Trying to get DOScab to work on an arcade Monitor

[OldSchool79]

I emailed Chris (I think) about the error I am getting when trying to run DOScab on an arcade monitor. It should be able to use 320x240 mode, which I have set up with the VGA to arcade TSR, but instead is saying mode not supported. I have compiled software myself using Allegro and DJGPP that will display 320x240 on the arcade monitor, so I don't know what could be different in DOScab.

I made a nice 320x240 skin too but can't use it

[Chris]

I emailed Chris (I think) about the error I am getting when trying to run DOScab on an arcade monitor. It should be able to use 320x240 mode, which I have set up with the VGA to arcade TSR, but instead is saying mode not supported. I have compiled software myself using Allegro and DJGPP that will display 320x240 on the arcade monitor, so I don't know what could be different in DOScab.

I responded via E-Mail, but I'll copy that response here so everyone can enjoy...

Which TSR are you using?  With AdvanceVBE, you should be able to hit 320x240.  If that doesn't work, try 512x240. 320x200 will also almost certainly work, but you'll have trouble making anything look good at this resolution.  You'll also want to make sure you're skin is set to low-res.skn or low-res2.skn.  (Edit: I see below you have your own skin...)

It's possible your hardware only supports 320x240 with an 8-bit color depth; the jukebox requires at least 15-bit color depth.  It'll try your requested resolution at 15, 16, 24, and 32 bit color depth before giving up and throwing that error message.

If you can't get it to work, please let me know which video chipset you're running.

I made a nice 320x240 skin too but can't use it

Are you willing to share? 

--Chris

[OldSchool79]

Hi Chris, I got your email but I will reply here.

It looks like the problem occurs before the TSR so I will explain. Basically I can't get 320x240 mode to work on it, even 320x200 mode doesn't work. 640x480 mode does work.

You mention that Allegro can't do 320x240 modem in greater than 8 bit, but I believe  AdvanceMAME does do 320x240@15bit or greater. ADVV is saying it can do the higher bpp modes. On my desktop computer (not the cabinet) 320x240 works with WINcab (that's how I made the skin) so I dont think it's a DOS related issue. I am going to try one more test before I finish this post. If it works in XP in 320x240 on this machine then I will try booting in DOS on this machine.

I'll finish this post after I run this test...

That's not going to happen since I can't get sound to work on this.

Check your email for the 320x240 skin.

[Chris]

It looks like the problem occurs before the TSR so I will explain. Basically I can't get 320x240 mode to work on it, even 320x200 mode doesn't work. 640x480 mode does work.

What chipset is on the video card?

That's not going to happen since I can't get sound to work on this.

On the cabinet?  What sound chipset is on the cabinet?

Thanks!

--Chris

[OldSchool79]

From memory it's a Matrox G200 with 8Mb (Millenium I think), something around the 1997 era.

DOScab runs on the cabinet in DOS but only 640x480 or higher. Here's the specs:

PII 400
512Mb SD RAM
20Gb HDD
Matrox G200 (?)
Sound Blaster 16 (ISA)

It refuses to run 320x240, and even 320x200.

I tried to test it out on my other computer (the one I have Windows XP on) and I couldn't get it to detect my sound card. I have onboard nForce sound, as well as a Creative ES1371. I tried using the so called DOS drivers for the ES1371 but to no avail, none of my DOS programs detect it as a SB.

Also, I mentioned making a volume attribute for each queued song, to allow the random picked songs (non-credit songs) to play quieter. It was always my understanding that songs automatically playing were played quieter.

EDIT: Uh I notice you are asking for the chipset of the cabinet, I will find out the specific motherboard and chipset info when I get the chance and post here.

[Chris]

As far as I know, the ES1370 and ES1371 just aren't compatible with the sound libraries I use, which is a real pain since they're probably the most common PCI sound chips...   and the library programmers aren't interested in adding any more drivers, as they'd prefer that DOS just went away...

I've been trying to put together a sound card compatibility list, but for PCI the only sure bet I know of is the CompUSA ALS4000-based card, and even then the stock drivers don't work, you have to download updated drivers...  I have gotten VIA embedded sound chips to work but I haven't tried an NForce.

--Chris

[StephenH]

You may want to consider an ArcadeVGA card, as this may fix the problem, as it supports 24-bit and 32-bit in all arcade resolutions.

[OldSchool79]

Yes I've considered one of those but my problem is not hardware it's software. I've been trying to convince Chris to make DOScab arcade friendly. You could easily get WINcab to work in arcade resolutions, but my cabinet is DOS only at the moment (DOS does it better than Windows IMO) and getting arcade resolutions in 16 bit is the tricky bit.

Chris might I try making these suggestions:

1. I think I posted on the Allegro forum a while ago how I would get tweaked video modes to work in high bit depths in DOS and it was possible (it has to be otherwise we wouldn't have AdvanceMAME)

2. You can also have 320x240@16bit when using SVGA mode in DOS. See http://www.talula.demon.co.uk/allegro/onlinedocs/en/alleg036.html
Might require SCITech display doctor though *grumble*

3. 320x240@8bit DOScab option maybe?

4. My final and most highly recommended option would be to use AdvanceMAME compatibility for video modes in DOS. All AdvanceXXX programs seem to run from the same setup file *.rc that is created with the arcade video mode setup utility ADVV. I assume you know all of this already though 

[Chris]

Yes I've considered one of those but my problem is not hardware it's software. I've been trying to convince Chris to make DOScab arcade friendly. You could easily get WINcab to work in arcade resolutions, but my cabinet is DOS only at the moment (DOS does it better than Windows IMO) and getting arcade resolutions in 16 bit is the tricky bit.

Chris might I try making these suggestions:

1. I think I posted on the Allegro forum a while ago how I would get tweaked video modes to work in high bit depths in DOS and it was possible (it has to be otherwise we wouldn't have AdvanceMAME)

2. You can also have 320x240@16bit when using SVGA mode in DOS. See http://www.talula.demon.co.uk/allegro/onlinedocs/en/alleg036.html
Might require SCITech display doctor though *grumble*

3. 320x240@8bit DOScab option maybe?

4. My final and most highly recommended option would be to use AdvanceMAME compatibility for video modes in DOS. All AdvanceXXX programs seem to run from the same setup file *.rc that is created with the arcade video mode setup utility ADVV. I assume you know all of this already though

[Silver]

Chris - looks like you've been busy! Great work.....

[Chris]

Chris - looks like you've been busy! Great work.....

Yeah, I was up until 3 AM last night laying in the sound events.  So your skin now can have a [Sounds] section that looks like:

BTN_COIN1=coin.wav
BTN_COIN2=coin.wav
BTN_ANY=btnclick.wav
MSG_START=startup.wav

Other good news is that rather than actually re-sort the titlestrip arrays to fix the album sorting issue, I created a separate index, sorted the index, and changed all requests for song information to be indirected through the index.  This gives me much of the backend to make filtering work, so I can start looking at that.  I'm also looking at being able to sort multiple SongPaths into libraries, which could be accessed directly through a filter definition, possibly with passcode protection, so you could have one library for Dad's hardcore rap, another for Mom's jazz, and a third for Junior's Disney songs, and have buttons to directly select them on the panel (or access them through a filter pop-up.)

--Chris

[GadgetGeek]

Yeah, I was up until 3 AM last night

Are you one of those lucky ones that function fine on little sleep?!  Or is it that is the only chance you get to work after dealing with the family and the rest of the real world?

[Chris]

Yeah, I was up until 3 AM last night

Are you one of those lucky ones that function fine on little sleep?!

[OldSchool79]

Ok I will try an SVGA driver, yes it is a low priority request

[Chris]

If that doesn't work, can you post your .rc?

--Chris