Author Topic: OMG WTF am I doing Wrong (Read 3453 times)

Hoagie_one · « **on:** June 21, 2003, 09:59:26 am »

Ok, I have never used a FE before. I have always just used mame32. It has always worked very well for me. But I want to use a FE so I have a nice look for my future cab. So i get the windows command line version of mame, then I start getting FE's to try out.

MAME WAH -- Ok, I spend way too long trying to configure it, but i finally get it configured and when I go to run a Rom, it doesnt do anything.

Game Launcher - I try Game launcher next because everyone said it was easy to set up. Not easy to me. There are configs and mame dats and mame cnfgs and list dats, and whatever else. I dont have a clue whats going on here. Then i see a config utility that just confuses me more because it cant call some file that it is looking for in teh mame directory that isnt in the mame directory. I get alot errors and just give up on this one too.

Dragon king -- this one just scews up my resolution and crashes every time i try to run it.

Now, I see that the common problem is not the FE's, because youguys all use them all the time. So, the common problem is probably ME.

WTF am I doing Wrong?

Thanks
Mike

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #1 on:** June 21, 2003, 10:12:00 am »

Oh, and even better now, I put Mame 32 back on and it wont run any roms either. It opens the GUI, but wont run a rom, it just sits there.

One of these stupid FE's just fried something. DAMMIt im pissed off

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #2 on:** June 21, 2003, 10:29:52 am »

And Furthermore, I tried to take my mame32 and roms to another computer and it ran fine so somewhere, somehow, one of these FE's Fubared my computer and it wont run MAME now.

GRRRRRRR

BuZz880 · « **Reply #3 on:** June 21, 2003, 10:33:08 am »

As a general rule most FE's have a quickstart documentation to get you running ASAP. The latest version of MAMEWAH however, is in a Beta stage so might not be fully documented. I am not sure.

When you ask these questions it would be helpful to know some things about your computer including what OS are you using?

Since this is your first FE experiment, the easiest FE to use is MAME32. I understand you had it working so now the trick is to figure out what went wrong. You haven't told me enough about the problem you are having with it - do your available roms appear in the list? Perhaps you need to edit your mame32.ini file and be certain the FE is looking in the right directory perhaps one of your FE's changed something in that regard?

try a simple test. Go START--RUN then type your command string to mame32.exe lets say c:\program files\mame32.exe pacman (or some other ROM you have and are certain it is located in the MAME32/ROMS directory.

Does that work?

Next try the same thing with MAME. what is it? c:\mame mame.exe pacman (again make sure the rom is in the mame\roms directory.

Sometimes when trying multiple mame builds I know I end up moving my roims back and forth and before long they end up in the wrong directory perhaps that is your problem, perhaps not. Let us know. If either of the above work then you know its just an FE issue and needs a little more config time.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #4 on:** June 21, 2003, 10:52:22 am »

i deleted or uninstalled all the FE's. I am just trying to get MAME32 to run again. It runs and dislplays all the roms. It can audit and view the properties of the roms just fine. When i try to play them, it does nothing. Just sits there like i didnt even hit the button.

I am using XP home on this computer

I tried a system restore to before i installed any of the FE's, i may try to go back further.

I deleted a Mame registry entry that was suggested in teh Troubleshooting file. I have tried a option-reset in mame32.

I am going to try a previous version of mame and see if that will run next

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #5 on:** June 21, 2003, 11:24:44 am »

I have now tried several system restores, 3 different versions of Mame32 and crying out loud. I get the same results. Nada.

Can anyone point me to a help board for mame issues?

)p( · « **Reply #6 on:** June 21, 2003, 11:30:45 am »

i would be careful with that restore...it would suprise me if any of the fe's you mention did change anything relevant to running mame.

As buzz880 try running mame from the commandline first..i would first try the commandline build of mame as noe registry stuff can screw that up...

so...go to the command prompt then cd to the folder your commandline mame is in...then if your mame is mamepp.exe create the mamepp.ini:
mamepp.exe -cc

then open mamepp.ini and oint rompath in it to your roms folder
rompath \roms\;c:\roms\;

then try to run a game
mamepp pacman

does it work?

peter

BuZz880 · « **Reply #7 on:** June 21, 2003, 11:31:54 am »

alt.games.mame is pretty good - lots of people reading it.

Sounds to me like your FE is simply not finding the ROm, I understand it appears in the list but the behaviour you describe is exactly as though there was not a rom there when MAME goes to load it. Try command line stuff as I described above just to be sure.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #8 on:** June 21, 2003, 11:43:27 am »

Ok, it ran fine from the command prompt.

But.....why then do i have issues with MAME32?

SirPoonga · « **Reply #9 on:** June 21, 2003, 11:51:02 am »

Try rebooting?

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #10 on:** June 21, 2003, 12:06:18 pm »

yes tried rebooting.

Ok, since i got my command line working, i went back and tried mamewah. It remembered all my configurations when i reinstalled it, not sure if this is good or bad. I made the nessesary changes and tried to run a rom. Every rom i try to run through mamewah gives me a new error. It tells me that it cant run the rom, check and make sure the rom or executable is working.

Its working alreight cause i just ran it from teh command line.

Sigh, WTF did I do?

)p( · « **Reply #11 on:** June 21, 2003, 12:14:49 pm »

Quote from: Hoagie_one on June 21, 2003, 12:06:18 pm

yes tried rebooting.

Ok, since i got my command line working, i went back and tried mamewah. It remembered all my configurations when i reinstalled it, not sure if this is good or bad. I made the nessesary changes and tried to run a rom. Every rom i try to run through mamewah gives me a new error. It tells me that it cant run the rom, check and make sure the rom or executable is working.

Its working alreight cause i just ran it from teh command line.

Sigh, WTF did I do?

That sounds weird if you point mamewah to the correct folders for your mame...it should work...

for testing the launching of games you could try downloading mine..unzip it keeping the folder structure...doubleclick "go directly to configuration menu.bat" ...In the main configuration menu select the listmanager. Then click on the mame emulator in the emulator section and choose edit emulator. In section 1 point emupath and workingdir to your mame folder. section 3 point mame to your mame executable. then run fe3darcade.exe and try to launch a game...

peter

Odonadon · « **Reply #12 on:** June 21, 2003, 11:34:14 pm »

Quote from: Hoagie_one on June 21, 2003, 09:59:26 am

Ok, I have never used a FE before. I have always just used mame32. It has always worked very well for me. But I want to use a FE so I have a nice look for my future cab. So i get the windows command line version of mame, then I start getting FE's to try out.

MAME WAH -- Ok, I spend way too long trying to configure it, but i finally get it configured and when I go to run a Rom, it doesnt do anything.

Game Launcher - I try Game launcher next because everyone said it was easy to set up. Not easy to me. There are configs and mame dats and mame cnfgs and list dats, and whatever else. I dont have a clue whats going on here. Then i see a config utility that just confuses me more because it cant call some file that it is looking for in teh mame directory that isnt in the mame directory. I get alot errors and just give up on this one too.

Dragon king -- this one just scews up my resolution and crashes every time i try to run it.

Now, I see that the common problem is not the FE's, because youguys all use them all the time. So, the common problem is probably ME.

WTF am I doing Wrong?

Thanks
Mike

Well, it's not ALL just you. It usually takes me an hour or so to finally get that stupid mamescan (GameLauncher) to find my roms if I add any new ones. Plus, I have to run GL in debug mode to get my other emus to run without GL crashing.

Dragon King crashes on each and every computer I've tried it on. Don't use it unless you've got something powerful.

MameWAH has been great to me so far, but I have no idea how to tell the stupid thing to display the full name of the game, instead of the rom file name in the list.

Other than that, MameWAH has been the easiest front-end I've ever used to setup. I haven't had any grief at all - no error messages or anything. Just the ---Bad words, bad words, whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do when saint censors you?--- file listing issue

Odonadon

Rocky · « **Reply #13 on:** June 22, 2003, 12:14:57 am »

Odonadon,

To get the list to be regular names instead of rom names, here's what Minwah says from another post. (Sorry I don't know how to just link to it

)

>Using the latest version (v0.951b), go into 'Emulator
>Settings' > 'List Generation Settings' and change
>the 'List Generation Method' to 'ROM Folder vs Listinfo
>(M.A.M.E.)'. Oh, and then refresh the games list

Hope that helps

Rocky

Odonadon · « **Reply #14 on:** June 22, 2003, 12:30:58 am »

Quote from: Rocky on June 22, 2003, 12:14:57 am

Odonadon,

To get the list to be regular names instead of rom names, here's what Minwah says from another post. (Sorry I don't know how to just link to it )

>Using the latest version (v0.951b), go into 'Emulator
>Settings' > 'List Generation Settings' and change
>the 'List Generation Method' to 'ROM Folder vs Listinfo
>(M.A.M.E.)'. Oh, and then refresh the games list

Hope that helps

Rocky

Thanks! That works awesome! So yeah, took me a few hours to get MameWAH up and running 100%. Never got that far with GL - been using that for 6 months.

Odonadon

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #15 on:** June 22, 2003, 10:24:33 am »

I believe that Mamewah is the way i want to go but I cant get my roms to run at all right now. Not even in MAME 32. They only run from command line.

Does anyone know all the registry setting i have to delete to clear Mame, mamewah, dragonking, and gamelauncher from my registry?

I have to try that next.

BuZz880 · « **Reply #16 on:** June 22, 2003, 10:49:48 am »

Hey Hoagie,

I still think sincce the command line works that its just a matter of getting MAMEWAH setup right which means reviewing line-by line your EXECUTION SETTINGS your MISC SETTINGS and your LIST GENERATION SETTINGS.

After that is confirmed:

Try in MAMEWAH setting it to

a) SEND ROM EXTENSION

and

b) SEND ROM PATH

Also try LONG FILENAMES ON and OFF.

I might be fishing here but its something to try.

AS for registry settings maybe you can google for "manual uninstall mame" or something. Seems to me MAME32 has registry settings but MAME Windows probably doesn't. Also MAMEWAH doesn't seem to have much because I can move it around from folder to folder and it still works.

You can always run regedit and search for the term "mame" but be very careful before deleting any of these keys make sure you know what it is. Many of them simply track what programs have been used last and stuff like that so deleting them can't possibly help anyway.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #17 on:** June 22, 2003, 12:20:01 pm »

ok then, maybe im just ignorant on how to properly configure Mame wah. I dont know what have the stuff is in teh thing anyways and the readme is written to those who do know. I am still a newbie to all of this.

Still irritates me that Mame32 wont run on its own though, makes me think something else is still wrong

BuZz880 · « **Reply #18 on:** June 22, 2003, 12:56:33 pm »

can you run mame32 as a command line? It used to work I haven't tried lately.

mame32.exe pacman

?

Odonadon · « **Reply #19 on:** June 22, 2003, 01:05:36 pm »

Quote from: Hoagie_one on June 22, 2003, 12:20:01 pm

ok then, maybe im just ignorant on how to properly configure Mame wah. I dont know what have the stuff is in teh thing anyways and the readme is written to those who do know. I am still a newbie to all of this.

Still irritates me that Mame32 wont run on its own though, makes me think something else is still wrong

You're right - Mamewah's documentation is a little lacking. You pretty much need to know what needs to be setup first, then find out where in mamewah's options it is. Basically, you need rom executable, and rom path. It should run fine with just those two options filled in correctly. If your roms are in a different path alltogether from mame, try turning "send rom path" option on.

Odonadon

AlanS17 · « **Reply #20 on:** June 22, 2003, 01:09:23 pm »

REFORMAT!!! (works every time)

mrhowell · « **Reply #21 on:** June 22, 2003, 01:43:06 pm »

I think we need a poll question here.

SirPeale · « **Reply #22 on:** June 22, 2003, 02:02:45 pm »

One of the first things you might want to try is checking to see if your directories are set correctly in MAME32. Go to OPTIONS, then Directories. Make sure it explicitly states the directory that your ROMs are in, as opposed to just 'roms' (which although is the default something has obviously gone wrong here).

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #23 on:** June 22, 2003, 02:30:05 pm »

Quote from: AlanS17 on June 22, 2003, 01:09:23 pm

REFORMAT!!! (works every time)

last ditch option, and onlyafter i back up the 20 gigs of stuff i cant lose, lol

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #24 on:** June 22, 2003, 02:30:49 pm »

Quote from: Peale on June 22, 2003, 02:02:45 pm

One of the first things you might want to try is checking to see if your directories are set correctly in MAME32. Go to OPTIONS, then Directories. Make sure it explicitly states the directory that your ROMs are in, as opposed to just 'roms' (which although is the default something has obviously gone wrong here).

Did that, thats not the problem

BobA · « **Reply #25 on:** June 22, 2003, 02:45:23 pm »

Maybe you could list the names of your mame directory and roms directory and the directory you have mamewah in. Often when roms cannot be found there is some problem with the directory naming or drive.

BobA

Howard_Casto · « **Reply #26 on:** June 22, 2003, 09:21:24 pm »

Ok man, I know this doesn't help you but if you are having trouble getting mame32 to work then you are just the type of person that isn't good with computers period. Mame32 is virtually idiot proof.

I would suggest that you just take some time to really understand how your computer and emulators work instead to trying for the "make it work now, without effort" approach.

Hope that isn't too harsh, but I can guarantee you, at least half of the people that have responded were thinking the same thing but were afraid to say so.

SirPeale · « **Reply #27 on:** June 22, 2003, 10:09:27 pm »

Quote from: Howard_Casto on June 22, 2003, 09:21:24 pm

Ok man, I know this doesn't help you but if you are having trouble getting mame32 to work then you are just the type of person that isn't good with computers period. Mame32 is virtually idiot proof.

I would suggest that you just take some time to really understand how your computer and emulators work instead to trying for the "make it work now, without effort" approach.

Hope that isn't too harsh, but I can guarantee you, at least half of the people that have responded were thinking the same thing but were afraid to say so.

Howard, I really don't think that this is the problem. He clearly states he can get it to work from the command line, but can't get it to work via a double click on an icon.

Perhaps an option would be to unzip MAME32 into a new directory (named something other than what it is now) and point the directory towards where the ROMs are.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #28 on:** June 22, 2003, 11:26:51 pm »

Quote from: Howard_Casto on June 22, 2003, 09:21:24 pm

Ok man, I know this doesn't help you but if you are having trouble getting mame32 to work then you are just the type of person that isn't good with computers period. Mame32 is virtually idiot proof.

I would suggest that you just take some time to really understand how your computer and emulators work instead to trying for the "make it work now, without effort" approach.

Hope that isn't too harsh, but I can guarantee you, at least half of the people that have responded were thinking the same thing but were afraid to say so.

I'm not an idiot, and if you took the time to read what I was saying you'd know that too, but ill start over from the beginning and ill speak slowly

I had Mame 32 working fine, in fact it was working perfectly. I even changed rom directories too, but it was really hard. Then one day, I tried to configure Mamewah with the windows command line version of Mame. I couldn't get it to run roms and i was sad, I cried even. Then I tried Game launcher and had trouble with setup, stopped half way through and tried Dragon king. Dragon king crashed, screwed my resolution and did nothing.

OK, here's the part you missed. NOW, Mame32 wont run. In fact I cannot get Mame to run in any way except through a dos prompt command line. No front ends at all. I may not have mamewah or any other front end set up correctly, but i do know how to run Mame 32, and it isn't working anymore.

But thank you for your harsh comments, I'm sure you'll feel better now that you got them out.

Furthermore, Even If I was a total Newb, why wouldn't you give me some encouragement and advice instead of being a total jerk? I'm sure that half the people who replied here feel that way too.

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #29 on:** June 23, 2003, 12:24:11 am »

Quote from: Peale on June 22, 2003, 10:09:27 pm

Perhaps an option would be to unzip MAME32 into a new directory (named something other than what it is now) and point the directory towards where the ROMs are.

Didnt work

)p( · « **Reply #30 on:** June 23, 2003, 01:20:37 am »

Quote from: Hoagie_one on June 22, 2003, 11:26:51 pm

OK, here's the part you missed. NOW, Mame32 wont run. In fact I cannot get Mame to run in any way except through a dos prompt command line. No front ends at all. I may not have mamewah or any other front end set up correctly, but i do know how to run Mame 32, and it isn't working anymore.

did you run mame32 just before you tried those fe's...as it could be the case there was allready something wrong to start with...if not...i am almost sure you must be able to run the commandline version with an fe.

which version of mam32 are you using...the regular build? There are different versions of mame32 floating around. so to start with debugging i would get the official version from mam32qa then install it in a new folder and in the mame32 gui adjust the dirs to point to your roms...

if that does not work most likely there is some conflicting info in the registry...

as for mamewah, gamelauncher or dk makeing changec to your system seems unlikely...
gamelauncher does not do anything to the registry or your mame files
dk nothing to your mamefiles and as far as i know nothing to the registry either
mamewah i am not 100% sure...but i would be surprised if it would...minwah?

peter

Hoagie_one · « **Reply #31 on:** June 23, 2003, 09:35:00 pm »

Quote from: )p( on June 23, 2003, 01:20:37 am

so to start with debugging i would get the official version from mam32qa then install it in a new folder and in the mame32 gui adjust the dirs to point to your roms...

if that does not work most likely there is some conflicting info in the registry...

Tried that, didnt help

Quote from: )p( on June 23, 2003, 01:20:37 am

as for mamewah, gamelauncher or dk makeing changec to your system seems unlikely...
gamelauncher does not do anything to the registry or your mame files
dk nothing to your mamefiles and as far as i know nothing to the registry either
mamewah i am not 100% sure...but i would be surprised if it would...minwah?

peter

I thought the same thing, but after i delted mamewah and the other Fe's, I later re-installed mamewah again and it had rememmbered all my previous settings, so it does have some sort of memory, not sure if its the registry or not.

What i need to know is the registry keys that mame\mame32\and mamewah use so i can delete them all and start over. Can anyone help me with that?

SirPeale · « **Reply #32 on:** June 24, 2003, 08:52:49 am »

Have you tried deleting your MAME32 registry entry?

Available under /HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Freeware/MAME32

Although I believe the latest version uses very little registry, and has gone to INI files for stoing settings.


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