Scrap PC- will this work for MAME?

[eyal8r]

Hey guys-
Wanted to get your opinions on this. Yes, I've read the 'What PC do I need FAQ" and am now unsure of a few things...

I have an OLD AMD 800Mhz cpu, some POS motherboard that doesn't even have a brand in it- ya know the kind- 2 PCI slots, 1 AGP, and an added in card for the 2 USB ports, onboard sound, etc. It also has a stick of 128MB PC100 ram. I also scrapped up an OLD SCHOOL ATI All in Wonder Pro board- from like 5+ years ago, but it DOES HAVE S-video out on it. I'm curious if this is good enough to run most of the MAME games or if I should just break down and spend $150 more for a nicer setup (I'd still have to buy a cd rom, case w/power supply, and a hard drive).  Will this work, or, should I shop for some POS system thats newer and more upgraded than this?  I dont plan on running any top of the line, newest MAME games, but, dont want to be too limited either...  your thoughts?
Thanks guys...
D

[JCKnife]

[paigeoliver]All the Mame .55 games will run on a Tandy calculator[/paigeoliver]

 

[IceCold]

That should be fine, just use an older mame version(like the poster before me alluded to)

[eyal8r]

well, I needed to run Analog+ for my TBs and spinners- will this work?

Or- do you guys know of a better system I can buy somewhere right now instead?
Thanks for the help!
D

[paigeoliver]

I have built countless cabinets and that computer is better than ANY computer I have ever used for mame, except for one, and I have built a lot of cabs.

[elvis]

Cache helps things along.  If it's an old Athlon T-Bird it should be OK.  If it's a Duron, then you might have some problems.

I built a system dedicated to vertical games from a celeron 733 the other week that ran most games pre-1990 just fine.  You will have problems with newer/bigger games.

[eyal8r]

hmmm- shoot. Im ok spending a little bit more if it's going to reap me better games and no upgrading later. I think I can piece together a system, or buy one, for $300 or so.  Maybe that's the way to go.  What, you think if I stay around 2.4GHZ (AMD), 128MB+ I should be ok?

Also- where do I get all the games from?  Can I download them all off the net (yes, all 5000 of them), or do I have to order them from somewhere or something?
Thanks again
D

[paigeoliver]

hmmm- shoot. Im ok spending a little bit more if it's going to reap me better games and no upgrading later. I think I can piece together a system, or buy one, for $300 or so.  Maybe that's the way to go.  What, you think if I stay around 2.4GHZ (AMD), 128MB+ I should be ok?

Also- where do I get all the games from?  Can I download them all off the net (yes, all 5000 of them), or do I have to order them from somewhere or something?
Thanks again
D

Mame supports roughly 4000 games. Of which about 30 or 40 require a faster computer than you have. Leavin 3960 which don't require a faster computer.

[eyal8r]

hehe- well, when you put it THAT WAY...

I'll throw this MB and CPU/Ram into a new case, buy a 60Gig Drive for $55 or so, and find a cheap cd rom and go from there. IF I ever have any problems, I can always upgrade the MB and CPU later I guess.

Any thoughts on the video card?  Too old, or it's just fine?
Thanks again!
D

[eyal8r]

oh- let me ask one more thing...

What about running a N64/NES/SNES emulator on this setup- will THAT run ok, or, do I need something much better as well?
Thanks
D

[krick]

I agree with other posters here that a faster PC is probably not necessary unless you want to run the VERY latest games in MAME.

[Trenchbroom]

NES, SNES, Genesis, etc. (all 8 or 16 bit emulation for that matter) should run butter smooth on your machine.

N64?  Hmm.  Your video card is gonna be the bottleneck.  If the ATI card has less than 64 MB you will have problems.  Even with a more modern video card you would still have some framerate issues due to the sub 1 ghz CPU if you use the most compatible N64 emulator (PJ64).  You might have to go without sound, or with the resolution down to 640x480 or even lower to get the speed up. 

If you are still willing to give it a go for N64 emulation, look for some old versions of either UltraHLE or Corn.  If you can get them running they should give you decent speed.

[elvis]

Any thoughts on the video card?  Too old, or it's just fine?

Fine.  MAME doesn't use any sort of 3D accelleration or any other video-related stuff.  Almost any VGA-capable card will suffice.

[Kremmit]

hehe- well, when you put it THAT WAY...

I'll throw this MB and CPU/Ram into a new case, buy a 60Gig Drive for $55 or so, and find a cheap cd rom and go from there. IF I ever have any problems, I can always upgrade the MB and CPU later I guess.

Any thoughts on the video card?

[elvis]

More RAM = faster MAME.

Sort of.  MAME won't run any *FASTER* with more RAM.  What it will do is allow you to load some of the bigger games into memory.

Imagine system RAM like desk space.  You can onlt put so many large documents on your desk before you need to start reshuffling (ie: virtual memory, or swap space).  Too much reshuffling slows things down (disk thrashing).  The solution is to get a bigger desk (more RAM) so that you can look at more things at once.

However, the bigger desk (more RAM) only helps for the documents with more stuff in them (bigger games).  Small documents (small games) are wasted on a huge desk.  No point having 512MB RAM for PacMan/puckman.  It won't run a single frame per second faster than it would with 128MB RAM.

*MOST* MAME games will squeeze into 256MB RAM.  There are some newer ones that need more.  gunbird2 won't fit in under 384MB, and the newer STV games require 512MB.  But you're talking about 30 of the 5000-odd games there.

CPU power is your limiting factor.  As the MAME devs themselves say: get the fastest CPU you can afford.  Everything else is secondary.

[Kremmit]

Elvis (I knew you were still alive!):

All true.  I know that "More RAM = faster MAME" is way over-simplified, but is doesn't sound like Eyel8r is really looking to go in depth, just get some fast answers.  Since it sounds like he's decided to stay with this processor, at least until he gets his cab up and running, I figured some more RAM would give him the most bang for the buck.  The thing's only got "128 megs of PC100 RAM".  Another 128mb of moldy old RAM can't cost very much, and would get him to that magic 256mb level you mentioned.  It's way cheaper than a new processor and mobo, for sure, so I figure it's worth trying first.  And, if he decides to move to a better CPU/Mobo later, he's only out a little $$ on the RAM.

Oh, and Eyel8r, don't even ask about ROM downloads on this site.   

[eyal8r]

ROM downloads- you mean, for MAME games, or N64 and others?  I thought all the MAME games were very openly distributed?

Thanks for all the insights- I think Im just gonna fork out the cash and build up a newer system.  Nothing hardcore, but something a good $300-400 can handle...
Thanks!
D

[paigeoliver]

Actually, all you need to get some good N64 action going is an old Voodoo3 card (ebay) and the voodoo3 enabled version of UltraHle (I am sure it is still floating around somewhere), it is STILL a better N64 emulator than any of the current ones.

Also, you don't NEED a CDROM drive for a mame system.

As for roms, we can't provide links here, but there are a zillion places that will cheaply sell them all on DVD which is much easier than downloading 4200 files (comprising 20 GB of data) one at a time.

I downloaded them all one at a time years ago. It took me 15 days doing it for 6 hours a day.

[eyal8r]

So, I assume I can get this Voodoo3 card and it will run MAME just fine as well, correct?

So, to recap- I snag this Voodoo3 card on ebay, build up a semi-decent system for a few hundred bucks, install XP and Analog+ and Im good to go to run MAME Analog +, N64, NEW, SNES, etc, correct?

Thanks for all the help guys- you all rock!
D

[paigeoliver]

So, I assume I can get this Voodoo3 card and it will run MAME just fine as well, correct?

So, to recap- I snag this Voodoo3 card on ebay, build up a semi-decent system for a few hundred bucks, install XP and Analog+ and Im good to go to run MAME Analog +, N64, NEW, SNES, etc, correct?

Thanks for all the help guys- you all rock!
D

You can buy an entire 1 Ghz computer system for $100 used. Check ebay, find a local one so you can pick it up. We bought one like that (p3, 256 MB ram, 1 GHZ) for my friend recently and we didn't even have to look hard to find it. We picked the sucker up less than 2 hours after deciding we wanted to look for one.

I only suggested the Voodoo3 if you were using your OLD computer. If you are using a new one then you won't need it, because you can use one of the newer N64 emulators.

You only need analog+ for a few very specific things, such as using two trackballs at once. I have built more than a dozen machines and never had to use it. And I don't think windows XP mixes with a voodoo3 very well. The company that made the voodoo cards went out of business like 4 years ago, so they never released any XP drivers.

[Tiger-Heli]

Good advice here so far.  I just have a couple of things to add . . .

Mame supports roughly 4000 games. Of which about 30 or 40 require a faster computer than you have. Leavin 3960 which don't require a faster computer.

And of the 30 or 40 that require a faster computer, about 3/4 of those will be unplayable on a P4 3.5 Ghz (when one comes out).  So you would really only pick up about 10 games.

Regarding emulation in general, you should be fine with your current set-up for MAME, NES, and SNES.  For N64, you will be able to play some of the games, but most will NOT play well with that setup.  However, emulators are free, so I would try playing the games and tweaking the settings and see how they work for you.  Also, it's fairly hard to play most N64 stuff on a MAME cab.  The games are looking for a D-Pad, thumb trigger, analog stick, six action buttons and 2 shoulder buttons in a defined color and arrangement.  The best bet is front USB ports and an Adaptoid.  Otherwise, look hard at how much customization is required.

If you want N64 emulation, I would look at using Project64 and upgrading the system, rather than trying to find a VooDoo 3 card on E-bay.

MAME Analog plus is not significantly processor heavy, but if you find it slowing down games, you can always use regular MAME for 90% of the games and Analog plus only for the games that need it.

Finally, somewhere you mentioned a 2.4 G AMD with 128M Ram and XP - Bad decision.  The lack of Memory will bottleneck that system.  You would probably get better performance from a 1.8 Ghz processor and 256-512M RAM.  Win98SE runs well with 256 M of Ram, okay with 512M, and tends to get worse with more than 512M.  WinXP really only runs well with 512M of RAM and anything beyond this is gravy.

[paigeoliver]

Another tip (I am just going to assume you are using mamewah) is to have several mame installs. Mame .55, Mame. 65, mame. 75, mame .85, etc. I believe you can literally put them all in the same folder as long as you give the exes different names. Set up all your versions in your front end, that way you can switch from one to another. As there is always SOMETHING terribly broken in every version of mame.

Now the fun part (which I may do) is setting up multi-version roms, but I will leave that topic for another post.

[eyal8r]

Hmmm- decisions decisions.  If you guys are telling me that my little 800MHz system here will do just fine for my setup, then I'll go for it. I can always upgrade the MB and CPU more later if it sucks. I have to run Analog+ since I have 2 TBs and 2 spinners. As for the N64 emulation, well, I might just try it on the games I want and see how it goes. I kinda think it'd be fun to play some Mike Tyson on a cab, ya know? Zelda, well, after all this, I think it'd be better played laying in a bean bag or something, and not standing up in a cab. LOL...

I can't thank you guys enough for all your help! Now I just gotta find somewhere to order the DVDs/CDs...  lol...
Thanks
D

[mahuti]

I'm not gonna read the whole thread, but I'll just add by saying that I've never purchased a PC for a MAME box. ALL of them were free hand me downs. I used a 200, then 233 mhz (which ran only simple games) and have been running a 500 mhz for a year, and it plays many, many games, including fighting games perfectly well. Can't speak for n64, but I bet an 800 will do fine.

[Lilwolf]

When dealing with a slow computer... Look at mame versions that where out when the processor came out.  Really makes a difference for some.

Get a frontend that handles more then one version of mame.   So you can use analog+ mame when needed... but plain jane mame for all others.

Look at all other emulators when needed.  CPS2 emulation in mame might not be 60fps... but I bet you will get it in final burn / all the others.  Same with some neogeo games.  This can also be hidden with a good frontend.

But remember... emulation was out and very active when 450s where an ubersystem.  I bought my celery 300/oc450 to get a bunch of games running at 60fps (upgraded my 233 that worked on many) 

[Tiger-Heli]

I have to run Analog+ since I have 2 TBs and 2 spinners.

EDIT:  S/b - I have to run Analog+ for dual spinner or trackball games since I have 2 TBs and 2 spinners.

Analog Plus is not a major CPU cycle or memory hog, though.

Zelda, well, after all this, I think it'd be better played laying in a bean bag or something, and not standing up in a cab. LOL...

Howard Casto has been trying to convince people of this for years.  Console games are meant to be played for hours on a gamepad, TV, and sofa.  Arcade games are meant to be played to 5-10 minutes on an arcade cab.

(I think you might be the only one listening, though  )

[pointdablame]

And of the 30 or 40 that require a faster computer, about 3/4 of those will be unplayable on a P4 3.5 Ghz (when one comes out).  So you would really only pick up about 10 games.

Not that it really matters since the OP won't be able to build a computer with one for a few hundred bucks, but Intel already has a 3.8ghz CPU out.  Not sure if it would add any games, but they are out.

[fredster]

I have a 466 that does okay for most games PRE 1990.

After that, I have frameskipping. 

It handles trackball okay.

I have had trouble playing MK on a 1.0 ghz machine.

[Stingray]

My cab is running on a blazing 233 mhz machine and it plays every game I'm interested in. Those are mostly mid 80's and earlier titles though.

-S

[dmish82]

I'm running a 933Mhz machine w/ 256mb ram and i'm able to play almost every game i wanted to except for Marvel VS Capcom.

[eyal8r]

Hmmm- now that you guys mention it tho-

I'd like to play Gauntlet, Tron, Spider-Man, and X-Men as well as all the 80s games. Will this run ok?  What about some of the flight sim games- AfterBurner, Star Wars, etc- will it run those ok?

I cannot thank you guys enough for all the posts!
D

[anthonylitz]

Hmmm- now that you guys mention it tho-

I'd like to play Gauntlet, Tron, Spider-Man, and X-Men as well as all the 80s games. Will this run ok?  What about some of the flight sim games- AfterBurner, Star Wars, etc- will it run those ok?

I cannot thank you guys enough for all the posts!
D

Hay!  Yeah all games mantioned here are going to play f-i-n-e.
AfterBurner....not sure on this one, it is an old so will work well with you 800megahertz....but does this one even work in MAME?  I remember not getting it to run, oh well off to play some After Burner    Ok I'm back, nope After Burner no workie....BUT After Burner II works great!

Good Luck
Anthony

[krick]

I think the "old computer will be fine" thing works for most people until they try to play any of the Mortal Kombat series (actually most of the Williams games from that time period) with a recent version of MAME.  The sound skips and stutters horribly.

It seems that the MAME team keeps improving the Williams sound emulation requiring lots more CPU power.

So if you want to run the (only) latest version of MAME and play MK3, then you need to bite the bullet and get a new computer.

Or you can do as some in this thread have suggested and run multiple versions of MAME.  If a game won't play correctly on your computer, try running (just that game) in an older version of MAME.

[eyal8r]

perfect. And yup- never been into the whole MK thing, but then again, I've never really played it too much. DOH!  Thanks guys!  It's off to build up the OLD school computer!
D

[Chris]

My original MAME cabinet system was an Athlon 600, which I soon upgraded to an Athlon 800.

[anthonylitz]

On the offical release of mame32 .88  almost every game's sound studurd.  I switch to MameFX .88 and now much better.  I have a P4 1.5 -  512 ram.  And yeah even still MK 1 even is skippy.

Anthony