Timing Issue for certain virtual cd images?

[snarls]

Hi,

I am getting closer getting my emulators which use cd images to work. For SSF most all work now, however for a couple of them, they say "drive empty" in SSF when launched through gameex. I know the LaunchBefore with DTLite works because other games of the same image type (bin\cue) work. I was never able to get [VIRTUALDRIVE] to work, hence the DTLite.

I think it's a timing issue where SSF launches before the cd is loaded to the virtual drive for this game because when I run that emu in Debug mode where gameex shows the bat and pauses, then everything works with that game (the other games for this emu dont need to be in debug to work).

how can I add a couple seconds sleep after LaunchBefore and before SSF launches so that this will work? I cant put a bat in there because I dont know how to pass in [ROMPATH]\[ROMFILE] to the bat for the DTLite launch.

Any ideas? Or am I doing it all wrong? thanks

[Stub]

Insted of pointing to the application you could make a bat that calls a sleep then the correct app.

SSS.bat-------------------

sleep 2

SSF.exe $1 $2

[nullPointer]

I think Stub is on to something, but a little more detail might be in order. First, you pass in parameters to a batch file in the same way you pass parameters to (most) emulators. Your 'Launch Before' command will look something like this:

start "" "C:\YOUR_DIRECTORY\SSF_Launch_Before.bat" "[ROMPATH]\[ROMFILE]"

Then your batch file will look something like Stub suggests. Bear in mind that your batch file will not see the "[ROMPATH]\[ROMFILE]" parameter as two parameters; it will be read as a single parameter. So that gets you something like this (where the %~1 represents the "[ROMPATH]\[ROMFILE]" parameter):

start "" "C:\Program Files (x86)\DAEMON Tools Lite\DTLite.exe" -mount scsi, 0, "%~1"

:: Wait 5 seconds before launching the emulator.

:: Note that this command only works in Vista and above

timeout 5

If your SSF command is working currently (most of the time), it should be fine as is.

Now that your mounting your images as a Launch Before directive, you'll probably want to unmount them as a Launch After directive (if you're not already)

That can be something as simple as this.

start "" "C:\Program Files (x86)\DAEMON Tools Lite\DTLite.exe" -unmount scsi, 0

Note that I'm using a SCSI virtual drive in the above commands. The 'scsi' parameter could just as easily be replaced with a 'dt' parameter (although I can't recall off the top of my head if SSF will work correctly with a a virtual dt drive ...)

[snarls]

Thanks, I'll try that. That was exactly what I was after, I had no idea how to pass in the rompath and file from gameex into a bat file, but your DOS wizardry of %~1 showed me how

I appreciate the help from everyone, I expect this will fix it.

[Draco1962]

@Snarls - Did these suggestions resolve the issue?

[snarls]

Actually they didn't unfortunately. None of the bat file things above even worked - though thanks for the suggestions anyway. It was a couple of cds that kept failing because of timing I think.

More trial and error for hours and I got this to work for all my images:

Run Command: (no arguments on command line)

SSF.exe

LaunchBefore:

""C:\Program Files (x86)\DAEMON Tools Lite\DTLite.exe" -mount dt,0,"[ROMPATH]\[ROMFILE]""

LaunchAfter:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\DAEMON Tools Lite\DTLite.exe" -unmount 0

I have a AMD Phenom 7850 Triple-Core with 4Gb ram on win 7 x64 so it should be fast enough. It seems taking out the scsi option from the Daemon Tools Lite command line did the trick for them all, but with it, several would fail unless in GameEx debug mode... weird?

[nullPointer]

Actually they didn't unfortunately. None of the bat file things above even worked - though thanks for the suggestions anyway. It was a couple of cds that kept failing because of timing I think.

More trial and error for hours and I got this to work for all my images:

Run Command: (no arguments on command line)

SSF.exe

LaunchBefore:

""C:\Program Files (x86)\DAEMON Tools Lite\DTLite.exe" -mount dt,0,"[ROMPATH]\[ROMFILE]""

LaunchAfter:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\DAEMON Tools Lite\DTLite.exe" -unmount 0

I have a AMD Phenom 7850 Triple-Core with 4Gb ram on win 7 x64 so it should be fast enough. It seems taking out the scsi option from the Daemon Tools Lite command line did the trick for them all, but with it, several would fail unless in GameEx debug mode... weird?

Sorry, I made the assumption that you had a DaemonTools SCSI drive in place. Glad you got everything worked out! Did the steps you listed above resolve your original timing issues?

[snarls]

hi nullpointer I thought I did, because the scsi option worked for most games, just not a couple unless gameex debug was on - which I found odd?? but they all work without the scsi switch. thanks for your help though