Gameboy Zero on Odroid C0 (Helder AIO - KeDei HDMI - Helder PSU)

General GBZ-related chat goes here. Share ideas, tips and tricks, or ask questions that don't fit into the hardware/software help forums.
Post Reply
Kapster
Posts: 7
Joined: Tue Aug 14, 2018 11:44 am
Has thanked: 1 time
Been thanked: 1 time

Gameboy Zero on Odroid C0 (Helder AIO - KeDei HDMI - Helder PSU)

Post by Kapster » Tue Sep 04, 2018 4:26 am

Hey everyone,

I have been screening the forum for some weeks, looking for some tweaks, tipps and tricks to start off my own build. So I came across a lot of Raspberry Pi Zero builds, but to my understanding they lack in performance, especially when going for PSX games. Better off with a Raspberry Pi 3 b (not + as it draws too much power), however all the desoldering and butchering is a bit frightning.

Looking for an alternative I came across Odroid, which I have used before, the C1+ is my audio player (run via I2S into my DAC, switched from Raspberry Pi just for the native sampling frequency of the audio chip) in the living room.

The Odroid C0 (A Zero aswell!) looks promising to me, I am going for an HDMI screen (the KeDei), so no problem with analogue AV output missing. Power will be done with an Helder Retro PSU. The board is unpopulated, so no desoldering needed. An the specs look promising too:
* Amlogic ARM® Cortex®-A5(ARMv7) 1.5Ghz quad core CPUs
* Mali™-450 MP2 GPU (OpenGL ES 2.0/1.1 enabled for Linux and Android)
* 1Gbyte DDR3 SDRAM
* eMMC4.5 HS200 Flash Storage slot / UHS-1 SDR50 MicroSD Card slot
* 40pin + 7pin GPIOs (unpopulated)
* USB 2.0 Host x 2 (unpopulated)
* Infrared(IR) Receiver (unpopulated)
* Li+ rechargeable battery charger for wearable and robots application
* Battery voltage level is accessible via ADC in the SoC.
* DC/DC step-down converters for higher power efficiency
* DC/DC step-up converter for 5Volt rails (USB host and HDMI) from a Li-Polymer battery
* DIY friendly C0 Connector Pack is available for handy prototyping
Power consumption:
Ok, I did some test, but like you its not 100% on CPU+GPU... I used games for testing, has this maybe a "true life" use case of CPU + GPU usage.

What I used is : HDMI in 800x480, 1 usb wireless dongle for keyboard + integrated mouse, all running debian jessie with a very light WM.

- If no sdcard, no emmc, no usb : 0.12A
- If no sdcard, no emmc, wireless keyboard dongle : 0.15A
- Boot, without X and no login : 0.26A
- Playing Astromenace : 0.38A
- Playing Aquaria : 0.32 - 0.40A
- Playing Hurrican: 0.28 - 0.34A
- Playing RVGL : 0.30 - 0.36A

When playing Aquaria, CPU was around 80% usage, I guess that GPU was working hard too.
So I would say with no HDMI and no USB, the board should consume no more than 0.4A with CPU and GPU near full load...
Src: https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=111&t=25812
Image
Hardkernel ODROID C0

Am I missing out on something? I could not find a single build on sudomod based on the Odroid C0?!

Looking forward! Best regards, Kapster

Kapster
Posts: 7
Joined: Tue Aug 14, 2018 11:44 am
Has thanked: 1 time
Been thanked: 1 time

Re: Gameboy Zero on Odroid C0 (Helder AIO - KeDei HDMI - Helder PSU)

Post by Kapster » Thu Sep 06, 2018 3:45 pm

Okay. I just ordered my C0, so lets see how it goes. I know that there might be some issues with Retropie, but good alternative are available aswell. I am confident to make this happen, also happy to put my 3d printer back to good use! Will keep you updated!

Ziploc99
Posts: 36
Joined: Sun Jun 17, 2018 10:02 am
Has thanked: 26 times
Been thanked: 11 times

Re: Gameboy Zero on Odroid C0 (Helder AIO - KeDei HDMI - Helder PSU)

Post by Ziploc99 » Sun Sep 30, 2018 3:27 pm

Any updates? Curious as to how this build is going

User avatar
antonym
Posts: 19
Joined: Mon Nov 27, 2017 12:33 am
Has thanked: 11 times
Been thanked: 1 time

Re: Gameboy Zero on Odroid C0 (Helder AIO - KeDei HDMI - Helder PSU)

Post by antonym » Wed Jan 09, 2019 3:57 pm

This is frikin awesome! I was just talking to someone else on the forums about using an odroid in a gameboy project, and this is perfect! This forum has been dead for a while, but please update if you can.

zharguy
Posts: 1
Joined: Sat Jan 12, 2019 9:27 pm

Re: Gameboy Zero on Odroid C0 (Helder AIO - KeDei HDMI - Helder PSU)

Post by zharguy » Sat Jan 12, 2019 9:47 pm

A couple of FYIs in case anyone else is considering using a c0 for the build:
  1. There should be a composite video output (see https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=111&t=7726 for software details), the pin itself should be the one shown in here: https://imgur.com/a/ZRnLllT.
  2. Since there's already a power IC on the board itself(this one: https://www.monolithicpower.com/en/mp2637.html), you don't really need a separate PSU, just plug in the battery, and the onboard charger+booster should provide 2A of 5V power. You'll need their charger (https://ameridroid.com/products/5v-2a-power-supply) though. There's also an ADC for battery voltage monitoring.
  3. Seems like someone's already made a build for this(https://magazine.odroid.com/article/gam ... g-console/), but the performance isn't all that great apparently.

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 1 guest