[SOLVED] Wrong resolution on second Screen after starting GM

[Max_FS]

Dear all,

while using two screens (CRT as main screen and LCD as marquee-screen) I still have some issues since using CRT EmuDriver and no longer ArcadeVGA.

While the frontend (AttractMode) is running, the resolution of my LCD screen is 1366x768. When starting a game with Groovymame, resolution of the LCD screen switches to 640x480. This results in a blue screen for some seconds and a box displaying the resolution is shown for some additional seconds. Both is annoying. Additionally, the marquee artwork is smaller, while Groovymame is running.

I made some configurations with regard to the resolutions (which I already had before I changed from ArcadeVGA to CRT EMUDriver).

In Attract Mode I activated the Plugin Multimon and set "Monitor 2: Width" to 1366 and "Monitor 2: Height" to 294 and "Preserve aspect ratio" to no. With that, the marquee is properly displayed in the frontend whether I use ARCADEVGA or CRT EMUDriver. For explanation: Height is set to 294 because my screen was cut to three parts (768/3=294).

Now to proceed with GroovyMame:
In mame.ini I set resolution of the second screen to auto. I also tried 1366x768 and 1366x294 but it did not prevent switching to 640x480 on second screen and even made it look worse.ht
Then I have lay-files for every game. In those I set heigth and with to 1366x768 for the whole screen and to 1366x768 for the area of the screen where to display the marquee artwork.
Can anybody help with this? I already searched the forum but did not find a solution as I only have the wrong resolution in the game but not in the frontend.
I also attached a log file made while running a random game.

Many thanks and best regards
Max


My setup:
ASUS Z87-A Mainboard
Intel Pentium G3258 CPU
Sapphire Radeon HD 6450 GPU with CRT EMU-Driver, flashed with Atom-15
Windows 7
Sony Trinitron CRT as first screen
Stretched LCD as second screen
GroovyMame (version 0.218)
AttractMode (version 2.6.1)

[Max_FS]

In addition:
Now I am able to prevent switching resolution on the second screen ba setting resolution in mame.ini for screen 1 to 1366x768. I don't know why this didn't work before.
However, when I do this, the picture on the marquee screen looks completely different from how it looks in the frontend. It starts in the middle of the screen (vertical) and is cut off by half.

Does anyone have an idea how to fix that?

[Max_FS]

I think it is fixed now and i did it by changing the values in the lay-files at random. I changed the bounds in the first line from "x=0 y=0 width=1366 height=768" to "x=0 y=240 width=1366 height=768" and in the other line from "x=0 y=0 width=1366 height=256" to "x=0 y=0 width=1366 height=474".

Now it works, however I do not understand why it helped. The settings I had before made more sense to me. I also do not see any correlation between the values.
So I do not need any more help to fix it but if anyone can explain it I may be interested 

[Calamity]

Hi Max_FS,

Sorry I couldn't help. From what I'm seeing, your monitor reports 1366x768 instead of 1366x256 (I'm assuming 294 was a typo if you meant 768/3).
 
So for the OS your monitor is still 16:9. It'll create a frame buffer of 1366x768 and attempt to center the marquee in there, thus the centering issue.

I can't figure out why the new numbers got it working because I haven't touched the layout format since long, but it's clear that someway you managed to recenter the picture by doing that.

[Max_FS]

Hi Calamity,

thanks for your reply. Yes, my monitor still "thinks" he has a resolution of 1366x768. I heard that the display was made by cutting a display in three parts so every single part works with 1366x768. This is also the resolution I have to choose in the Windows options. As far as I understand it, the values in the lay-files define to only use a certain part of the 768 (one third as it was cut into three parts).

However, I know found out, that for a very few games it won't work with the values I posted below. When comparing the games, they all have in common interlaced mode. They all have a vertical orientation (while other games with vertical orientation and without interlaced mode work) and most of them are based on the galaxian-driver.

It seems to be the last little issue in connection with my problem to be solved.

[Max_FS]

OK, last addition:
For the interlaced games I have to use my old values in the lay-files to have them centered properly. Very confusing...