Vantage and GameLauncher running from floppy (now working!)

[JoyMonkey]

I've been playing around with a Vantage/GameLauncher bootable floppy, but I'm having some trouble with GameLauncher. When I try and run a game from GameLauncher, it quits back to DOS for no apparent reason.

Here's an image of the floppy:
http://www.joymonkey.com/misc/vantage-floppy2.exe
http://www.wickedretarded.com/misc/Vantagefloppy4.exe
http://www.wickedretarded.com/misc/vantage-floppy6.exe

This will auto-extract to a floppy disk, you'll need to add your own Vantage roms to try it out. No sound drivers are included either (I think it should work with most old ISA cards though). Also, to keep things small, no documentation is included.

This floppy unzips Vantage and Gamelauncher to a ramdrive (drive G), then copies over any roms and samples you've got (you should put these in the A:\ROMS and A:\SAMPLES folders). Then it runs MsPacMan (so I know Vantage is working), then it'll run GameLauncher but as I said, it craps out when you select a game.

Any ideas?

Edit: The latest floppy is working, but GameLauncher will only launch games if it's set to debug mode.

[Thenasty]

Maybe I'm overlooking something.

Your path only shows

set path=a:\dos;a:\;x:\vantage\;

I think it also should say

set path=a:\dos;a:\;x:\vantage

or

set path=a:\dos;a:\;x:\vantage\;x:\

or

set path=a:\dos;a:\;x:\vantage\;x:\


 I need to review it again but I need ot run ATM. Need to somewhere quick.
other than those, I don't see anything else ATM.

[JoyMonkey]

I tried changing the paths, but no joy.
I compared the log file in x:\glaunch\logs to a working set up running Mame and they look identical; the log says that it is running Vantage, but returns to Gamelauncher a split second afterwards. I wonder if it could be a config problem in Vantage.

[SirPeale]

On a slightly different note, where the heck does VAntAGE store it's key commands?  I've changed the ones on my box several times now, and each time it runs I have to reset. 

[Thenasty]

if there is a Vantage CFG problem, why did it run mspacman then ?
I'm guessing here but why not try to copy the CWSDPMI into the RAMDRIVE \VANTAGE also. At some time during my many installation of pgrograms, when it gets intalled on a certain DRIVE LETTER, it wo't run. Its picky and must be intalled on a D: DRVIE LETTER. If its intalled any other DRIVE LETTER, it kaputs. Never use Vantage or Glaunch so i can't say thats the case.

or why not just put GLAUNCH an VANTAGE and all the programs/data into one folder/dir.

LMK whats up and I might make the image on a floppy ( if I can find one, where are those AOL DISK they used to send me ? ).

[Thenasty]

I found a disk and created the image. I have a problem with Vantage giving me SIGSERV error...

Glaunch runs but I got a blank menu screen ( is it b'cause I have no snapshots ?), should I see the text name of the games from vant.map ?. I only see the Title on top "Vantage Arcade Classics". Dunno if it makes a diffirence but in glaunch\config\vant.cfg, the folder path for the SNAPSHOT is set to SNAPSHOTS, in DOS the 9 letter will be ignored, ex: if you CD SNAPHOSTS, it will go to SNAPSHOT folder no problem. I dunno if Glaunch is picky on that part or not.


About Vantage SIGSERV error, my test pc specs is 500mhz CPU w/512MB RAM.
is there a CWSDPMI switch I read to bypass this error ?

[JoyMonkey]

The reason you've got a blank screen in GLaunch with no game names is that you need to add some roms to the a:\roms folder for games to show up in the frontend.

I played around with vant.cfg last night and tried removing the snapshots path completely, but it didn't make any difference for me.

I have no idea what the SIGSERV error is. I set the CWSDPMI included on the floppy to use drive X instead of drive C, perhaps I made some other change that's giving you trouble. I don't know a whole lot about CWSDPMI I'm afraid.

I'll try using a drive letter other than X tonight and see if it makes a difference.

[Thenasty]

I created some dummy mspacman.zip and amidar.zip in the Vatage\roms folder.  the menu now shows those two games.
Maybe that where your problem relies, you have the roms in your A: drive.  According to vantage.cfg ROMS it does not point to A:

[JoyMonkey]

I created some dummy mspacman.zip and amidar.zip in the Vatage\roms folder.  the menu now shows those two games.
Maybe that where your problem relies, you have the roms in your A: drive.  According to vantage.cfg ROMS it does not point to A:

The autoexec copies all zip files in A:\roms onto the X drive where Vantage and GameLauncher expects to find the roms.

[JoyMonkey]

I've put together an updated floppy image ( http://www.wickedretarded.com/misc/Vantagefloppy4.exe ), but it still has the same problem (exits to DOS prompt when a game is selected in GameLauncher).
I replaced CWSDPMI, merged Vantage and GLaunch into a single directory, deleted some redundant files and tried a bunch of different configs.
There's got to be something stupid that I'm missing here??

[SirPeale]

Can you do it from your hard drive, using the same setup?

[Thenasty]

you got my PM about the final culprit...GL+VANTAGE hates RAMDRIVE together but ok if you run the programs separately.
Vantage runs ok by itself fine.
GL runs ok by itself (maybe w/other emu besides vantage)
but..
as a team, its a no no .....

[Thenasty]

Can you do it from your hard drive, using the same setup?

runs fine in an HD drive w/no RAMDRIVE.
maybe one more test for me to see, if I enable my HD and boot of floppy.

[Thenasty]

ok...just tried it and bottom line is:

1. it runs fine if HD is present running everything on RAMDRIVE
2. it won't run by itself running RAMDRIVE only (no HD) see my prev-post above.
3. Everything runs fine on HD w/out using any RAMDRIVE.

[JoyMonkey]

So maybe I need to try another XMS RamDrive program or tweak what its running now. It's as if the XMS program relies on the presence of a C drive. Hmmm...

[Thenasty]

let me know what you come up.....try DOS 6.22

[Truz]

not that this is of much help, but i tried out the floppy on this old laptop i had and it makes it all the way to the Game Launcher select screen and lists the few roms i put on there. But when i go to start up a game. It looks like it is going to load, but then it flashes "Incorrect MS-DOS version" in the upper right corner.

I think what you are trying to do is awesome, and would work awesome in a cabinet i want to make that only plays a few 4-way games. Thats why i figured i would try this out, hopefully you guys can get it working... because im not to savy with all this DOS stuff.

[greven grevs]

FIgured I too would post my experience with your wonderful program.
The same as Truz , get all the way to the game select screen but when it select a game it goes back to a prompt.  Wierd thing is that it goes to a G:\ prompt not a A:\

keep up the work!

[JoyMonkey]

FIgured I too would post my experience with your wonderful program.
The same as Truz , get all the way to the game select screen but when it select a game it goes back to a prompt.  Wierd thing is that it goes to a G:\ prompt not a A:\

keep up the work!

The ramdrive it creates and tries to run everything from is set as G.
I should probably try using a standard ramdrive.sys ramdrive, could be anything though.

[greven grevs]

DOAH! says that right there in your first post!

better stop boozing

[daywane]

thats it. your cut off. hand it over 

[JoyMonkey]

I finally got it working! But for some reason GameLauncher won't write it's save-state file (glaunch.sta) unless it's set to debug mode in glaunch.cfg. And without a save-state file, it refuses to run anything.

This floppy image has GLauncher set to debug mode, so it works, it's just not as pretty as it could/should be.

Check it out:
http://www.wickedretarded.com/misc/vantage-floppy6.exe

As usual, no roms are included, you need to put some Vantage roms into the roms folder on the floppy for it to be of any use.

[Thenasty]

so, you finally found exactly whats up with GL. I have to give it try. All I have to do is set the deubg mode on in my cfg ? Wonder why it won't write to a RAMDRIVE ?..

[JoyMonkey]

This floppy uses the standard Microsoft RamDrive.sys instead of the xmsdisk I was using before.
Debug mode didn't work with xmsdisk (I have no idea why not), but it works with ramdrive. I tried older and newer versions of GameLauncher, but no dice. I tried running batch files from GameLauncher instead of runing Vantage directly from GameLauncer, but that didn't work either.

[daywane]

how hard will it be to set up to run from CD instead of floppy
very happy it works now.