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Explanation of best MAME Version for TVs
Tilzs:
--- Quote from: Howard_Casto on July 30, 2004, 02:01:43 am ---I'll tell you what most people don't know.
Advance mame is for dos users.
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and Linux
Howard_Casto:
--- Quote from: Minwah on August 02, 2004, 04:43:57 pm ---
I must admit HC, I thought the refresh option was added fairly recently (maybe the same time as zoom). I'm pretty sure they never used to be there.
Either way, there must have been a reason for SmoothMAME, I'm sure Twisty wouldn't have gone to the effort of doing it if a simple ini option could've done it...
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Nope... it's been in there since around .36b17. Mind you nobody ever uses these settings properly anyway. I am still amazed of people complaining about mame setting the wrong resolution when you shouldn't be letting mame set the resolution in the first place. (Or at least under normal circumstances.)
I know what smooth mame was for, it just didn't make any sense. Smooth mame gets games to run at 60fps, it has little or nothing to do with the refresh rate. All running a game at 60fps that isn't meant to run at that speed does is render the screen more, thus putting a worse tax on your processor and give the input scheme more chances to poll, thus loosing accuracy on both ends. It's soul purpose was to try to eliminate screen tearing on side scrollers with odd refresh rates, only it didn't work.
Twisty had good intentions, it's just his experiment didn't pan out. That happens sometimes. But there's no point arguing over if it works in the present to try to defend his good name. His name is still good, he just made a stinker at one point. ;)
Gradius:
OK, I'll try to explain it so that you can understand it. For games to run smoothly, they must run synced to the monitor refresh. For this you should use vsync or triple buffer, otherwise you'll experience tearing on screen. Now, this is with 60hz games, and supposing the res mode you're using in your PC is 60hz (120 hz will also be ok, but there will be some pixel doubling in moving objects). Any problems so far? OK. Now, what happens if the emulated game runs at 57hz, or at 59,63hz (cps2). There will be a mismatch between the emulated game rate and the actual rate you've set. Result: hiccups in scrolls and moving sprites. The higher the mismatch is, the more frequent the hiccups will be. Solution: set exact refresh rates for every game, which is really a pain considering the variety of res modes and refresh rates there are. Easy solution: tweak these games to be pure 60hz (they will run a percentage faster up to 60). This is what SMOOTHMAME is for. I can't understand that you say that SmoothMAME was useless, because, in my opinion, it has been the best and most useful MAME build I've ever used, and I couldn't be more grateful to Twisty for releasing his modified drivers during all this time. If you are 100% purists and don't want any speed tweak, I understand that you don't use global 60hz, but if you want smoothness and perfect performance, it's the way to go.
Minwah:
--- Quote from: Howard_Casto on August 03, 2004, 02:03:05 am ---Nope... it's been in there since around .36b17. Mind you nobody ever uses these settings properly anyway. I am still amazed of people complaining about mame setting the wrong resolution when you shouldn't be letting mame set the resolution in the first place. (Or at least under normal circumstances.)
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I stand corrected :)
It surprises me also how many people just leave the MAME defaults (many not bothering to even create mame.ini!)
seibu:
--- Quote from: Gradius on August 04, 2004, 02:12:01 am ---OK, I'll try to explain it so that you can understand it. For games to run smoothly, they must run synced to the monitor refresh. For this you should use vsync or triple buffer, otherwise you'll experience tearing on screen. Now, this is with 60hz games, and supposing the res mode you're using in your PC is 60hz (120 hz will also be ok, but there will be some pixel doubling in moving objects). Any problems so far? OK. Now, what happens if the emulated game runs at 57hz, or at 59,63hz (cps2). There will be a mismatch between the emulated game rate and the actual rate you've set. Result: hiccups in scrolls and moving sprites. The higher the mismatch is, the more frequent the hiccups will be. Solution: set exact refresh rates for every game, which is really a pain considering the variety of res modes and refresh rates there are. Easy solution: tweak these games to be pure 60hz (they will run a percentage faster up to 60). This is what SMOOTHMAME is for. I can't understand that you say that SmoothMAME was useless, because, in my opinion, it has been the best and most useful MAME build I've ever used, and I couldn't be more grateful to Twisty for releasing his modified drivers during all this time. If you are 100% purists and don't want any speed tweak, I understand that you don't use global 60hz, but if you want smoothness and perfect performance, it's the way to go.
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Thank you. Or to put it another way, go and play Pac-Land on an Arcade monitor using an Arcade VGA under windows. You will not be able to eliminate the tearing completely, no matter what you do.
Now, do the same thing with SmoothMAME in Windows, or AdvanceMAME under Linux or DOS. No tearing, see.
Also, to call AdvanceMAME a thing of the past is a bit rich. AdvanceMAME under windows is certainly a bit redundant, but AdvanceMAME under Linux or DOS is still the only way to get truly authentic video output. It's also the only way to enjoy Med Res games without ugly, inauthentic hardware stretch.