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Author Topic: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?  (Read 8021 times)

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PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« on: November 06, 2003, 08:23:45 PM »
Check out the "Dolphin" emulator for windows here

Or is it just a hoax?

Hope not.
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Offline xeron

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #1 on: November 06, 2003, 08:28:57 PM »
You can emulate a PowerPC on a 6502 if you want. It would run far too slow to be any use, but ;-)

Sure, the x86 can emulate PowerPC, just like PowerPC can emulate x86. Don't expect it to be as fast as the real thing, though.
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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #2 on: November 06, 2003, 08:32:23 PM »
Quote

xeron wrote:
You can emulate a PowerPC on a 6502 if you want. It would run far too slow to be any use, but ;-)

Sure, the x86 can emulate PowerPC, just like PowerPC can emulate x86. Don't expect it to be as fast as the real thing, though.


A 3GHz x86 CPU emulating a PPC has got to be faster than a 600MHz G3 or near enough same speed though.  Amithlon for OS4 anyone? ;-)
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Offline Kronos

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #3 on: November 06, 2003, 08:38:35 PM »
@mdma
Only with JIT-tech or similar.

UAE-non-JIT for example just reaches medicore 030-speed on PCs
over 1ghz .......
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Offline xeron

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #4 on: November 06, 2003, 08:40:47 PM »
Quote

mdma wrote:
A 3GHz x86 CPU emulating a PPC has got to be faster than a 600MHz G3 or near enough same speed though.  Amithlon for OS4 anyone? ;-)


Your maths are likely to be somewhat wrong. The PowerPC is a relatively modern processor. Remember, clockspeed is not an indication of how powerful a processor is.
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Offline itix

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #5 on: November 06, 2003, 08:53:20 PM »
Quote

A 3GHz x86 CPU emulating a PPC has got to be faster than a 600MHz G3 or near enough same speed though.


With MMU emulation it is going to crawl.
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Offline bloodmoney

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #6 on: November 06, 2003, 10:26:38 PM »

I have searched for years on this issue with no results. Aparently its next to   impossible to do even an ancient power pc. Many companies have promised (I.E. softmac) but failed to deliver. Obe Wan Kenobi can't help you. Microcode solutions is your only hope.

Microcode-solutionsemaculation :-?
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Offline bloodmoney

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #7 on: November 06, 2003, 10:28:10 PM »
there are two links smashed together in above post sorry.
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Offline Hammer

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #8 on: November 06, 2003, 11:03:11 PM »
Quote

xeron wrote:
Quote

mdma wrote:
A 3GHz x86 CPU emulating a PPC has got to be faster than a 600MHz G3 or near enough same speed though.  Amithlon for OS4 anyone? ;-)


Your maths are likely to be somewhat wrong. The PowerPC is a relatively modern processor. Remember, clockspeed is not an indication of how powerful a processor is.

Note that modern X86 processors (e.g. K6/K7/K8 and Pentium Pro/II/III/VI) translates X86 ISA into smaller RISC like instructions via HW decoder/translator before pumping it into the Post-RISC pipelines architecture. Think of Transmeta software/hardware translator done in pure HW acceleration. This techniques enable X86 CPU manufactures to change the cores without changing the ISA.

To reach reasonably high Mhz speed (in region of 1.8Ghz at this time**), IBM's PowerPC 970 employs a similar action (i.e. decode/crush stage) with PowerPC ISA.
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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #9 on: November 06, 2003, 11:08:55 PM »
I wonder what level of decomposition is used for the PPC ISA? The instructions are far simpler and more orthogonal than x86 ones to start with...
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Offline Hammer

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #10 on: November 06, 2003, 11:27:57 PM »
Quote
I wonder what level of decomposition is used for the PPC ISA? The instructions are far simpler and more orthogonal than x86 ones to start with...

Well, IBM has decided to employ crush/decode way and 16 depth pipeline stages for reaching reasonably high Mhz (compared to Motorola’s PowerPCs).  

X86 translation/decode HW has this thing called "zero cycle decoding" for for certain instructions. With AMD64, they have sawn off the 16bit stuff in the AMD64 mode.  
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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #11 on: November 07, 2003, 09:51:39 AM »
Quote

itix wrote:
Quote

A 3GHz x86 CPU emulating a PPC has got to be faster than a 600MHz G3 or near enough same speed though.


With MMU emulation it is going to crawl.


Has anyone looked at the AVI's on that link I posted? It looks pretty fast to me.  Maybe it is a JIT emulator?
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Offline bloodline

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #12 on: November 07, 2003, 10:35:25 AM »
I see no reason why a PPC-JIT could not be make for an x86, and I would not be surprised if the Modern x86 gave exceptional performance.


As a Side note I ran WinUAE on my new 3ghz machine and was able to Emulate an A500 to perfection. Even the sound was faultless... I used a 60Hz Video sync (It's a shame the PC can't generate a 50Hz one:-( ), bur all my old games ran perfectly. It did a similarly great job emulation an A1200 (basicly the same, but with the addition of an EC020+AGA and 2Meg Chip ram). There was an some issues with the display going black at time (which I think is a bug in UAE).

Then I decided to switch the JIT on (Fastest Possible setting and Direct)... wow!!! Speed checkers were reporting about 2500MIPS (this only happens when you have the 60Hz sync on, otherwise the timers run too fast). The Sysinfo comment was "Phone Me", I tried it didn't work :-(

Now where did I put my Imagine disks!!! :-)
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Offline Djole_

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #13 on: November 07, 2003, 10:49:34 AM »
Sysspeed just shows 2500 mips coz the JIT skips the fake instructions from Sysspeed so it thinks it's that fast..... same as on mos .... but the actuall speed is much lower.

Now don't get me wrong i never used UAE and never will but i just happen to know this....


Amiga emulation .... bah ... get a real Amiga....
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Offline xeron

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Re: PowerPC emulation on x86 possible?
« Reply #14 on: November 07, 2003, 10:53:30 AM »
Quote

mdma wrote:
Has anyone looked at the AVI's on that link I posted? It looks pretty fast to me.  Maybe it is a JIT emulator?


For starters the Gamecube processor (Gekko) is not a full spec PowerPC chip, and IIRC its not super fast either. I don't know how much cache it has onboard, or if you need to emulate the MMU for the Gamecube.
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