Getting help setting up GameEx

[Jaeron]

So I'm about as frustrated as I can get, and I am at a complete loss at this point.

I've been using Mame32/MameUI since the beginning of emulation back when Windows 95 was all the rage. I didn't bother updating for a very long time, I had my cabinet, and everything worked just fine so I didn't bother. I did at some point update maybe 5 years ago, but still used MAMEUI, so it wasn't really much different. I recently started over from scratch, and found out that MAMEUI is gone. I was looking for a new UI, and honestly, I'm not a big fan of the UI's I've seen. Someone suggested GameEx, and I gave it a shot. I downloaded it on my main PC first, tried it out, went through the configuration, and everything worked well. I had a very small issue with the names not displaying the way I wanted, but I eventually got it to work just right.

I decided I would install it on my new MAME cabinet, and this is where things got really ugly.

I configured it the first time, all the extras showed up, the game list was populated, and I even set the names to display the way I wanted. Everything looked perfect. Updated the game list, it went through and seemed like it worked. Tried starting a game, and instead of launching the game, it would just load back into GameEx. I went through the FAQ line by line, and tried each of the fixes (Remove the bezel option, etc.. etc..) that were there. I went through the forums and found everything I could, and couldn't get it to work. So I completely uninstalled and started over.

This time, I went through and configured everything, and it wouldn't even verify the directory. For ROM path, I'd browse to my directory, which is "H:\Emulation\MAME\Roms", but when I got to the verify step, it showed "No roms found in "H:\Emulation\MAME\Roms\MAME\Roms", it added a MAME\Roms to my path. I browsed to the directory and noticed it created folders. I then noticed that folders have appeared all over my PC, in the root C:\ drive, H:\Emulation, so on and so on. Obviously nothing is working. Now when I go into GameEx, update list just locks the system up entirely.

I did absolutely nothing different than when I did this on my main computer, it's just not working. I've tried going through the videos, tutorials, etc, but everything is dated. The options are different. And everyone uses the default paths. My main HD is a 128GB drive, and my H:\ is a 1TB, so I want to store everything there.

I know I haven't provided anything really, but I don't even know where to start. It's not like someone can just walk me through an entire installation. Any ideas on where I can start troubleshooting at this point? I'm at a loss, and I'm about to give up and use a front end I don't like as much, that I can get working. I've been at this for 3 days now, spending every hour I'm not sleeping, eating, or working to no avail.

Thanks in advance,

Frustrated Jaeron

[Draco1962]

I am sure we can help you with this issue. First I will ask that you supply us with a copy of your gameex.ini and log.txt files.

[Jaeron]

Okay, I'm attaching the two files. I walked away from that machine for a while, figured I'd wait till I was ready to spend some time working on it again to come check for a reply.

Thank you for offering to help, hopefully I can finally get this going.

Just some quick info, I'm storing all of the roms on my H:\ drive, as obvious by the directories that show in the ini file. My main harddrive is a 200Gb drive, and the H:\ is actually an external HDD. I leave it on the external because I'm using it on both machines. (The other machine runs GameEx just fine)

Keep in mind, the ONLY thing on the external is the ROMS, so this won't be an issue with installation, each machine has the install set up locally while pointing to the external for ROMS and extras.

Thanks

GameEx.ini

log.txt

[nullPointer]

Hi Jaeron

The following lines from your log look a bit suspect to me:

00:26:51.8 5/13/2012: Running: C: C:\Emulators\MAME\mame.exe -verifysets -rompath "H:\Emulation" > C:\Emulators\MAME\verify.dat

00:27:08.2 5/13/2012: Opening Verify.dat

00:27:09.2 5/13/2012: Processing Verify.dat

00:27:09.2 5/13/2012: ERROR: Could Not process verify.dat. Check your MAME version supports -verifysets. Are you using MAME Plus? (mamep/mame32p.exe)

00:27:09.2 5/13/2012: Trying MAME Plus version of Verify Sets

00:27:09.2 5/13/2012: Running: C: C:\Emulators\MAME\mame.exe -verifysets -rompath "H:\Emulation" > C:\Emulators\MAME\verify.dat

00:27:25.6 5/13/2012: Opening Verify.dat

00:27:26.6 5/13/2012: Processing Verify.dat

00:27:26.6 5/13/2012: Total verifyable roms: 2

Earlier in the log it shows that you're running MAME .141, so it seems weird that the application is attempting to verify ROMs using a MAME Plus verification schema. Perhaps your version of verify.dat is corrupt or (more likely) out of synch with your current version of MAME?

Aside from that, there are a couple of standard questions that we should get out of the way. Forgive me if these questions cover the basic stuff, but we need to rule out a couple of things before diving in further. Does MAME run O.K. for you outside of GameEx? Also, does your version of MAME match the version of your ROM set?

[Jaeron]

So as far as the version match, I have the newest version of MAME which I got from the automatic setup in GameEx, and when it didn't work I started from scratch and manually downloaded the newest version from the mame site. The romset I have was current at the time, but I haven't updated the roms recently. As long as the version of MAME is newer than the roms, that shouldn't be a problem correct?

As far as the MAME working outside, I haven't configured MAME with the config.ini in a long time. We're talking 15 years long time. So to be honest, I don't even remember how to get MAME functioning without a front end. I CAN tell you that when I run mame.exe it runs, just isn't configured to know the rompaths.

[nullPointer]

So as far as the version match, I have the newest version of MAME which I got from the automatic setup in GameEx, and when it didn't work I started from scratch and manually downloaded the newest version from the mame site. The romset I have was current at the time, but I haven't updated the roms recently. As long as the version of MAME is newer than the roms, that shouldn't be a problem correct?

The common advice is to say that your ROM set must match your version of MAME due to differences in the actual ROM sets (right down to the actual ROM names) and the continually evolving MAME drivers. My advice would be to run your ROMs through your ROM verification program of choice. I prefer clrmamepro, but ROM Center is another excellent choice (if you're uninitiated, here’s a set of clrmamepro tutorials to get you started)

As far as the MAME working outside, I haven't configured MAME with the config.ini in a long time. We're talking 15 years long time. So to be honest, I don't even remember how to get MAME functioning without a front end. I CAN tell you that when I run mame.exe it runs, just isn't configured to know the rompaths.

Basically you’ll want to try to run MAME via the command line. Here’s some documentation on how to do just that.