Endaar

What are you trying to accomplish? Honestly, I spent a LOT of time trying to make the most of this feature and I don't think it was worthwhile. There just aren't enough games that actually support features other than flashing the start button to justify worrying about it. After Burner II and Chase HQ are about the only games where this really adds a nice effect if done right. Endaar

I figured this out on my own. Apparently GameEx needs to see both a romname and gamename in controls.ini in order for it to call CPWizard. Endaar

Hi headkaze - I tried out the latest version, and for the most part the auto-show seems to work fine. If you set the show delay to zero though, the program generates an error message. This is still not as neat of a solution as when GameEx shows the panel, but it is certainly an option. I really haven't had enough time to test things more to try and figure out what's going on with GameEx. Thank you for all of your work on CPWizard, it's a great program. Endaar

OK, I looked into this a little further. For some games, GameEx simply doesn't call CPWizard when launching MAME. Tom, what triggers GameEx to launch CPWizard? I'm assuming it's one of the controls files somewhere but nothing obvious stands out. Thanks, James

Hi All, I can't figure this one out... I have CP Wizard setup and working. The majority of games properly display the CP before GameEx loads MAME, but some do not. However, once in MAME, if I open CP Wizard and view the CP, it displays correctly. I suspect this is something stupid I'm missing, and would appreciate any help. Thanks, Endaar

I have a UAII kit, except I used Mameroom's 2-player CP kit as well. I don't think there are any substantive differences in mounting it versus the tankbase, though. Like you, I don't trust my woodworking skills and wanted something that would ensure a good result. Honestly, I really did not have many problems with the kit. It IS pricy, and if you were expecting plywood or MDF because of the price, I can understand being frustrated. But the end result is strong and much more durable than I expected. I'll try to touch on a few items you mentioned, but as IMBezerk noted, more info would really be helpful in assisting you. Neither the marquee retainers nor the panels they attach to are drilled, and I'm assuming that's what you're having a problem with in that area. It wasn't a big deal drilling holes for this, but if you prefer not to, you can certainly use heavy-duty velcro, which should easily be strong enough to hold a few pieces of plexi in place. I am not using their marquee light, but admittedly there is no clear-cut way to mount anything you put there. Here too I ended up using velcro to attach my light fixture to the top panel of the cabinet. There aren't that many screws - where are you having stripping issues? If you mean the cam-lock things with a threaded end, you might just not be putting enough pressure on them when screwing them into the wood. The finish will chip a bit right around the hole, but it's not visible so don't worry about it. I would NOT use a power-drill for this, either. Some of the rear panels use screws, and admittedly they are not the best. They're not load bearing though, so again I don't see why you'd have a stripping problem. I made some slight modifications and used nuts and bolts to hold the panels in place, but in retrospect this really wasn't necessary. The only places where I really can see having a problem are the keyboard tray and CP attachment. It doesn't sound like you're that far along though. Give us some more info and we'll try to help. I'm also happy to provide pictures if possible of any areas where you're struggling. Endaar

I'm not sure if it's in every version of Win7, but the OS has built-in virtualization that will seamlessly run XP. Essentially it will start a VM running XP and then present that application in a window as if it's natively running on Win7. If your familiar with how OS/2 Warp ran Windows 3.1, the concept seems pretty similar.

Your other option is an online automatic backup service like Carbonite. For around $60 a year, it will continually backup whatever you choose to their servers, so it's always available for a restore. This is really the best bet if you're concerned about data loss. Endaar

No matter how thoroughly you try to selectively backup, you will realize weeks later that you missed something. With the prices of large external drives being so low, why make things so complicated? Before you format your system drive, copy the whole thing to an external drive. Then you have whatever it is you may need. Endaar

No such luck, same thing in 10.24. I've uploded the latest log. Thanks Tom! log.txt

Oops, log file now attached. log.txt

Log attached. I played GAIRES on Fusion (Genesis), and afterwards the "Last Played" selection properly showed the screenshots from it. When I selected the game though, I was brought to MKII, which was the last MAME game I played. MKII was in fact what was loaded when I started the game. Thanks for your help, and please let me know if you need any further info. Endaar

I've only customized some text via the Advanced Config tool. That predates the custom menu feature, and I haven't done anything to customize the menus outside of the config utility. Endaar

Hi All, If the last game I play is something other than MAME, the "Last Played" menu properly shows that game along with its video, etc. However, when selecting "Last Played," I'm brought to the last MAME game I played. I thought I remembered this being mentioned before on the boards, but couldn't find it if so. Not sure if this is a bug or something in my setup. I appreciate any help. Thanks. Endaar

That's a great line, LOL.

I'm going to partially disagree with bkenobi here...Without seeing the setup in person, I really doubt network speed is the problem unless all three users are literally copying huge files simultaneously. Even at that, I suspect your drives would be the bottleneck way before the LAN. IDE drives aren't exactly the best for random access by multiple users. Honestly though, this shouldn't be all that hard to figure out. When you have slowdowns, what is the server's CPU utilization, and what is the network utilization? If both are acceptable - under 80% let's say - that would point to the drives. The other thing as bkenobi mentioned is whether the router is actually a Gb unit. Also, if you have port speed and/or duplex hard-coded on one side of a link and set to auto on the other, you will see a lot of packets dropped which can kill transfer speeds. Ideally, set everything to auto on both ends of each link. Endaar

Couple examples... In After Burner II, one of the lamps lights-up when you have lock-on. I'd like to flash the fire button in that case. In Chase HQ, there are two lamp outputs that make up the flashing lights of the siren. I have a number of LEDs around my monitor that I'd like to use for this purpose, so that lamp0 lights a few LEDs in blue and LED1 lights other LEDs in red. LEDBlinky has this functionality, but it only supports one output per lamp and as you know doesn't do everything that your plugin does. Mamehooker covers pretty much all the bases when it comes to handling MAME's outputs, but I suspect the LEDWiz API resets the board when a new program accesses it, so running it concurrently with your plugin results in it turning off the LEDs lit by the plugin. I hope all that makes sense. Thanks. James

Sorry Headkaze, I should have been more specific. I don't see a way to do per-game event settings. Thanks again.

headkaze, does your plugin have any support for the various MAME outputs (lamps, etc.) other than flashing the start buttons? Thanks for everything you do for the community. Endaar

NM, I sorted it out. User error.

Hi All, I just finished setting up my cabinet and am having a problem with the LCD/LED plugin. The plugin correctly lights my buttons for each game, no problems there. I also have a few admin buttons which are set in the default MAME profile to stay always lit. Again, no issues. What happens is that when exiting MAME and returning into GameEx, the buttons that were lit for MAME do not shut off. Buttons that are programmed for the GameEx profile do light properly. It looks like the GameEx profile is getting applied, but the MAME settings are not being cleared when MAME exits. I don't see anything I'm missing in the setup, so any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! Endaar

Hi All, I can't seem to get high scores to display in GameEx. I have the latest hiscore.dat in my MAME directory and the latest HiToText.EXE in my GameEx directory. I compiled MAME 133 with hiscore support, and that's working fine, creating .hi files. "Enable High Scores" is set to YES. When I view the game info page for a game with a corresponding .hi file (Donkey Kong for example), there's no option to view high scores. I've checked everything a few times and just can't see what I'm missing; probably something stupid. I'm attaching my gameex.ini file and would appreciate any help. Thanks, Endaar INI.zip

I hate to admit what we have to PAY Dell to take them, lol.

Yeah, that's exactly what it's meant for. Most of the Dell stuff these days is non-standard and proprietary. The build looks amazing. Endaar

Honestly, if the company did anything wrong, it's simply that they misestimated the timeline. Maybe I missed something, but assuming the cabinet shows up within the next few days as promised, it will have taken a little more than four months start to finish. They claimed 6-7 weeks before the addition of the lighted buttons. I'm going to assume they buy the buttons from GGG, since both the Electric ICE and NovaGem buttons do not seem to be available anywhere else. GGG was out of both types of buttons for upwards of six weeks, so if I'm right, that delay was out of their control. The communication seems to have been reasonable, which is all you can ask for. I'm not saying you shouldn't be upset at the delay, but it shouldn't leave such a sour taste in your mouth as long as the final product is as expected. Endaar