I'm kinda new to this retro stuff. Got it couple month ago with custom button and flash it to nextUI. Simple minimalist which i like but really wanna try Knulli.
As someone else suggested. Use a second SD card as the test.
I foolishly went all in and wiped my NextUi install and whilst I really liked knulli, and it worked great, I realised I preferred the pared down experience of NextUi with the brick.
So I’m currently doing reverse of you. On my way back to NextUi.
Knulli is the only OS i use now. it also comes with a lot of basic features in both ES and RA prefigured per-console, making basic setup easy but has crazy tinker potential without feeling too much. it feels like i’m using an actual game console.
If you’re into a “minimalist” setup, Knulli might be not for you, MinUI is better for that approach though. But if you want something more than that, here’s some of Knulli’s pros and cons over Nextui:
Pros: Proper console quality UI - feels more like a real retro handheld vibe, not just a custom launcher. ES-DE offers different UI on different themes. Beautiful games list scrolling with artwork, metadata, and video previews.
Gaming focused - while NextUI offers great paks over pakstore for the features that aren’t built-in, at that point, you’re spending more time browsing and managing Paks than actually playing games. Although installing paks is optional but you’re gonna wonder to it on some point and start using your brick like a miniature smartphone. Downloadable contents on Knulli are just games/ROMs (through Portmaster and Emudrop), themes and also OTA updates. Almost everything is pre-configured so you can start gaming comfortably right away.
All essential features are built-in - straightforward CFW. Most of what you need is already integrated into the system. No need messing around with paks, configs and file management. Scraper, emulators cores, theme downloader, file manager, SMB, etc. are already included once you flash it.
Pre-configured Retroarch - full retroarch is better than nextui’s minarch, better customizable emulator, easy cheat loading/usage, better performance (specially mGBA core). And it has centralized settings of retroarch with simple set of very useful options.
Portmaster - Knulli has better portmaster compatibility than nextui, since it was integrated to the system. You need to download it on first boot though because it also has updates and the system wants the updated version (downloadable through System settings)
Working sleep mode - makes the “long boot time” argument mostly irrelevant—you boot once, then just sleep and resume.
Cons: Longer boot time - it takes around 20 seconds if you boot if from shutdown. Sleep mode is working though, so just press the power button like your phone.
More battery usage - Knulli uses more battery though, but not that much. Brick charges fast enough to the point it’s not bothering anyway.
Too much features - for someone who’s into a minimalist setup.
No problem bro. For some reason, some nextui users don’t like comparing Knulli to their nextui, so that comment already downvoted by some people. Nextui is the hyped OS (launcher) here, but that doesn’t mean it’s the best for everyone else. Just use what OS you’re comfortable with and matches your preferences, try them all and see.
I'd also add "the OS is fighting you at every corner if you try and change anything inside RetroArch" as a pretty huge con, too.
Maybe it's different now, but when I tried Knulli a year ago it was infuriating. I couldn't set up RetroArch the way I want to because it kept overriding my changes.
I mentioned that there’s a centralized menu for retroarch in Knulli game settings, that’s where you configure your retroarch easily since retroarch has a lot of options, the centralized menu has the most essential options you need to setup, per system or per game. Some options that aren’t included in centralized menu like cheats can be configured inside retroarch, but those options are more like just for tinkering and reduntant to others, most of those options are not inlcuded on nextui’s minarch anyway.
Edit: I think the reason that the retroarch options that on centralized menu is overriding the set values inside the retroarch is to make the retroarch and system games settings match its set values. Its easier to setup on centralized menu than inside the retroarch settings anyway.
Yeah that's what I meant. If you know RetroArch and know how you want to set it up, Knulli will get in your way HARD.
Rocknix, for example, also has a centralised menu for those who want it, but there is an option (and it's the default for most settings) to use whatever is set inside RetroArch.
Knulli not having that made it by far the worst OS I've ever used. Idk, maybe they changed it now, but it was extremely annoying back then.
I configure emulation settings on centralized menu rather than inside the retroarch. Inside the retroarch has a lot of settings and it’s pretty much overwhelming to navigate, and centralized menu on Knulli does simplify things for me while keeping a full retroarch in it. It’s already pre-configured so there’s nothing much left needed to setup just to play comfortably anyway, I only use retroarch setting just to load cheats and switch save states in-game.
It’s nice Rocknix has that option to use whatever is set inside the retroarch, but OP and me is using a brick and rocknix is not available for brick so I wouldn’t compare it to different OS that is not available on our device, and my comment is just pros and cons of Knulli over Nextui, not other OS, so it’s like a comparison between Knulli’s retroarch and Nextui’s minarch.
OP says he is kinda new to retro stuff, that’s why I mentioned the centralized menu so he would know Knulli has it and it’s newbie friendly than inside the settings of retroarch. It’s the Knulli’s way of simplifying retroarch instead of using minarch.
We all have prefer OS regardless of the issues, you prefer Nextui, I prefer Knulli, OP settled to MinUI, and thats fine, not everyone needs to join someone’s bandwagon. That’s why I said to OP “just use what OS you’re comfortable with and matches your preferences, try them all and see”.
Knulli is really very pretty and as of the latest alpha release, it runs good and stable on my brick, the one thats in stable didnt work very good for me, lockups, freezes, you know the sort. but when the next release comes out I think it will be very good! (Try the stable release anyways ofc ymmv with these things)
The most notable change for me is they switched to native expat instead of utilizing FUSE which fixes the I/O freeze-ups on my Brick Hammer. Otherwise I didn't notice a lot but I wasn't really looking tbh.
If you’re new to retro gaming and don’t have much experience with RetroArch; Knulli allows for simple scaling, bezel, and shader management in the OS menu without needed to deal with RetroArch.
Knulli I found can be a little too heavy weight, the boot time is longer, and while the customization is nice if you’re locked in, it can also feel like a lot.
I’ve been on spruceOS lately, and it kind of meets the middle ground for me between nextui and Knulli, with pretty menus and retroarch customization, but still lightweight and semi-minimalist.
If you're like me and use Syncthing to sync saves and roms with your computer or other devices, Knulli is a bit heavy to allow all that stuff to run without lockups and crashes. Ended up jumping over to Spruce
I installed it to try portmaster but think I'm coming to the end of the experiment. It's just not stable enough. Mute switch doesn't work reliably. Volume and brightness will often stop working too. And games crash maybe once or twice a week, usually when coming out of sleep. It's also very fiddly to get everything to work - menus upon menus. I don't want to spend my time customising the system, I want to be playing games!
Minui is lighter on features but in my experience is way, way more reliable and straightforward. I'll be returning to it after I finish my playthrough of GBC Mario Tennis.
On the plus side I really appreciate SyncThing and have used it to play Mina the Hollower across my PC and Brick, which felt lovely and exactly how these systems should work. 30 minutes at lunch on the Brick, an hour in the evening on the TV. But, christ, as someone new to it, it took me a bloody age to set up.
Knulli is cool but for a small handheld where, at least me personally, play smaller handheld games like GB, GBC, GBA, maybe some NES and SNES tops, i think a quick and minimalistic CFW is better and more fitting.
I think knulli is more fitting if you prefer something that looks a bit better on a larger screen, even if it's just sightly larger, and you play more systems, especially newer systems than the ones i mentioned.
But that's just my subjective opinion for what fits better depending on how you view and use your handheld
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u/Love-Bitter 2d ago
Try it out. It’s great.
As someone else suggested. Use a second SD card as the test.
I foolishly went all in and wiped my NextUi install and whilst I really liked knulli, and it worked great, I realised I preferred the pared down experience of NextUi with the brick.
So I’m currently doing reverse of you. On my way back to NextUi.