• @[email protected]
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    8 months ago

    That’s so weird. This isn’t about Nintendo hardware sucking: it’s running on an actual Nintendo Switch, except instead of it using the Switch’s OS and it running the game, it goes Linux -> Emulator (yuzu) -> game (running from an actual cart through a dumper) and somehow that’s faster.

    It’s a software issue.

    Is it the Nintendo Switch OS which is needlessly bloated? It does nothing, how can it be heavier than an actual Linux Distribution?

    I’m not familiar with how the Switch works, but the dumper has a FPGA for decoding the cartridge. Is this something that the Switch has to do in real time in software, and maybe that’s where the performance loss comes from? It seems unlikely but I know nothing of the Switch’s internals or software. In fact let’s just say I know nothing at all, I’m just an idiot.

    PS: Everyone who buys used Switch games should see this until the end. The dumper allows you to extract a certificate file from a cartridge. Basically, someone malicious could buy a new game, dump it including the certificate file, clone it, and resell the game. Then they would be able to play online with it. If you buy the original copy afterwards and play online, you are likely going to be the one whose certificate is flagged as fake, leading to you being banned.

    Also, they could just sell multiple copies of cloned games and you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference… Except for the certificate, which would be the same and would signal Nintendo that you (and like 10 other people) are playing a fake game, unbeknownst to you.

    • @[email protected]
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      268 months ago

      It does nothing, how can it be heavier than an actual Linux Distribution?

      Are you sure about that? Data mining, even to the extents that take toll on user experience, is a common thing in consumer electronics

      • @[email protected]
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        128 months ago

        To be honest I naively assumed Nintendo not to be the type of company (… Or even competent enough) to implement the type of data mining that would impact performance lol

    • @[email protected]
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      178 months ago

      Is it the Nintendo Switch OS which is needlessly bloated? It does nothing, how can it be heavier than an actual Linux Distribution?

      AFAIK the OS is based on a microkernel and the modules are rather small, so there’s probably a lot of overhead for IPC. Also I guess the power management is quite aggressive to increase battery life and lower heat.

      • @[email protected]
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        8 months ago

        Yeah power management is the most likely culprit here. What is not shown is his battery life and thermals which I suspect are deplorable.

        • @[email protected]
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          78 months ago

          I remember there being a mod for cfw that unlocked a manual power setting slider and the results were similar.

      • V ‎ ‎
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        28 months ago

        Additionally, as a high level emulator Yuzu sacrifices some accuracy for speed. It’s possible that this allows it to also be faster than the official implementation.

    • @[email protected]
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      88 months ago

      Contrary to popular opinion, i’m gonna guess graphics driver. Specifically the shader compiler.

    • @[email protected]
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      8 months ago

      This is actually not surprising to me. I heard that Windows used to perform better on a virtual machine with a Linux host. The Linux kernel is very mature, and virtual machines (or emulators) use tricks to improve performance.

      • @[email protected]
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        48 months ago

        This has been big on some of AMD’s workstation and server chips because Windows generally doesn’t know what to do with the unexpected NUMA Node layouts. Or the scheduler just can’t handle 128 cores. So abstracting that away with Linux’s superior scheduler can help significantly on certain hardware

      • Natanael
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        38 months ago

        I think a bigger factor is the memory and resources reserved for the account system / store / online services, etc. But also, yeah the emulator might be more efficient on a few calls

    • ElectricMachman
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      38 months ago

      One look at the Switch store app says everything about how sub-optimal the OS is

      • @[email protected]
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        18 months ago

        Sure, this makes sense for Minecraft, and the video itself only compared Minecraft (for fear of being struck by the Nintendo Ninjas, which is an interesting fear considering everything else in the video). I’d love to see if other games, like BoTW or Pokémon S/V, have similar performance enhancements.

  • @[email protected]
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    718 months ago

    Feeling inspired, I set out to push the limits of recursive emulation myself. My first step was getting a Linux emulator running inside Minecraft. Yes, you heard me right - Linux running inside Minecraft. Once I had achieved that, the natural progression was to install Yuzu on this virtual version of Linux. It took some trial and error, but eventually, I managed to do just that.

    At this point, I could hardly contain my excitement. The results were impressive; the performance increase was noticeable compared to previous iterations. But for me, that wasn’t enough. I wanted more. So, in true recursion fashion, I installed another Linux emulator within this Minecraft-embedded Yuzu environment. This new iteration had its own Yuzu setup, and thus the cycle continued.

    As layers upon layers of nested Linux environments grew, the performance kept improving exponentially. Every time I upgraded the recursion level, the FPS went through the roof. Eventually, it reached unbelievable heights. Today, with multiple levels of recursion, I am proud to announce that the performance of this nestled setup is now over 9000 FPS!

    • @Gimpydude
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      148 months ago

      God-tier shit post. I hope this becomes legendary copypasta.

    • Natanael
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      138 months ago

      Unironically doubly accurate meme because in that movie time ran faster in dreams within dreams

  • macniel
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    8 months ago

    Which is very embarrassing for N but expected from them nonetheless.

    • @[email protected]
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      368 months ago

      N doesn’t give a fuck about embarrassing outdated hardware.

      Children and shills will still support them

      • iAmTheTot
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        438 months ago

        This isn’t about hardware, though. The experiment was performed on a Switch.

    • @[email protected]OP
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      218 months ago

      Has been the case for a long time 😂

      Honestly I just don’t want to spend $400 or whatever on such a single-purpose device.

      I realize people use “desktop” OS’s to do all sorts of nefarious things but if your solution is to require that I buy incredibly-narrowly usable device to run the games I want to play, I’m just going to play them nefariously and not feel bad about it 🤷 and everytime you sue someone who makes that possible it just reinforces my decision.

        • Storksforlegs
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          8 months ago

          The hardware and corporate practises i would agree, (especially the hardware - extra shitty considering its aimed at families and kids and it wears out so fast)

          But I have to disagree about the games. Their flagship games are consistently very good (so long as you’re a fan of the genres).

    • @[email protected]
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      28 months ago

      Unfortunately, the copyright issue was about a decryption key, not about Yuzu providing a better product.

      • TwilightVulpine
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        98 months ago

        It’s downright bizarre that apparently someone can own a physical copy of a game and not be allowed to dump them. DMCA and customer rights are broken.

      • @[email protected]
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        78 months ago

        That copyright thing was never actually tested in court though, because they settled before the trial began. The “copyrighted keys” argument was what Nintendo originally used to bring the lawsuit, but it was never actually tested because it never went to trial. In fact, many legal experts say it likely would have been thrown out in Yuzu’s favor. But Yuzu didn’t have a legal fund, so they couldn’t afford to actually take it to court and fight it.

        • @[email protected]OP
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          18 months ago

          I doubt the settlement amount came close to what the legal fees would have cost. They knew they were going to lose.

          • @[email protected]
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            28 months ago

            Any court process is a great burden. People don’t evade it only if they think and are sure they will lose.

            On the inverse, many sure-to-win proceedings never occur because it’s a high barrier and a time- and money-costly process and so people don’t see it as worth pursuing.

            • @[email protected]OP
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              28 months ago

              You’re not saying anything I haven’t already addressed in the comment you replied to. The Yuzu settlement was $2.4M. That’s more than enough to cover a good attorney’s fees for several years.

              • @[email protected]
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                18 months ago

                I wasn’t aware of the monetary part of the settlement. The figure was not included in that comment.

  • neoman4426
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    48 months ago

    Interesting. I wonder if it’s a universal thing that’ll happen to varying degrees on any game, or specific to Minecraft (or ones in whatever necessary way “similar”) with other games performing better natively

  • @[email protected]
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    18 months ago

    is this really an emulator in the traditional sense? (implementing certain hardware architecture using software) or are they just implementing some software to read and run games in the host hardware? I would be very surprised if this was a true emulator, but I have no idea about the current scenario.