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MartyPC is a cross-platform IBM PC emulator written in Rust, for Windows, Linux and macOS.

User Guide

Click here to access the MartyPC User Guide

Downloading MartyPC

Builds are available through periodic releases. Newer, automatic builds are available via the Actions tab under the Artifacts for each workflow run. (You will need to be logged in to GitHub to download Artifacts).

Why another PC emulator?

MartyPC began as a hobby project to see if I could write an emulator from scratch while learning the Rust programming language. My original goals for MartyPC were modest, but it has reached a level of functionality that I could have never imagined.

MartyPC's intended niche in the emulation world is an aide for retro PC development. It is packed with debugging tools and logging facilities, with many more planned. It may not be as user-friendly to set up as other emulators, but if you are familiar with edting configuration files you shouldn't have any major problems.

Accuracy

Development of MartyPC started in April 2022. I began work on making MartyPC's 8088 CPU emulation cycle-accurate in November 2022. To do so, I validated the operation of the CPU against a real 8088 CPU connected to an Arduino MEGA microcontroller. See my Arduino8088 project for more details. This allows an instruction to be simultaneously executed on the emulator and a real CPU and the execution results compared, cycle-by-cycle. More info on this process is described on my blog.

Extensive hardware research has been performed to improve MartyPC's peripheral emulation as well, including investigating the 8253 timer chip with an Arduino, investigating DMA timings with an oscilloscope, and ultimately, building a bus sniffer using a logic analyzer.

In April 2023, MartyPC became accurate enough to run the infamous PC demo, 8088 MPH.

8008mph01

In May 2023, MartyPC became the first PC emulator capable of emulating every effect in the PC demo Area 5150. (See video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zADeLm9g0Zg)

8008mph01

Online Demos

The WebAssembly build of MartyPC can run both 8088MPH and Area 5150 in your web browser!

Features

Currently, MartyPC can emulate an original IBM 5150 PC, 5160 XT, or a generic XT clone machine.

Device Support

Besides emulating the 8088 CPU, MartyPC emulates the following devices:

Configuration Support

MartyPC supports custom machine configurations via base machine configuration profiles plus optional extensions called 'overlays', analagous to installing extension cards or other upgrades.

Debugging Support

MartyPC has an extensive debugging GUI with several useful displays including instruction disassembly, CPU state, memory viewer, and various peripheral states. Code and memory breakpoints are supported. MartyPC also supports instruction and cycle-based logging.

debugger01

Multi-window support

Run two video cards in separate windows, or the same video card in 'accurate' and 'debug' views - or with different shaders!

Shader support

A basic, configurable CRT shader is included with more to come (LibraShader support is planned)

multimon01

Screenshots

For more, check out the Screenshot Gallery section of the Wiki!

Special Thanks

I have a long list of people to thank (See the About box!) but I would especially like to mention the contributions made by reenigne. Without his work reverse-engineering the 8088 microcode, this emulator would never have been possible. I would also like to thank Ken Shirriff and his excellent blog, covering much of the silicon logic of the 8086 (and 8088 by extension).