GP2X

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GP2X
Manufacturer	GamePark Holdings
Type	Handheld game console
Generation	Seventh generation era
First available	November 10, 2005
CPU	Dual CPU: 200MHz Host ARM920T 200MHz ARM940T
Media	Secure Digital card

The GP2X is an open-source, Linux-based handheld video game console and media player created and sold by GamePark Holdings of South Korea.

The GP2X was designed for homebrew developers as well as commercial developers. It is commonly used to run emulators for game consoles such as Neo Geo, Sega Genesis, Master System, Game Gear, Commodore 64, NES, Pc-engine/TurboGrafx 16, and others.

Contents 1 Overview 2 History 3 Hardware 3.1 Specifications 3.2 Expandability 3.3 TV Output 3.4 Power 3.5 Storage 3.6 Overclocking 4 Multimedia support 4.1 Video 4.2 Audio 5 Software 5.1 Built-in Software 5.2 Emulators 5.3 Games 5.4 Multimedia Players 5.5 PDA Applications 5.6 Open source development 5.7 GP2X Executables 6 Controversy 6.1 DRM 6.2 Copyright violations 7 References 8 See also 9 External links 9.1 Community and news websites 9.2 Development 9.3 Help

[edit] Overview

Released on November 10, 2005 in South Korea, the GP2X is designed to play video and music, view photos, and play games. It has an open architecture, allowing anybody to develop and run software. Also, there is the possibility for additional features (such as support for new media formats) to be added in the future due to the upgradeable firmware.

A popular use of the GP2X is to run emulators, which allow one to use software from another system on the GP2X.

[edit] History

Shortly after the release of the GP32 in 2001, its maker GamePark began to design their next handheld. A disagreement within the company about the general direction of this system prompted many of the staff (including all but one GP32 engineer) to leave and create their own company, GamePark Holdings, to produce a 2D-based handheld system which they saw as the sequel to the GP32. In contrast, GamePark is developing the XGP and GPKiDS systems.

GamePark Holdings spoke to previous GP32 distributors and developers to determine the specifications for the new machine and how it should be promoted. Meetings were held in Seoul, Korea, where the final design of the new console was agreed upon.

The first name of this console was the GPX2. However, it couldn't be used as a final name due to a possible trademark violation with the name of a Japanese printer, the GPX. Confusion with a potential second generation printer needed to be avoided, so a contest for a new name was announced on August 3, 2005. Around 1500 names were submitted in total, but further trademark issues prevented the registration of the top 15 names. Eventually, during discussions in Seoul with the UK distributor it was decided to simply reverse the last two characters of the original name to give the final GP2X.

The GP2X has seen several minor hardware updates, most notably the changes from the First Edition to Normal Edition and the Normal Edition to the MK2. The differences between editions are detailed on the GP2X wiki.^[1]

As of October 16th, 2006, the GP2X has sold 30000 units, and is expected that sales will reach to 50000 by Christmas.^[2] Due to the open nature of the console, several applications were made for it and has become a versatile device that may end up supplanting older game consoles which it emulates.

[edit] Hardware

[edit] Specifications

• Chipset: MagicEyes MMSP2 MP2520F System-on-a-Chip
• CPU: 200MHz ARM920T host, 200MHz ARM940T
• NAND Flash ROM: 64 MB
• RAM: SDRAM 64 MB
• Operating System: Linux-based OS
• Storage: SD Card
• Connection to PC: USB 2.0 High Speed
• USB Host: USB 1.1
• Power: 2 × AA battery or via AC adapter
• Display: 320×240 3.5 inch, 260,000 colors TFT LCD
• TV output
• Physical size: 143.6 mm wide, 82.9 mm high, 27 mm (excl. joystick approx.) / 34 mm deep
• Weight: 161 g (without battery)

Despite advertising and general blogosphere consensus to the contrary, the GP2X is not a dual-core device as far as the provided Linux OS is considered---it sees only the ARM920T.

[edit] Expandability

The GP2X has a proprietary EXT port on the base of the unit into which a special USB cable or break out box can be plugged, allowing for USB devices to be connected to and used on the GP2X directly. The only thing limiting what can be used through this interface is the availability of drivers.

The connector used to expand the GP2X is hard to come by on its own but it is used with a few other devices. The Samsung e810/e730 and LG U8110/20/30/36/38 mobile telephone data cables, along with the official GP2X TV-Out adapter are suitable connectors.

[edit] TV Output

The GP2X also supports TV-out with a special cable that plugs into the EXT port. This allows videos that are normally scaled down to fit the GP2Xs screen to be played at native resolution on a TV. It also lets software be displayed on the higher resolution TV rather than the screen. Not all software supports this, but with a special application it is possible to enable TV-out functionality in all applications. This is done by launching a background process.

[edit] Power

The GP2X requires 2 AA-sized batteries if not running from an external power supply. Due to the high current drain, standard alkaline batteries will not function for very long in the GP2X; NiMH or lithium batteries are recommended.

Battery life varies depending on the type of activity being performed and can last anywhere from 10 minutes (using alkaline batteries) to over 6 hours (using high-capacity NiMH batteries). When listening to music, power can be conserved by turning off the backlight and display.

The GP2X has a socket for an external power supply. It must be rated 3.3V DC at 1A with a standard center-grounded connector. The power supply should be regulated, as voltage spikes can permanently damage the unit.

[edit] Storage

The GP2X's primary storage device is the Secure Digital card, which can be placed into a socket at the top of the unit. The firmware currently supports SD cards up to 4 GB in capacity. SD cards must be formatted as either FAT16, FAT32 (FAT32 is more reliable), or ext2. The GP2X also has 64 MB of internal flash memory storage, of which 32MB can be used for user data.

The hardware is capable of addressing the new SDHC standard and work is currently being done to make SDHC cards compatible with the unit.

[edit] Overclocking

The two ARM cores in the GP2X can be overclocked beyond their rated speed in software. The maximum speed one can reach through overclocking varies from system to system, with some occasionally reaching over 300MHz^{[citation needed]} and others barely reaching 240MHz (many systems can be overclocked beyond 240MHz with no problems^{[citation needed]}). Some distributors have started to sell pre-tested GP2Xs, pricing them based on the maximum speed one can reach on that particular unit (though their testing is not guaranteed and has been proved not to be always correct due to the maximum speed possible is influenced by many factors including temperature and battery power).

[edit] Multimedia support

[edit] Video

• Video formats: DivX 3/4/5, XviD (MPEG4)
• Audio formats: MP3 and Vorbis
• Container files: AVI and OGM
• Maximum Resolution: 720*480
• Captions: SMI, SRT
• Battery Life: 4-5 hours average, longer times possible with high capacity batteries and with use of the power saving modes within.

[edit] Audio

• Audio Formats: MP3, Ogg Vorbis
• Channels: Stereo
• Frequency Range: 20Hz - 20kHz
• Power output: 100mA
• Sample Resolution/Rate: 16bit/8-48 kHz
• Equalizer: includes "Normal", "Classic", "Rock", "Jazz", "Pop" presets
• Battery Life: ~10 hours (information given by manufacturer: 2 x 2850mAh AA battery)

[edit] Software

Due to the fact that the tools required for development on the GP2X are freely available, there is a wealth of software available for the GP2X, much of which is free. Types of software available includes emulators, games, PDA applications and multimedia players.

• archive.gp2x.de - Provides downloads for most of the software available for the GP2X

[edit] Built-in Software

The GP2X has several pieces of software built directly into the firmware. There is a version of MPlayer which is used to play music and video, an image viewer, an e-book reader (which can display the contents of standard text documents on-screen) and a utility to adjust the LCD update frequency to eliminate any flickering.

Also available in the firmware (though not accessible directly through the menu) is a Samba server, for transferring files to the machine using the default Windows network file sharing protocol; an HTTP server, for providing web pages; an FTP server, a different way of transferring files; and finally, telnet access allowing for direct command line access from outside the machine. These servers operate over the included USB networking functionality, allowing one to connect the GP2X to a wider network through a PC.

Version 3.0.0 of the firmware comes with 5 games pre-installed in the NAND memory. The games are Payback (demo), Noiz2sa, Flobopuyo, Supertux, and Vektar (freeware version). This firmware is currently shipped with new GP2Xs.

[edit] Emulators

There are many emulators available for the GP2X which allow you to run software from other systems on the GP2X as long as you possess a copy of the software you wish to run (generally in the form of a ROM dump). Many emulators will run most software perfectly and at the intended speed, but some others may have various issues (often to do with speed or sound). Popular emulators include GnGeo which emulates the Neo Geo; GNUboy2x, a Game Boy Color emulator; MAME, an emulator of various arcade machines; DrMD, which emulates the Master System, Game Gear and Mega Drive; SquidgeSNES and PocketSNES, which emulate Super Nintendo games; and Picodrive, which emulates Mega Drive and also many popular Sega CD games.

• List of Emulators - a very complete list of emulators for the GP2X
• Emulation speculation - Speculation on the ability for computer hardware to be emulated on GP2X.

[edit] Games

Since the GP2X has a much smaller following than other handheld consoles, such as the Sony PSP or the Nintendo DS, there are very few commercial games available for it. At the time of writing, Vektar, Payback, Quartz², Retrovirus RTS and Blazar have been released as commercial games for the GP2X, and the games Odonata and Elsewhere were released in October 2006 for Korean distribution only.^[3]

However, there are many ports of games from other platforms, mostly Linux, to the GP2X. Popular ports include Super Tux and the Duke Nukem 3D, Quake and Doom engines (which can run the original games if you own a copy with the correct data files). There are also dozens of 'homebrew' games such as Tile Match and Beat2x, made by programmers at home in their spare time.

• Category:GP2X games - A (rather incomplete) list of games available for the GP2X
• Games List - A list of games hosted at the GP2X Wiki

[edit] Multimedia Players

There are several unofficial multimedia players available for the GP2X, intended to support more formats than the built-in music and video players can handle. One such program is a port of FFPlay that allows you to play several RealMedia and Windows Media formats. Since the release of the MPlayer source code, several unofficial builds have been released for various purposes. One of these adds support for playing music in the AAC format.

[edit] PDA Applications

Two popular PDA desktop environments have been ported to the GP2X: Qtopia and GPE. Both contain a range of programs such as a web browser, word processor, etc. and can be controlled with either the GP2X controls or a USB mouse and keyboard connected through a USB cable attached to the EXT port.

[edit] Open source development

SDKs (software development kits) are freely and easily available for the GP2X allowing anybody with the required skills to write an application or game. Most SDKs are based around a gcc cross-compiler toolchain and SDL. SDL is available for many systems, allowing for very good cross-compatibility of code with other platforms such as Microsoft Windows and GNU/Linux.

A port of the Allegro ^[4] game programming library is also available for the GP2X, as is a port of the Fenix game toolkit.

Other libraries under development include Minimal Library SDK, which allows for direct hardware access inside the GP2X Linux environment, and sdk2x a set of libraries and a program which allows you to leave Linux completely for total control of all the hardware with no operating system to interfere.

Currently in development is gpu940, a soft 3D renderer that can do many rendering types, including true perspective texture mapping/lighting. It utilizes the ARM940T CPU of the GP2X, and allows for the GP2X to run basic OpenGL functions at a decent speed. ^[5] In January 2007, the renderer's OpenGL functions allowed for the 3D roleplaying game Egoboo to be ported to the GP2X at a playable speed, and a month later updated with increased speed and added lighting effected. ^[6]

[edit] GP2X Executables

GP2X executable files have one of two 3 letter file extensions. For games, the .gpe extension is used. These are listed in the Games section of the menu. Utilities have the extension .gpu, and appear in the Utilities section of the menu.

[edit] Controversy

[edit] DRM

There has been debate [1] over the inclusion of DRM in the GP2X. As yet, there's no information on how exactly this DRM restricts the rights of users. Gamepark Holdings has however stated [2] that DRM will be used only to restrict commercial games made for the system, and will not be used to restrict user-loaded content. Two possible protection schemes are locking software to operate only from the Secure Digital (SD) card on which it is shipped, or locking it to the unique hardware ID of a single GP2X unit.

However, it is possible to find the serial number of a device. This could be used in DRM technology. [3]

[edit] Copyright violations

The GP2X firmware uses a significant amount of GNU GPL code, including MPlayer for its media functions and the Linux kernel for its OS. The GPL requires for the release of the source code to users of the binary application (i.e. GP2X users); however, the source code was not released when the GP2X was released to consumers.^[7]

• February 18, 2006 - Kernel source for Firmware 1.4.0 released.
• July 6, 2006 - Modified MPlayer source code released, however without significant bits to use the hardware Mpeg-4 decoder, and since that was statically linked into the MPlayer binary, currently it has been moved out to a precompiled closed source kernel module, a GPL violation in itself.
• The kernel source for Firmware 2.0 has also been released, however the i2c code had been removed, so a copyright violation is still present.
• Much of the uboot code is missing from what they have released.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] References

[edit] See also

Handheld game consoles
Early units
See Microvision and Handheld electronic games
Nintendo handhelds
Game & Watch | Game Boy (Pocket | Light) | Game Boy Color | Game Boy Advance (SP | Micro) | Nintendo DS (Lite)
Bandai handhelds
WonderSwan | WonderSwan Color | SwanCrystal
GamePark/Holdings handhelds
GP32 | GP2X | XGP | XGP Mini | XGP Kids
SNK handhelds
Neo Geo Pocket | Neo Geo Pocket Color
Sega handhelds
Game Gear | Nomad | Mega Jet
Sony handhelds
PocketStation | PlayStation Portable
Other handhelds
Atari Lynx | Gamate | Watara Supervision | Mega Duck | Game.com | Gizmondo | N-Gage | TurboExpress | Pepper Pad | GameKing | iRiver G10 | Ez MINI | OQO Model 2
Comparison

• GamePark Holdings
• GP2X Games
• GP32

[edit] External links

[edit] Community and news websites

• GP32X - news and forums covering all Gamepark handhelds
• Emuholic - homebrew news for all major handhelds, including the GP2X

[edit] Development

• www.GP2Xdev.org - GP2X developer's portal
• game-editor.com - Game creator tool for GP2X
• Edge SDK - Commercial mobile game engine including support for GP2X

[edit] Help

• wiki.gp2x.org - GP2X Wiki
• GP2X User Guide - fan-made user guide
• GP2X FAQ - GP2X FAQ
• Gamepark Newbie - Another GP2X FAQ
• Checklist - Emulator Compatibility lists