[RP] The Rasberry Pi (1st Gen) As A Retrogaming System With Retropie Raspbian

Retropie (3.0) runs on on Raspberry Pi B and B+ (the first generation of Raspberry Pie low cost single board computers). There’s also a version for the new Raspberry Pi 2.

This version takes a little bit of time to configure and setup. It is less monkey proof like the HAPPI Game Center. Probably you can compare HAPPI Game Center vs Retropie to iOS va Android. The latter takes a little tinkering to get it up and running but it is faster, more customizable and allows for more gamepads to be used and systems to be emulated.

The downside of this bit of software is the fact that the nice GUI (Emulation Station) is taxed to the max due to the amount of systems being emulated and the amount of graphics loaded in the graphics memory when navigating in the GUI. On the older Pies this leads to ‘black’ or ‘white screen of death’ were the GUI simply ceases to display information. Another factor that may play a role is the fact that when you use the HDMI out on the Raspberry and hook it up to a 1080p TV it tries to output at that resolution. The HAPPI Game Center is hardwired to output at 720p so it uses less memory that way. Not sure if that’s possible with the RetroPie distribution. So on a first generation Raspberry Pie the system is not really usable when you add more games and systems to the SD card. That is if you use HDMI, if you use Composite video you’ll be able to keep it up and running – check out the video to see how and why.

I have checked out the computer and the console options available in the distribution, there’s quite a lot more game systems available.

I think this is a very good distribution with a lot of solid 100% emulation on a non overclocked standard 1st Generation Raspberry Pi. I expect it to simply blast on ahead full speed on the Raspberry Pie 2. But that’s for another video. When you run the card in a Raspberry Pi B (second version with twice the memory) you will not have those memory issues on the composite video and the emulation experience is even more solid.

Check out my experiences and further thoughts on this wonderful front end.

Verdict:
-Website & information on how to install and do the setup are available here:
http://blog.petrockblock.com/retropie/
https://github.com/petrockblog/RetroPie-Setup/wiki
https://github.com/petrockblog/RetroPie-Setup

-Installation and configuration is not a simple procedure but with a little bit of persistence it should be possible to install and configure it using the provided documentation. There’s many settings and a lot of controllers can be used and configured with this system.

-Pies supported B, B+ and 2
-video through HDMI – on older systems can have a white or black screen
– video through composite video on older systems provides a near perfect old composite experience and working GUI on older systems due to the lower memory requirements.
-audio through HDMI or analog jack plug is of varying quality depending on the emulator used

HAPPI GAME CENTER
http://mon-pi-et-moi.fr/

RETROPIE
http://blog.petrockblock.com/retropie/
https://github.com/petrockblog/RetroPie-Setup/wiki
https://github.com/petrockblog/RetroPie-Setup