New build of QEMU

Forum: DSL Embedded
Topic: New build of QEMU
started by: cbagger01

Posted by cbagger01 on April 21 2005,04:20

I just wanted to give a heads up to everyone that the newer builds of QEMU (since around Feb 2005, I think) now support a mouse with a scroll wheel and it works inside DSL embedded!

version 0.6.2:

- better BIOS translation and HDD geometry auto-detection
- user mode networking bug fix
- undocumented FPU ops support
- Cirrus VGA: support for 1280x1024x[8,15,16] modes
- 'pidfile' option
- .dmg disk image format support (Johannes Schindelin)
- keymaps support (initial patch by Johannes Schindelin)
- big endian ARM support (Lennert Buytenhek)
- added generic 64 bit target support
- initial x86_64 target support
- initial APIC support
- MMX/SSE/SSE2/PNI support
- PC parallel port support (Mark Jonckheere)
- initial SPARC64 support (Blue Swirl)
- armv5te user mode support (Paul Brook)
- ARM VFP support (Paul Brook)
- Samba 3 support
- initial Cocoa support (Pierre d'Herbemont)

QEMU 0.6.2 has been released for linux but for some reason there was never a release posted for Windows host OS.

However, you can get a recent win32 build which has this functionality. The version number inside the build says version 0.6.2

I also noticed that the virtual PC's CPU is now a Pentium II instead of a Pentium Pro which should help with the performance of some programs inside the guest OS.

You can download it here:

< http://www.freeoszoo.org/ftp/qemu/win32/daily/QemuInstall-20050411.exe >

and then install it on a Windows computer.

Then open up explorer and go to this directory:

C:\Program Files\Qemu

and replace the old files on your DSL embedded drive/directory with these files:

C:\Program Files\Qemu\qemu.exe
C:\Program Files\Qemu\SDL.dll
C:\Program Files\Qemu\bios\bios.bin
C:\Program Files\Qemu\bios\vgabios.bin
C:\Program Files\Qemu\bios\vgabios-cirrus.bin
C:\Program Files\Qemu\bios\linux_boot.bin

Backup your old files in some other place if you want to be able to undo your changes.

Have fun!

Posted by cbagger01 on April 23 2005,03:51

Just curious, but has anyone besides me actually tried this?

I use embedded a lot and gaining additional speed plus a working scroll wheel for my mouse while running QEMU under MSWindows was a big improvement but that's just me.

Posted by DeeJay on April 23 2005,10:22

Quote (cbagger01 @ April 22 2005,23:51)

Thanks for spotting this and pointing it out. I have launched DSL by running Qemu-062 from comike's qGui helper, and I confirm that the scroll mouse works for me. I don't know DSL well enough to know if there is a performance gain. When I do a '5-way' install onto a pen-drive shortly I will incorporate this version of Qemu and report back again. Obviously it would not be right to distribute an unstable daily build as part of a DSL-embedded package yet, but there will be advantages to upgrading as soon as these features become stable.

DeeJay

Posted by sonny73044 on April 23 2005,15:07

Yes, and it works great in Windows, well the scroll mouse does and it does 'appear' to be a little faster (hey I didn't exactly time anything) But since I love my scroll mouse this is wonderfull
Just curious if anyone knows where the linux binaries/source for 0.6.2 are
I can't seem to find anything but 0.6.1

Posted by cbagger01 on April 23 2005,18:48

The existing DSL embedded is running from a "daily build" back from 11/21/2004, so I wouldn't let that scare you too much.

qemu stability has never been 100% but I don't notice much difference in instability between my old qemu and this build.

If it proves to be problematic we can always try some of the other build and read the revision notes and mailing list to see if we can find a build between now and 2/2005 that has both scroll wheel support and relative stability.

But so far it seems fine to me.

Posted by gurru on April 24 2005,07:15

I thought it was because fluxbox didn't support scroll wheels.

Posted by Caspar_s on April 24 2005,18:53

Okay, quick question which I couldn't find anywhere... is there a way to force 1024x768 resolution - mainly for fullscreen display.

For those with lcd displays - fullscreen bad

Okay, from messing around with qemu for the last couple of days (freedos, Ms dos 7.1, dsl):
I can finally get dsl fullscreen so I can see the bottom bar. Ummm, if your monitor can't handle resolutions below 1024x768 (or maybe below 800x640... 640x480 is the default dos and dsl "text" modes) don't try to run with -full-screen on the command line. Qemu messes up, crashes, things in windows go strange, the mouse freezes... and when I reboot the monitor just displays "This monitor can't handle this resolution - change the input to 1024x768" ummm, which is very difficult to do when you can't SEE! Rebooting into safe mode (press ctrl while booting) deleting the video driver (with no mouse because safe mode doesn't use my usb mouse... and you can't change the resolution because it is set for 16colors 640x480) rebooting, finding the driver, rebooting... finally working again.

Ummm, so yeah I've done this about 20 times this weekend!!!

It seems slower to me... I'll have to experiment more with the old one - maybe because my system is not that much more powerful than the emulated one... so it is not able to run in what is left of the system after winME is running. I don't know - I'll try changing the memory a bit as well. Maybe 192 will be better.

Anyway, just thought I'd give everyone a bit of a warning - fullscreen can mess things up, so try only switching to it when fluxbox is up and switch back BEFORE shutting down....

Sigh.
(Umm, quick question...?

)

Posted by cbagger01 on April 24 2005,19:34

When I need to go fullscreen, I just hit

CTRL-ALT-F

and again to switch back before shutting down QEMU.

Posted by Caspar_s on April 24 2005,20:08

Yup, I forgot to mention that - just for some reason you have to switch it back before shut down. No idea why I can boot dsl fine (no monitor troubles) and can get into windows safemode 640x480, but it has trouble after crashing from fullscreen.

Okay, some more testing - copied the original back, and it is faster on my comp - 1ghz Epia. I am not sure how much is because of the increased video - 1280x1024x24 instead of the 1024x768x16 that the original runs on - I tried switching it back, but it doesn't seem to have done much. Also I think a lot is just that there isn't enough room for it to run the P2 on top of winME.

Either version, all memory tries and video resolutions I tried... I still get to 40% cpu usage from moving my mouse around

Anyway, I've got a headache now. I mainly use embedded to look into things while on the board - research for when I boot fully into dsl, so the slower speed does not affect me much - as long as it doesn't crash windows

Cya

Posted by cbagger01 on April 25 2005,03:19

A higher display resolutionw will definately slow down the performance.

That is why DSL defaults to fb800x600 resolution.

It is the least stressful resolution that is still usable (640 x 480 is difficult to use).

FYI, the QEMU folks recommend that both host OS (in this case Windows ME) and guest OS (in this case DSL embedded) should both be run at 16 bit color depth for best performance.

Hope this helps.

Posted by muellerr1 on April 26 2005,15:13

I've downloaded the new qemu, replaced the files as directed, but my scroll wheel still doesn't work. I know I've got the new qemu because of the higher resolution. I run xsetup.sh and then xstart. The only mouse option that works for me is the default. When I choose USB mouse I can't use the mouse at all. Booting from USB the mouse works just fine, scroll wheel and all. Any ideas?

I'm using a Dell M40 Precision laptop in a dock with W2K server, would that prevent it from working? I get the exact same situation running qemu from my home setup (Mandrake 10.1) with the mouse directly in the motherboard USB port, though.

Posted by cbagger01 on April 26 2005,16:48

Hmm..

I am using DSL Embedded/new QEMU on a Dell Optiplex GX280 running Windows XP with a Dell MO56U0 USB optical scroll mouse and it is working fine.

I also have run it on a Dell Poweredge 400SC with a Logitech PS/2 optical scroll mouse and Windows XP host OS and it also works.

Keep in mind that these files are for the MSWindows host Operating system.

If you are running qemu from a Linux host, you will need to upgrade the linux qemu binary file in your qemu folder.

If you can find a precompiled qemu daily build or a Qemu 0.6.2 release build for LINUX, you should be able to replace this file and you will be in business.

Posted by muellerr1 on April 26 2005,18:16

I did a little more experimenting and discovered that I can use the scroll mouse, but only if I accept the default Xvesa setup. Seems to me that Generic Wheel mouse on /dev/psaux (or something like that) was detected on qemu boot. But none of the options in xsetup allow me to choose this generic mouse type, so if I want to change resolutions, how do I do it without choosing a new mouse?

Posted by cbagger01 on April 26 2005,22:35

I would expect that if you choose USB Mouse = NO and PS/2 mouse = YES from the xsetup.sh script would work. Keep in mind that the simulated mouse is a PS2 mouse even if your real mouse is a USB mouse.

Mouse protocol is automatically detected by xvesa or xfbdev servers.

However, you do need to make sure that you have additional mouse buttons enabled in your .xserverrc file. Usually it is specified like this:

/dev/psaux,5

Posted by muellerr1 on April 28 2005,14:25

That did it. Thanks again.

Posted by gmanpsycho on May 13 2005,20:05

Quote

You can download it here:

< http://www.freeoszoo.org/ftp/qemu/win32/daily/QemuInstall-20050411.exe >

and then install it on a Windows computer.

I clicked on the link and can not find it. Can someone help?

Posted by gmanpsycho on May 13 2005,20:16

NVM. I found it on a mirror site.

I found it here:

< http://ftp.club-internet.fr/mirrors....ly >

Posted by cbagger01 on May 13 2005,22:38

FYI,

the DSL team has updated the version of QEMU to 0.7, for the latest version of DSL-embedded, 1.1