Some questions about old versions of Daemon Tools and getting TurboGrafx CD to work

[Vic Rattlehead]

So I've managed to get hold of an old version of Daemon Tools and I'm considering to install it on my computer to see if I can get TurboGrafx CD (Magic Engine or Ootake) to work, since I really love shoot 'em ups. It is the only CD-based system that I've tried to get to work that I still hasn't succeeded with. I have a few questions though that perhaps somebody on this forum would know the answers to.

The Daemon Tools version is an old one, because from what I've read Daemon Tools was bought ought by someone else who afterwards added adware\spyware to that did not always give the user the ability to opt out of it during installation. Such a questionable practice leads me to suspect that if the current developers wanted they could add more hidden and malicious types of spyware\trojans in the executable. Since Daemon Tools is in itself a rootkit, albeit a benevolent one, it would be easy to hide something extra within it, that would not be easy to discover.

That's why I have downloaded an old version of it (3.47) that is from the time before it was bought by the new developers. But being so old, possible from 2005, could installing this program cause issues on my fairly new Windows 7 computer? This is my main computer and not a cabinet I use only for playing games, so I am more cautious about what I install on it than I would be if this was a gaming PC only.
Are there any other problems that could arise by using such an old piece of software that does go deep down into windows? Any know exploits of Daemon Tools drivers used by hackers?

Is this old version of Daemon Tools itself supported by GameEx, or is only more recent versions supported?

Would I have any other option than installing this program? Maybe a disk image program will be included in GameEx Revolution? I have tried Virtual CloneDrive although with no success. Sega CD (Kega Fusion), PlayStation (ePSXe) and Gamecube (Dolphin) all works great through GameEx. PlayStation 2 (PCSX2) only works outside of GameEx, but I haven't really looked into the issue, so it's probably just some small thing that needs to be corrected.

[stigzler]

I wouldn't worry too much about using the newer version. They've finally sorted it all out so it works OK now. I've had latest installed for a long time and haven't seen the gates of Hades open up yet. 

[Vic Rattlehead]

I decided to give Mednafen another try and downloaded the latest version, replacing the one, currently in my GameEx installation. It was surprisingly easy to get it to work, the issue that made me unable to play games in it was that the GameEx TurboGrafx default mapping files must be deleted before you can play any games. This was an issue with Magic Engine and Ootake as well, I had just forgotten about it. Getting CD games to work was as easy as dropping the SYSCARD1.PCE, SYSCARD2.PCE, and SYSCARD3.PCE files into Mednafen's main directory. (I think those three should cover all cards and BIOS files needed for anything right?)

Configuring the gamepad to use was almost as fast as it is in Ootake, which is a blessing since this is something I have to do regularly. (Configuring controllers in Magic Engine is really cumbersome by comparison.) The emulation itself seems very similar to that it Magic Engine and Ootake. Both regarding how the music and sounds sound, as well as how it looks and feel when you play it. But I haven't played a lot of PC Engine yet so I may very well be missing many finer details. So far it's by far the best emulator of the three for practical reasons.

And then I wanted to get some scanlines, or possibly a CRT filter if one was available. This was a little harder because it took some time to understand how I to edit the config file, and find the information I wanted. When you know what you are supposed to do, then of course it is pretty easy. It would be better if you could do things like turning on unlimited sprites or scanlines while the emulator was, running but it is not a big issue.

At first I thought that you could use Blaargh's excellent nes.ntsc filter for PC Engine games, so it was a let down when I discovered that it was only for NES games! Still the basic scanlines that you can enable are as good as what you'll get with Ootake and Magic Engine and they do the job well.

I would really recommend anyone interested in playing PC Engine games to try this emulator as it is in my opinion the best one for the job, although you really can't go wrong with any of the three as long as you manage to get the CD games to work.

Thanks a lot Parka1300 for getting me to give this excellent emulator another chance!

I also tried the NES emulation in Mednafen and it is great as well. The graphics were great when the NTSC filter was used and it is the same filter that is being used in Nestopia. The music was in my opinion not as beautiful as in Nestopia and MESS, a little more harsh to the ears and not as nuanced, but it is a long time since I've heard a real NES and that was through crappy TV speakers, so Mednafen's sound could be more authentic for all that i know.

Parka, have you ever heard of anyone using third party graphics filters with Mednafen?