[RESOLVED] Some back glasses for visual pinball are not loading when run from Pinball X

[JimmyCoupe]

I appear to have an odd issue with Pinball X.  I have setup 240 tables on visual pinball X  and I am I now going through them via PinballX to make sure everything is working ok.  Every now and again I am coming across a table that fails to load its back glass.  I can quit the table and reload it and it still doesn't load the back glass.  One of the tables is "Black Sabbath" another is "He-Man".  The back glass loads fine in Windows but via PinballX there is just a black screen where the black glass should be.  The table and the DMD are loading fine, the issue is purely with the back glass.

I am using a 2 screen cabinet setup.  As I say above from Windows both these tables load the back glass fine every time, from PinballX I get a black screen where the black glass should be showing.  Am I missing an option somewhere?  is it a known issue?  this is literally every now and again I come across a table that does it so I am confused why its happening.

 

I have attached the log file and pinballx.ini as I know they will be asked for 😀

PinballX.iniFetching info... log.txtFetching info...

[scutters]

My guess is that the backglass is running but just hidden behind the black pinballx backglass screen. To confirm can you try launching one of the tables from PinballX and pressing ALT+TAB - is the backglass window loaded? If that's the case the then right click on the B2S and select Stay on top (or similar) and save.

 

[JimmyCoupe]

Thanks for the help.  Your right the back glass was set to standard like all the others but for some reason is hidden behind PinballX.  When I change the option to Stay on Top the ultraDMD then gets stuck behind the back glass.  That is why I set them all up as standard rather than Stay on Top.  The UltraDMD in its ini file is set to Stay on Top true so they are now fighting each other :-(.

[JimmyCoupe]

I have just finished my testing of my VPX tables in PinballX and only 7 out of 240 tables do the bug that I reported above.

 

Masters of the Universe

Def Leppard

Black Sabbath

River Boat Gambler

Rush

The Champion Pub

Waterworld

 

I will now start downloading different back glasses for these tables to see if the issue continues.  If it does I will then look at the tables code and see what is different about these tables to others and go from there unless anyone has any ideas.  I want to say its a set up thing but when 233 tables work without issue and its only 7 effected then its likely PinballX or something odd about these tables back glasses or the table code that launches the back glass.

 

It also looked like it was only some ultraDMD tables effected but 4 are ultraDMD and 3 are not so head scratch time.

[scutters]

  On 3/28/2025 at 3:08 PM, JimmyCoupe said:

Thanks for the help.  Your right the back glass was set to standard like all the others but for some reason is hidden behind PinballX.  When I change the option to Stay on Top the ultraDMD then gets stuck behind the back glass.  That is why I set them all up as standard rather than Stay on Top.  The UltraDMD in its ini file is set to Stay on Top true so they are now fighting each other :-(.

Expand  

Gotcha. I'm a 3 screen user so i just have B2S set as on top all the time. 

The problem is probably due to the ordering of stuff opening on two screens on your set up with B2S set to stay on top (the DMD window opens before the backglass), it might be the order in the table script, or it might even be the size of the backglass file with smaller ones just opening quicker - so it is worth trying different backglass files.

One other option would be leave B2S as set to on top and to use B2SWindowPunch (https://github.com/vpinball/b2s-backglass/wiki/B2SWindowPunch) that comes with B2S server as i guess the issue you have is exactly what it's for (but like i say, i'm a 3 screen user so i've never tried it)

 

[JimmyCoupe]

Thanks again for the help  turns out it was a combination of backglass issues and table scripts.  I have now solved all my issues above with the following:

 

Standard DMD tables:

I fixed the standard DMD tables by just changing the back glass to another version.  This solved those tables fine accept The Champion Pub, I had to set a flag in the script to true.  The creator had marked the code and said if you are using my backglass then set this flag to true.  Once done it had no issues running from PinballX.

 

UltraDMD Tables:

The UltraDMD tables were another issue all together.  At the top of the script this was commented out...

' new B2S stuff ************************************************

'Dim Controller    
'Set Controller = CreateObject("B2S.Server")
'Controller.B2SName = "RUSH2112_B2S"
'Controller.Run()

Const cGameName="RUSH2112_B2S"

' **************************************************************

Once I had uncommented to:

' new B2S stuff ************************************************

Dim Controller    
Set Controller = CreateObject("B2S.Server")
Controller.B2SName = "RUSH2112_B2S"
Controller.Run()

Const cGameName="RUSH2112_B2S"

' **************************************************************

Then all the backglasses worked fine accept one.

Master of the Universe didn't have any of this code in it so I added this to the table script:

' new B2S stuff ************************************************

Dim Controller    
Set Controller = CreateObject("B2S.Server")
Controller.B2SName = "MastersoftheUniverse"
Controller.Run()

' **************************************************************

Once I had added this Master of the Universe backglass worked fine with PinballX.

I am now more prepared if I have any more issues in the future.

 

[Draco1962]

Thanks for reporting back with your solutions! This will help others yhat may have issues with these or similar tables!