With the discontinuation of PSPVBA, Zx-81 has had time to update his other emulator projects, adding some of the refinements first achieved in PSPVBA to make his other emulators faster and more practical. With PSPAtari being updated yesterday, Zx has moved on to update another one of his emulators, this time for the ColecoVision video game system.

PSPColem is a port of Marat Fayzullin's Colem, a program which emulates the ColecoVision videogame system. It's running on FreeBSD, HP-UX, SunOS, Solaris, Linux, as well as other Unix systems, and with the help of everyone's favourite emulator coder Zx-81, on the PSP.

Here's the changelog for PSPColem v1.0.6:

• Emulator menu reorganisation (new menu for settings)
• New icons and background image with help from crait
• Battery status is now displayed in the emulator window
• Added a watchdog to automatically return to the emulator menu when the battery is very low (< 5%)
• New feature to save and load a distinct setting file for each games
• Added keyboard change skin option (you can add your own virtual keyboard images in the graphics directory).
• Speed limiter option
• Delete files option (in the file selector)
• Screenshots are now saved in PNG format instead of BMP
• Huge speed improvement (that's why there is a speed limiter now)
• Bug fix

Download: [PSPColem: A ColecoVision Emulator for PSP v1.0.6]
View: [Forum release thread]

The latest version of Exophase's gpSP GBA emulator for the PSP is now out for download.

gpSP v0.6 is still a beta release, so "watch out for new bugs," says Exophase. This new version still manages to fix a couple of bugs from the initial release, and offers a few new features, and adds new games to the game_config.txt file. New to this update are (taken from the Readme file):

Bug fixes

• Fixed a nasty bug that shouldn't have made it into the initial release; a lot of games that TECM.. erm.. crash won't anymore. NOTE: This doesn't mean that no game will ever crash, freeze, otherwise not work.
• Fixed some crashes in the GUI and the ability to "go up" past ms0:/PSP. Made the "go up" button square like it was supposed to be (instead of cross).

Feature additions

• There's now a menu that you can access, by default press right while holding down triangle for the frameskip bar.
• Menu option: resize screen aspect ratio, the default is now "scaled 3:2" which makes it look more like a normal GBA. You can use "fullscreen" (what it was like before) or "unscaled 3:2" (tiny but pixel for pixel like a GBA)
• Menu option: You can now load new games while the current one is running.
• Menu option: You can now restart the currently running game.
• Menu option: Frameskip variation - this defaults to "uniform" whereas it defaulted to "random" last release. Basically, turn it on random if you find that frameskip causes flickering animations to make things disappear. Other than that it will generally look better on uniform.
• GUI and file loading now have "auto repeat" on the buttons so they're not such a pain to navigate.

Download: [gpSP v0.6 GBA emulator for the PSP binary file]
Download: [gpSP v0.6 GBA emulator for the PSP source file]
Discuss: [gpSP v0.6 Forum Release Thread]

Read on for the full changelog.

We all had a scare when word broke out that emulation machine zx-81 is giving up on making improvements to his GBA emulator, PSPVBA. zx-81 quickly doused that rumor releasing v1.2.3 saying that "Who said i give up? I never give up when i got ideas to make things going better." If there's one thing he's proven, other than being a very talented coder, it's that he is no quitter; especially with the release of his emu now booted to v1.2.4.

According to him, this release is "a bit faster compared to v1.2.3 (up to 3% on v-rally 3)". What's more, the version is now also compatible to 2.x firmwares. Here's a list of what's new with v1.2.4:

- Improve the code of the graphic stuff (up to 3% faster)
- Improve the code of the ARM emulator (faster)
- Add BIOS file support (see the README)
- Add option to adjust the sound quality
- Add option to delete files (in the file selector)
- Bug fix in the save settings code
- Merge the code for 1.5FW and 2.xFW

zx-81 also recognizes that there has been a lot of new PSP owners flocking the community, so he's included a very detailed instruction of how to use his program in the readme inside the file. Another reminder though, he says that "this package is under GPL Copyright, read COPYING file for more information about it." With that cleared, we here at the realms of QJ salute zx-81 for a job well done!

Download: [PSPVBA: GameBoy Advance Emulator v1.2.4 1.5 FW]
Download: [PSPVBA: GameBoy Advance Emulator v1.2.4 2.x FW]
Discuss: [Forum Release Thread]

This guy simply doesn't know how to stop! I've said it before and I'll say it again - zx-81 is an emulation machine! And yet again, we've got a new release of the oh-so-popular GBA emulator, PSPVBA. Now at v1.2.3, this update makes the best GBA emulator, even better. Here's what he had to say: "Who said i give up? I never give up when i got ideas to make things going better. Here is a new version of PSPVBA the GameBoy Advance Emulator for PSP, which is a bit faster (up to 6% on v-rally 3) compared to v1.2.2 !"

And here's a list of what you can expect from the latest release:

• Rewrite critical parts of graphic emulation source code
• Rewrite critical parts of the ARM emulator to make it going faster
• Review memory cache strategy
• Bug fix and code cleaning

This new version, like the newer ones, only works on firmware 1.5. Plus, the source has been bundled.

Download Link: [PSPVBA v1.2.3]

zx-81 has released another version of his PSPVBA emulator, giving you the ability to play Gameboy Advance games on your Playstation Portable. The new version, v1.2.2, comes with these changes:

- Rewrite some part of the Gfx code (up to 5% faster)
- Bug fix and code cleaning

Note that PSPVBA will not work for firmware 2.0+. Unfortunately, it also seems that this version of PSPVBA will be the last one, at least for a while. The author has stated that he has "reached the limit of what I can do on this emulator" in terms of speed. He has spent a quite a few days attempting to improve the speed, but did not find a solution. Nonetheless, PSPVBA is a great effort and should really be appreciated, considering how much work zx-81 has done on his emulators.

Download: [PSPVBA v1.2.2 for PSP]

Thanks to Tiggerman for letting us know about the new version.

Zx-81 from our forums has released a new version of the PSPWeather homebrew application for the PSP. PSPWeather is a simple piece of network software that allows you to view the local weather conditions on your PSP. It was developed by McDongle a year ago, but since then Zx-81 has worked his magic on it, adding new features and bug fixes. Nuclear fallout couldn't stop Zx-81, he's even moving out of emulator territory now! Don't worry, he can multi-task and is still working on his amazing PSPVBA GameBoy Advance Emulator for the PSP. Back to PSPWeather, here's the changelog:

• Ported to new SDK
• Fixed DHCP issue (work fine on 1.5FW now!)
• Many bug fixes including code cleaning, memory leak fix etc ...
• Added a simple startup icon

These new additions bring this year-old piece of homebrew back into the homebrew scene of 2006. Zx likes to make programs that let people reminisce over the past, and this is one of them. You can easily tell - it had issues with DHCP working on firmware 1.5 - I haven't seen bug issues specific for 1.5 in ages! The original release thread for McDongle's PSPWeather v1.05 can be found here.

A firmware 1.5 binary version and the source code is included in the download.

Download: [PSPWeather v1.06]
View: [Forum release thread]

For many of us PSPVBA is synonymous to Zx-81. but it's very nice to know that there are new blood that get inspired by the work that other people do (perhaps a result of homebrew going mainstream?). Tommydanger's PSPVBA is based on Zx-81's creation. It may be based on his work, but Tommy made sure that his version will not be engulfed in the shadow of Zx-81's work. He decided to add more features in his release instead of making it run faster.

New features:

• improved rom browser
• displays rom size
• marks roms red that are incompatible
• ability to delete roms in the rom browser
• multiple rom settings
• autoload last played rom at startup

However, even if he says that he didn't focus on making it faster a lot of those that have downloaded and tried the program found that games run smoother and the sound is better. A lot of them attribute it to its 1.2.1 engine.

Those that are already familiar to ZX-81's work on the PSPVBA will not find it hard to use Tommy's work, but those that are going to use it the first time, a complete How-to is included in the Read Me file.

To give credit where credit is due, Tommy would like to thank Zx-81 for being both a nice guy and coder. Also Shadow, for his beautiful icons and backgrounds.

Download: [Tommy's PSPVBA v0.1]
Discuss: [Forum Release Thread]

Zx-81, who's been hailed as QJ's resident emulator porting machine (a much deserved title, we might add), is back with the latest update of his PSPVBA GBA emulator - PSPVBA v1.2.0 (Media Engine). In this newest version of PSPVBA, Zx-81 gives us these new features to expect:

• All the sound part has been rewritten to use the media engine so it's faster
  
• Graphical Unit access was improved
  
• Added new beautiful icons and background (designed by Win-Win)
  
• Added option to enable/disable GBA battery/flash save to avoid disk save every 10 seconds in several games

If you haven't tried PSPVBA, here's how you install it:

• Unzip the zip file, and copy the content of the directory FW1.5 on the PSP/Game directory.
• Put the ROM image files on "ROM" sub-directory.
  

See that doesn't sound too hard. The complete instruction is listed in the readme file in case you have some issues. And now for the bad news: PSPVBA v1.2.0 doesn't work for +2.0 FW. Sorry 'bout that. But Zx-81 has included one binary version for 1.5 FW and the source codes in the download file. You can post your comments, suggestions and praises for Zx-81 at the comments or in our forum's release thread.

Update 1: zx-81, showcasing his Barry Allen-like skills, just updated this emulator to fix the analog/digital swap bug minutes after the other one was released earlier. The link below has the updated file.

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Update 2: Third time's the charm! zx-81 has wasted no time in releasing the next version of this emulator with the following fixes and changes:

• New feature to save and load a distinct setting file for each games
• Add option to enable/disable the cache with the Graphical Unit
• Emulator menus reorganisation (new menu for settings)
• Bug fix: Emulator menu is now launched on startup
• Bug fix: no more freeze when exiting the emulator (but HOME button still doesn't work !)
• Bug fix: bad refresh of the emulator menu/screen

Download:[PSPVBA v1.2.1 Media Engine]
Discuss: [Forum Release Thread]

Zx-81 has gone and done it again by releasing v1.1.0 of his PSPVBA GameBoy Advance emulator for the PSP today! According to Zx himself, the best GBA emulator for the PSP to date is now both fast and smooth, with quite a few changes, and now works on both 2.5 and 2.6 firmwares perfectly! However, Zx has confirmed that this will probably be the last 2.5/2.6 compatible version of PSPVBA because he is going to work on using the ME which is only possible on 1.5 with Kernel mode. Here's the latest changelog:

• It works now on 2.5 and 2.6 FW (Zx has tested it using DevHook)
• All the graphics parts have been rewritten to replace SDL by direct GU access (faster)
• Sound is now played at 22Khz instead of 11Khz (i can play it up to 44Khz, but it's slower).
• The images are now smooth (using the GU)
• Snapshot files are now in PNG format (instead of BMP)

As with all of Zx's previous releases, this version comes packaged under GPL copyright, please read copying.txt for more info, comes with 1.5 and 1.0 binary versions in the download as well as the source code. Happy GBA emulation!

Download: [PSPVBA v1.1.0]

We did say that Zx-81 is one of the more talented developers out there, and he proves this again by releasing the latest version of his GameBoy Advance emulator. This newest version of PSPVBA: GBA emulator, v1.0.7, has numerous new features and bug fixes that will definitely make your GBA emulator better.

Here's the changelog for PSVBA: GBA Emulator v1.0.7:

• Sound improvement
• Switch off the sound during screenshot save
• The percent of battery left is now displayed in the emulator window;
• Add a watchdog to automatically return to the emulator menu when the battery is very low (< 5%);
• Modify the UI to be able to use custom background images (transparency);
• Sleep mode is now working (but only when you're in the emulator window).

This version also has some new, impressive icons and background that were designed by no other than Shadow.

Download: [PSPVBA: GameBoy Advance Emulator v1.0.7]