New version of best, free arcade emulator, FinalBurn, out!

[Guest Menneisyys]

Another GREAT piece of news for you emulator fans after the recent release of Pocket Commodore 64 3.0 (see review HERE): version 0.14 of FinalBurn, without doubt the BEST arcade emulator, has just been released with many optimizations (most importantly, the CPS-3 core has been rewritten) and compatibility enhancements.

Please see THIS for a complete tutorial on using the emulator. As usual, you’ll need to download the executable HERE, from the first post. Note that you’ll only need to download burner0.014.rar; FinalBurn.rar contains the old, 0.11 version and fbaud.rar is only needed for desktop usage (if you plan to create cache files on the desktop). Also make sure that the ROM pack is still at its previous URL linked to from my tutorial.

I’ve thoroughly tested it on several of my Windows Mobile devices; most importantly, with the very resource-hungry, excellent platformer shoot’m’up Metal Slug 2, which did have sound emulation problems in previous versions. (The new, 0.14 version has some 68k optimizations too, in addition to the new CPS-3 core). While it’s on very few, high-end devices that the game is playable without any sound glitches, there is indeed some performance gain over the older versions. Note that with less resource-hungry games (for example, the CPS-1 / 2 vertical scroller 19xx-series) there won’t be performance problems at all, not even on less capable platforms.

WM2003 QVGA iPAQ 2210 (400 MHz PXA255): works better than on the TI OMAP-based HTC Vox / s710 running at 200 MHz; however, it too has sound problems

HTC Vox / s710 (200 MHz TI OMAP; haven’t tested it overclocked) running the latest (January 2008) factory ROM: major sound problems (better to switch it off entirely)

Dell Axim x51v with WM6.1 (see THIS), PXA270 at 624 MHz: minor sound problems on scenes with many opponents

HTC Universal with WM6.1 (see THIS) (PXA270 at 520 MHz): absolutely no sound problems, perfectly playable (Great news!)

HP iPAQ 210 with factory ROM & the official battery update, no other tasks running, PXA310 at 624 MHz: definitely worse than on the x51v / Universal, choppy sound most of the time (but, of course, better than on the old iPAQ 2210 or the HTC s710).

All in all, if you like quality (!!!!) 2D arcade games, you MUST give it a try. Again, don’t forget to read THIS for a tutorial. You may also want to read the WinMo Arcade Bible for more info on how FinalBurn compares to other arcade emulators and what makes it the best.

[Guest jaikben]

good review, as for me on the o2 xda flame, everything works fine as far as I tried some cps1/2/3 and neo geo games. Nice to know that cps3 has the same core as 32x hint hint :D

most games seem almost full speed on flame ( with sound ).