Hyperspin / Mame problems on new machine

[jukingeo]

Hello All,

Well, it looks like the problems I am having with getting everything set up on my new computer are continuing.  Going back to Windows XP and setting up Mame on my new machine, and for the front end, I decided not to go with Mala this time.  This time around I decided to give Hyperspin...well, a SPIN!

Right off the bat I encountered two problems, one is with Hyperspin and the other is with Mame.

Versions:

Hyperspin 1.0
Mame .100

Ok, for the first problem I am having with Hyperspin.  I have my computer set up for a resolution of 1024 by 768 and I also set Hyperspin to the same resolution.  I also set Hyperspin to operate in full screen.    Now after playing a couple of games, Hyperspin seems to 'pop back' to a 800 by 600 resolution, upon ESCaping out from a game.   The front end DOES NOT appear to be in a Window (meaning you don't have the Windows border with the min, max, exit buttons).  However you certainly can see the Windows desktop showing through the areas not covered up.   Once Hyperspin does this, it stays stuck in that mode until I close out of the program and restart it.  Once I do that it goes back to the set 1024 by 768 resolution.   But I play a few games and low and behold, it will pop back down to the lower resolution.

As you can see this would be very unfortunate if I decide to use Hyperspin in an arcade cabinet environment where the goal is to NOT see the desktop.

The next issue I am having is an orientation problem with Mame.  At first I thought the problem was with Hyperspin too, but when I tested Mame running alone on the command line, I found the problem still occurs.   What is happening is that Mame is automatically rotating vertical games even though I have automatic rotation turned off.  The version of Mame I am using is .100 and I had used this version with my previous Dell computer setup in which I was using Mala as the front end and I had no issues with it there.  Since I have auto rotation turned off, I am wondering if something could be going on between Mame and my new computer's gpu.  Thus that is another area I need advice on.

Now my overall impressions of Hyperspin are good and it is running pretty smooth on my new machine, but I am curious if I could use still images for the backgrounds rather than use videos.  Videos would take up a chunk of disk space in the event I would want to put the Mame/Hyperspin combo on an older machine.  I am sure that with videos on an older machine, things would slow down considerably.

Thank You,

Geo

[abispac]

first off, get hyperspin 1.2 and your problems will go away, you might need to redownload the themes again or you can use the theme convertion tool available at the hyperspin forums.
For mame i would just erase the mame.ini file and the default.cfg located a cfg mame folder. good luck.

[Dazz]

Yes, you can use images instead of videos.  Just put the screenshots into your video folder for that system and make sure they are .png format.

[jukingeo]

first off, get hyperspin 1.2 and your problems will go away, you might need to redownload the themes again or you can use the theme convertion tool available at the hyperspin forums.
For mame i would just erase the mame.ini file and the default.cfg located a cfg mame folder. good luck.

I actually did get the problem to stop.  I posted this same question over in the HS forums and they told me it was a setting in mame.ini.  I had to set MAME to NOT switch resolutions and that seems to have solved that problem.  However, I still have the problem with MAME automatically rotating vertical games.  I do have "norotate" in the mame.ini file set to '1', which would not allow monitor rotation, yet it STILL rotates the monitor image automatically.

Yes, you can use images instead of videos.  Just put the screenshots into your video folder for that system and make sure they are .png format.

Thank You, I tried that out last night and it worked fine.

BTW, would you know if you can play background music (when HS is sitting idle) much in the same way you can with Mala?

Thanx,

Geo

Geo

[Congui]

Hi.

Just tried running mame with norotate set to 1, and it rotates; tried norotate set to 0 and it doesn't rotate.  That's strange, I thought it was the other way around

Run mame with norotate set to 0 and you should be ok.

Cheers,
Congui.

[jukingeo]

Hi.

Just tried running mame with norotate set to 1, and it rotates; tried norotate set to 0 and it doesn't rotate.  That's strange, I thought it was the other way around

Run mame with norotate set to 0 and you should be ok.

Cheers,
Congui.

Hello Congui,

I discovered this myself today when I tried another version of Mame (.123) and it worked fine with HS.  Naturally I examined the mame.ini file and noticed that "norotate = 0".   So I proceeded to set the Mame version (.100) I have on Hyperspin to match and low and behold, my problem went away.

Apparently the switch setting for "norotate" is reversed where 0 is ENABLED and 1 is DISABLED.  The developers of Mame should change the label then to "rotate", or appropriately assign the switches.

I have to make a hard note of that in my Mame notes so this way I don't go through this again.

Anyway, thanx guys for your help on this matter. Now on to the next issue:

There is another issue regarding Hyperspin I am having in terms of the background music.  I had noticed in the MAME configuration folder for HS that there was a folder labeled "Background Music".  Naturally I thought this was a way to have music playing in the background whenever the Mame menu wheel is selected.  So I went I put a couple .mp3 songs in that folder and fired up HS and navigated to the MAME menu wheel.  Low and behold, nothing...no music.   I checked out the settings in HSHQ and I cannot see anything that is for setting up background music.  Can anyone tell me how to get the background music to play?   Am I using the wrong format? (I thought I read somewhere that it takes .mp3's).

Thanx,

Geo

[Dazz]

The background music is on a per game basis and the mp3 must be named the same as the rom name.  Current version does not allow of overall fe background music.  Perhaps in an upcoming version.

[jukingeo]

The background music is on a per game basis and the mp3 must be named the same as the rom name.

That is weird way to offer a background music feature (please don't take that offensively).   I figured it would be a more popular feature to have music playing AS you are searching for a game.  Not after you found it.

  Current version does not allow of overall fe background music.  Perhaps in an upcoming version.

Bummer!

Thanx for the info,

Geo