RIP-Felix

Agreed. Just remember that faith is not credulity. Faith is a promise (or contractual obligation) that both parties WILL hold up their end of the agreed upon terms. Marriage and Faith in God are very much the same kind of agreement. While people make mistakes, God will NEVER betray you! Just remain loyal on your end in both your marriage and promise to God, and you can be assured of your reward. Your head is in the right place. Stay strong and keep on keep'n on!

I like that case...A LOT!! Specifically, I like that heatsink!!! Question: Does it work with a Pi 3 rev. B+ ? I saw a review saying it doesn't?

I saw it, and didn't like it...Damn! ...I really wanted to like it. I tried, but just culden't get past the liberties they took with the MAJOR plot lines. They trounced on the spirit of the book too much for me to enjoy their adaptation of the story. I hate agreeing with this cliche, but...The book is WAYYYY better. Did you like it? I'd love to hear why. So please, help me to have a better perspective. I'm dying to be proven wrong.

How about one for a powered wheelchair? Make it so it swivels out, so it's easy to get in/out of. Go on Grampy, you can get along and play Donkey Kong.

2 DAYS LEFT!!! In preparation I'm reading the book again. It may be a bad idea, but I want to have the story fresh in mind so I can pick out all the details/flaws I can. It's part of the hype process. I may just be setting myself up for a massive letdown, but maybe not...Hopefully not. I am managing my expectations. There are major rewrites required, for licensing reasons. So long as they don't ruin the spirit of the book and rewrite too many of the core plot lines, I think I'll like it.

Just Bought Link, Mario, and Sonic. I also got a Mario Question box lamp. I'm going to put Mario on the lamp. Then place sonic and link on either side. These will go on the top of my arcade cabinet. I got Micro usb adapters for them so I can hook all of them up to the PC running the Arcade. So when I power it on, they light up with the marquee. Should be pretty cool. I just need to find a way to mount them so they don't fall off. EDIT: I had to modify the Question Box lamp so it will power on the moment the USB powers up. It had a momentary switch that I replaced with a Latching type. Luckily it's the exact switch I used in my MiniNES (Nestalgia) project. So I had an extra lying around. A quick solder job and it worked like a charm. I can still turn it on/off the way it worked before too, so nothing lost. Something I didn't realize about the Lamp when I bought it was that it makes a coin sound when it turns on. A nice touch when the arcade turns on! I'm still waiting on Link, but he will go where Mario is now and Mario will be on top of the question block. Here is a pic:

Well that's the thing. It disproportionately affects older CPUs. The older (within the last 10 years - the relevant ones) are affected more than the newer faster models. So yeah, there is perhaps a fear factor there, but I think it's driven more out of necessity than coercion. Tests show that the patch doesn't seem to as noticeable in normal user scenarios as was initially feared (Browsing internet, gaming, and file management). Where it becomes noticeable is when the CPU is usually operating near 100%, like in servers or data centers. I wonder about video encoding. That one gets me as it's the primary reason I bought a fast CPU (Intel i7-4790K). It already takes a buttload of time to encode mp4 home movies in hitfilm.

Just saw it last weekend and was expecting it to be worse. I saw "Wonder" before TLJ and was expecting it to be the better movie of the two, but enjoyed both.

Aparantly, it's a huge vulnerability. Intel cpu users are vulnerable from the internet, regardless of settings. AMD is vulnerable from local access, so hackers would need physical access to your computer. The exploit was discovered by a professional hacking service that brings them to the attention of the companies it affects. From what I gather, it has not yet hit the nefarious hacking community yet, but they will start attacking the fix once they get a look at what it does (revealing the exploit itself). So until Intel, ARM, and AMD fix their physical CPU architecture, this will continue to be a security risk requiring regular OS level updates to keep ahead of the hackers. So, expect a 5-30% performance hit for current CPU's. The new architecture is going to be 5% faster without any advances in technology, other than fixing the flaw. So annoying.

Meanwhile, AMD eagerly awaits the increase in market share. Nothing more satisfying than your competition doing your job for you.

You should watch the video. Yes he did make a chip that plugs into the expansion port, but figured out exactly how the CD sub-system worked (2:30). Essentially there is a CPU that controls that system and he was able to dump it's rom. No one was able to do this previously. Saturn is particularly hard because of the way it works and emulation efforts in the past were a trial/error process. This contribution to the available information will allow emulator devs to make cycle accurate emulation. He only started the project in 2013 and recently finished (like in the last year or two). He is getting close to releasing prototype boards that will allow you to load roms on your Saturn. However, he has been sharing his findings with emulator devs, who should be releasing updates with real improvements as they figure out how to implement these findings in software (19:16)! So I think this is news, at least it was to me.

Yeah, but the files actually have to no special characters (The *.gen, *.sfrom, and etc). Most romsets have alternate dumps, hacks, and regions inside of an archive (Goodsets do anyway). I already went through and extracted the US region verified working dumps, those signified with "(USA) [!]". I placed them in a separate folder when I wanted to pair down the full set to the to IGN top 100. This makes finding a good game much easier;) It was a lot of work, but thus are the ones I included on the SD card (once I got them renamed correctly). I managed to get the L2/R2 momentary press issue sorted. It was pressing L1 and R1. L1/2 and R1/2 are registering as the same buttons respectively. So instead of L2 (Select item) or R2 (Select weapon) it was pressing L1 (Scope) and R1 (nothing, since I couldn't select a weapon). I swapped them in settings and that works, but I can't use L1 and R1 because of it. Also, the left analog stick is just cloning the D-pad. It's not analog at all, retroarch settings doesn't change that. The Wii classic controller works better, but I need to do more testing...

Yup, the "\(" escapes the ( command and tells it to literally look for an open parentheses. Same with "\]". I wasted a whole day watching youtube videos trying to figure that out!!! Eventually I managed to whip the romnames into shape. Probably took me more time than it would have to rename them one by one! (breaths deeply)...

Interesting!

Yes, I can see the usefulness. It's just masked by the throbbing pain in my neck! Trouble in SNEStalgia The 8BitDo SF30 pro controller isn't perfectly recognized in retroarch on the SNESC yet! R3/L3 and the right analog stick do not bind (are not seen). Everything else is seen. All the regular cores work fine without these controls (NES, SNES, Genesis, Atari 2600, and GB/GBA are the ones I've tested so far). However, PS1 and N64 won't work properly without them. For PS1 I'm using pcsx_rearmed_neon. R3/L3 and the right analog stick are not recognized, so no ape escape! Also, in Metal Gear Solid, L1/L2 act like a momentary switch. It doesn't see me holding the button down, which won't allow me to select weapons/items. It just equips the scope. So PS1 games are unplayable with this controller. Mupen64 is even worse. In addition to the buttons retroarch won't bind, the emu itself doesn't respond to the left analog stick or D-pad, even though they are bound in retroarch. Since there is no emulation station or frontend with the SNESC, it makes troubleshooting these things out of my league. There most likely needs to be a core update to modify the controller driver (wherever it's located). I'm using "_km_pcsx_rearmed_neon_12_16_17.hmod" for the PSX core, but I'm not sure that's where the retroarch controller drivers are stored. These cores get installed on the SNESC using Hakchi1, an unforgiving process. Assuming the driver is in the *.hmod, I would need to edit it and hack around inside of it (Linux coding). YUK!!!

Speaking of coding... HELP!!! The USB-HOST MOD that I'm using requires that no special characters be in the romname. My Goodset roms have Parentheses, exclamation points, and hyphens (Battletoads & Double Dragon - The Ultimate Team (U) [!].nes for example). In order for it to be loaded from the USB drive, it needs to be renamed to Battletoads & Double Dragon_The Ultimate Team.nes. I could do this rom by rom, but it would take forever. So I downloaded a bulk renaming tool (RegexRenamer, but I'm not married to it). However it uses general expressions to match patterns and rename. I have no idea how to get it to remove just the special characters. I've already spent too much time watching youtube videos trying to figure it out, to no avail. How do I remove "(U)" and "(!)" without changing anything else? How do I replace "-" with underscores? EDIT: I Found the following to work: (.\(.*\]) That searches for "space(" + any number of characters followed by "]". That removes "space(U) [!]" After renaming, I'm left with "Battletoads & Double Dragon - The Ultimate Team.nes". The last thing left is to remove are the hyphens; (.-.) That matches "space-space". In the replace bar I put an underscore. It thus becomes "Battletoads & Double Dragon_The Ultimate Team.nes" after renaming again.

SNEStalgia update Apparently the SNES classic edition can now have a USB/SD storage device added. You can solder in an SD card (Invasive) or use a micro USB On-The-Go Adapter to extend the storage. The alteration is less user friendly and bugs are still being worked out, but now the sky's the limit for it's library. I'm going to add PS1 to it. From what I understand it's hardware is slightly more impressive than the raspberry Pi 3. So it should be able to swing more (N64?). I like the interface better than emulation station, the save state manager and rewind feature specifically, but it doesn't offer the flexibility RPi does. Regardless, this is a huge leap forward. It's really giving NEStalgia the old Na-Na-Nuh-Boo-Boo-I-Hold-Your-Face-In-Doo_Doo! It can't emulate the cartridge, and never will. So there's that. They are really fighting for Daddy's attention.

Yeah, that seems doable. I'll probably put this project off for a while, I'm just not feeling it right now. Nice tool however. Thanks for the tip! Defiantly on my to-do list.

Yeah, I read through the walk-through. It's pretty strait forward, albeit tedious, I'm just hesitant to edit my run on start and end scripts. NEStalgia uses them to automate the cartridge emulation function. I might be able to get it to work in addition to the modified script I already have, but each time the changes add up and later make figuring out what you did harder. SD image backups will thus be necessary. My bigger concern is that I don't have a dedicated controller. I routinely pair the Wii U pro, SF30/NES30 pro, and PS3 controllers to other devices (GameEX HTPC, Arcade Cab, SNES classic edition, and original SNES/NES/PS3). I'm not sure that the Bluetooth ID or linux assignments will always be the same when resyncing to the Pi. I've had this problem on windows, even with wired controllers. I have a bunch of different adapters, but the USB port you plug it into has to be the same or the event ID changes; I often have to redo all the keymaps in GameEX, MAME, Emulators, and etc. because I can never remember which port it was plugged into. The only solution I've found it to mark the ports or leave the adapter in permanently. I wish there was a way to instruct the computer to recognize the adapter and assign it a static event ID, regardless of which USB port it was plugged into. Maybe there is, but I've revisited this issue may times and came up empty each time. That's the biggest advantage of retroarch IMO. One controller map applies to every system. So you just have to do it once. However, it always has to be recognized as the same controller. Wired is one thing, wireless has been a mixed bag in my experience. The last thing I want to do is have to repeat that tedious process each time I pair the controller because Emulation station recognized it as "Gampad 8" instead of "Gamepad 6", even though they are both the same "SF30 pro gampad". Sorry your suggestion is bringing up some Personal Computer Stress Disorder (PCSD). I've been through some loosing battles with my arcade cab, and this is bringing me back there. EDIT:

Yikes, my Profile pic says it all! Well...ummm...yeah, that's that's the intense linux muck around session I was hoping to avoid. I can see why you've been putting it off. I've had rumble working in ePSXe on windows. I use ePSXeCutor to create shortcuts with per game settings which are launched by GameEX. Then I manage disc switching with @nullPointer's Switch disc. That works fine, but takes forever to setup correctly. Then if some path or video driver changes, you have to start all over. I've been needing to redo my setup since I last upgraded my video card, but have been pitting off because of what a PITA it is. RetroPi makes PS1 simpler. PSX2PSP simplifies multi disc games and retroarch makes disc swapping easy. EmulationStation automates the controller profiles for easy setup. Why for Pete's sake is the only thing lacking Force Feedback? It's frustrating. It seems like it would be such a simple thing, but just isn't. It was so close to being the perfect solution for PS1 emulation! Sigh...I guess nothing is perfect. Oh well.

I'm starting to think some of the issues of the PSX emulator not working are related to some configuration exception in retroarch, not the controller. The reason is because none of my controllers will control PS1 now. With all the testing/setting up I was doing with a Wii U pro, PS3, and the 8BitDo controllers I think something got confused. I need to reset the PS1 configuration file and retry. It was working great with my Wii U Pro controller (No rumble though) now it isn't. So I'm skeptical that my results for the Switch mode above are accurate. I think it was just the first appearance of this issue, which has now spread to the rest of my controllers. I have no idea why, so I just need to find the config file and reset it. I'm not sure where to start. EDIT: Well I got the controllers working again (PS3 - using this Mayflash adapter, SF30 Pro, NES30 Pro, and Wii U Pro). They all work together fine, but the rumble still won't work on any of them. The PS3 controller uses the Mayflash adapter on it's x-input setting and is recognized as a "Microsoft X-box 360 controller". On windows this allows rumble support, but only one controller per wireless adapter. On it's D-input setting the adapter allows 4x PS3 controllers to pair simultaneously, but no rumble - again on windows. I wanted to see if it would work similarly in Retropi. It does recognize the controller and all buttons fine. Since the adapter handles the sync, the pi has no problem with it. The adapter automatically pairs the controllers Bluetooth ID, the Pi just sees the adapter as a USB controller. Re-pairing is no issue whatsoever. If I use the controller elsewhere (PS3, arcade cab, HTPC) all I have to do to re-sync with the pi is plug the PS3 controller into the adapter, and adapter into the Pi. No messing around with Bluetooth drivers! Now the lack of rumble no matter what I've tried is weird. The SF30 pro has rumble and vibrates once upon each sucessful sync with the pi. So I know it works. The Wii U Pro had force feedback, but I haven't felt anything. The PS3 controller has force feedback, but it doesn't rumble either. I have the rumble option in retroarch enabled, but that doesn't do anything. I have the rumble enabled in game (If that matters). What else can I try? I did find a guide that enables the Force Feedback in the driver for the Pantherlord/Greenasia USB PS1/2 Dualshock adapters. I do have one of these adapters and some controllers. The rumble is supposed to be weaker since the Pi can only supply 5v instead of the 7.5v OEM. However that guide is...um...daunting. I hate linux. I'd like to avoid compiling kernels manually if possible. Regardless, this is not exactly what I'm looking for anyway. What I'm trying to find out is why rumble isn't working for any controller I've tried.

Well, I couldn't get it to work (Firmware v1.20). I first tried putting the SF30pro in windows mode (x-input), which is usually the first requirement to get rumble support in emulators. It paired fine, I setup a Udev rule so it would automatically reconnect, but it wouldn't register the L2/R2 or Star/Home buttons. The rest worked so I tried firing up FF8 and seeing if I could at least get rumble to work. No luck - I rummaged through Retroarch settings and made sure all settings related to analog and rumble were enabled. Still Nothing. Maybe it's the emulator I'm using? IDK. So I put the SF30pro in Android mode (D-input) and that fixed the button issue. All the buttons register, but still no rumble. I'm not sure what else to try. There is nothing wrong with the controller otherwise. Pros: Everything except Rumble work on Raspberry pi and NES/SNES classic. I'm sure with time someone will bring full support to the Pi. It's such a cool controller! Turbo/Autofire feature is nice! It's easy to enable and disable, so that is really cool. Bigger and well made thumb sticks. They feel great, super locked in on your thumb. The NES30pro had smaller ones that were stiffer and less stable. They took some getting used to, these are immediately familiar. They feel the same, but slightly better than, the PS4's thimbsticks, since they have a little extra texture around the raised rim of the circular depression. If your thumb slips out, that texture catches your thumb and allows you to easily regain control. Nice improvement over the NES30 pro. LEDs are subdued. You can see them, but they don't blind you. The patterns they display are easy to understand and provide useful information about what mode the controller is in, the current player assignment, and syncing. The Retro Recievers for NES/SNES/SFC Classic Edition, NES, and SNES each work with this controller after you update the firmware on them. The Indifferent: The frequency of the auto-fire feature is so fast that it skips while firing. I think the auto-fire is optimized for the Switch and that doesn't necessarily work best for the Pi. It works, but I found it barely effective for Megaman X. It probably can't work perfect for every game, so I don't hold it against the controller. It's probably just the game I tried. Okay, It wouldn't be fair if I didn't say it. It is not an ergonomic controller. This is a pro because it looks and feels nostalgic. This is a con because it's not comfortable to play with for long periods of time. However, you don't buy this controller for comfort. You buy the Wii U controller for comfort. You buy this because it looks cool and gives you blisters while you babality your little brother on mortal Kombat! Remember, pain is weakness leaving the body! By the way, If you really want ergonomics and authentic retro gaming, the 8BitDo Retro Recievers also pair to the Wii U pro, PS4, and all 8BitDo controllers. So play your original NES, SNES, and classic edition with a modern controller. I imagine this would be useful for speed running. Cons: The rumble not working off the bat on Raspberry Pi. This is not a deal breaker. The controller rattles a bit when you shake it. That's just the nature of the thing, but it may feel a bit cheap because if it. It doesn't feel to light or otherwise flimsy. It just has a little clearance around the buttons. That is a very picky con however. EDIT: How the Different modes behave in Retropi Switch Mode - Controller pairs easily and repeatedly. It's recognized a "Pro Controller" and all buttons map when configured. NES and SNES emulators accept the input fine. However, PS1 doesn't. While I can access the Retroarch menu and control it, I can't actually play in game. For some reason the controls are not recognized by the emulator itself. Also, the Turbo feature is disabled in Switch mode. Dinput - This works fine. Recognized as "SF30 pro". I have had some issues with the controller not wanting to repair after the Pi has been off. I'm not sure what's going on. I did set up a Udev rule, as required for 8BitDo controllers. I do have the 8bitdo hack off, since this uses the new firmware. I'll have to test some more to see if it was just a one off thing, or a recurring problem. I will say, I've had similar trouble with the NES30 pro. Regardless, Dinput is the way this controller needs to be paired to the Pi. Xinput - Pairs fine and is recognized as "SF30 pro". The L2/R2 and Star/home buttons aren't recognized at all. macOS - Pairs fine and is recognized as "Wireless controller". Is not recognized during the configure input stage.

Just out of curiosity did y'all ever get the PS3 rumble driver sorted? I never did try connecting my PS3 controller to the Pi yet. I guess there are some issues with the rumble huh?

Just played some Megaman X on SNEStalgia with the SF30 pro. I had to update the firmware on the Retro Reciever and put the controller in Android mode (D-input mode), but it works. No rumble yet. I think it has to be in x-input mode for rumble to work with Retroarch and it doesn't work right with the SNES classic in X-input mode. I'm not sure if there is a way to do it unless D-input can be used for rumble. I'm hoping I can connect to NEStalgia in X-input mode... I'm restoring NEStalgia's SD image at the moment. Should be a bit, then I'll test PS1.