Linux for Dreamcast??!!

[VidGameKing]

what are the benifits or running linux on my dreamcast? is it compatible with all other linux programs or do i have to port programs to work on DC hardware? what do you guys think?

[Happy_Dude]

The beauty of GPL my friend

Use the coders cable and compile any software you need

on the Dreamcast

 

I don't know about benifits but it sure is cool.

 

Oh here's one

 

Premade Devkit for homebrew games Sweet hu?

[VidGameKing]

can you run games that were intended for linux on the DC when it runs in Linux? like could I play counter Strike on it?

[VidGameKing]

and if you could run linux on it does that mean you can run DOS? or windows? I know it comes with Windows CE, but is there anyway to access that? like could i bring up the WinCE desktop? could i run, or install WinCE programs on it?

[liquid_sky]

no, dc linux is very slow at the time..

[ubersaurus]

Why run linux on it? So that games using the Windows CE system won't run?

[Ze_ro]

I don't think you guys are understanding the concept here... you don't install anything ON the Dreamcast. There's no hard drive in there! There's also no WinCE in the machine either, it's on the discs.

 

The way you run Linux is that you burn it onto a CD... everything runs off that CD then. If you're lucky enough to have a BBA, you can network it with a different computer. While on the network, you CAN access hard drives on the network... so for example, you could have a CD to boot Linux, and once it boots, it would use a host computer for all it's data storage. Without a BBA though, you're stuck burning anything you want onto CD's... which would make compiling anything very difficult I would imagine.

 

Speaking of compiling things, it depends on what you're compiling I suppose. Keep in mind that the Dreamcast has entirely different hardware than most PC's. Any game that tries to use "standard" joysticks will probably not find any (Unless they've programmed the Dreamcast ones to appear like normal joysticks). Also, I think the only graphical stuff that's been ported is maybe X Windows... so I have my doubts that you'd be able to run anything very graphical (I doubt X11 would be very fast on Dreamcast anyways)

 

As for running other operating systems, good luck. Unless the OS is written with the Dreamcast's hardware in mind, then it has absolutely no chance of working. Microsoft has ported Windows CE to the Dreamcast, but I don't think you can actually USE windows on it... the point of WinCE on the disc is so that programmers can just program windows software instead of doing assembly and stuff. As far as I know, you cannot get to a Windows desktop from any game that actually uses Win CE. Don't even think about Dos. It's not written for an SH-4 processor, so the only way you'd get it is to run Dosemu in Linux, which would be very slow.

 

I should point out that there is also a NetBSD port to the Dreamcast. Unless you're a hardcore Unix person though, you probably wouldn't notice any differences between the two OS's.

 

So basically, this Linux-on-DC thing is mostly just for nerds, and isn't terribly practical

 

--Zero