Here you will find answers to frequently asked questions about the Macintosh version of PCSX and the included plugins.

The emulator is too slow. How can it be improved?

There are several settings that can make playing a better experience on slower hardware. First make sure that "Dynarec CPU core" is enabled. Secondly try disabling dithering in the GPU configuration dialog and enable frameskip (using P.E.Op.S. SoftGL Driver). Finally you can try to configure the SPU to the faster settings. Most other settings will have only little effect on the emulation speed.

PCSX crashed. What do I do?

The Macintosh port is still actively in development, which means that stability issues are still present in the software. If you encounter a crash bug that you can reproduce, then please contact me and I might be able to fix it in an upcomming version.

I have installed the BIOS but it still doesn't work?

Most likely you have installed it in the wrong location. The correct location is:
<your home dir>/Library/Application Support/Pcsx/Bios/

Where can I find a BIOS image?

For legal reasons I can't give you that information but you should be able to locate one through common search engines. If you have technical expertise you can even extract the required data from your Playstation yourself.
Note: You need to own an actual Playstation to legally use PCSX with a BIOS image.

Can I use the emulator without a BIOS image?

Yes you can. PCSX, like CVGS and Flarestorm, has a feature that tries to simulate that functions of the BIOS. The bad news is that this feature currently has lower compatibility than when using a real BIOS image. This means that even though you might have seen a screenshot of a specific game in action it's not guaranteed to work using this feature.

Does it work with ISO images, etc?

Currently PCSX does not include support for ISO images or other types of images. Only actual CD's will work. However it is possible that a CD-ROM plugin that supports ISO images will be developed in the future. Various people have also reported succes using the Roxio Toast software to mount images as CDs.

Will it work with my analog controller?

Yes, PCSX should have no trouble using any USB controller using the HIDInput plugin bundles with PCSX. However the specified plugin will need to be configured before use. Please note that although analog controls work there is no support for the "Rumble" feature.

Does game X work?

Probably to some extent. I have only tested a limited selection of PSX games with PCSX and I quite frankly don't know how the majority of the games will function. For now an unofficial list has been compiled by Hansi. I can understand the fact that you want to make sure that a game will work before you buy it to play with this emulator. To achieve optimal compatibility you need a BIOS image, which you can't legally have unless you own a Playstation console yourself.

Why is the music missing?

Probably because the music is on a cd audio track on the disc, which the CD-ROM plugin doesn't yet support. Otherwise you might accidentally have disabled xa-audio in either the PCSX configuration or the SPU plugin configuration dialogs.

Does PCSX use OpenGL?

The right answer would be yes, though only to get the software rendered graphics onto the screen as fast as possible using bi-linear scaling. This is needed since Playstation games uses many different resolutions.

Can I make a donation to support development?

Sure you can! There is a PayPal donate button on the left for the very same purpose. I'm currently an unemployed student working on this in my spare time and any kind of donation is welcome.