Compiling ScummVM with X11 backend (Ubuntu)

[Pyjamarama]

Hi,

I've been experimenting with Linux (Ubuntu Edgy) for a while now and with the help of some of the nice people here I have managed to compile ScummVM from SVN successfully (and even to write a little script that automates the process of installing all required resources, downloading the latest version from SVN and compiling, which is very handy).

One thing that I've noticed, is that using filters makes some games run very slowly on my Linux machine (1,2GHz, 768 MB, 128 MB AGP video card- not the fastest of CPUs, I know, but capable enough to run Doom 3, which is probably a lot more demanding than ScummVM). Interestingly some games are much more affected than others, e.g. Flight of the Amazon Queen becomes *really* slow with filters whereas SCUMM games are not noticeably affected.

I was thinking that compiling the ScummVM with x11 as a backend might improve this situation - is this assumption accurate or wouldn't it make any difference?

Anyway, my attempts at compiling ScummVM with the option --backend=x11 have so far only resulted in long lists of error messages. Could someone tell me if x11 is still a supported backend at all, and if so what sorts of things I need to install or do in order to have it compile successfully?

Thanks in advance,

Jan

[fingolfin]

The X11 backend is only updated at very irregular intervals. Whether it would improve speed is probably a matter of definition, given that it doesn't support any of the scaler features the SDL backend offers... So if the 1x, 2x and 3x default scalers are "fast enough" for you, you definitely won't benefit from the X11 backend (should you manage to compile it, that is .

[Pyjamarama]

Thanks fingolfin, that's all I needed to know. I guess I won't bother with the x11 backend then and play the games that are too slow under Linux on my (faster) Windows PC instead.

[eriktorbjorn]

One thing that I've noticed, is that using filters makes some games run very slowly on my Linux machine (1,2GHz, 768 MB, 128 MB AGP video card- not the fastest of CPUs, I know, but capable enough to run Doom 3, which is probably a lot more demanding than ScummVM). Interestingly some games are much more affected than others, e.g. Flight of the Amazon Queen becomes *really* slow with filters whereas SCUMM games are not noticeably affected.

That's strange. I can run Flight of the Amazon Queen with the HQ3x scaler and aspect ratio correction (which I assume is the "heaviest" scaler I can use) on my 450 MHz P3, and even during scenes like the escape from the hotel, it didn't use much more than 30% of the CPU. During fade-ups/downs, where the entire screen has to be redrawn each frame, it could briefly use more than 50%.

There are a couple of things which I imagine did help me, though:

My sound card has a hardware MIDI synth, so the CPU is mostly unaffected by that. Unlike the Adlib or - heaven preserve us - MT-32 emulators.

I run my desktop at 16 bpp, which is ScummVM's native colour depth. If I had run it at 24 or 32 bpp, things would probably have been a bit - perhaps a lot - slower. (24 bpp may actually be a lot slower than 32 bpp, at least on some hardware.)

[Pyjamarama]

Thanks, I'll definitely take a look at your suggestions.

I'm not using MT-32 emulation, but using soundfonrt with fluidsynth for midi output is probably not much better. Actually, the soundcard in my computer is a SB Live!, which has a hardware synth, but so far I haven't made an effort to find out how to load soundfonts on it under Linux - I guess I'd better start trying to find out.

Trying a lower bit depth for the desktop sounds like a good idea, too.

[eriktorbjorn]

I'm not using MT-32 emulation, but using soundfonrt with fluidsynth for midi output is probably not much better.

FluidSynth is usable, with the occasional stuttering, on my computer. I'm told the MT-32 emulator is not, by a long shot.

Actually, the soundcard in my computer is a SB Live!, which has a hardware synth, but so far I haven't made an effort to find out how to load soundfonts on it under Linux - I guess I'd better start trying to find out.

That's the kind of sound card I have, too. I'm using asfxload to load sound fonts but sfxload seems to work too. In Debian (unstable) they are part of the awesfx package.

The 8MBGMSFX.SF2 SoundFont that was included with the card sounds pretty good to me.

[Pyjamarama]

Thanks again, I'll give that a try in the next few days.