3 ms·

I remember playing the Bleem demo as a kid, and then a decade later thinking back and wondering "wait a minute, how was that emulation performance possible in 1

I remember playing the Bleem demo as a kid, and then a decade later thinking back and wondering "wait a minute, how was that emulation performance possible in 1999?"

AtlasBarfed 6y ago
Q1 2000 was the 1Ghz intel release. The PS1 had a 33MHz CPU. Bleemcast on a 200MHz CPU is more impressive.
- djmips 6y ago
  I still was impressed at the time for the PC version, not only for getting it to work on a PC but the amount of reverse engineering that he was able to do with zero information.
- bluedino 6y ago
  Connectix Virtual GameStaton ran on the original iMac which was 233MHz or so
- rcthompson 6y ago
  I mean, whatever PC I had in 1999 was definitely already several years old and probably wasn't top of the line at the time of purchase. So it was probably closer to 200 MHz than 1GHz.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
    Pretty sure when Bleem came out I was still rocking the 166Mhz 64MB family computer running windows 95 or 98. If memory serves, I was able to play Crash Bandicoot at not-quite full speed. I owned a laptop shortly after that which was somewhere in the 200mhz-400mhz range that played PS games at full speed. Yeah, I actually owned Bleem even though I had a PlayStation. I think I still have the CD.
ElCapitanMarkla 6y ago
And as if that wasn’t impressive enough, Randy Linden also had a copy for the Sega Dreamcast, Bleemcast, where you could boot the emulator then load a PSX game. I think they had 3 or 4 versions for Gran Turismo, Tekken and a couple of other big games. It blows my mind how talented that guy is.
sumtechguy 6y ago
What gets me is how even though today we do not have totally perfect emulation of a lot of systems. Probably the closest to perfect is the byuu emulation of the SNES system. My amazement is some of this stuff still runs. I have over the years tracked down many one liner bugs in my own code. I also remember people in the alt Amiga groups arguing about perfect emulation before that system would even boot and 30GHZ computers. Yet it all still kinda worked. The MAME guys are adding in netlist bits to get rid of those wav files they have used for years for sounds. They had to go back and re-model the circuits component by component which is obviously not great on CPU. Which is how much of it was able to run on older computers. They took massive shortcuts. If something took 500ms on the actual hardware they would do it in 30 and give the time up to something else that needed it. Whereas maybe some very oddball bit of software would rely on that 500ms. The funny thing is most dont. The other way holds true too. Those circuits emus they are adding in eat massive amounts of CPU time to calculate. But on the real hardware finish nearly instantly. I still am amazed some of this software works. For some bits of software you do need that deep understanding. But so much of it just blts junk from one area to another and polls on the controls. When you get to those weird effect where the developer was squeezing the console/computer on scanlines and store/load boundaries you need that but so much of it just works...

I remember playing the Bleem demo as a kid, and then a decade later thinking back and wondering "wait a minute, how was that emulation performance possible in 1999?"

AtlasBarfed 6y ago

Q1 2000 was the 1Ghz intel release. The PS1 had a 33MHz CPU. Bleemcast on a 200MHz CPU is more impressive.

djmips 6y ago
I still was impressed at the time for the PC version, not only for getting it to work on a PC but the amount of reverse engineering that he was able to do with zero information.
bluedino 6y ago
Connectix Virtual GameStaton ran on the original iMac which was 233MHz or so
rcthompson 6y ago
I mean, whatever PC I had in 1999 was definitely already several years old and probably wasn't top of the line at the time of purchase. So it was probably closer to 200 MHz than 1GHz.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
  Pretty sure when Bleem came out I was still rocking the 166Mhz 64MB family computer running windows 95 or 98. If memory serves, I was able to play Crash Bandicoot at not-quite full speed. I owned a laptop shortly after that which was somewhere in the 200mhz-400mhz range that played PS games at full speed. Yeah, I actually owned Bleem even though I had a PlayStation. I think I still have the CD.

ElCapitanMarkla 6y ago

And as if that wasn’t impressive enough, Randy Linden also had a copy for the Sega Dreamcast, Bleemcast, where you could boot the emulator then load a PSX game. I think they had 3 or 4 versions for Gran Turismo, Tekken and a couple of other big games. It blows my mind how talented that guy is.

sumtechguy 6y ago

What gets me is how even though today we do not have totally perfect emulation of a lot of systems. Probably the closest to perfect is the byuu emulation of the SNES system. My amazement is some of this stuff still runs. I have over the years tracked down many one liner bugs in my own code. I also remember people in the alt Amiga groups arguing about perfect emulation before that system would even boot and 30GHZ computers. Yet it all still kinda worked. The MAME guys are adding in netlist bits to get rid of those wav files they have used for years for sounds. They had to go back and re-model the circuits component by component which is obviously not great on CPU. Which is how much of it was able to run on older computers. They took massive shortcuts. If something took 500ms on the actual hardware they would do it in 30 and give the time up to something else that needed it. Whereas maybe some very oddball bit of software would rely on that 500ms. The funny thing is most dont. The other way holds true too. Those circuits emus they are adding in eat massive amounts of CPU time to calculate. But on the real hardware finish nearly instantly. I still am amazed some of this software works. For some bits of software you do need that deep understanding. But so much of it just blts junk from one area to another and polls on the controls. When you get to those weird effect where the developer was squeezing the console/computer on scanlines and store/load boundaries you need that but so much of it just works...