Emulator unresponsive when displaying a different background image

[andoruB]

I thought this was happening only when I would have the PSP home screen opened up, but it happens when a game brings up a custom background screen. The emulator becomes unresponsive and I can't choose any option from there...

[solarmystic]

Some extra details would be helpful:-

1. Which revision(s) is this happening in?
2. Describe the exact method used to reproduce the issue. As precisely as you can.
3. What is your platform and device used with the emulator?
4. You mentioned a game. Is the issue specific to that particular game, or does it affect all games? Details please.

Thanks.

[andoruB]

My bad, I rushed writing this down ASAP that I haven't thought about writing those things.

1. From what I know it has happened to me on all the revisions I've tried so far from the "stable" 0.8.1 to all the GitHub builds I tried by now (I can't list them since I can't remember exactly which ones I tried.
   I tried v0.8.1-540-g3c653cb now, and while I don't have any way to assign a key to the home button, sometimes when I end the emulation during a game, when it exits to the main menu and I click on "Settings" the game's art pops up in the background, making the emulator unresponsive.
   I also noticed this happening while I have too many games in the "Recent" field in the main screen, or if I turn on "Buffered Rendering"
2. Earlier it happened when I would press the "Home" button, now it only happens if I end the emulation, return to the main screen, and click on Settings.
3. Windows XP SP3 x86 on a PC (obviously XD )
4. It appears to affect all the games I tried. I could list them if you think it's necessary, but I doubt in this case it is =)

[solarmystic]

Thanks for the reply. I tried reproducing your issue using the method that you've provided but I can't seem to get it to be unresponsive.

I've attempted it on both the official 0.8.1 release and the latest Orphis git build (0.8.10-540)

For your reference, I'm on Windows 7 64bit, and I've tried to repro it on both 32bit and 64bit builds. I've also got 28 game icons on my main screen, which I consider a hefty amount.

If I understand you correctly, the problem repro is as follows:-

1. Launch PPSSPP
2. Start any game on the Recent main screen
3. Stop the emulation
4. Head to the Settings Menu
5. When the game (the last one) background art appears, the emulator should be unresponsive

Does that sound right to you?

Thanks.

[andoruB]

Precisely so. My bad, and if you weren't able to reproduce it must mean that maybe the display library that was used has some gripe with the video drivers of my card. It also happens when I turn on buffered rendering to even more extreme results, but for that I'll post a different issue since I suppose they're not related. I also wanted to post a log of what's going on, but unfortunately the emulator itself doesn't log UI stuff.

[hrydgard]

Could be some weird synchronization error with our image loading background thread, that just doesn't happen on multicore machines for example. That threading code may not be 100% robust, had to do ugly hacks around the fact that Windows Events are not quite the same as condition variables :(

[andoruB]

Is it possible to disable threading for single-core CPUs? Not everyone can afford a "modern" PC XD

[hrydgard]

Threading for background tasks is not only for multi core CPUs, it's about trying to not block rendering when loading images in this case. What we probably have here is a bug that should be fixed, that's probably just easier to reproduce on a single core machine.

[andoruB]

Oh, I understand that, sorry for assuming things =)
But that makes me wonder, is this related to the Buffered Rendering issue? Or should I open another one specifically for this?

[hrydgard]

Very likely has nothing to do with buffered rendering. This issue is fine, let's keep it open.

[andoruB]

My bad, I asked to know if I should open a separate issue for it, so I'll do so =)
EDIT: If it's of any help, I'll post the CPU usage on various conditions:
With 3 previously opened games on the screen - 100%
With no previously opened games - 3-10%
With 1 opened game on the screen - 80-90%
Opening Settings screen with default background (moving circles, squares, triangles and X's) - 6-12%
Opening Settings screen after loading a game and ending the emulation - 100% (as expected)

[andoruB]

Still not fixed as of v0.8.1-997-g4ac782f

[andoruB]

Still not fixed as of v0.8.1-1372-gf833872 either...

[andoruB]

Worser in v0.9.1-454-ge07b581
Now the whole UI is slow (but decent), and still as slow when there's a background image.

[hrydgard]

This is probably the weirdest issue around here, nobody else has ever reported that the UI is slow. Sounds like some very weird combination of graphics drivers and hardware...

[andoruB]

You mentioned earlier to leave this issue open so I thought maybe you wanted to see if somebody else pitches in with the same problem, but you're probably right in the end, in the case nobody reported it.

[xsacha]

Just noticed, Windows XP. Which videocard?

[andoruB]

NVidia 5500FX.
Now it's occurring all through the menu (since the NewUI). It happens on both the latest v0.9.5-623-g2739e4a and stable 0.9.5.

[unknownbrackets]

I improved something that caused the PSP to burn the primary core in a spin loop on the pause screen a little while back. I can't remember if it was after this report or not, though.

Has this improved at all in the latest build?

Also, do you have a compiler or anything to try some things?

-[Unknown]

[andoruB]

Unfortunately I can't try it out anymore with the old card as I've taken it out. But with the newer one, it works properly, so it could have been the fix you've done that fixed things. Regardless thanks. If you have nothing else to add, you can close the issue :)

[unknownbrackets]

Okay, well, I don't see any other users commenting that they have the same issue, so I think it's best to close this for now. We can reopen if someone else reports.

-[Unknown]