Where can I find Z26 configured for a cab?

[Jakobud]

Good job Pacfan.  I like seeing you guys come together to accomplish cool stuff like this.

[PacManFan]

What a drag.... This version of Z26 just hangs on my cab machine (P2 running Win2k). I have to actually bring up the task manager and kill the process to get it to shut down. The weird thing is, it'll say "Z26 -- FROZEN" in the task list... Anyone have any idea what's wrong?

Thanks for any tips...

I developed it on a w2k machine, I'm not quite sure what could be wrong. I only altered the key mappings. How are you launching it? what's the command line? What rom are you trying to play? Try chaning the screen mode by holding down p1 b2 and pressing 1..9 for differant screen modes.
-PMF

[BuZz880]

Mine says Z26-frozen all the time and it works great.  

I use Win2K as well, ArcadeVGA card.  Try running it through your FE, I notice it has a popup if you don't use an FE but it disappears if you do, maybe thats part of the problem?

[Superdude]

Hey PacmanFan! Hows Emutron Comming along?  

[Xochi]

I developed it on a w2k machine, I'm not quite sure what could be wrong. I only altered the key mappings. How are you launching it? what's the command line? What rom are you trying to play? Try chaning the screen mode by holding down p1 b2 and pressing 1..9 for differant screen modes.
-PMF

Looked at it a little more... on the machine it's hanging on, it can't recognize the Turtle Beach Montego II as a Sound Blaster compatible card. When I start it, it gives the message about pressing escape to quit or any other key to use the PC Speaker. When I hit any other key it hangs...

I don't think my problem's specific to your patch PMF. I just started to set up Z26 after seeing your mame compatible version, so I guess Z26 hates my Sound Card.

Actually, I just tried stella after Z26 and it hangs also... I'm wondering if my BLASTER env variable is set correctly but I'm not sure how find out since Win2K just auto configures the card.... Sigh. Reminds of the bad old DOS days.

[BuZz880]

Try it without sound.  The command line was z26.exe <romname> -s0

at least that was it on the DOS version I assume it still works.

There is no blaster variable in Win2K.  Basically if it works without sound as above next try -s1, s2, s3, s4, etc. until you find a mode that works with your card.  

[PacManFan]

Hey PacmanFan! Hows Emutron Comming along?  

EmuTron is coming along slowly but surely, What I'v got now is a front-end for my front end. I'm developing screens that allow you to drag and drop- point and click to add/edit things to the script visually. It's running Emutron in a windowed mode, so you can see immediately exactly what it will look like full screen. I finished the save script functionality, so it actually writes the scripts for you when you click "Export". I'm just not happy yet with the interface for designing things. I'm modeling it after a 2d editor / powerpoint style interface.
I'll probably post a few screen shots soon so I can get some feedback.
I'm still trying to figure out how to represent visually the differant events and actions, and allow the user to easily add / modify them.
I'm toying with the idea about putting in a walk through scripting wizard that asks questions like: "Do you want and mp3 playlist", "Do you want multiple or a single game list", "Check here for multiple emulator support", "Select which types of images to display : screen shot, flyer, cabinet, marqee, etc.." ,"Please select your mame directory", "Please select your rom directory".

After the wizard runs, you'll have a basic script that you can then modify and tweak the layouts and actions.
I think that's a better idea than making the user start from scratch when creating a script, although I'll give them that option too.
I'm also putting in support for a menuing system.
You can put an "OnClick(rectname)" along with the keys to trigger events. So if you click on a rectangle on the screen, it can trigger events to run-> bitmaps to load, lists to change,etc.... Now that I've got basic expression parsing like a=b*c+4, you can use variables to do all sorts of things with an if-then statement.
It's just tricky to try to represent all these things visually on the screen to the user to give them control, and yet still maintain a user-friedly interface.
Any suggestions as far as usabilty?
-PMF

[tsaavik]

YES!!! after strugling with trying to compile stella someone FINALLY conquers the atari 2600 emulator in cab problem!

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU1

[Xochi]

Try it without sound.  The command line was z26.exe <romname> -s0

at least that was it on the DOS version I assume it still works.

There is no blaster variable in Win2K.  Basically if it works without sound as above next try -s1, s2, s3, s4, etc. until you find a mode that works with your card.  

Yeah, I actually tried it with -s0 already (although I ordered my command line differently, hopefully that isn't the prob ) anyway -s0 hangs too! Which is really weird.  

As I remember the docs implied that the BLASTER env needed to be set regardless of OS (makes sense it's a DOS app). And I only think I saw -s0,1,2 mentioned... I'll try unsetting BLASTER and some of the other switches, I guess. It doesn't hang on my other Win2K box, just my cab machine!  

[Cue-Ball]

I just want to say thanks to everyone involved in the z26 recompile effort.  I finally got around to installing Stella and z26 on my cab over the weekend and noticed that both emulators had the huge drawback of not using MAME default keys.  I hopped on the forum to see if anyone else had found a workaround and, low and behold, this thread appeared on page 2. :-)

Thanks again, guys.

[creatine28]

How do you get the roms to work with z26?   I tried using a dos window just to test it and when I type ...

z26 gamename  

nothing happens?   I read about changing the . bin to .a26,  is this correct?

Thanks!

[P-Funk]

Thank you PacManFan.  Great job.

Exactly what I've been hoping for.

[PacManFan]

Thank you PacManFan.  Great job.

Exactly what I've been hoping for.

No problem,
Just doing my part to help the BYOAC community
-PMF

Anyone got a link for the stellaX source?

[BuZz880]

Make sure you are running a ROM within your command line, this version of Z26 does not seem to have the integrated frontend the old DOS version had.