May 2021: NEW FIRMWARE (V.3.0) ON GITHUB! Ruka CFW Release 3.0 Alpha 1 - This release includes the following changes: HDMI is now working properly RetroArch has been upgraded to v1.9.1 Brightness can be changed via hotkeys (FN + Vol Up/Down) Shutdown SD corruption prevention Some additional retroarch cores....
I've got a A13 on the way; never would have considered it if I hadn't seen your video of taking it apart. I'm a sucker for tinkering so I had to go for it. Really great channel!
Got one yesterday for my birthday. My family loves it, and my 11-year old son has been having a blast exploring the games. I'm going to get into tinkering with it more in the near future, but I can report that this system is great right out of the box. The form factor is inviting for others to watch and want to take turns or join in if there are controllers available. We played a family game of Simpsons Arcade and it was fun as hell and the screen was just the right size for crowding around. Great party system, great family system, great personal system. Great for sharing games with others. Just. Flat. Out. Great.
Awesome, hope you enjoy it! It's not a perfect device, but it's a lot of fun to tinker with. There's a video out there of someone adding a Raspberry Pi 4 to the device, I think that's above my skill level but it's tempting :)
@@RetroGameCorps I just bought one too after seeing your 3 vids. I think you need to work for Powkiddy marketing!!! 😂 Looking fwd to modding the OS and getting Daphne up and running on it. It was hell for me to get it running on my Pi4.
That 5 button push start saved my powkiddy a13. It was stuck in a boot loop. All I did was accidentally took out the sd card while it was on. After the 5 button push start, it's working again!
I have installed the custom firmware on my A13, I just wanted to let everyone know some of the main caveats/down sides over the stock firmware that need re-iterating from this video: 1. Battery life is reduced from 5 hours to less than 3, mainly because the brightness is set to maximum by default with no way of adjusting it. 2. It randomly crashes/switches off when the battery gets below 30% 3. You have to repair your memory card every time you want to make a change to retroarch or romset on Windows (already mentioned by Russ but it's really annoying). 4. No HDMI out support. I am seriously considering reverting back to stock firmware because of the above, although I need to compare game performance between the two.
One thing about RetroArch that I recently discovered is that you don't need to navigate to Resume after making changes. Just press the menu button to hide the menu! This has the added bonus of remembering your position in the menu so you can open, tweak, close repeatedly to quickly test things out. It took me a while to get rid of my muscle memory always going to quick menu resume, but there's no looking back once you get used to just pressing the menu button to get back into the game!
When the cpu takes a hit if you are using a shader a diff option is use a scanline image overlay. If you like to use system theme bezels as your overlay and also want to use a scaline image you can merge the bezel with the scanline image using a few diff PC programs. Many diff scan images available too but there should be one to suit. Did this for my PS Classic.
Yes - I've been waiting for your CFW vid! Just ordered one on these from Aliexpress. I've already got an A12 which I love but the screen on that is poor which kind of spoils it for me - this one has a slightly bigger screen that looks a lot better. I'm looking forward to modding this using this vid when I get it. I also get the 'drive needs to be repaired' problem almost every time I put my SD into my PC - Windows soon sorts it out if you let it repair, but it's still damn annoying.
lol, i feel your pain... i am pretty much desperate to get my A13 back to 'normal' and sorry Team Ruka but your firmware is less stable than my grandmother. ..If i successfully get my A13 back to original firmware, i'll report back here to help
i found the original firmware (see link below) but tbh i don't know the necessary steps to safely flash it onto the A13 mega.nz/file/guBikTAD#hGfZbB7x8l2R0GWs1atG30rGsZEHEPitP3moc7v2-nw
Is anyone else having trouble with the A13 CFW, specifically the newest release? Maybe it's the IPS incompatibility, but the CFW causes my A13 to crash constantly even on an EXT4 partitioned SD.
I want to know too, I got my A13 recently and the manufacture date was early September, not sure if the Ruka cfw will causing same problem as yours. Which version of cfw did you use?
Hi Russ, Just a though... I am not a fan of the arcade style sticks, but this system looks like it could be modded into a great large screen handheld portable. A 3d printed case, some buttons and dpad should do it. Your thoughts?
That sounds like a good idea, but I'm not sure if it would be worth the effort since this is a relatively low powered chipset. I think you'd be better served building a raspberry pi handheld!
Yes, the mednafen-vb core is available. I just tested it and Mario Tennis played fine, but Gold had some slowdown and audio crackling (which is typical with this game and core). Overall I'd say it's pretty decent!
Hi - great tutorial! still unsure if I will change to the Ruka fw though, a bit worried about stability. Will you be able to add additional cores to the stock firmware as well?
6:36 some crashing noise in the background... Late night on my headphones I thought someone had broken into my house. Ran downstairs looking for intruders. Then I realized it was you not me.
In the written guide, you give a link to the latest RetroArch cores and suggest replacing with newer ones, but how do you tell if they are newer? All of the cores in the SD card archive have a data of 05/07/21, which is the date that the archive was created, and there's no guarantee that the latest cores were used to create that archive. Or just replace them all to be safe?
Hello, I'm trying to install Ruka's cf, but links to the programs needed for the update (including drivers and RKDEVTOOL) no longer work. Could you share them to me if you still have them? Thank you.
great vid ;) just 2 small tips... found.000/found.xxx are broken file (after windows scan), can be deleted. And stop using winrar unlimited shareware! try 7zip! opensource, free and far better..
Good to know about the found.000 files, I'll get them out of there! I use 7zip too, I just can't break my habit of using WinRAR for simple tasks. Old habits die hard! Thanks for the feedback :)
@@RetroGameCorps and again thank for your great video! Check their discord (storage..) , there is an improvement pack for A12 that fix and improve ruka cfw (bezel of course and some tweak for resolution, kiosk mode (so it doesnt write/corrupt ini file), etc.. some tweak could be imported to A13 I think.. take a lot at it if you got time!
I followed the steps to the letter, but when I try to run a game all I get is a blank screen. Any ideas on what I did wrong or why it happens? BTW, Love your videos!
Would be interested in cfw if they can work out the kinks with hdmi out. I really like the idea of having a "switch experience" with this unit. Especially on a CRT tv - oh man!
Hello Russ, Thank you for the great video. I think I have watched this video like 5 times! I was wondering If you have any updates done to your A13. I Have a A12 and I play this over the TV.
Friend, please help me, I saw your video and tried to install it on my Powkiddy because it gave me an error, the screen has a strange stripe on the right, I would like to update the system to the factory default, can you help me do this?
Hi Russ, I reverted back to the stock firmware and now for some reason my back and volume down buttons have switched in function. Just wondering if you experienced this and any fix would be must appreciated, it's messing with my OCD.
@@GolfTechie79 I had the same issue after the the CFW didn't work for me. Download the files from the description in this video and flash the Rev2_E version(also shown how in the video). Should fix things. th-cam.com/video/A3kN288t-qU/w-d-xo.html
Being a RockChip you could run EmuElec or Batocera so so easy, just use the right ".dtb" for that chip Same thing on Android TV Boxes I now have Batocera Running
QUESTION!!! So I bought this system, but the SD card inside it was cracked... Is there a way to aquire the original stock image to put on another SD??? Because I can't get the Team Ruka firmware, I'm basically stuck with a dud item...
Hey sir... can you make a video tutorial on how to install Batocera OS on it...? i saw some videos that do this, but im not sure if its true or not. And also they do not provide basic info on how to install it. If you do sir found time to do it,i really appreciate it and thank you..! happy gaming..!
Edit - It's fixed. I pieced together my own firmware update using the Team Ruka resources and eventually got it back to factory spec! Thanks for the help everyone! After flashing the A13 to the original firmware after futzing around with the Team Ruka build a while I ended up bricking my A13. It appears to be stuck in connect mode even after powering down. I get a blank screen and I can connect it to my PC, but it won't flash any memory locations, test or reset device, or do anything else in the Rockchip Android tool but recognize that the chip is there. I'm trying to power it down but its taking forever since its not drawing any power. I'm ready to open it up and disconnect the battery instead. Anyone else have issues like this with the A13 (or its sister products like the A12) and know if there is a way to get it out of connect mode?
could you please upload/share your custom firmware update, as there's a growing number of us who bitterly regret the custom firmware. .......please man, help!
@@segafrog On the Team Ruka Warehouse telegram there is a full and splitted A13 firmware. You should be able to use that and the android uploaded they have available there to restore your A13. Mine took a long time because the actual uploader on the A13 got corrupted and it didn't even turn on the screen when I powered it, so I had to figure out some deeper level stuff. The good news is that the chip in the A13 has a printed ROM that makes it hard to totally brick. I honestly have no idea how I got it to work, I just kept futzing with it until it did...
@@AverageDrafter cool thanks v much for the info, ...but i gotta say, i had some real luck this evening.... i changed my SD card format to EXT4 and i'm now not having any problems/issues at all!.. so for now i'm gonna leave the custom firmware on there, but will definitely try your process if all goes to crap again. Thanks pal, ......and i can definitely confirm that EXT4 is the way to go for anyone using CFW!
got my A13 today! Is there a film over the screen or is that a screen protector? In the corner there's a tab that pulled off saying "Step 2 please peek of this ask after application completed" but JUST THAT came off. I don't want to risk damaging the screen but it does look like there's a film on it rather than a screen protector. Can anyone confirm?
@@RetroGameCorps Yup, I managed to get it off tonight with the dull tip of a butter knife. I was really worried I could damage the screen but it came off with a little bit of effort once I got a corner. That leads me to wonder - do you think there is an IPS panel that one could buy and mod in? Once sanwa parts are modded in, the LCD honestly becomes the worst thing about it.
I just flashed my firmware to my A13 today... Im still getting use to the configurations... I was wondering if for example im playing an Snes ROM and i wanna play Sega megadrive roms... Do i have to manually switch Cores or will the system do it automatically?
If you create playlists you can just browse the game folders and launch games without loading cores at all. But yes, you should also be able to just 'load content' and it will pick the right core for you (or ask you if it isn't sure).
I have PowKiddy A13 but so far I was a little bit scared of this flashing :) I wonder if it's possible to put inside PowKiddy A13 some Raspberry / Odroid, connect the screen, buttons and then install some Batocera etc.
Telegram tells me there isn't a user with the name TeamRuka. Do you have another download link? Google just comes up with your guide, some reddit posts that also tell me to check that Telegram account, and not much else. There is a rukabot, but I don't know what the commands are.
Batocera is available for the A12/13. And also for the PS5000/7000 The a12/13 version works on my Coolbaby RS18 as its same OS and UI but doesnt run the best. It works but can be laggy, and some of the easier systems dont work well, while some do. Couldnt get PS1 to run but they do with the stock OS. Oh yeah, all boots and runs from the SD card so if you still have your PS7000 give it a try. Also, if you have the X2 Id love for you try it on that and let me know how it runs. Youd need to also use the a12/13 version for the X2..same OS, like the a12/13 and RS18. Good thing is it runs off SD card so no harm in trying. If you get around to it anyway.
@@fonzitheman Thanks for the info, I had no idea! I gave my PS7000 to my brother, I still have my X2 and my Coolbaby RS18. I was also wrong about the Powkiddy X39, it's actually a decent handheld!
@@jonathonearl482 If you give Batocera a go on the X2 let me know how it runs. Would be tempted to get one if it runs OK. 😁 (You would need to flash the Powkiddy A12/13 version to a micro SD card )
@@jonathonearl482 Well, you only to flash it to a spare micro SD card. If it ends up a bit crap you only have to put your original back in and "Bickety Bam! " back to normal ☺️ Go on, do it now. Ill just wait here til you get back 😉
I'm not sure if you're asking whether it's possible to make a favorites list (it is!), or if you want my personal favorites. If you're asking for the latter, I've mostly been playing arcade fighting games, beat-em-ups, and driving games (like Mario Kart SNES and R4 Ridge Racer PS1). I thought Tony Hawk games would be fun on this but they are NOT :D
@@RetroGameCorps lol i was asking if you can create a favorites list with the new firmware as what came with the a13 doesnt allow that... I play alot of the same also...
I haven't seen anything yet, but I haven't been up to speed on the custom firmware. I know there's a new version out with HDMI out but I haven't tested it yet.
can someone upload these files to google drive or something? why do u have to message a guy for it, he will get crazy with all these messages. That's why i think he deleted his account it says User @TeamRuka not found when trying to message him in Telegram. PLEASE UPLOAD THE FILES.
This video is no longer useful/relevant. The telegram group no longer exists and on github it says devices made/ordered after Dec 2021 are not supported and it will brick the device. The menus are all in Chinese and I can't remap the controls so when I play street fighter the light punch and medium punch are reversed and I cannot fix it. If anyone can help/post an updated guide would be much appreciated, didn't find much via google.
Hi, nice video you make 😁. Can you make material about handheld Odroid go Super? It looks quite interesting, and I wonder if it is better than Rg351p XD
Yes, it worked fine. I had some problems getting the controls to work on the team selection screen, but gameplay worked fine. There was a little audio crackling but otherwise it played smoothly.
Had this firmware for a while now...is anybody else experiencing the backlight permanently being on 100%? There's no options to change it because there's no system options when you install this firmware. Help would be GREATLY appreciated.
it might mean that the rom isn't exactly correct for the emulator trying to extract it. ..Try something like a NES rom, and see if you can run it with any of the various NES emulators. ...tbh i'm back on the official powkiddy firmware now, because i hated the team ruka custom unstable unpredictable firmware
@@segafrog Once I changed the temp directory to the SD Card it worked. I Think I'm going to try to implement some of the bezels from the bezel project for this platform. Seems like it would be awesome.
It's so strange. Everything is ok on first boot. After the next boot everything is f*cked up. Assets gone, settings gone... Seems like Retroarch destroys itself?! 🧐 P.S. (They should just change the original FW to disable blur and I would be fine)
Well, I think it's more about specific games. Racing and fighting games on those systems are still viable options. I have 20 PS1 games on here and they're really fun to play. I was hoping Tony Hawk games would be fun too but they're actually a pain when using a joystick.
have you seen this its a new motherboard for the powkiddy....RETROPIE For POWKIDDY A13 A12 Arcade Game Console Main Board Motherboard 32GB Pre-install 9000 Games
ace, thanks for mentioning this.... i bought one (£30 with free postage) and it's on its way. ..i'll report back here to comment on it when i receive & try it, ...(which will probably take about two weeks from now)
update: it worked out great!. ....i bought the main board (AliExpress) and swapping it out with the old one was easy with no soldering required etc... it has stock firmware (thank God!), because i hated the team ruka firmware (so many issues/problems), ..and also i had previously accidentally broken my on/off switch, so replacing the board solved that problem aswell 😊
Honestly I don't find any of these custom firmwares to be worth using as they are incomplete & buggy. Stock features are broken with these, such as HDMI output. Yeah, no thanks. The stock firmware is honestly just fine if you can load your own English games on to it vs the Chinese ones.
May 2021: NEW FIRMWARE (V.3.0) ON GITHUB!
Ruka CFW Release 3.0 Alpha 1
- This release includes the following changes:
HDMI is now working properly
RetroArch has been upgraded to v1.9.1
Brightness can be changed via hotkeys (FN + Vol Up/Down)
Shutdown SD corruption prevention
Some additional retroarch cores....
I've got a A13 on the way; never would have considered it if I hadn't seen your video of taking it apart. I'm a sucker for tinkering so I had to go for it. Really great channel!
RETROPIE For POWKIDDY A13 A12 Arcade Game Console Main Board Motherboard 32GB Pre-install 9000 Games
Thank you for this guide!
I have to admit, that you have convinced me to purchase this machine.
Happy to be of help :)
Love your videos man :)
Thanks Jackson!
Got one yesterday for my birthday. My family loves it, and my 11-year old son has been having a blast exploring the games. I'm going to get into tinkering with it more in the near future, but I can report that this system is great right out of the box. The form factor is inviting for others to watch and want to take turns or join in if there are controllers available. We played a family game of Simpsons Arcade and it was fun as hell and the screen was just the right size for crowding around.
Great party system, great family system, great personal system. Great for sharing games with others. Just. Flat. Out. Great.
Glad you like it!
Just bought one of these just from seeing your coverage on this item
Awesome, hope you enjoy it! It's not a perfect device, but it's a lot of fun to tinker with. There's a video out there of someone adding a Raspberry Pi 4 to the device, I think that's above my skill level but it's tempting :)
@@RetroGameCorps I just bought one too after seeing your 3 vids. I think you need to work for Powkiddy marketing!!! 😂 Looking fwd to modding the OS and getting Daphne up and running on it. It was hell for me to get it running on my Pi4.
Hi Russ! Any plans to do an update video for the latest version of Ruka cfw?
U made it awesome. I'd take this over am Arcade1up machine any day since u can add controllers and an external monitor. Great video mann
That tiny arcade looks pretty fun!
It's one of my favorite projects so far!
Another awesome video, thanks!!!
Thanks for watching!
thank you for this Tutorial!
Thanks for this!
My pleasure :)
That 5 button push start saved my powkiddy a13. It was stuck in a boot loop. All I did was accidentally took out the sd card while it was on. After the 5 button push start, it's working again!
Yes! Thank you!
You're welcome!
I have installed the custom firmware on my A13, I just wanted to let everyone know some of the main caveats/down sides over the stock firmware that need re-iterating from this video: 1. Battery life is reduced from 5 hours to less than 3, mainly because the brightness is set to maximum by default with no way of adjusting it. 2. It randomly crashes/switches off when the battery gets below 30% 3. You have to repair your memory card every time you want to make a change to retroarch or romset on Windows (already mentioned by Russ but it's really annoying). 4. No HDMI out support. I am seriously considering reverting back to stock firmware because of the above, although I need to compare game performance between the two.
Thanks for the feedback. It's definitely not without its shortcomings, and yeah I wish the HDMI and brightness were fixed.
Have they fixed these issues
16:34 How did you change the user interface to the original retroarch blue xmb please? I can't find instructions on your website.
Good vid Russ.
Thanks Jason!
Can i swap an sd card from a a12 and put it into an a13? Great vid!
Can you install other roms for this device without custom firmware? Like More MAME roms etc.
You can. But you need to find the correct romsets
One thing about RetroArch that I recently discovered is that you don't need to navigate to Resume after making changes. Just press the menu button to hide the menu!
This has the added bonus of remembering your position in the menu so you can open, tweak, close repeatedly to quickly test things out.
It took me a while to get rid of my muscle memory always going to quick menu resume, but there's no looking back once you get used to just pressing the menu button to get back into the game!
Oh, that's a nice trick, thanks!
Could you test if it is the same firmware of the powkiddy x2?
Batocera is now available for the A12/13 and the PS5000/7000.
When the cpu takes a hit if you are using a shader a diff option is use a scanline image overlay.
If you like to use system theme bezels as your overlay and also want to use a scaline image you can merge the bezel with the scanline image using a few diff PC programs.
Many diff scan images available too but there should be one to suit.
Did this for my PS Classic.
Thanks for the tips!
Can you do a updated video for version 3.0 please?
Any updates or comments on the device following a year of use?
Yes - I've been waiting for your CFW vid! Just ordered one on these from Aliexpress. I've already got an A12 which I love but the screen on that is poor which kind of spoils it for me - this one has a slightly bigger screen that looks a lot better. I'm looking forward to modding this using this vid when I get it.
I also get the 'drive needs to be repaired' problem almost every time I put my SD into my PC - Windows soon sorts it out if you let it repair, but it's still damn annoying.
Awesome, hope you enjoy the A13!
Please help, how can i flash to the original A13 Firmware, my lcd screen has big issues after ruka firmware flashing.
lol, i feel your pain... i am pretty much desperate to get my A13 back to 'normal' and sorry Team Ruka but your firmware is less stable than my grandmother.
..If i successfully get my A13 back to original firmware, i'll report back here to help
i found the original firmware (see link below) but tbh i don't know the necessary steps to safely flash it onto the A13 mega.nz/file/guBikTAD#hGfZbB7x8l2R0GWs1atG30rGsZEHEPitP3moc7v2-nw
@@segafrogmerci for the link, but no batch or flash file! Thats the point we can`t restore:(
Is anyone else having trouble with the A13 CFW, specifically the newest release? Maybe it's the IPS incompatibility, but the CFW causes my A13 to crash constantly even on an EXT4 partitioned SD.
the team ruka CFW pretty much messes up the A13 unfortunately.
Sorry it's happened to you pal, ..it sucks....i wish it didn't
I want to know too, I got my A13 recently and the manufacture date was early September, not sure if the Ruka cfw will causing same problem as yours. Which version of cfw did you use?
Hi Russ, Just a though... I am not a fan of the arcade style sticks, but this system looks like it could be modded into a great large screen handheld portable. A 3d printed case, some buttons and dpad should do it. Your thoughts?
That sounds like a good idea, but I'm not sure if it would be worth the effort since this is a relatively low powered chipset. I think you'd be better served building a raspberry pi handheld!
Will this new firmware work on the X2 handheld? It looks like it has the same stock firmware as the A12 and A13
How to factory reset? My screen is locked on blank, after welcome screen
Also my hdmi display not working
Is there a VirtualBoy Core? Does VirtualBoy work well on the A13?
Yes, the mednafen-vb core is available. I just tested it and Mario Tennis played fine, but Gold had some slowdown and audio crackling (which is typical with this game and core). Overall I'd say it's pretty decent!
@@RetroGameCorps Gold? What is Gold?
@@SatoshiMatrix1 Haha, sorry that was a typo. GOLF!
Any other safe links to the CFM? When I try to join the telegram channel it tells me "Username TeamRuka not found."
It looks like the channel went down, I'm looking for an updated link now.
It looks like only the Spanish language channel is functioning for now, so be prepared to use Google Translate :) t.me/joinchat/B5SjM1OVlW0eD-0Tv5GrmA
Here you are: mega.nz/file/dP4xBaLI#55QDZkrIWxov06QXs9LksT_AlLDczySL9lseqlyfX3Y
Hi - great tutorial! still unsure if I will change to the Ruka fw though, a bit worried about stability. Will you be able to add additional cores to the stock firmware as well?
To answer my own question. You can only add new cores with this custom firmware.
6:36 some crashing noise in the background... Late night on my headphones I thought someone had broken into my house. Ran downstairs looking for intruders. Then I realized it was you not me.
I think that's my wife putting away dishes in the background. Sorry about that!
In the written guide, you give a link to the latest RetroArch cores and suggest replacing with newer ones, but how do you tell if they are newer? All of the cores in the SD card archive have a data of 05/07/21, which is the date that the archive was created, and there's no guarantee that the latest cores were used to create that archive. Or just replace them all to be safe?
Hello,
I'm trying to install Ruka's cf, but links to the programs needed for the update (including drivers and RKDEVTOOL) no longer work.
Could you share them to me if you still have them?
Thank you.
fantastic stuff this is amazing! has there been any further improvements on this custom firmware?
hello, in my CFW seems does not have shaders, all the folders are empty, please help
@Teamruka doesn't exist on Telegram, any idea or advice would be useful
Hello, I read your page, you said the SD is only for storing games, so If I just want to change the card I don't have to make an image?
, hey man ,, whats that clear hand held in the background called?
great vid ;) just 2 small tips... found.000/found.xxx are broken file (after windows scan), can be deleted. And stop using winrar unlimited shareware! try 7zip! opensource, free and far better..
Good to know about the found.000 files, I'll get them out of there! I use 7zip too, I just can't break my habit of using WinRAR for simple tasks. Old habits die hard! Thanks for the feedback :)
@@RetroGameCorps and again thank for your great video! Check their discord (storage..) , there is an improvement pack for A12 that fix and improve ruka cfw (bezel of course and some tweak for resolution, kiosk mode (so it doesnt write/corrupt ini file), etc.. some tweak could be imported to A13 I think.. take a lot at it if you got time!
this normie uses windows to review & do EVERYTHING,
and you lot expect him to use FOSS archiver? LOL
I followed the steps to the letter, but when I try to run a game all I get is a blank screen. Any ideas on what I did wrong or why it happens? BTW, Love your videos!
Would be interested in cfw if they can work out the kinks with hdmi out. I really like the idea of having a "switch experience" with this unit. Especially on a CRT tv - oh man!
That would be a lot of fun! I'm keeping an eye out for updates.
Hello Russ, Thank you for the great video. I think I have watched this video like 5 times! I was wondering If you have any updates done to your A13. I Have a A12 and I play this over the TV.
Friend, please help me, I saw your video and tried to install it on my Powkiddy because it gave me an error, the screen has a strange stripe on the right, I would like to update the system to the factory default, can you help me do this?
Hi Russ, I reverted back to the stock firmware and now for some reason my back and volume down buttons have switched in function. Just wondering if you experienced this and any fix would be must appreciated, it's messing with my OCD.
I meant much appreciated...OCD again!
@@GolfTechie79 I had the same issue after the the CFW didn't work for me. Download the files from the description in this video and flash the Rev2_E version(also shown how in the video). Should fix things. th-cam.com/video/A3kN288t-qU/w-d-xo.html
Being a RockChip you could run EmuElec or Batocera so so easy, just use the right ".dtb" for that chip
Same thing on Android TV Boxes
I now have Batocera Running
I'm thinking of getting an A13 and would love to have Batocera running on it. What .dtb did you use? Any other tips on getting setup?
@@pol4195 All the info is on Telegram
@@MrJaz8088 Cool, thanks mate
Does the firmware work on Powkiddy X2? It seem to have the same interface and running retro arch base.
I have heard the firmware boots, but that the controls don't work. So it's still a work in progress!
Awesome video any updates on a custom firmware that allows HDMI out?
Yes, there is a new version with working HDMI: github.com/Ruka-CFW/rk3128-cfw
@@RetroGameCorps Thanks man
QUESTION!!! So I bought this system, but the SD card inside it was cracked... Is there a way to aquire the original stock image to put on another SD??? Because I can't get the Team Ruka firmware, I'm basically stuck with a dud item...
Send me an email, retrogamecorps (at) gmail
Hey sir... can you make a video tutorial on how to install Batocera OS on it...? i saw some videos that do this, but im not sure if its true or not. And also they do not provide basic info on how to install it. If you do sir found time to do it,i really appreciate it and thank you..! happy gaming..!
Edit - It's fixed. I pieced together my own firmware update using the Team Ruka resources and eventually got it back to factory spec! Thanks for the help everyone!
After flashing the A13 to the original firmware after futzing around with the Team Ruka build a while I ended up bricking my A13.
It appears to be stuck in connect mode even after powering down. I get a blank screen and I can connect it to my PC, but it won't flash any memory locations, test or reset device, or do anything else in the Rockchip Android tool but recognize that the chip is there.
I'm trying to power it down but its taking forever since its not drawing any power. I'm ready to open it up and disconnect the battery instead. Anyone else have issues like this with the A13 (or its sister products like the A12) and know if there is a way to get it out of connect mode?
Hi, please can you help me:
I`ve messed around with my A13 and now my Screen is like crazy.
Can i restore to the original A13 Firmware?
Thanx !
could you please upload/share your custom firmware update, as there's a growing number of us who bitterly regret the custom firmware. .......please man, help!
@@segafrog On the Team Ruka Warehouse telegram there is a full and splitted A13 firmware. You should be able to use that and the android uploaded they have available there to restore your A13. Mine took a long time because the actual uploader on the A13 got corrupted and it didn't even turn on the screen when I powered it, so I had to figure out some deeper level stuff. The good news is that the chip in the A13 has a printed ROM that makes it hard to totally brick. I honestly have no idea how I got it to work, I just kept futzing with it until it did...
@@AverageDrafter cool thanks v much for the info, ...but i gotta say, i had some real luck this evening.... i changed my SD card format to EXT4 and i'm now not having any problems/issues at all!.. so for now i'm gonna leave the custom firmware on there, but will definitely try your process if all goes to crap again. Thanks pal, ......and i can definitely confirm that EXT4 is the way to go for anyone using CFW!
got my A13 today! Is there a film over the screen or is that a screen protector?
In the corner there's a tab that pulled off saying "Step 2 please peek of this ask after application completed" but JUST THAT came off. I don't want to risk damaging the screen but it does look like there's a film on it rather than a screen protector.
Can anyone confirm?
Yeah it's a film. Not sure if it's a protector or not, it took a little muscle to get off but it did produce a clearer picture when I took it off.
@@RetroGameCorps Yup, I managed to get it off tonight with the dull tip of a butter knife. I was really worried I could damage the screen but it came off with a little bit of effort once I got a corner.
That leads me to wonder - do you think there is an IPS panel that one could buy and mod in? Once sanwa parts are modded in, the LCD honestly becomes the worst thing about it.
@@SatoshiMatrix1 I’ve thought about that too. I guess the trick will be finding a display that fits and a ribbon cable that matches too.
@@RetroGameCorps If you do, I'd love to see a guide on how to do that too.
I just flashed my firmware to my A13 today... Im still getting use to the configurations... I was wondering if for example im playing an Snes ROM and i wanna play Sega megadrive roms... Do i have to manually switch Cores or will the system do it automatically?
If you create playlists you can just browse the game folders and launch games without loading cores at all. But yes, you should also be able to just 'load content' and it will pick the right core for you (or ask you if it isn't sure).
I have PowKiddy A13 but so far I was a little bit scared of this flashing :)
I wonder if it's possible to put inside PowKiddy A13 some Raspberry / Odroid, connect the screen, buttons and then install some Batocera etc.
But why does n64 work in original firmware then and now not as u say?
Are the buttons 24mm or 30mm????
Hi.Can i have MAME 32 arcades games into A13 console? Thank you
Any other news on this item? Looks great.
Any reportedly working SNES cores with this CFW yet?
Telegram tells me there isn't a user with the name TeamRuka. Do you have another download link? Google just comes up with your guide, some reddit posts that also tell me to check that Telegram account, and not much else. There is a rukabot, but I don't know what the commands are.
Can I use an SD card from my a12 into my a13?
I didn't find the n64 cores. Are there in this ruka version?
can we flash the console with a usb a cable to usb c with a thunderbolt 3 port without buying the specific cable
the link of usb driver is dead
looks like wip has been slow-there's no hdmi update for the new firmware yet. Last development version was at May 2022, 1year ago (Git Hub).
I would like to see you play some video files with that Powkiddy A13.
Batocera is available for the A12/13.
And also for the PS5000/7000
The a12/13 version works on my Coolbaby RS18 as its same OS and UI but doesnt run the best.
It works but can be laggy, and some of the easier systems dont work well, while some do.
Couldnt get PS1 to run but they do with the stock OS.
Oh yeah, all boots and runs from the SD card so if you still have your PS7000 give it a try.
Also, if you have the X2 Id love for you try it on that and let me know how it runs.
Youd need to also use the a12/13 version for the X2..same OS, like the a12/13 and RS18.
Good thing is it runs off SD card so no harm in trying.
If you get around to it anyway.
@@fonzitheman Thanks for the info, I had no idea! I gave my PS7000 to my brother, I still have my X2 and my Coolbaby RS18.
I was also wrong about the Powkiddy X39, it's actually a decent handheld!
@@jonathonearl482
If you give Batocera a go on the X2 let me know how it runs.
Would be tempted to get one if it runs OK. 😁
(You would need to flash the Powkiddy A12/13 version to a micro SD card )
@@fonzitheman I'll let you know what happens, if I decide to upgrade the firmware.
@@jonathonearl482
Well, you only to flash it to a spare micro SD card. If it ends up a bit crap you only have to put your original back in and "Bickety Bam! " back to normal ☺️
Go on, do it now. Ill just wait here til you get back 😉
Noticed the Ruka has several posts to their github, and wonder how much has changed from this post.
Can you create a Favorites list of games you play the most with this firmware?
I'm not sure if you're asking whether it's possible to make a favorites list (it is!), or if you want my personal favorites. If you're asking for the latter, I've mostly been playing arcade fighting games, beat-em-ups, and driving games (like Mario Kart SNES and R4 Ridge Racer PS1). I thought Tony Hawk games would be fun on this but they are NOT :D
@@RetroGameCorps lol i was asking if you can create a favorites list with the new firmware as what came with the a13 doesnt allow that... I play alot of the same also...
Any update of dreamcast emu works on it?
I haven't seen anything yet, but I haven't been up to speed on the custom firmware. I know there's a new version out with HDMI out but I haven't tested it yet.
How to factory reset
Anyone know how to get your battery % to display on retroarch? Hate not knowing how much power I have and my a13 just shuts down on me. Cheers.
can someone upload these files to google drive or something? why do u have to message a guy for it, he will get crazy with all these messages. That's why i think he deleted his account it says User @TeamRuka not found when trying to message him in Telegram.
PLEASE UPLOAD THE FILES.
the link for android tool and driver is error. Can anyone please update the new link for these? I will be very appreciated!
This video is no longer useful/relevant. The telegram group no longer exists and on github it says devices made/ordered after Dec 2021 are not supported and it will brick the device. The menus are all in Chinese and I can't remap the controls so when I play street fighter the light punch and medium punch are reversed and I cannot fix it. If anyone can help/post an updated guide would be much appreciated, didn't find much via google.
th-cam.com/video/FzszXaCt6ug/w-d-xo.html
@@Wileo it works, thank you!
Hi, nice video you make 😁. Can you make material about handheld Odroid go Super? It looks quite interesting, and I wonder if it is better than Rg351p XD
Most definitely -- I preordered one, so hopefully it'll come soon.
hello, how do you exit kiosk mode?
Hi, I believe it is the konami code (up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, b, a, b, a, start), but I've never had to do it myself.
@@RetroGameCorps thank you very much :)
How connect ps7000 in pc for use cfw?
hello It is possible to play the konami run and gun arcade game on this machine ?
Yes, it worked fine. I had some problems getting the controls to work on the team selection screen, but gameplay worked fine. There was a little audio crackling but otherwise it played smoothly.
Did the giveaway ended?
Yes, I drew the winners last night, and informed them. Sorry you weren't picked, but thank you for participating!
OK. So this unit already comes shipped with N64. So why can't they just borrow from that portion of code, files, etc.?
It doesn’t come shipped with N64, unfortunately.
shouldnt you be able to use a micro usb cable instead of that usb kinda thing theres a micro usb charging port on the back
This cfw direct boot to retroarch,, but you can't do a safe shutdown, I always get SD card corrupt
You need to use ext4 partition instead of fat32
@@fakemaria Thanks, it works
Had this firmware for a while now...is anybody else experiencing the backlight permanently being on 100%? There's no options to change it because there's no system options when you install this firmware. Help would be GREATLY appreciated.
Every time I try to play something I get the error that the rom cannot be extracted. Anyone?
it might mean that the rom isn't exactly correct for the emulator trying to extract it. ..Try something like a NES rom, and see if you can run it with any of the various NES emulators. ...tbh i'm back on the official powkiddy firmware now, because i hated the team ruka custom unstable unpredictable firmware
@@segafrog Once I changed the temp directory to the SD Card it worked. I Think I'm going to try to implement some of the bezels from the bezel project for this platform. Seems like it would be awesome.
Does this work with the A12?
Yes! It's actually made for the A12 but luckily the A13 works too :)
Maybe you should change the title so that it's easier for people to find?
@@RainerK.good idea, thanks!
Can this thing handle Sega Saturn games?
Hi, unfortunately Saturn isn’t playable on this device.
@@RetroGameCorps 1. Noooooooo! 2. Thank you for the speedy reply! ....but mostly Nooooo. Are there any large screen handhelds that can?
It's so strange. Everything is ok on first boot. After the next boot everything is f*cked up. Assets gone, settings gone... Seems like Retroarch destroys itself?! 🧐
P.S. (They should just change the original FW to disable blur and I would be fine)
Why don’t you sell this on eBay
yeah,how can I play dreamcast,ps1, and n64 with only 1 joystick and 6 buttons?
Well, I think it's more about specific games. Racing and fighting games on those systems are still viable options. I have 20 PS1 games on here and they're really fun to play. I was hoping Tony Hawk games would be fun too but they're actually a pain when using a joystick.
I thing I can hope from Powkiddy is that they make one of these that can play saturn games well. Mainly for Die Hard Arcade(its horrible in mame2003)
you can plug a gamepad (there is usb port), sometime buttons settings need to be reconfigured but most common are working out of the box
Hi, anyone who has the original files / img file for the sd-card? My SD-Card = ☠️
Hi, I would check with the Telegram channel.
I have a A12 with Team Mupoong CFW from Sept 2020, i was going to give this a try, but Telegram and Links are DEAD.!
Hmm the A12 is not Displaying Team Ruka right at all, colours and size is wrong, and have coloured bars on the side of screen
I guess i have a IPS screen, so nothing work's right, i know its a A12 Rev 2 with the Return button in the Middle and not and the End
Winner Winner Chicken Dinner,
My A12 Rev.2 with IPS is now Team Ruka
have you seen this its a new motherboard for the powkiddy....RETROPIE For POWKIDDY A13 A12 Arcade Game Console Main Board Motherboard 32GB Pre-install 9000 Games
ace, thanks for mentioning this.... i bought one (£30 with free postage) and it's on its way. ..i'll report back here to comment on it when i receive & try it, ...(which will probably take about two weeks from now)
update: it worked out great!. ....i bought the main board (AliExpress) and swapping it out with the old one was easy with no soldering required etc... it has stock firmware (thank God!), because i hated the team ruka firmware (so many issues/problems), ..and also i had previously accidentally broken my on/off switch, so replacing the board solved that problem aswell 😊
@@nikebs7326 does this mean it is a retropie chip or still rockchip?
@@fr3847 hi, sorry for late reply, it's rockchip
@@nikebs7326 Interesting - is battery life worse or better?
Anyone tried this CFW on the POWKIDDY J13?
Atomiswave?
Great video! You have a spelling error #retoarch
If you ever put a raspberry pi in it please do a step by step video.
Honestly I don't find any of these custom firmwares to be worth using as they are incomplete & buggy. Stock features are broken with these, such as HDMI output. Yeah, no thanks. The stock firmware is honestly just fine if you can load your own English games on to it vs the Chinese ones.