RG99 retro handheld OpenDingux custom firmware

[665b2aed2735evoodoo47]

..might as well drop this here so google would catch it, in case that one person that may be needing this in the future tries to search for it (the original post does not exist anymore as the opendingux forum died a death so sudden that web archive didn't even manage to cache it).

so lets take a shot at making what probably is the worst hackable handheld into something that actually is kind of tolerable. introducing the RG99, an attempt to basically scam people who are looking to buy a RG300 by sticking RetroMini (RS90) internals (with a worse audio chip) into a RG300 shell, and selling it for a slightly cheaper price than the real deal. the result is.. bad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFZyQyqhXy8

but hey, opendingux beta has support for this thing, right? weeell sort of, you certainly can flash the opensource os, but here comes the catch - to be able to do anything, you also need emulators. and they kind of didn't really exist - the assumption that all the fairly well optimized RetroMini (RS90) builds would simply work turned out to be false. you were stuck with a Genesis and PCE emulator someone compiled ages ago and that was pretty much it. so I did what I do best - went around and bothered people with actual skill until they fixed it. here's the result;

How to flash (linux live boot to avoid having to deal with windows drivers);

-click on the first link with a green checkmark (warning: last few releases unstable. build #148 attached to this post until this is resolved), scroll down and get odboot-client-linux and update-rs90 (note you have to have an account on github and be signed in, else the download links will not be clickable), extract both to a folder
-connect the RG99 to the computer using an USB-C data cord (a charge only cord will not work), press and hold the start button, start it up, release after a few seconds, if it keeps vibrating, it's in the boot mode
-open terminal (rightmouseclick onto any empty space) from the folder where you have the odboot-client and the current update opk, type sudo ./odboot-client od-update.opk (replace od-update.opk with the filename of the current update opk from the update-rs90 zip), hit enter, choose RG99 and continue (note - you may need to do chmod +x odboot-client first to make the flasher executable)
-the RG99 should stop vibrating and show instructions on its screen (you may have to press the d-pad at this point for them to show), follow those until everything is done (note that RSA key creation may take a while and the process may appear to be stuck, just give it some time)

Commander file operations
ReGBA GBA (not everything will run fullspeed unless the RG99 is overclocked)
Gambatte GB/GBC (good sound, fast enough for most games but not all)
GnuBoy GB/GBC (very fast, but worse sound)
PicoDrive SMS/GG/SMD/32X (32X slow)
Temper PCE
FCEUX NES (some frameskip unless overclocked)
PCSX4ALL PSX (few games run ok, but most are slow unless the RG99 is overclocked)
Snes9x4d SNES (not fullspeed, overclock is recommended)
ScummVM classic adventure games
EasyRPG RPG Maker 2000 and 2003 games
Handy Atari Lynx
Oswan WonderSwan
ProSystem Atari 7800 (not everything will run fullspeed)

applications go either to the /media/data/apps folder on the internal storage or the /apps folder on the sdcard.

ta-daa! now you can kind of play GB/GBC/GBA/SMS/GG/SMD/PCE/NES without wanting to throw up, with a few sprinkles of SNES and PS1 on top. oh and that Diablo port supposedly runs ok too.

so, if you find this thing in some store's junk bin for 10$, and you really, really don't have anything better to do with your life than playing some retro games with occasional frame drops, you can maybe think of buying it just to defy any reason or logic. but don't buy it on aliexpress for 40+ bucks, would you kindly.

also the handheld has a tiny motor that allows it to vibrate (because someone thought this would be a good idea, apparently), and it does so while booting up, which is both completely moronic and also utterly hilarious, so there you go.

[665b2aed27520voodoo47]

..and if you ever wondered how long it takes google to notice a thing, then it's about a week.

//tried to use this to point to the guide indirectly posting under that review youtube video - man the youtube anti-link algorithm is harsh, "search for systemshock org rg99 retro" didn't go through, had to get rid of the org bit to avoid auto-deletion. geez.

//woah, the stable build is getting downloads. guess we are System Shock AND the RG99 archive now.