Simple MAME Question (I hope)

[psikey]

I downloaded 0.88 yesterday and installed it. For some reason I can't get it to keep my settings (interface or dipswitch settings). If I set say, Ms. Pac-Man to 5 lives, exit, and start the game, I only get three. I do not remember this happening before. I can assign a button on my controller and it works during that session but if I get out and come back, I have to re-assign it. I don't think I did anything different than usual on this install. Is there anything special I should be looking for? One side note, I run mame32 separately on this machine, and I don't have any issues with it. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

[Thenasty]

make sure you have all the folders/dir created and make sure that under cfg, nvram files are not read only.

Best way to do it, just delete the folder/dir and create  it again, so its blank.
Oh and of course you have you check that your path is correct too.

[psikey]

nasty, thanks for your feedback. I totally deleted mame and started over. when i unzip into a new mame folder, i do not get all the folders (things like hi and cfg are not there), is this normal? I also have a quick question about the path. In the mame.ini file near the top has the heading "Windows path and directory options". Default for cfg_directory is cfg. Is this where the dip switch setting go after you change them? also the default is cfg, should this be a path (C:\dave\mame\cfg, that is if I HAD a cfg folder after installation). This is happening on two different machines> The two things I want to be able to do are adjust dipswitches once ( I have kids that are just learning to play games) and to be able to save my high score.

Now, when I play ms. pac-man and change any settings, mame should generate a cfg file for it in the cfg folder, correct? There should also be a *.hi file, which there is, but it doesn't save my high score, even though I have a dat file installed in the same directory as the exe.

I really don't understand what is going on, I've never had this much trouble with it before, even tried 0.86 with same results. BTW, all file seem to not be read-only. Sorry for the length, just getting frustrated.

[psikey]

update, mame is NOT generating a cfg file after playing ms pac, using very few roms to try to figure out what's wrong

[KHAN]

mame.ini file defines the names of mame folders and
files.You should have all folders that are present in your
default mame.ini...
1)set your controllers (whether you are using keyboard or joystick)try to set keys menually from a file in Ctrlr forder.
2)Hiscore.dat file must be present for saving highscores,some games use "hi"  neogeo's and other games uses NVRAM folders to save thier highscores.
try to get a letest unofficial highscore.dat file.
3)Cfg files will automatically generate in the cfg folder when you play a game.You will be able to save game setting after you got a *.cfg

don't set any other extra path in the mame.ini file for cfg.

### Windows path and directory options ###
rompath                 roms
samplepath              samples
inipath                 ini
cfg_directory           cfg
nvram_directory         nvram
memcard_directory       memcard
input_directory         inp
hiscore_directory       hi
state_directory         sta
artwork_directory       artwork
snapshot_directory      snap
diff_directory          diff
ctrlr_directory         ctrlr
cheat_file              cheat.dat
hiscore_file            hiscore.dat
history_file            history.dat
mameinfo_file           mameinfo.dat