USB-DVG Users support thread

Hey guys... I'm just wondering... I too will be going down the same rabbit hole Ya'll are blazing the trail for...

Have you had a stable build running on the Pi4? And if so, what is the reason for pursuing a Pi5 install... what benefit is to be had by diving into a bunch of new gremlins vs. Staying with a Pi4 build that is stable...

If the Pi4 is stable, it wouldn't make sense to me to "upgrade" to the latest Pi unless there is a significant benefit.

In comparison, there are many embedded systems that are running flawlessly on hardware that is obsolete by today's standard on operating systems that aren't even supported any more... is this move to a Pi5 just a personal "I've gotta have the latest and greatest" quest? Seems to me that if the Pi4 is stable and working, then I would leave "well enough" alone

Am I missing something?

Thanks in advance,
Dylan
 
Well...
The Pi4 image and advancemame version is running on 0.106 I believe so it could be a benefit to get to a more recent version of mame/roms.

I imagine that update will necessitate a Pi5 to run.
I have had no problem with getting the Pi4 to run but it certainly does noticeably gag on the Death Star explosion and the self destruct countdown in Major Havoc anyway.
Unsure where else it slows down.

I was hoping that the greater power of the Pi5 would clear that stuff up, but I couldn't get it to run and found it impossible to make the proper line adjustments necessary for it to even be functional.

I too have been unable to alter the Pi5 image using something other than the Pi itself, but I really suck at typing and do not like the thought of altering all of these lines, as I will invariably screw something up.
Probably numerous times.
 
Hey guys... I'm just wondering... I too will be going down the same rabbit hole Ya'll are blazing the trail for...

Have you had a stable build running on the Pi4? And if so, what is the reason for pursuing a Pi5 install... what benefit is to be had by diving into a bunch of new gremlins vs. Staying with a Pi4 build that is stable...

If the Pi4 is stable, it wouldn't make sense to me to "upgrade" to the latest Pi unless there is a significant benefit.

In comparison, there are many embedded systems that are running flawlessly on hardware that is obsolete by today's standard on operating systems that aren't even supported any more... is this move to a Pi5 just a personal "I've gotta have the latest and greatest" quest? Seems to me that if the Pi4 is stable and working, then I would leave "well enough" alone

Am I missing something?

Thanks in advance,
Dylan

I have the 5 pretty much working at this point, but I'm sticking with the Pi 4 for now. The 5 build is definitely buggier. Maybe a later release will clean some of that up (and/or replace the ancient AdvanceMAME entirely).
 
I did a little A/B comparison, and I don't see what the 5 buys you with the current software. Star Wars is probably the most CPU-intensive of the vectors, and performance is close to indistinguishable from the 5 to the 4 (sounds and music can get choppy/garbled with both, for instance). Not going to drop my 5 in the trash or anything, but it's not a significant upgrade at this point.
 
I have had no problem with getting the Pi4 to run but it certainly does noticeably gag on the Death Star explosion and the self destruct countdown in Major Havoc anyway.
Unsure where else it slows down.
@bobbyb13 & @alfonzotan

Have either of you tried adding heatsink and fan and overclocking the Pi4?

Some information here and here to note just a couple Gurgle search results.

Dylan
 
Have heatsink and fan on mine already but haven't played with clock settings at all (beyind my current knowledge base!)
I'll have to look into that Dylan.
 
I'm not certain the speed of the pi is making a big difference to performance. If you run star wars with an LCD then there is no slowdown when the death star explodes (correct me if I'm wrong). My theory is that a throttle on the number of generated vectors is needed either on mame before bring sent over usb or else in the usb dvg software.
 
Aha!
An informed opinion at last. :beerchug:
Well that answers that definitively.
Still hoping for machine work time soon.
Summer work load for me at home and everywhere else sucks.
 
Even at that sound is glitchy in SW, and from a search that appears to be a common issue in AdvanceMAME.
 
Making these changes to advmame.rc in /home/pi/.advance for the Pi 5 build only gives Star Wars and TESB acceptable audio:

debug_rawsound yes
sync_resample emulation
sound_samplerate 22050

Original settings, if you want to change them back:
debug_rawsound no
sync_resample auto
sound_samplerate 44100

Turning up audio volume in the Star Wars tab menu 2-3 dB helps after this change (Empire was already turned up in my build).

These changes do make audio less choppy in a Pi 4 build, but it also makes audio so tinny as to be not worth the change.

If I could just get Vectrex games to launch I'd probably be ready to declare my Pi 5 configuration as fully usable, given the limits of AdvanceMAME. Alas, no such luck.

Also on the audio front, I have no sound for Eliminator, Solar Quest, Armor Attack, Rip Off or Boxing Bugs (although the last one is a known advmame limitation).

UPDATE: That's because the audio sample files for those games weren't in the SD image. Now sound works on everything but Boxing Bugs.
 
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@alfonzotan ... are you running audio directly off the Pi, or do you have an external sound processor?( HiFi Berry, USB sound peripheral, etc)?

D

For the Pi 5 I'm using a generic (and quite old) USB audio dongle. For the Pi 4 I was plugging straight in to the audio jack until basically today, when I used the same USB dongle.
 
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I'd be curious to hear if other users also see a lot of MAME crashes during game play (game stops at random and goes back to the vmmenu screen). I suspect it isn't just me, but...
 
Okay, I think I have *everything* fixed in the Pi 5... except Vectrex. That doesn't work at all, and it looks like a problem with the advmess application.

I started over from a "virgin" Mario build and redid everything one step at a time, and now all the controls are right, all the sounds work (minus Boxing Bugs of course), the Tab menu works, and MAME doesn't arbitrarily crash on me. That should do for the time being.

I'll post the advmame.rc file I worked out here later. 99% of the fixes were tweaks to that, the rest was just putting missing roms and samples in the right place.
 
I'm hopefully nearing completion of my Cosmic Chasm dvg build (running Chasm in a dedicated cab just off dvg hardware).

One thing I haven't been able to find or figure out is how to change the menu button mapping? I know how to adjust the buttons for a specific game, but if you're on the menu trying to select a game is it possible to remap those to the new control panel layout I'm using?
 
I'm hopefully nearing completion of my Cosmic Chasm dvg build (running Chasm in a dedicated cab just off dvg hardware).

One thing I haven't been able to find or figure out is how to change the menu button mapping? I know how to adjust the buttons for a specific game, but if you're on the menu trying to select a game is it possible to remap those to the new control panel layout I'm using?

Edit the vmmenu.cfg file in /usr/local/share/advance. You can the the codes for keystrokes in the vmmenu settings screen, pull it up from the menu with CTRL-Shift-~.
 
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