Audio Stuttering on games w/ chd files

[John Simon]

I have been trying to resolve an issue with stuttering audio.  I only seem to see it on games with chd support, specifically Carnevil, Golden Tee, and some others.  (I can't say for certain it is related to CHD, given these games are also relatively heavy in 3D rendering compared to most MAME games)    I have tried it on 3 systems, and see the problem on 2 of the 3 of them.

1.) MAME Cabinet (Stuttering):  older core2 duo running Win7 , 4GB RAM, budget PCIe GPU

2.) Laptop (Stuttering):  i7 (7500U), Win10, 8GB RAM, running on an SSD,  and decent mobile NVIDIA GPU,

3. Older Desktop( (no stuttering!) :  older i7 (2600K), Win10, 8GB RAM, running on SSD, and an aging GPU. 

If the problem was not seen on the laptop, I would chalk it up to old hardware in the MAME cabinet, but if I can get it running well on the laptop, I'll just scrap the core2 duo and put the laptop in the cabinet.

Any advice on where to look or other things to try would be appreciated.

Thanks! -John

[Tom Speirs]

You may want to look at the MAME options for audio. You can increase the latency or decrease the sample rate. In the past the -triplebuffer has also caused issues with audio in MAME. May I also suggest looking into GroovyMAME.

[Draco1962]

Not knowing the model of the laptop or the audio for any of the machines is only going to lead to spitballing why it is happening.

You do not tell us what MAME version or if the stutter occurs outside GameEx.

 

[John Simon]

Thanks for the quick replies! 

The version of MAME is 0.182, it is definitely not an issue specific to GameEx.

I don't think I have triple buffering enabled, but will double check.

The laptop is an HP Envy.  I will need to go write down the details on the audio hardware and other items.  I also need to see if there is some significant difference between my old desktop which does not have the problem and the Laptop/MAME-rig; at least right now, nothing jumps out at me. 

Thanks again! - John

[John Simon]

Just had a thought....Even though the desktop has a pretty dated i7 (2600) compared to the laptop (7500), it is a quad core, whereas the laptop is a dual core.  I'm guessing the audio doesn't starve for CPU time with the extra cores.  Are there any performance settings worth playing with if this is the case?

[Draco1962]

Not sure of anything specific to your laptop that you can change. That it is occurring outside of GameEx means that there is something limiting the experience via the laptop and it may not be anything you can change if it is firmware related. Making sure you have the latest drivers from the PC or laptop's manufacturer is a good place to start.

[John Simon]

Thanks!  I did see some command line args for multi-processor support.  I might see if that does anything.  How about enabling frame dropping?  Does that sometimes yield acceptable results?  

[Draco1962]

Try it. Not all kit is created equal.

[tthurman]

I've read that changing the dip switch to medium resolution sometimes assists with this problem, but it seems to be dependent on the game itself, at least somewhat.

http://www.solvalou.com/subpage/arcade_dips/C/carnevil