Joystick locks for brief periods

[Dan Q]

Hi,

I've been using GameEx for about a year, on my (MAME) arcade cabinet.

Everything works great, but I have two annoying bugs.

1. Every so often (maybe once an hour), and regardless of the game being played, the joystick stops responding for approx 3 seconds.

It's so regular, that I expect it to happen at least once or twice whenever I'm playing. I thought it must be something running in the background (in Windows), so I disabled every Windows process and service, except the ones you aren't allowed to, but that didn't fix it. It's not a connection problem, because I've re-wired the thing three times with three different joysticks with the same result each time. When the joystick springs back into life, it then issues all the commands that were buffered during that 3 second pause. In most games this isn't a huge problem, but means certain death in the likes of Pac-man or Defender.

Any suggestions?

2. The second thing involves the jukebox. After selecting a game, the music should fade out as the game initialises. However, sometimes the music can take 10 to 15 seconds to fade out... and if you start playing the game before the music has stopped, the screen can go black and you have to exit back to the game menu and select the game again.

Anyone else had this problem?

Grateful for any advice... thanks.

[Tom Speirs]

Hi,

I've been using GameEx for about a year, on my (MAME) arcade cabinet.

Everything works great, but I have two annoying bugs.

1. Every so often (maybe once an hour), and regardless of the game being played, the joystick stops responding for approx 3 seconds.

It's so regular, that I expect it to happen at least once or twice whenever I'm playing. I thought it must be something running in the background (in Windows), so I disabled every Windows process and service, except the ones you aren't allowed to, but that didn't fix it. It's not a connection problem, because I've re-wired the thing three times with three different joysticks with the same result each time. When the joystick springs back into life, it then issues all the commands that were buffered during that 3 second pause. In most games this isn't a huge problem, but means certain death in the likes of Pac-man or Defender.

Any suggestions?

2. The second thing involves the jukebox. After selecting a game, the music should fade out as the game initialises. However, sometimes the music can take 10 to 15 seconds to fade out... and if you start playing the game before the music has stopped, the screen can go black and you have to exit back to the game menu and select the game again.

Anyone else had this problem?

Grateful for any advice... thanks.

Please post the log, and which systems are affected with the second issue?

[Dan Q]

Please post the log, and which systems are affected with the second issue?

09:07:45.2 11.12.2009: GameEx: Version 10.15: Starting Log

09:07:45.2 11.12.2009: Operating System Platform: Win32NT

09:07:45.2 11.12.2009: Operating System Name: Windows XP

09:07:45.2 11.12.2009: Operating System Version: 5.1.2600

09:07:45.3 11.12.2009: Checking for versions of .net Framework installed

09:07:45.3 11.12.2009: .net Framework 1.1 Installed

09:07:45.3 11.12.2009: .net Framework 2.0 Installed

09:07:45.3 11.12.2009: Intel® Pentium® 4 CPU 1.60GHz, 511MB

09:07:45.4 11.12.2009: 1,6Ghz

09:07:45.4 11.12.2009: Running Randomize()

09:07:45.4 11.12.2009: Loading PlugIns

09:07:45.4 11.12.2009: Checking for applications to Launch On Startup

09:07:45.5 11.12.2009: Running Misc startup tasks

09:07:45.5 11.12.2009: Setting Menu types

09:07:45.5 11.12.2009: Opening Configuration File

09:07:45.5 11.12.2009: Getting Configuration Values

09:07:45.5 11.12.2009: Using Theme: Default - Dark Gloss

09:07:45.5 11.12.2009: Checking for alternate Image Directory for Theme: Default - Dark Gloss

09:07:45.5 11.12.2009: Launching HideOS.exe

09:07:45.5 11.12.2009: Initialising Video/MNG DLL's

09:07:45.6 11.12.2009: CPWizard enabled

09:07:45.6 11.12.2009: Launching CPWizard: "C:\Program Files\CPWizard\CPWizard.exe" -minimized

09:07:47.2 11.12.2009: GameEx will check for media insertion (may affect performance)

09:07:47.2 11.12.2009: Hiding Taskbar

09:07:47.4 11.12.2009: Is Media Center running?

09:07:47.4 11.12.2009: Checking/Creating LCD Registry values

09:07:47.4 11.12.2009: Check Media Center Exit/Start Mode

09:07:47.4 11.12.2009: Media Center Mode 2

09:07:47.5 11.12.2009: Snap Delay set to: 1

09:07:47.5 11.12.2009: Get other settings

09:07:47.6 11.12.2009: Desktop set to Hide ICONS and set Background to Black

09:07:47.6 11.12.2009: Start work for Form

09:07:47.6 11.12.2009: Getting Original Screen Size

09:07:47.6 11.12.2009: Opening Database Connection

09:07:56.2 11.12.2009: Initializing Component

09:07:56.4 11.12.2009: Retrieving resolution setting

09:07:56.6 11.12.2009: Initialising Windows Media Player Component

09:07:58.9 11.12.2009: MAME Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32

09:07:59.0 11.12.2009: MAME EXE file is: Mame32.exe

09:07:59.0 11.12.2009: ROM Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\roms

09:07:59.1 11.12.2009: Catver.ini is located at: C:\Program Files\GameEx\DATA\catver.ini

09:07:59.1 11.12.2009: controls.ini is located at: C:\Program Files\GameEx\data\controls.ini

09:07:59.1 11.12.2009: History.dat is located at: C:\Program Files\GameEx\DATA\history.dat

09:07:59.1 11.12.2009: nplayers.ini is located at: C:\Program Files\GameEx\DATA\nplayers.ini

09:07:59.1 11.12.2009: MAMEinfo.dat is located at: C:\Program Files\GameEx\DATA\mameinfo.dat

09:07:59.2 11.12.2009: Loading Controls.ini map file

09:07:59.3 11.12.2009: Snap Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\snap

09:07:59.3 11.12.2009: AVI Snap Path: Not Found

09:07:59.3 11.12.2009: Flyer Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\flyers

09:07:59.3 11.12.2009: Cabinet Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\cabinets

09:07:59.4 11.12.2009: Title Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\titles

09:07:59.4 11.12.2009: PCB Path: Not Found

09:07:59.4 11.12.2009: Artwork Preview Path: Not Found

09:07:59.4 11.12.2009: Panel Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\cpanel

09:07:59.4 11.12.2009: Manual Path: Not Found

09:07:59.5 11.12.2009: Icon Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\icons

09:07:59.5 11.12.2009: Marquee Path is: C:\Emulators\Mame32\marquees

09:07:59.6 11.12.2009: Loading Custom Emulators

09:08:00.2 11.12.2009: Using Version 3 Themes Animations

09:08:00.2 11.12.2009: Using General Font: Trebuchet MS

09:08:00.2 11.12.2009: Using Title Font: Trebuchet MS

09:08:00.3 11.12.2009: Initialising DirectDraw

09:08:02.0 11.12.2009: Creating DirectDraw Device

09:08:02.0 11.12.2009: Using Device: NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440

09:08:23.7 11.12.2009: 62mb video memory available

09:08:50.7 11.12.2009: Setting Resolution to 800x600 32 bit color

09:08:50.7 11.12.2009: Creating DirectDraw Surfaces

09:08:50.7 11.12.2009: Creating Primary Surface - Full Screen Mode

09:08:50.8 11.12.2009: Creating Back Buffer

09:08:50.9 11.12.2009: Loading graphic Surfaces

09:08:51.0 11.12.2009: Display is running at: 800x600 16bit color, 60hz

09:08:51.1 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Flags

09:08:51.3 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Misc and Dialogs

09:08:51.4 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Volume

09:08:51.5 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Arrows

09:08:51.5 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces GameEXlogo Text

09:08:51.5 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Toolbar

09:08:51.6 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Backgrounds

09:08:52.0 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Toolbar Controls

09:08:52.0 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces GameEx Logo

09:08:52.1 11.12.2009: Creating Surface Unselected

09:08:52.1 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Home & Exit

09:08:52.2 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Snaps

09:08:52.2 11.12.2009: Creating Surfaces Menu and List Bars

09:08:52.5 11.12.2009: Creating Fonts

09:08:52.5 11.12.2009: Creating Game Font

09:08:53.1 11.12.2009: Creating Game Font Faded

09:08:53.2 11.12.2009: Creating Title Font

09:08:53.4 11.12.2009: Restoring Title Font From Cache

09:08:54.4 11.12.2009: Creating Font Black

09:08:54.7 11.12.2009: Creating Font Black Small

09:08:55.2 11.12.2009: Fonts Created Succesfully

09:08:55.2 11.12.2009: 48mb video memory left available

09:08:55.2 11.12.2009: Creating instance of global keyboard hook

09:09:23.6 11.12.2009: Attempting to load game list

09:09:24.5 11.12.2009: Text/Language: English

09:09:24.5 11.12.2009: Applying Language/Text

09:09:24.7 11.12.2009: Initialising Bass Audio Library

09:09:25.1 11.12.2009: MAME CMD options: -nowindow -joy -skip_gameinfo

09:09:25.1 11.12.2009: Loading last used Game List

09:09:25.5 11.12.2009: Setting Music Volume

09:09:25.6 11.12.2009: Loading music

09:09:30.6 11.12.2009: Creating DirectSound Device

09:09:30.6 11.12.2009: Trying: Primary Sound Driver

09:09:30.6 11.12.2009: Loading Sound Files

09:09:30.8 11.12.2009: DirectSound Device Created Successfully

09:09:30.8 11.12.2009: Creating ICONS

09:09:30.9 11.12.2009: Recreating ICONS

09:09:31.3 11.12.2009: Initialising DirectInput for Gamepad support

09:09:31.3 11.12.2009: Unable to create a joystick device

09:09:31.4 11.12.2009: Initializing MCE Remote

09:09:31.4 11.12.2009: Initialization OK! Starting GameEx!

09:09:31.5 11.12.2009: Testing Main Loop Once: Processing Frame

09:09:32.8 11.12.2009: Testing Main Loop Once: Main Loop ran successfully

09:09:46.3 11.12.2009: Running: cmd.exe /c C: C:\Emulators\Mame32\Mame32.exe rainbow -rompath C:\Emulators\Mame32\roms -nowindow -joy -skip_gameinfo

09:09:47.2 11.12.2009: Launching CPWizard: "C:\Program Files\CPWizard\CPWizard.exe" -emu mame -game rainbow -timeout 9000

09:33:06.3 11.12.2009: Exiting GameEx!

09:33:06.3 11.12.2009: Saving Settings

09:33:08.4 11.12.2009: Disposing Plugins

09:33:08.5 11.12.2009: Closing database connection

09:33:08.5 11.12.2009: Checking for applications to Launch On Exit

This is the log from today. I played a game of Rainbow Islands.

The game took just over 20 minutes and during the game the joystick locked up... for 3 seconds... and it only happened once.

[Dan Q]

Please post the log, and which systems are affected with the second issue?

Sorry, forgot to answer the second question.

I use GameEx for MAME only. I have it running at pretty low settings, and I'm only running about 100 roms from the 70's and 80's (ie. nothing that's going to stretch the hardware).

[Tom Speirs]

I dont have any suggestions but I know I did implement some performance improvments some versions back for when GameEx was running in the background after launching a game. I dont know if that was after the version your running, but did notice it was not the latest.

If you run ruitgame.bat does the issue still happen?

[Brian Hoffman]

Use an old versoin of mame, a version from about the time your hardware was still new.

Even old games in newer versions of mame will tax your hardware in ways you may not realize.

www.mamedev.org old releases, left hand side. Try running mame .96

It sounds like a resource problem to me.

BH

[headkaze]

Oh dear yes, a P4 1.6 with 512 MB of RAM. That is CPWizard minimum requirements then your running GameEx and MAME aswell. I would try and upgrade to at least a P4 3 Ghz and 1 gig of RAM (2 gigs even better). You should be able to get that upgrade really cheap these days (although you may need to look around a bit to find). Be careful to get the hardware to match your motherboard.

[Dan Q]

Thanks for all the replies guys.

I'm willing to accept the 'resource' problem causes the delay in the music cutting out.

If I stop the music manually, just before selecting a game, I don't get any problems. This would be because MAME isn't running yet, so everything runs smoothly.

But I don't see how a resource problem would cause the controls to go haywire for a couple of seconds, just once during a game.

(I've decided now that it's not buffering my commands, but is instead issuing a single random control change contrary to the direction that I may be moving at the time). It's as if someone takes over the controls for a couple of seconds and they over-rule anything you want to do.

I'd love to upgrade the PC, but it's hard to justify spending money just to play 80's arcade games. The arcade cabinet seemed the perfect use for an old 'low-spec' machine.

I'll just have to live with it until I 'acquire' a better machine.

Thanks anyway.

[headkaze]

The joystick locking and going in a different direction are two distinctly different things. One implies there is not enough CPU to poll the joystick and the other implies something else like a hardware issue such as wiring or faulty joysticks. What sort of joysticks are you using and do you have PPJoy installed? Try uninstalling PPJoy if you have it and perhaps unplug your keyboard as input from that is accepted in MAME and could be conflicting. The best way is a process of elimination by subtraction potential causes until you find the problem. The easiest way is by hardware first but unplugging things and then by software by running MAME outside of GameEx etc.