Monitor Issues

[tellaedhel]

Hello everybody,

I have as I stated in a subject line, a WG-19K4901 monitor that is in a working condition. I use it with my XP Pro, Pentium 4, ATI Radeon 7000 with 6.5 Catalyst and Soft-15Khz system. I have HyperSpin installed and windows completely hidden. It took me awhile before I got it to work in Windows and HyperSpin and some 75% of my games. However I had games, the likes of Pac-man, Super Mario, Lode Runner, Galaga88 that would not sync corectlly. The picture was very unstable (picture but unplayable due to a vertical rotation) or not visible at all (bunch of lines and not in-game picture). Since I had no windows, I had a hard time trying different resolutions, with quickres (its a taskbar program) that I wanted to add to a usermodes.txt file within the Soft-15Khz folder (since the older quickres has no user interface). Therefore, I downloaded and installed a newer version of Quickres that has UI. Well, I was delighted to find out that I will finally be able to test few resolutions. And that is when problems started...

Firt of all, I wanted to try one of the resolutions that I was sure it does not work - it was on of the games, could be Losw Runnwe or something - it should be ran in 288x224x16 which I chose within the Quickres. Sure enough the picture was gone with few lines and lots of disturbance. Well, I understood at once that this one was not going to work and that I will have to replace it with the one that would work with my monitor. So I pressed escape to go back to my regular resolution. Poof, nothing happened. Pressed again - nothing... Well, I then tried different keys and combination of keys - nothing... Krap - got to reset, I thought. And I did. Once back up, the system kept this bad resolution and would not let me see anything. Well, I went to a Safe Mode and removed Quickres hoping that the picture would come back. Nothing... So I went back to the Safe Mode and removed all of my video drivers, along with Soft-15Khz driver and BOOM there was light... the picture was back, however pretty messed up again, but usuable. In fact I had two screens which I fixed installing back the 15Khz driver mod in Soft-15Khz. Well, I did that after installing back my 6.5 Catalyst. So, it took me awhile to get my HyperSpin picture look all nice and even and Windows XP Pro as well, but my problem now spread to all of my Mame32 roms. I ketpt all of my Mame settings as default - if I remember well and now all of my roms are visible, however very unstable and completelly unplayable. I tried tweaking the monitor itself, but I would get my HyperSpin and Win messed up and the games playable... so, that is no good.

With that being said, I am open for any suyggestions you might have and any advice would be greatly appreciated.

If you by any chance need some more info, let me know.
Thanks in advance for giving my problems your attantion.

[tellaedhel]

Ok, finally got it to work... uninstalled everything that has to do anything with graphics... got 6.5 Catalyst back and it worked... well, not for all of my games.
What are the working resolution for the likes of Pac-Man, Super Pang, Cadillac and Dinosaurs, Arkanoid, Galaga 88, Bomb Jack, Commando, Lode Runner, Pang 3, Punisher.... any of these would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance...

[Dekar]

Heya tella!

You want to use the MAME Res Tool. It will automatically scan your romset and set the appropriate native resolutions for all your games. I've used it on two cabinets and it's the perfect tool if you want to run games in their native res.

Find it here:

http://mamewah.mameworld.info/downloads.htm

[tellaedhel]

Capital!
I will give it a try as soon as I return home from work.

Thanks Dakar, I will post back with results.

[Dekar]

You're welcome. Good luck!

[tellaedhel]

Strangley enough, I came home from work and cranked my machine. Went straight into the windows and edited my mame.ini file following someone elses suggestion. Now, I have no idea if it was because of the modified .ini or because my drivers finally settled, but now most of my ROMS work. There are only few now, that don't really work with the current settings - arkanoid, galaga88, pac-man and lode-runner - as far as I can remember, those were the ones I'd like to have but it is not urgent, so I will probably play with .ini settings some more... but .ini for those games not mame.ini
I assume those should be stored in the same folder Mame.ini is stored in, and they should have the exact same name as the .zip (rom) file, am I correct? I will try forcing some of the resolutions that is not native for those games but that is available with my driver settings.

[Dekar]

Again, MameRES Tool will create individual .ini files for your entire romset (each in a separate file, matching the .zip/rom name). Try it and you'll see that arkanoid, galaga, pac-man etc. will run in their native res afterwards.

[tellaedhel]

Argh... now, I have to do it when I get home from work. Cannot wait to try it. Is there anything specific to be aware of, since I found this topic very sensitive? I am hoping my new created .ini files won't mess up my current, so-so, working environment. Just to make sure, I can always delete those .inis for the games that are working correctly, right?

Thanks Dekar for a quick response... can't wait

[Dekar]

Just back up all your .ini files before you use it (incl. mame.ini). It's pretty straight-forward to use. I believe there are instructions on mameworld as well. Good luck!

Oh yes, you can delete .inis for the games that are already working correctly. No worries.

[tellaedhel]

Wonderful!
Thanks Dekar, I will be back here with more questions, pretty sure about that, eh

and I will post back as soon as I try MameRES tool







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