converting from arcadeos to mamewah -AARRGGHH!!

[vettetek]

ok, i basically got the jist of setting this up. I can basically get a game to come up and running. First it seems like it takes alot longer to get it started than with arcadeos. Then, even thought the pallate of colors is fine in windows, or even mamewah, the pallette is all screwed up ( a few colors) in game. This was tested with track and field for example. Anyone have any ideas?!
This is only 1 of the MULTIPLE problems im having trying to do this. But well start here!
much thanks!
~V

[Hiub1]

Do you have any hardware filtering enabled on your video card? If so I would suggest turning all that stuff off. See if that helps any.

[vettetek]

Well, I have the color problem solved. Seems I have an older version of an arcadeVGA card and the newer drivers dont work with it. Now that I got the drivers loaded, the colors are correct, but I cant seem to get 8 bit color depth with it, which I need to achieve for a clear picture, and I need to figure out how to set the video modes. those are all messed up as well. Like I said, I am used to arcadeos and advmame. I know how to adjust all those settings in that. Im really hoping I can achieve better results with mamewah and windows. Otherwise Ill be getting rid of my arcadevga (after 12 hours of having it), and going back to my old rage and DOS
~HELP!
~V

[vettetek]

Yep, still having problems - messed with it till midnight last night. colors are right, but now everything is blurry - kinda almost looks like antiailiasing. No effects are turned on though, so I dont think its that. Im not sure if its a driver issue (still), or if its just a mode or setting. I hope there is one of you out there that is an expert with this card and can guide me. I have heard alot of talk about how great these cards are, but I cant get a decent resolution in windows. When I first turn it on, the POST screen looks great! (in dos) and even the windows (xp) startup screen looks good too. But once it enters windows, it gets kinda crappy at the 640x480. I did use the little galaga icon to change my modes to something better - which does look great, but I cant get the auto pan to work. and then once I run a game, first off, it takes LONGER to get it running than it did in dos with arcade OS (which is a BIG reason I made the switch), and then like I said at the begginning, the graphics are all blurry - playable, but blurry. should I NOT use windows xp? 98se maybe? Oh yah, I was - am using Mamewah - for the moment. I like the configurability of arcadepic better though
SOMEBODY PLEASE HELP!
~V

[vettetek]

WOW!
49 views - Can anyone give me some Idea of how to get this up and running right? I know someone is out there who had had to deal with something like this before. PLEASE help! Should I run win 98 then?
thanks,
~V

[Hiub1]

That sounds pretty weird. Are you sure your monitor is OK? Can you tell us something more about what hardware you're running?

[vettetek]

yah, my monitor is fine. Ive sorted through most problems now. I have winxp running with latest mamewah and mamepp ver .88. it does work, but im not happy with the results. Like all the video modes, I downloaded the video mode setup programs from mamewah site, some games are fine, but some are all oversized, and look awful. Im just thinking of dumping this and going back to arcadeos. I already have about 30 hours logged in just trying to get this running, and I dont see ANY advantage to running mamewah vs arcade os.

[Minwah]

Now that I got the drivers loaded, the colors are correct, but I cant seem to get 8 bit color depth with it, which I need to achieve for a clear picture

Why do you want 8-bit?  Recent versions of MAME uses 16-bit colour for all games...

[Minwah]

Yep, still having problems - messed with it till midnight last night. colors are right, but now everything is blurry - kinda almost looks like antiailiasing. No effects are turned on though, so I dont think its that.

Turn OFF hardware stretch (hwstretch

But once it enters windows, it gets kinda crappy at the 640x480. I did use the little galaga icon to change my modes to something better - which does look great, but I cant get the auto pan to work.

Auto-pan is only required for high resolutions.  Just use 640x480 interlaced for Windows (good comprimise between desktop space and quality), and have MAMEWAH run at low-res - I use
368x240.

and then once I run a game, first off, it takes LONGER to get it running than it did in dos with arcade OS (which is a BIG reason I made the switch),

Use MAME v0.88, and turn on skip_validitychecks.

and then like I said at the begginning, the graphics are all blurry - playable, but blurry. should I NOT use windows xp? 98se maybe?

Definately use WinXP.  Create game-specific ini files to set the resolution for each game - try the AVGA MAME Res. Tool from my site...

[Minwah]

yah, my monitor is fine. Ive sorted through most problems now. I have winxp running with latest mamewah and mamepp ver .88. it does work, but im not happy with the results. Like all the video modes, I downloaded the video mode setup programs from mamewah site, some games are fine, but some are all oversized, and look awful. Im just thinking of dumping this and going back to arcadeos. I already have about 30 hours logged in just trying to get this running, and I dont see ANY advantage to running mamewah vs arcade os.

Sorry I hadn't read this before I replied...

But the Res tool works fine (I use it) - have you pointed to your \mame\ini path in mame.ini?

[vettetek]

cool, Im getting there - sort of. Lets tackle the slow load first - where do I find the ini file to put the skip_validitychecks in? is it under the other options in the mame ini file under mamewah? then I set it to 0 or yes?
~V

[jcrouse]

It's goes in the file c:\mamewah\mamewah.exe. It's actually a Mame command line parameter. It goes here:

### Execution Settings ###
emulator_executable                       c:\mame\mame.exe
send_rom_path                             0
send_rom_extension                        0
quotes_around_romnames                    0
long_filenames                            1
show_dos_box                              auto
commandline_format                        [name] -skip_disclaimer -skip_gameinfo -skip -skipvaliditychecks
alt_commandline_format_1                  [name]
alt_commandline_format_2                  [name]

Good Luck,
John

[jcrouse]

****** The above post is messed up and the board is screwed up so I can't change it ******

It should read:

commandline_format      [name] -skip_disclaimer -skip_gameinfo -skip_validitychecks

Sorry,
John

[vettetek]

WOW!
That really worked well! no more nag screens and FAST load times! Now, Im going to have to get  my vector games working and some other "larger" resoulution games. my monitor only likes the 288 highth for games, how do I get around that? Like I stated before, I was able to get 640X480 before in advmame, but I cant seem to get it to work in mamewah. Maybe its the interlacing...how do I disable that?
~V

[Minwah]

It's goes in the file c:\mamewah\mamewah.exe. It's actually a Mame command line parameter. It goes here:

That's fine, but actually I would set it in (MAME's) mame.ini:

skip_validitychecks 1

This way it will always work, independent of FE

[Minwah]

WOW!
That really worked well! no more nag screens and FAST load times! Now, Im going to have to get  my vector games working and some other "larger" resoulution games. my monitor only likes the 288 highth for games, how do I get around that? Like I stated before, I was able to get 640X480 before in advmame, but I cant seem to get it to work in mamewah. Maybe its the interlacing...how do I disable that?
~V

Just set 'resolution 640x480' in your gamename.ini files...

[vettetek]

If I do that then the games are too big for the screen. Andy from ultimarc said to set my max display size in windows to 640x288. In fact, Im running mamewah in that size. So whenenver a game is larger than 288 vertically, its off the screen. For example, Tapper is 512x512 (recommended in the ini setup), and was way too large to fit. I change the verticle to 288 and it fits. Again, This is a workaround to make it go, but I dont think im utilising the cards full potential this way. If I switch it back, I get all kinds of flickering and interlacing problems.
Any Ideas on that?!
~V
PS I DID have a 640x480 mode that worked well in arcadeos. NOW I had to "fit" the mode in ADVV, but it looked ok nevertheless

[Minwah]

If I do that then the games are too big for the screen. Andy from ultimarc said to set my max display size in windows to 640x288. In fact, Im running mamewah in that size. So whenenver a game is larger than 288 vertically, its off the screen. For example, Tapper is 512x512 (recommended in the ini setup), and was way too large to fit. I change the verticle to 288 and it fits. Again, This is a workaround to make it go, but I dont think im utilising the cards full potential this way. If I switch it back, I get all kinds of flickering and interlacing problems.
Any Ideas on that?!

Hmmm.  The max non-interlaced mode you can display is 640x288.  But 640x480 (& even 800x600 I think) should display full-screen interlaced just fine (if a bit flickery due to the interlacing).  I personally use 640x480 for my desktop (& some games).

I don't know what to suggest, other than check the driver is for the correct ArcadeVGA version  

[vettetek]

I went around with the drivers, and finally found the correct ones for the 7000 series arcadevga.
Ok, I turned my display settings to allow max resoultion of 800x600. I then attempted to run my desktop in 640x480 - flickery. I ran mamewah (which is still set to 640x288) and it looks fine. I tried discs of tron - which is a 512x480 game - and it works, can see all of the screen, but its still flickery. So the question is - is it my monitor? its only about 10 years old - a 34" sharp image. cant it handle any thing more than 288 verticle? and if that isnt it - and it shouldnt matter, is it interlacing, and how do I set the drivers, resolution, ar Mamewah to disable it?
thanks
~V

[Minwah]

I went around with the drivers, and finally found the correct ones for the 7000 series arcadevga.
Ok, I turned my display settings to allow max resoultion of 800x600. I then attempted to run my desktop in 640x480 - flickery. I ran mamewah (which is still set to 640x288) and it looks fine. I tried discs of tron - which is a 512x480 game - and it works, can see all of the screen, but its still flickery. So the question is - is it my monitor? its only about 10 years old - a 34" sharp image. cant it handle any thing more than 288 verticle? and if that isnt it - and it shouldnt matter, is it interlacing, and how do I set the drivers, resolution, ar Mamewah to disable it?

It sounds fine to me.  Any mode with more than ~288 lines will flicker, due to interlacing.  You have a standard resolution monitor (as is intended for the AVGA), but it cannot display medium or high resolution games without using interlacing (there are too many lines for the screen).

So DOTRON is medium res, so you'll have to run it at something like 640x480 (interlaced).  It will flicker but that is the best you can do, without buying a medium res. monitor for the handful of games that use one...

[vettetek]

I thought there was a way to deinterlace for certain games though. How is everyone else running discs of tron for example? The thing is, I had it running in arcadeos and advmame very well. Now , like I said, I "adjusted" the modes until they were centered. Im sure im not looking at it right though.
I thought that an arcade VGA card was supposed to "create" these modes like the ADVV program does in dos for diffrent modes. So far all im seeing is like 1 mode that everything is thrying to "squash or stretch" into.
I am SO close now! Im starting to become a believer in Mamewah! Ive got my layout made, roms loaded, ect. I just need this one little thing (resoultion) to be fixed and Im IN!!
Thanks
~V

[Minwah]

I thought there was a way to deinterlace for certain games though. How is everyone else running discs of tron for example? The thing is, I had it running in arcadeos and advmame very well. Now , like I said, I "adjusted" the modes until they were centered. Im sure im not looking at it right though.
I thought that an arcade VGA card was supposed to "create" these modes like the ADVV program does in dos for diffrent modes. So far all im seeing is like 1 mode that everything is thrying to "squash or stretch" into.

Believe me a standard res. arcade monitor *cannot* display more than ~288 lines (you might get 300ish).

So if it looked better in AdvMAME then you must have had it setup differently (obviously), but it still is impossible for it to be showing >~288 lines.  So to remove the flicker you must run in a non-interlaced mode (& use hwstretch/direct3d), but this means you'll be squashing too many lines in (normally looks pretty crap IMO).  I really don't know what to suggest - I run the game at 640x480 and there is a slight bit of flicker, but it looks pretty good.

[vettetek]

ok, I do understand that. BUT exactly HOW do you run in non interlaced mode, and utilise the HW stretch and direct3d?
I didnt know that you can manipulate that.
Thanks
~V

[Minwah]

ok, I do understand that. BUT exactly HOW do you run in non interlaced mode, and utilise the HW stretch and direct3d?
I didnt know that you can manipulate that.

Interlacing takes care of itself, I've marked the following with *'s to show which will be interlaced:

H   V   Vertical Refresh
240 240 60Hz
256 240 60Hz
256 256
256 264
288 240 60Hz
296 240 60Hz
304 240 60Hz
321 240 60Hz
321 256
336 240 60Hz
352 256 Vert on Horiz Mon
352 264 Vert on Horiz Mon
352 288 Vert on Horiz Mon
368 240 60Hz
384 288
392 240 60Hz
401 256 53Hz (Mortal Kombat etc)
448 240 60Hz
512 240 60Hz
512 288
*512 448 Vert on Horiz Mon
*512 512
632 264
640 240 60Hz
640 288
*640 480 60Hz
648 304
*720 480
*800 600

Set hwstretch and direct3d how you wish in mame.ini (or just add these lines to your game-specific ini files):

direct3d                0
hwstretch               0