Using MAME with SageTV V2

[Opus4]

Great -- sounds like what you came up with ought to work just fine then.

Originally posted by ravenray
All I know is when I was just testing mame alone with my pvr 250 remote, nothing will happen. Some how when you select a game in mame, the ID or name changes and there's no focus to it.

That's exactly what shodge was talking about, prompting this whole mode() discussion.

- Andy

[ravenray]

Just to let you know, it's a no go. The mode(x) will not work for this. Gotta find another way.

[Opus4]

I don't know if mode(mame) is case-sensitive, so you could try mode(Mame). (?) For testing, you could also start Notepad & then use your 'go' button (confirm there really is no definition for 'go' in [SageTV]). While Notepad has focus, press a button to see what, if anything, shows up in Notepad. Ex: 'OK' button should produce the text 'ok'.

I don't know how often shodge is online, so maybe you could pm him to see if he got it working.

- Andy

[ravenray]

Yup, I did that test to. Came up with my OK in notepad.

[Opus4]

So, that means the mode switch is working properly. Perhaps mame reads keyboard input differently from how irremote sends its keys -- if so, it probably reads the keyboard directly through DirectX (DirectInput, I think) instead of 'normal' Windows methods/messages. At this point, you will definitely have to talk to someone with more knowledge of mame to find out if there is a way to send it input w/o using an actual keyboard, joystick, gamepad, etc.

- Andy

[ravenray]

Andy,

You hit it on the nail. That's exactly it. I guess this won't be possible for a long while.

[Opus4]

Well... wasn't _this_ conversation useful?? I guess you got that confirmed somewhere? But yeah, after all this, it dawned on me that they are probably using DirectInput for better response. Relying on Windows messages for keyboard control in a game is sort of worthless.

If you ever find out if/how it can be done with other messages, I guess you can look into having irremote send those.

- Andy

[Droid]

1) Do I run the Windows frontend version?
2) I tried the mame.exe and it worked, but I get a blank SAGE afterward.
3) I dont have a mame.ini file?

Thanks.... I really need a dumb persons walk thru.

[ravenray]

I currently run the mame32 version. I did both test on sage and myhtpc and they both work for me. I preferre to use myhtpc as I can have it show me the snap shots of my games (more configuration if you go through this route).

[shodge]

Hmm,

I have the snapshots of the games show up for me in the Sage menu....

Droid, to keep mame from stealing the graphics screen when MAME runs, you have to tell mame not to use DDRAW. Yes this can be done through the mame.ini file. If you don't have one, you can have mame create one. Just type mame -help, or mame /? or just mame (I'm not sure which as I am at work). One of the options listed should be to create a mame.ini.... You should be good from there...

-Stan

[shatter]

Hi,

I am trying to get mame to work in SageTV v2 without luck. None of my roms are showing up in the game listing screen in Sage.

I have sage installed on my C drive and mame on d drive as d:\mame with gamelist.txt under d:\mame\docs please see the entries from my sage.properties file below:

mame/gamelist_filename=gamelist.txt
mame/mame_docs_path=D\:\\MAME\\docs
mame/mame_exe_path=D\:\\MAME\\mamepp.exe
mame/mame_images_path=D\:\\MAME\\snap
mame/mame_roms_path=D\:\\MAME\\roms
mame/mame_working_directory=D\:\\MAME

Any ideas why I am not getting any games showing up in the Arcade Game listing in Sage?

Thanks

[mwhite]

Hi Shatter,

I had the same problem.

I had unzipped the roms I wanted to use into the roms folder instead of leaving them zipped up. Then I found out that mame knows how to unzip the roms automagically.

Leaving the roms zipped up in the roms folder fixed my problem.

Of course, your mileage may vary.

HTH

-mark

[shatter]

thanks Mark!

That was the trick. I have all my roms unzipped into folders and instead it wants things as zip files.

thanks again!!

[yanksno1]

Is there a way to have normal PC non-mame games displayed? That would be a feature I'd think people would want.

[Ranthorn]

This thread has been very helpful. I am able to run Mame from Sage just fine on my monitor. I would like to display it on the TV. I'm using the Hauppage 350 as my TV-out. Is it possible to do what I want?

[sabre]

On the trick to turn off DDRAW in mame.ini, that works to get the screen back to Sage. Bit it runs mame very scrunched, at least on ms pacman. Anyone else see this, or know of a resolution?

edit--turning off 3d and switchres does work, but i like to keep 3d on in overlay since it causes less freezing when looking at overlays - at least for me. just have to add a couple of key strokes.

[wbarber69]

lots of good info, and they sage there is no support for mame under sage

[mc2wheels]

I am able to see the list of games and play them, but I am unable to display the preview pictures in the game list. Mame32 can find them. Do i need to unzip the files?

[abasu2003]

you need to play them

[mc2wheels]

I do play them, but the screen snapshots for the games do not show up on the display where I choose what game to play. It's just a nice to have really, but I was wondering if I need to configure it differently. I have the images path pointing to my snap directory where the zipped png files are. Has anyone out there gotten this to work?