We saw that with the evolution of DOS and Windows emulators, with each generation of emulator improving upon the last thanks to new ideas and approaches being tried out - we've come a long way since the days of Z80 and JPP.
To me, it seems counter-intuitive for *nix Spectrum emulators to follow a different path, with one project dominating all others. Yes, that's due to the open source model, but I find it surprising that not as many *nix coders want to write an emulator from scratch as their DOS/Windows counterparts, even taking into account the difference in operating system popularity.
On the flipside, maybe I shouldn't be thinking of *nix in isolation like that - ideas are being shared across the different platforms, so maybe the concern about new ideas and approaches being constrained in the *nix sector isn't really appropriate.
I think the bottom line is that I get a kick out of seeing people trying out different things in different ways and think that *nix users are missing out on that fun by having fewer active players than their Windows counterparts. I don't believe that just because something's been done once, it shouldn't also be done by someone else - DOS/Windows users always having three or four maintained emulators to choose from is a strength, and I think a reason why the Speccy scene as a whole is so strong 17 years after the final YS was published.
I just believe that having multiple projects, you get multiple viewpoints, multiple approaches, and a competition between emulator authors to make their emulators better.
Fuse has competition though. Fuse attempts to be an accurate Spectrum emulator, so all the Windows emulators are providing competition. The only reason for writing a new *nix emulator is the mountaineer's rationale: because it's there. Unless you really want to start from scratch it makes far more sense to use enhance Fuse. 99.9% of the work has already been done. Fred's work on the OS X port of Fuse is a good example of using the Fuse source, and providing something extra from it.
The only reason for writing a new *nix emulator is the mountaineer's rationale: because it's there.
Aye - and that's why I like Windows having more Spectrum emulators: more enthusiasts doing what they enjoy and sharing their emulators and (above all) their enthusiasm for the subject. I find that rather addictive, and watching the recent development of Sinclarean and Ziggy just as an observer has been a joy. Fuse is a great emulator, but I wish there was more of a buzz around it, and I wonder if the entrance of new *nix Speccy emulators would spark that off.
Yes, there's no need for another *nix emulator, but when has that ever stopped someone from doing something in a hobby they enjoy? I love doing pointless things in interesting ways.
Yes, there's no need for another *nix emulator, but when has that ever stopped someone from doing something in a hobby they enjoy? I love doing pointless things in interesting ways.
I think the point is, nobody really sets out to write just another emulator - they set out to write a *better* emulator (where better might mean more accurate, more user-friendly, emulates that one obscure Russian printer interface, or anything in between), and Fuse provides a ready-made way to do that without the grunt-work of debugging a Z80 core.
And only choice? I realise that there are other *nix-based emulators, but I think it's only Fuse that I've heard about over the past few years. Whilst completely understandable, I think it's quite saddening that the Windows sector is so well supported with currently-supported emulators whereas *nix is perhaps a little too reliant on Fuse development. I'd have thought that writing emulators would have appealed more to *nix programmers rather than Windows coders.
I tend to feel the opposite - I don't quite get all the excitement about writing emulators which I see as mainly an enabling tool rather than a goal in themselves, and would prefer to see more of that energy spent on writing new tools, software and hardware for the Spectrum.
Others may well feel differently, but I personally find the prospect of competition between emulators demotivating rather than energising and much prefer an atmosphere of cooperation rather than competition (which if you ask me is what has defined the Speccy emulator scene for a long time).
In that sense it has been a great couple of years for the Spectrum scene with loads of new games and exciting hardware with less happening on the emulator front which are largely mature and functional.
As a hobby coder I have to say writing an emulator from scratch can be invigorating, exciting (I'll never forget the moment when the Sinclair copyright message popped up on my then infantile emulator screen. Nearly broke in to a jig, I did!), eye-opening experience but it can also be tedious at times. Like Fuse, there are open-source cores available on Windows too (in fact, Fuse has been used in some Windows emulators) so it's not like things are so different on *nix and Windows when it come to writing an emulator.
However, an emulator isn't just about writing a Z80 core. It's also about writing the support functions, the user-experience, etc. I dunno about others but I wanted to experience the "process" of writing an emulator from scratch and also create a different user-experience. If someone were writing an emulator just to offer a different user-experience it would make far more sense to use an existing z80 core because otherwise it's quite easy to be bogged down trying to emulate the beast accurately.
I use linux to develop GP2Xpectrum and all derived ports (iPhone, Android) using a free toolchain, Android SDK-NDK, all over linux... debuging using eclipse+CDT .... all in ubuntu 9.10...
You can download xpectrum project and compile to linux with the makefile included.
I think together with FUSE, is one of the zx spectrum emulator more versatile, multi-platform and user-oriented emulators around over the years...
The emulation is top notch and the result of brilliant people who worked in its development over the years. ;)
Why's that a bad thing? Or more to the point, what do you think is going to threaten the continued development of Fuse in future? If Phil Kendall were to get hit by a bus tomorrow - or, less morbidly, gets caught up in an almighty flame war and leaves the Speccy scene forever - the Fuse project will still go on, thanks to it being an open source project.
If you tried to emulate a ZX spectrum back in the late nineties you had a variety of options each with their own 'characters'.
ZX32 provided a different experience to WSpecem, which was different to X128 which despite being DOS looked and sounded absolutely nothing like Warajevo (due to palette and beeper issues that people around here have probably forgotten about!)
They were all great emulators in their own ways - and the programmers personalities, opinions and the choices they made when they coded their emulators added colour to the whole emulation experience.
I play piano in my spare time - My interpretation of a classic piece would be different to someone else's. I think the same is true to some extent when it comes to writing a program. Different emulator authors have their own ideas as to what is accurate emulation and they try to achieve different things.
Having just one (admittedly excellent) emulator does make linux the poorer choice if you are interested in spectrum emulation.
Thanks Seleuco for mentioning Xpectrum... Id not heard of this project... Since this project is all about cross-platform development and the webpage mentions mobile devices in particular, I wondered whether this project would compile to ARM architechture... the reason I ask, is that OpenPandora are now shipping their devices, and software is still scarce on that system. Fuse has been compiled to run on OpenPandora, but Im sure they'd appreciate more Spectrum related software...
Thanks Seleuco for mentioning Xpectrum... Id not heard of this project... Since this project is all about cross-platform development and the webpage mentions mobile devices in particular, I wondered whether this project would compile to ARM architechture... the reason I ask, is that OpenPandora are now shipping their devices, and software is still scarce on that system. Fuse has been compiled to run on OpenPandora, but Im sure they'd appreciate more Spectrum related software...
It should be a easy port.... If i have the chance to get some Pandora someday... I will make a port for that platform.. but i think anybody could do it without much work... :) and i would provide all possible assistance...
The good thing is that xpectrum does not depend on any GUI widget ... except iXpectrum (ObjectiveC) and Xpectroid (java).. which have a little more platform work (but is isolated)
Comments
but I use Spectaculator , registered. It's not that much considering what your getting with it.
http://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/showthread.php?t=24933&page=5
http://zx-pk.ru/
But Spin and SpecEmu are close.
And, as other say, they may be better in some rare technical aspects but if you aren't a hardcore user, you will never notice.
I want to have a program that will be as close as possible to the original hardware.
SpecEmu gives me that feeling.. support four bright ULA issue (and ULA plus too), passes all z80 tests, stable and bug free (after two years of use on daily basis), lightweight (no instalation and deep integration into os), win 7 compatible etc.
I think it lacks only a few small things like joystick support to be perfect..
So, if the original question was, which is the best free emulator i have no doubt that this is SpecEmu.
Spin is also quite good but its still in beta stage, with some bugs and without much hope that something will change in future:
http://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/showpost.php?p=445975&postcount=78
And of course, for those using Linux, the first and best choice is a Fuse, another brilliant and free Spectrum emulator.
http://zx-pk.ru/
And only choice? I realise that there are other *nix-based emulators, but I think it's only Fuse that I've heard about over the past few years. Whilst completely understandable, I think it's quite saddening that the Windows sector is so well supported with currently-supported emulators whereas *nix is perhaps a little too reliant on Fuse development. I'd have thought that writing emulators would have appealed more to *nix programmers rather than Windows coders.
But Spectaculator doesnt cost much and i think is the best emulator out there.
..fortuantely, things are slowly changing... lately, we've been seeing more tools written in other languages (eg: JAVA, even RUBY) and a growing awareness for making things more cross-platform... but still, its very little in the grand scheme of things... Its a start at least however, and one that will hopefully grow...
If we want this situation to change, then we really need to commit ourselves to chosing our language and tools carefully when writing anything for Speccy development... We need to purposefully try to make things cross platform from the start of our projects... Breaking our comfortable habits in these areas isn't easy, and Im as guilty as the next man for selecting closed source single platform tools when flinging together projects, but until those habits change, Windows will remain the epso facto preferred platform for zx development....
Well, if you use games from wos archive, then i assume that you are first unpacked them with winzip or similar program.
Then, for ease of use i recommend a file association in (Options / Advanced / File Associacions) and check all those empty boxes.
Now you can start almost any game with simple mouse double click on it from your file manager (i use Total Commander) and games should start automatically.
If not, go to Options/Tape and check "Auto Tape tape play/stop" and "Auto load tapes"
Optionally you can check "Edge detection" (and / or) "Flashload.." option for faster loading.
I also recommend to check first five option under Option/Display tab and "Use late timings.." for better compatibility with some games/demos.
For latest version of SpecEmu you can check on official UlaPlus page at http://sites.google.com/site/ulaplus/
Frankly, Fuse is so superior to any native *nix based emulator so its not necessary to waste much time.
Maybe only worth a try is M. Fayzullin's Speccy 1.6 (Windows version is not bad), but Fuse is clear winner here, no doubt of that.
On my Slax Linux i use Fuse and SpecEmu (under Wine) and both work great.
http://zx-pk.ru/
Why's that a bad thing? Or more to the point, what do you think is going to threaten the continued development of Fuse in future? If Phil Kendall were to get hit by a bus tomorrow - or, less morbidly, gets caught up in an almighty flame war and leaves the Speccy scene forever - the Fuse project will still go on, thanks to it being an open source project.
Fuse has practically no competition on *nix, because there is no reason for any competing emulator to exist - if there's some killer feature that it lacks, then it makes far more sense to patch Fuse to implement it - as I've done myself on several occasions, and contributed my changes back to the Fuse project - rather than to build a new emulator from scratch. This isn't a flaw - it's the open source model doing what it does best.
If anything, it's the Windows community which is too reliant on a small number of developers continuing work on their projects, as we've seen with RealSpectrum and now (it seems) SPIN.
I wouldn't call being open source a bad thing, and certainly the Fuse project will go on for as long as people are interested in it. I just believe that having multiple projects, you get multiple viewpoints, multiple approaches, and a competition between emulator authors to make their emulators better.
We saw that with the evolution of DOS and Windows emulators, with each generation of emulator improving upon the last thanks to new ideas and approaches being tried out - we've come a long way since the days of Z80 and JPP.
To me, it seems counter-intuitive for *nix Spectrum emulators to follow a different path, with one project dominating all others. Yes, that's due to the open source model, but I find it surprising that not as many *nix coders want to write an emulator from scratch as their DOS/Windows counterparts, even taking into account the difference in operating system popularity.
On the flipside, maybe I shouldn't be thinking of *nix in isolation like that - ideas are being shared across the different platforms, so maybe the concern about new ideas and approaches being constrained in the *nix sector isn't really appropriate.
I think the bottom line is that I get a kick out of seeing people trying out different things in different ways and think that *nix users are missing out on that fun by having fewer active players than their Windows counterparts. I don't believe that just because something's been done once, it shouldn't also be done by someone else - DOS/Windows users always having three or four maintained emulators to choose from is a strength, and I think a reason why the Speccy scene as a whole is so strong 17 years after the final YS was published.
Aye - and that's why I like Windows having more Spectrum emulators: more enthusiasts doing what they enjoy and sharing their emulators and (above all) their enthusiasm for the subject. I find that rather addictive, and watching the recent development of Sinclarean and Ziggy just as an observer has been a joy. Fuse is a great emulator, but I wish there was more of a buzz around it, and I wonder if the entrance of new *nix Speccy emulators would spark that off.
Yes, there's no need for another *nix emulator, but when has that ever stopped someone from doing something in a hobby they enjoy? I love doing pointless things in interesting ways.
I think the point is, nobody really sets out to write just another emulator - they set out to write a *better* emulator (where better might mean more accurate, more user-friendly, emulates that one obscure Russian printer interface, or anything in between), and Fuse provides a ready-made way to do that without the grunt-work of debugging a Z80 core.
I tend to feel the opposite - I don't quite get all the excitement about writing emulators which I see as mainly an enabling tool rather than a goal in themselves, and would prefer to see more of that energy spent on writing new tools, software and hardware for the Spectrum.
Others may well feel differently, but I personally find the prospect of competition between emulators demotivating rather than energising and much prefer an atmosphere of cooperation rather than competition (which if you ask me is what has defined the Speccy emulator scene for a long time).
In that sense it has been a great couple of years for the Spectrum scene with loads of new games and exciting hardware with less happening on the emulator front which are largely mature and functional.
However, an emulator isn't just about writing a Z80 core. It's also about writing the support functions, the user-experience, etc. I dunno about others but I wanted to experience the "process" of writing an emulator from scratch and also create a different user-experience. If someone were writing an emulator just to offer a different user-experience it would make far more sense to use an existing z80 core because otherwise it's quite easy to be bogged down trying to emulate the beast accurately.
Bytes:Chuntey - Spectrum tech blog.
http://code.google.com/p/xpectrum/
I use linux to develop GP2Xpectrum and all derived ports (iPhone, Android) using a free toolchain, Android SDK-NDK, all over linux... debuging using eclipse+CDT .... all in ubuntu 9.10...
You can download xpectrum project and compile to linux with the makefile included.
I think together with FUSE, is one of the zx spectrum emulator more versatile, multi-platform and user-oriented emulators around over the years...
The emulation is top notch and the result of brilliant people who worked in its development over the years. ;)
If you tried to emulate a ZX spectrum back in the late nineties you had a variety of options each with their own 'characters'.
ZX32 provided a different experience to WSpecem, which was different to X128 which despite being DOS looked and sounded absolutely nothing like Warajevo (due to palette and beeper issues that people around here have probably forgotten about!)
They were all great emulators in their own ways - and the programmers personalities, opinions and the choices they made when they coded their emulators added colour to the whole emulation experience.
I play piano in my spare time - My interpretation of a classic piece would be different to someone else's. I think the same is true to some extent when it comes to writing a program. Different emulator authors have their own ideas as to what is accurate emulation and they try to achieve different things.
Having just one (admittedly excellent) emulator does make linux the poorer choice if you are interested in spectrum emulation.
It is important factor in projects like Spectaculator which became commercial. You just have more clients.
And even if you don't sell it, you will probably be happier to believe that more people use it.
It should be a easy port.... If i have the chance to get some Pandora someday... I will make a port for that platform.. but i think anybody could do it without much work... :) and i would provide all possible assistance...
The good thing is that xpectrum does not depend on any GUI widget ... except iXpectrum (ObjectiveC) and Xpectroid (java).. which have a little more platform work (but is isolated)