How To Install Lakka

If you’re looking for a fun way to use an old PC, Lakka can turn it into an amazing retro gaming machine. This easy setup doesn’t require any advanced Linux knowledge, and you can even use the controllers you already have lying around to play your favorite old school games. Here’s a step-by-step guide to making it happen.

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How To Install Lakka On Windows

I’ve got lakka running on a cubietruck with an old 4 gig SD card (class 4) and an old 128 gig sata HDD. I was wondering if there was a way to install lakka directly to the HDD and maybe have some minimal bootloader on the SD. Installation Preparation. Head over to acceppt the disclaimer. Select GNU/Linux and then 'PC' (or if you got a box with dedicated hardware which is supported). 32 or 64bit depends on your hardware. Download the image and save it at your download location.

What You’ll Get with Lakka and How It’s Different From Other Emulators

Lakka and RetroPie are fairly simple to use, but Recalbox wins with its installation which doesn’t even require mounting an image file. Since it’s as intuitive as dragging and dropping files, Recalbox trounces both RetroPie and Lakka. Introduction to Linux - A Hands on Guide This guide was created as an overview of the Linux Operating System, geared toward new users as an exploration tour and getting started guide, with exercises at the end of each chapter.

Lakka is a lightweight Linux-based operating system derived from OpenELEC (a version of the Kodi home theater software) that combines the best retro game emulators out there into one, ready-to-install system. Once you’ve got it all set up, you’ll have an all-in-one game console for emulating everything from Atari games to Playstation games. Here’s a complete list of the systems you can emulate:

3DO (4DO)
Playstation (Beetle PSX)
SNES / Super Famicom (bsnes-mercury Balanced, SNES9x Next)
Nintendo DS (DeSmuMe)
Arcade (FBA)
Game Boy / Game Boy Color (Gambatte)
Sega Master System / Game Gear / Mega Drive / CD (Genesis Plus GX)
Lynx (Handy)
Neo Geo Pocket / Color (Mednafen Neopop)
PC Engine / TurboGrafx 16 (Mednafen PCE FAST)
PC-FX (Mednafen PC-FX)
Virtual Boy (Mednafen VB)
WonderSwan / Color (Mednafen Cygne)
Nintendo 64 (Mupen64Plus)
NES / Famicom (Nestopia)
PSP (PlayStation Portable)
Atari 7800 (ProSystem)
Atari 2600 (Stella)
Game Boy Advance (VBA-M)
Atari Jaguar (Virtual Jaguar)

After you load up your system with some ROMs, you’ll be able to navigate Lakka’s menus and your games with nothing but a controller. In fact, Lakka is similar to the RetroPie build we’ve featured before, but with one major difference: Lakka can be installed on a lot more than just the tiny Raspberry Pi mini-computer. It supports a ton of different devices, including almost any normal PC.

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What You Need

To install Lakka on a PC, you’ll need a few things:

A Mac or PC to download Lakka and create the USB thumb drive installer.
An old PC (or other device listed above) that you don’t mind dedicating as your Lakka console. Installing Lakka means installing it as the OS for the system. Do not install it on a machine you need for other things (there’s an alternate method we’ll cover later if you don’t have an extra PC to do this with).
An empty flash drive at least 512MB in size (at least 2 GB is probably best). You will not be able to use this thumb drive for anything else during this process, so back up everything you have on it before you wipe it.
A USB keyboard for setup and some advanced options and settings on your Lakka console.
A router (to transfer your ROMs via your home network).
At least one ethernet cable (for connecting your Lakka machine to the router; Wi-Fi is not supported yet).
A monitor or TV (if you’re not installing Lakka on a laptop).
A copy of the free 7-Zip software (if you’re a Windows user without an alternative for unzipping files).
A copy of the free software Win32DiskImager (if you’re a Windows user).
A PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, or other controller that can connect via USB.

Step One: Prepare Your Dedicated Lakka Machine

It’s worth repeating that installing Lakka on a PC means wiping whatever is currently on the hard drive. Be sure to back up any data you need before you dive in. If you’re going to throw in a different hard drive for this setup, though, you’re all set.

Before you can do anything else, you need to identify what kind of CPU you have in the machine you’re installing Lakka on. There are different packages to download for 32-bit and 64-bit systems, so it’s important. If the machine you’re going to be using still has an operating system on it, it’s pretty easy to check:

Windows XP / 7 / Vista / 8: Open the Start Menu > right-click computer > select Properties. You should see 32-bit or 64-bit next to System Type.
Intel-based Mac: click the Apple menu > About This Mac > More Info… > find the Processor Name section and compare the name to this chart from Apple.

With these two things taken care of, you’re ready to get Lakka installed.

Step Two: Download and “Burn” Lakka to a USB Drive

Hop on your normal computer (the one you aren’t installing Lakka on). Whether you’re on Windows or Mac, downloading and installing Lakka is pretty simple:

Download either the 32-bit Lakka package or the 64-bit Lakka package from the Lakka web site.
Unzip the package to get the Lakka image. On Windows, you can use a program like 7-Zip. On OS X, you can just double-click the file to unzip it.
If you’re on Windows, insert your flash drive, open Win32DiskImager, and set the Lakka .img as your Image File. Then select your flash drive as the Device and select Write.
If you’re on OS X, open a terminal (/Applications/Utilities/Terminal) and run diskutil list to note your current drives and partitions. Then insert your flash drive and run diskutil list again to identify which disk is your flash drive and note it. Go to the Lakka .img file location on your machine within the terminal and run sudo dd if=Lakka-*.img of=/dev/diskN (where diskN is the name of your USB drive you previously identified. Make extra sure you have the right disk name!). After a while, you’ll get a message saying how much was transferred, and you’ll have control of your prompt again.
Eject and remove the flash drive.

Now the Lakka installer is ready.

Step Three: Boot from Your USB Drive and Run the Installer

When you’re ready, go ahead and plug the USB drive, a keyboard, and a monitor into the PC you want to use for Lakka. Then, get ready to boot your Lakka PC to from your USB drive in the system’s BIOS:

Restart your Lakka PC and wait for the first screen to pop up. You should see a quick message that says something like “Press F12 to Choose Boot Device” somewhere on the screen. Press it as soon as you see it.
A menu should then appear with a list of things you can boot from. Highlight your USB drive and press Enter.
If you don’t see your USB drive as an option, select the option for “BIOS Settings” or “BIOS Setup” (you may need to restart and hit a different key at boot to find this menu). Go to “Boot Devices,” or something similar, and make sure booting from USB drives is enabled.

Once you’re able to boot from the USB drive, follow these steps to install Lakka as the PC’s new OS:

Boot from the USB drive and you should see the Lakka Boot Menu.
Select Run Installer, select OK, and then select (1) Quick Install OpenELEC.tv (don’t worry about any of the other options).
Now select the drive to install it on (you probably only have one option) > select OK > you should see Lakka start to install.

When it’s finished, you’ll be asked to reboot. Select reboot and remove the USB drive before it boots up again. It will quickly reboot again on its own, but after that you should see the clean, red screen of the Lakka main menu.

Alternate Option: Run Lakka Live from Your USB Drive

When you opened the Lakka Boot Menu, you probably noticed that there is an option to Run Live. If you’re not interested in dedicating an entire machine to being your retro game console, you can run the entire OS from the USB drive as an alternative, without wiping your original machine.

When you select Run Live, you’re greeted with the same exact thing as when you install it. Once you load some games onto the USB drive, you’ll be able to boot into the drive, load Lakka, and play them on almost any computer with the same type of system (if you have the 64-bit image, you can run it on almost any 64-bit system). You can even keep your saved games and screenshots all on the USB drive. This great for getting double use out of a laptop when you’re traveling. Pop your USB in, boot into Lakka, and play retro games on your long flight. When you’ve had your fill, you can reboot into your normal operating system and do some work per usual.

Pro tip: Running Lakka live from the USB drive is a great way to test whether or not your hardware is capable of running Lakka, too. Lakka should work on most PCs, but the developers do mention that hardware can vary wildly, so there’s no guarantee that every system out there will work.

Step Four: Add ROMs to Lakka from Your Primary Computer

Assuming you already have some ROMs (or game files) of your own, you’ll need to transfer them from your primary computer to your new Lakka console. To do this, make sure your primary computer is connected to your home network either via Wi-Fi or direct connection to your router and follow these steps:

Make sure your Lakka machine is powered on and connected to your router via direct ethernet connection only. Lakka does not support Wi-Fi at the moment.
Find your ROMs on your primary computer and copy them. Here is a list of currently supported file types.
If your primary computer uses Windows, select Start, then Computer, find Network in the list on the left-hand side, and select LAKKA. Then open the ROMs folder and paste your ROMs. Be sure to let the transfer finish. Windows had a hard time finding Lakka over the network a few times for me, but I was able to get around this by typing “//lakka” into Windows Explorer and pressing Enter.
If your primary computer uses OS X, open Finder, locate LAKKA in the list on the left-hand side, head to the ROMs folder, and paste your ROMs there. Be sure to let the transfer finish.
On your Lakka console, head to the settings menu furthest to the left and scroll all the way down to Quit RetroArch and select it.

Lakka should reboot and when it comes back up, you’ll see all of your ROMs ready to go. Just head to a game you want play, hit B or O (circle) on your gamepad to select it, and hit B or O again to run it.

Controllers and Other Features

Lakka is designed to automatically recognize almost any USB controller you plug in. Any PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, or Xbox One controller is guaranteed to work out of the box. You can even use them wirelessly if you have a bluetooth dongle. While most of the controllers I tested out worked just fine, there were a couple surprises.

A Nintendo Wii U Pro Controller plugged in via USB did not work at all, which isn’t all that surprising. I was surprised, however, when my Afterglow PC controller (that looks exactly like a Xbox 360 controller) didn’t work either. For the controllers that do work, however, if they have a “home” button—like the Xbox and the Playstation controllers—it will pause your game state and take you back to the main OS menu.

The best surprise I encountered was when I tested out actual Super Nintendo controllers and they worked flawlessly. I used this USB SNES controller adapter for PC from Mayflash and had no issues whatsoever. It’s pretty neat to be able to play the classics with the classics.

Lakka comes with some other pretty interesting features baked in. You can save screenshots and even record videos of your games. Of course, the videos are in the ancient BSAVE bitmap format, so I’m not sure what you can do with those yet (if you do let me know). It also has a built in “rewind” function. If you have it enabled with a keyboard plugged in, you can hit the “r” key to rewind whatever just happened in the game. If you missed a jump, got killed by an enemy, or made any other mistake, you can just rewind out of it and give it another try. It’s a pretty handy feature for those tough games you want to get the nostalgia from, but don’t want to bang your head against.

Further Resources

You should have everything you need to run or install Lakka on your PC. If you need help or you’re interested in more advanced tips, there are a few places you can go:

Other Lakka installation tutorials: If you want to learn how to install on Raspberry Pis and other devices, here are instructions for those setups.
LibRetro Forums: For troubleshooting or other advanced questions.
RetroZone: A great source for old-school controller adapters and USB controllers.

Illustration by Tara Jacoby.

Scroll down to “Information”

Select “Network Information”

Your IP Address will be displayed, write it down because we’ll need it later.

Go to your PC and open an Explorer window.

Type in “youripaddress” on the address bar.

Enter “root” as the username and password when you’re asked for them.

Go down to the ROMs folder.

Create a new folder, use the name of the console as the folder’s name. IE: “Nintendo 64”

Place the ROM inside said folder.

Go back to your Raspberry Pi.

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Go to the Lakka menu.

Scroll down to “Load Content”

Select “Select File and Detect Core”

Scroll down to your console(s) and choose the one you want to use.

Select the ROM you want to play in said console.

Choose “Load Archive With Core”

You’ll be presented with a choice of two, select the first option, if it doesn’t works, go back and select the second one.

Congratulations, you’ve just installed Lakka into your Raspberry Pi, configured it, installed a ROM and that’s it for this Instructable.

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