Galaxian issue

[big10p]

Hi

I'm using groovyMAME .170 which is working great apart from Galaxian, which I can't seem to get to run completely smoothly. Occasionally the frame rate dips down briefly, causing a stutter in game play. This actually seems to affect all games using the galaxian driver e.g. UniWar S. I think this version of MAME has the 'galaxian hack' to get the stars to display correctly, etc. Maybe that has something to do with the issue?

Anyone know what settings I should use to get these games silky smooth? I've included my current mame.ini in case it helps.

Thanks.

[big10p]

Any ideas on this, guys? Do you use any special settings for these games?

[haynor666]

Why did You use custom monitor setup ?

[big10p]

Why did You use custom monitor setup ?

I think back along I had an issue with my monitor (MTC 9000) and I was tweaking values. However, the CRT range in the INI now matches the H9110 preset values. BTW, I am using the ASIO build of MAME, but I doubt that has a bearing on the issue.

Oh yeah, I also use a custom setup so that I can tweak the front/back porch in individual game INIs. i.e. some low resolutions have a black border at the top/bottom so I alter the front/back porch to put a border at the left/right, making the game display in the correct aspect ratio.

[haynor666]

How about use latest groovymame with portaudio and set ini from zero (copy only monitor range).

Game use 768x240@60.606 resolution so either it will use 768x240@60.606 or 2560x240@60.606 (if You are using super resolution).

With arcade_15 everything is fine.

[big10p]

Yes, I think I'm going to have to bite the bullet and upgrade to the latest GM, if that fixes the issue. It'll just be a major hassle, for various reasons.

How does portaudio work? Is there somewhere I can read up on it?

Thanks!

[haynor666]

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,152947.40.html

[big10p]

Cheers

[big10p]

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,152947.40.html

I'm struggling to decipher what I'm supposed to set the portaudio settings to, from that thread, TBH.

Firstly, I assume I have to download and install portaudio from this site?
http://www.portaudio.com/download.html

Then what do I set pa_device to? Windows WASAPI? Windows WDM-KS? I don't even know what those are, so no idea what to set. What about the latency settings, too?

This is all very confusing, so any help with what settings to use would be much appreciated. I'm using GM 183 on win7 64bit, BTW (if that makes a difference).

Thanks.

[big10p]

OK, I'm officially confused by this portaudio lark. The only downloads I can find are source code! Is it already compiled into MAME, or something? Is there a step-by-step guide anywhere to using portaudio?

[haynor666]

Portaudio does not need any driver or software. Groovymame (and official mame as well) has portaudio build in.

You need audio driver cabable of low level API like WDM-KS (starting from XP) or WASAPI (starting from Vista).

Examples from intealls post:

-sound portaudio -pa_api "Windows WDM-KS" -pa_latency 0.001 -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1
-sound portaudio -pa_api "Windows WASAPI" -pa_latency 0.003334 -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1
-sound portaudio -pa_api "Windows MME" -pa_latency 0.017 -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1
-sound portaudio -pa_api "Windows DirectSound" -pa_latency 0.017 -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1
-sound dsound -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1

Personally I use WDM-KS with Realtek HD audio

[big10p]

Portaudio does not need any driver or software. Groovymame (and official mame as well) has portaudio build in.

You need audio driver cabable of low level API like WDM-KS (starting from XP) or WASAPI (starting from Vista).

Examples from intealls post:

-sound portaudio -pa_api "Windows WDM-KS" -pa_latency 0.001 -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1
-sound portaudio -pa_api "Windows WASAPI" -pa_latency 0.003334 -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1
-sound portaudio -pa_api "Windows MME" -pa_latency 0.017 -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1
-sound portaudio -pa_api "Windows DirectSound" -pa_latency 0.017 -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1
-sound dsound -nosleep -priority 1 -audio_latency 1

Personally I use WDM-KS with Realtek HD audio

I'm using on-board sound, which I think may be Realtek too, but will have to check. I'll do some experimenting with those settings. Thanks.

[big10p]

I do have Realtek HD audio, but I seem to get lower latency reported in the log with those WASAPI settings. Thanks again for your help, haynor666.