Groovy MAME: Installation and quick configuration

C )   C o n f i g u r i n g   G r o o v y   M A M E

This is Groovy MAME 0.170's mame.ini content right after creating it after following Calamity's CRT Emudriver installation guide (note: an alternate ROM path has been added as an example):

#
# CORE CONFIGURATION OPTIONS
#
readconfig                1
writeconfig               0

#
# CORE SEARCH PATH OPTIONS
#
rompath                   roms;C:\ROM\MAME
hashpath                  hash
samplepath                samples
artpath                   artwork
ctrlrpath                 ctrlr
inipath                   .;ini
fontpath                  .
cheatpath                 cheat
crosshairpath             crosshair

#
# CORE OUTPUT DIRECTORY OPTIONS
#
cfg_directory             cfg
nvram_directory           nvram
input_directory           inp
state_directory           sta
snapshot_directory        snap
diff_directory            diff
comment_directory         comments

#
# CORE OUTPUT DIRECTORY OPTIONS
#
hiscore_directory         hi

#
# CORE STATE/PLAYBACK OPTIONS
#
state                     
autosave                  0
playback                  
record                    
mngwrite                  
aviwrite                  
wavwrite                  
snapname                  %g/%i
snapsize                  auto
snapview                  internal
snapbilinear              1
statename                 %g
burnin                    0

#
# CORE PERFORMANCE OPTIONS
#
autoframeskip             0
frameskip                 0
seconds_to_run            0
throttle                  1
syncrefresh               0
sleep                     1
speed                     1.0
refreshspeed              0

#
# CORE ROTATION OPTIONS
#
rotate                    1
ror                       0
rol                       0
autoror                   0
autorol                   0
flipx                     0
flipy                     0

#
# CORE ARTWORK OPTIONS
#
artwork_crop              1
use_backdrops             0
use_overlays              0
use_bezels                0
use_cpanels               0
use_marquees              0

#
# CORE SCREEN OPTIONS
#
brightness                1.0
contrast                  1.0
gamma                     1.0
pause_brightness          0.65
effect                    none

#
# CORE VECTOR OPTIONS
#
antialias                 1
beam_width_min            1.0
beam_width_max            1.0
beam_intensity_weight     0
flicker                   0

#
# CORE SOUND OPTIONS
#
samplerate                48000
samples                   1
volume                    0

#
# CORE INPUT OPTIONS
#
coin_lockout              1
ctrlr                     
mouse                     0
joystick                  1
lightgun                  0
multikeyboard             0
multimouse                0
steadykey                 0
ui_active                 0
offscreen_reload          0
joystick_map              auto
joystick_deadzone         0.3
joystick_saturation       0.85
natural                   0
joystick_contradictory    0
coin_impulse              0

#
# CORE INPUT AUTOMATIC ENABLE OPTIONS
#
paddle_device             keyboard
adstick_device            keyboard
pedal_device              keyboard
dial_device               keyboard
trackball_device          keyboard
lightgun_device           keyboard
positional_device         keyboard
mouse_device              mouse

#
# CORE DEBUGGING OPTIONS
#
verbose                   0
log                       0
oslog                     0
debug                     0
update_in_pause           0
debugscript               

#
# CORE COMM OPTIONS
#
comm_localhost            0.0.0.0
comm_localport            15112
comm_remotehost           127.0.0.1
comm_remoteport           15112

#
# CORE MISC OPTIONS
#
drc                       1
drc_use_c                 0
drc_log_uml               0
drc_log_native            0
bios                      
cheat                     0
skip_gameinfo             0
uifont                    default
ramsize                   
confirm_quit              0
ui_mouse                  0
autoboot_command          
autoboot_delay            2
autoboot_script           
console                   0

#
# CORE MKChamp OPTIONS
#
disable_hiscore_patch     0
disable_nagscreen_patch   1
disable_loading_patch     1

#
# CORE SWITCHRES OPTIONS
#
modeline_generation       1
monitor                   generic_15
orientation               horizontal
connector                 auto
interlace                 1
doublescan                1
cleanstretch              0
changeres                 1
powerstrip                0
lock_system_modes         1
lock_unsupported_modes    1
refresh_dont_care         0
dotclock_min              0
sync_refresh_tolerance    2.0
frame_delay               0
vsync_offset              0
black_frame_insertion     0
modeline                  auto
ps_timing                 auto
lcd_range                 auto
crt_range0                auto
crt_range1                auto
crt_range2                auto
crt_range3                auto
crt_range4                auto
crt_range5                auto
crt_range6                auto
crt_range7                auto
crt_range8                auto
crt_range9                auto

#
# OSD KEYBOARD MAPPING OPTIONS
#
uimodekey                 SCRLOCK

#
# OSD FONT OPTIONS
#
uifontprovider            auto

#
# OSD DEBUGGING OPTIONS
#
debugger                  auto
debugger_font             auto
debugger_font_size        0
watchdog                  0

#
# OSD PERFORMANCE OPTIONS
#
multithreading            0
numprocessors             auto
bench                     0

#
# OSD VIDEO OPTIONS
#
video                     auto
numscreens                1
window                    0
maximize                  1
keepaspect                0
unevenstretch             0
waitvsync                 0

#
# OSD PER-WINDOW VIDEO OPTIONS
#
screen                    auto
aspect                    auto
resolution                auto
view                      auto
screen0                   auto
aspect0                   auto
resolution0               auto
view0                     auto
screen1                   auto
aspect1                   auto
resolution1               auto
view1                     auto
screen2                   auto
aspect2                   auto
resolution2               auto
view2                     auto
screen3                   auto
aspect3                   auto
resolution3               auto
view3                     auto

#
# OSD FULL SCREEN OPTIONS
#
switchres                 1

#
# OSD ACCELERATED VIDEO OPTIONS
#
filter                    0
prescale                  1

#
# OpenGL-SPECIFIC OPTIONS
#
gl_forcepow2texture       0
gl_notexturerect          0
gl_vbo                    1
gl_pbo                    1
gl_glsl                   0
gl_glsl_filter            1
glsl_shader_mame0         none
glsl_shader_mame1         none
glsl_shader_mame2         none
glsl_shader_mame3         none
glsl_shader_mame4         none
glsl_shader_mame5         none
glsl_shader_mame6         none
glsl_shader_mame7         none
glsl_shader_mame8         none
glsl_shader_mame9         none
glsl_shader_screen0       none
glsl_shader_screen1       none
glsl_shader_screen2       none
glsl_shader_screen3       none
glsl_shader_screen4       none
glsl_shader_screen5       none
glsl_shader_screen6       none
glsl_shader_screen7       none
glsl_shader_screen8       none
glsl_shader_screen9       none

#
# OSD SOUND OPTIONS
#
sound                     auto
audio_latency             2.0

#
# WINDOWS PERFORMANCE OPTIONS
#
priority                  0
profile                   0

#
# WINDOWS VIDEO OPTIONS
#
menu                      0

#
# DIRECTDRAW-SPECIFIC OPTIONS
#
hwstretch                 0

#
# DIRECT3D POST-PROCESSING OPTIONS
#
hlsl_enable               0
hlslpath                  hlsl
hlsl_prescale_x           0
hlsl_prescale_y           0
hlsl_write                
hlsl_snap_width           2048
hlsl_snap_height          1536
shadow_mask_tile_mode     0
shadow_mask_alpha         0.0
shadow_mask_texture       shadow-mask.png
shadow_mask_x_count       6
shadow_mask_y_count       4
shadow_mask_usize         0.1875
shadow_mask_vsize         0.25
shadow_mask_uoffset       0.0
shadow_mask_voffset       0.0
curvature                 0.0
round_corner              0.0
smooth_border             0.0
reflection                0.0
vignetting                0.0
scanline_alpha            0.0
scanline_size             1.0
scanline_height           1.0
scanline_bright_scale     1.0
scanline_bright_offset    0.0
scanline_jitter           0.0
hum_bar_alpha             0.0
defocus                   1.0,0.0
converge_x                0.25,0.00,-0.25
converge_y                0.0,0.25,-0.25
radial_converge_x         0.0,0.0,0.0
radial_converge_y         0.0,0.0,0.0
red_ratio                 1.0,0.0,0.0
grn_ratio                 0.0,1.0,0.0
blu_ratio                 0.0,0.0,1.0
saturation                1.4
offset                    0.0,0.0,0.0
scale                     0.95,0.95,0.95
power                     0.8,0.8,0.8
floor                     0.05,0.05,0.05
phosphor_life             0.4,0.4,0.4

#
# NTSC POST-PROCESSING OPTIONS
#
yiq_enable                0
yiq_jitter                0.0
yiq_cc                    3.57954545
yiq_a                     0.5
yiq_b                     0.5
yiq_o                     0.0
yiq_p                     1.0
yiq_n                     1.0
yiq_y                     6.0
yiq_i                     1.2
yiq_q                     0.6
yiq_scan_time             52.6
yiq_phase_count           2

#
# VECTOR POST-PROCESSING OPTIONS
#
vector_length_scale       0.5
vector_length_ratio       500.0

#
# BLOOM POST-PROCESSING OPTIONS
#
bloom_blend_mode          0
bloom_scale               0.25
bloom_overdrive           1.0,1.0,1.0
bloom_lvl0_weight         1.0
bloom_lvl1_weight         0.64
bloom_lvl2_weight         0.32
bloom_lvl3_weight         0.16
bloom_lvl4_weight         0.08
bloom_lvl5_weight         0.04
bloom_lvl6_weight         0.04
bloom_lvl7_weight         0.02
bloom_lvl8_weight         0.02
bloom_lvl9_weight         0.01
bloom_lvl10_weight        0.01

#
# FULL SCREEN OPTIONS
#
triplebuffer              0
full_screen_brightness    1.0
full_screen_contrast      1.0
full_screen_gamma         1.0

#
# INPUT DEVICE OPTIONS
#
global_inputs             0
dual_lightgun             0

Open mame.ini and find the following lines in order to make the suggested changes below. The settings in mame.ini affect any game without a specific INI file in the INI folder. (The official explanation of all the Groovy MAME's features are here; check it out for further elaboration.)

1. video                     d3d9ex

Groovy MAME 0.170 under Windows 7 can use Direct Draw, Direct 3-D 9 and Direct 3-D 9 Ex, being the latter the recommended API. Notice that Direct Draw stopped being supported by MAME in version 0.171, whereas Direct 3-D 9 Ex only is supported by Groovy MAME 0.167 onwards. In order to use Direct 3-D 9 Ex, delete auto and type d3d9ex here, otherwise, Direct 3-D 9 will be generally picked.

The advantage of Direct 3-D 9 Ex over Direct 3-D 9 is that, unlike with the latter, there's no need to enable frame delay in order to force the frame latency to the minimum allowed by the driver and therefore avoid the dreaded frame queues present in the ATI video drivers when Direct 3-D is used, which add a lag of 2-3 frames.

For the case of the games using interlaced modes, Groovy MAME will automatically pick Direct Draw no matter what's been defined. This is intended as a workaround for Windows 7's design fault with interlaced modes (they are reported as having a halved refresh and synchronizing to these modes has the effect of halving the emulation speed -- Direct Draw bypasses this problem). In addition to that, Groovy MAME does also bypass Windows 7's inability to switch between progressive and interlaced modes under Direct Draw, so there's no need to manually make a mode change when using this API.

If the user wants to force Direct Draw or Direct 3-D 9 into a particular game/machine, the machinename.ini should have this line with ddraw or d3d instead of d3d9ex.

2. orientation               horizontal

Change it to vertical if the monitor in use has vertical orientation. Change it to rotate_l or rotate_r if you're using a rotating monitor set (anti-clockwise and clockwise, respectively).

Note that Switchres manages rotation options internally, so anything in mame.ini regarding screen rotation will be overridden, since the priority of Switchres option auto-setting (Core Switchres Options in mame.ini) is just above mame.ini.

3a. syncrefresh              0
3b. triplebuffer              0

Due to changes in MAME's original video performance, Groovy MAME manages certain options such as -syncrefresh and -triplebuffer automatically for the user's convenience, and it is required that these options are left as 0 in mame.ini for this to be possible. If the target refresh is achieved, Groovy MAME will select -syncrefresh, but if the desired refresh cannot be achieved due to monitor limitations, -triplebuffer will be used instead.

When -syncrefresh is used, Groovy MAME will synchronize both, video and audio emulation to the video card's refresh, resulting in the same perfect screen scrolling you get with the real hardware. You can force -syncrefresh for all games by enabling it in mame.ini, but this will make some of them run at an incorrect speed when the intended refresh cannot be achieved, which will be noticed by the modified sound pitch.

These particular cases where the intended refresh speed cannot be achieved are typically found when running (by way of rotating the picture) the games designed for vertically-oriented monitors on horizontally-oriented monitors and using a progressive mode. Here, -triplebuffer allows to keep the speed at 100% at the cost of smooth scrolling. It's very important to remark that -triplebuffer needs the -multithreading option to be enabled in order to work -- unless you force -syncrefresh in mame.ini, Groovy MAME will try to enable -triplebuffer when required, regardless of the -multithreading option state, causing sound stuttering. So if you're experiencing sound stuttering when running the games designed for vertically-oriented monitors on horizontally-orientated monitors by way of rotating the picture, the most possible cause is Groovy MAME not being able to active -triplebuffer properly because -multithreading is disabled.

Therefore, do never enable -triplebuffer as a general setting, as it degradates the emulation experience of games for which it's not strictly required. There's no increase of input lag associated to this option, however, since it's not the same -triplebuffer feature mainline MAME implements (blitting is performed here in an additional thread).

Also, be aware that -syncrefresh at 0 in other than mame.ini does actually disable this option for that particular game/machine or group of games. The value 0 for -syncrefresh means automatic only in regards to mame.ini.

4. multithreading            1

For -triplebuffer (Windows) to actually work as intended, -multithreading must be enabled first in mame.ini. This must be done manually as it is disabled by default for stability reasons (users of invasive frontends may get the emulator process killed).

The multi-threading feature in Groovy MAME is actually different to the one in mainline MAME (currently), being yet another of Groovy MAME's advantages over it. In mainline MAME -multithreading was added to improve performance by moving the window management (including rendering) to a second thread, making it asynchronous to the core emulation. This lack of synchronization causes well-known emulation bugs and indeed it's not recommended for a general usage. Groovy MAME's implementation, on the other hand, puts the focus on input responsiveness by separating input processing and rendering into different threads in order to avoid -waitvsync from locking input. Whether this has a real impact regarding input-lag reduction (for an up-to-date system) is still to be confirmed, though that could likely be the case. As long as -syncrefresh is in use, anyway, for the emulation side, it's exactly as if -multithreading was disabled -- as both threads run synchronized, the aforementioned bugs cannot happen, while the emulation performance gets the intended push-up if your system's CPU has more than one core.

5. disable_hiscore_patch     1

Set it to 0 in order to enable MK Champ's hiscore.diff. This is an unofficial feature to permanently save game score ranks in some games without non-volatile memory or support for it, by way of a HISCORE.DAT file. As it hacks the game's behaviour, emulation issues are prone to appear with it enabled.

6. disable_nagscreen_patch   1

Set it to 0 in order to enable MK Champ' patch to skip per-game emulation warning screens (unofficial feature).

7. disable_loading_patch     1

Set it to 0 in order to enable MK Champ' patch to skip per-game emulation loading screens (unofficial feature).

D )   C o n f i g u r i n g   G r o o v y   M A M E   A S I O

These are the instructions compiled and edited for convenience from Inteall's posts at BYOAC for the ASIO-related part of his build. Please, check his own thread for its genesis, development and discussion.

F )   S o l v i n g   o v e r s c a n   a n d   g e o m e t r y   i s s u e s

As a previous note, be aware that we always recommend the usage of monitors with adjustable geometry settings. Most will have them, but for many TV sets it'll not be easy to get access to the service menu or the devices which control them. Arcade games (and many old PC games) were conceived for monitors with easy-to-control screen geometry, so it wasn't really important which model or video mode they used and the consequent variations in screen geometry parameters against other samples (position, borders, etc.). Therefore, you can't expect a universal solution by software which sets a perfectly adjusted visible area on screen for every game in MAME so that you won't ever need to make monitor tweaks. Super resolutions (and only super resolutions) will essentially get the same horizontal amplitude for all the games, but you'll need to manually adjust the vertical size if you want to properly display games with different-enough video modes, though we'll show a way here (two ways, actually) to control the vertical position by software in case you want to leave at least that monitor setting intact.

F.1) Setting the best monitor specs

Different monitors require different definitions for the monitor's specifications in our system, and it's the monitor specs what determines overall screen geometry. Through Video Mode Maker, a definition of monitor specs was set in the process of installation; it's located in the Monitor settings tab, and it can be changed by another preset and even edited at will. It's likely that with the default preset you don't get a perfectly centered area under your current/default monitor parameters, so you may start by editing the monitor specs.

If you'll be using the monitor also with devices other than the PC for emulation (say, a game console), a smart approach may be firstly adjusting the monitor parameters to get the best geometry for these devices, given that they'll normally won't give you the option to do it internally.

In order to edit a preset (the one named Arcade 15.7 kHz - standard resolution is generally a good one to use as the basis for 15-kHz monitors, including TV sets), you need to know well what a monitor specs line consists of, which is widely explained here. Usually, you'll just need to correct the horizontal position, so take a look at this example:

15625-16200, 49.50-65.00, 2.000, 4.700, 8.000, 0.064, 0.192, 1.024, 0, 0, 192, 288, 448, 576 (original Arcade 15.7 kHz preset)

15625-16200, 49.50-65.00, 2.000, 4.700, 6.000, 0.064, 0.192, 1.024, 0, 0, 192, 288, 448, 576 (edited Arcade 15.7 kHz preset)

By picking the aforementioned preset in the corresponding field and changing this value with Notepad when clicking the edit button in VMM, you'll center the picture horizontally according to the demands of most NTSC consoles on many Trinitron TV sets, so you won't need to enter the TV's service menu and adjust this setting every time you change from your PC to your consoles and viceversa.

If, for instance, you also get the image positioned too low, you'll need to reduce the vertical back porch value:

15625-16200, 49.50-65.00, 2.000, 4.700, 6.000, 0.064, 0.192, 1.020, 0, 0, 192, 288, 448, 576

And so on.

Given that you can export the defined monitor specs directly to Groovy MAME as explained before, you don't need to also define this in Groovy MAME's INI file, though you can do it if you want to for some reason by finding and editing this line:

monitor                   generic_15

Yet more presets here.

Much like with VMM, it's possible to set custom values by the monitor's particular specs. To do that, type custom in place of generic_15 and add the values in the crt_range lines accordingly, taking always as a reference one of the given samples and their effect. Check VMM's tutorial for further elaboration.

F.2) Tuning up the screen geometry in a per-game basis

Groovy MAME lets us define the modeline(s) in the machinename.ini files, overriding the definitions in MAME's INI file. This is extremely useful to solve particularly geometry problems, such as the vertical centering derived from the disparity of the vertical scan rates or the overscan-into-underscan issues in quite a few arcade games.

The easiest way to tweak modelines per-game is:

1. Run the game with verbose enabled: Start menu, Run, C:\GROOVYMAME\mame64.exe machinename -v

2. Exit Groovy MAME and launch Arcade OSD. You'll notice the Get mode from clipboard option is enabled, go there. It will launch the last mode used by Groovy MAME, including custom timings.

3. Make the geometry changes as desired. Remember that you can't modify the vertical amplitude by software. 

4. When done, select Back and Copy modeline to clipboard. Exit the program.

5. Open Notepad, press CTRL + V. Now copy to the clipboard the modeline line, not the CRT range line, and paste it in your machinename.ini:

modeline "2560x240_60 kHz Hz" PixelClock, HRes, HSyncStart, HSyncEnd, HTotal, VRes, VSyncStart, VSyncEnd, VTotal, hsync, vsync

6. Save changes and test the game/machine.

Notes:

- Regarding the modeline option, the only requirement to use it is to have a modeline already available in the system with the same active width and height.

- Groovy MAME keeps the video mode specifications if modeline is used, but if the mode is defined with resolution instead, Groovy MAME will not use the vertical refresh attending Arcade OSD, but attending the emulator's request for that game, if v-sync is not disabled. The picture won't be scaled if it doesn't match the defined resolution (black borders and some shift will appear).

- If resolution is used, the video mode displayed in-game through MAME's menu and splash screen shows the vertical refresh from A-OSD according to that label, which usually won't be the one in actual use for the reason above.

- For minor tweaks, MAME's Slider Controls (reach them also through the TAB menu when running a machine), allows to modify the screen's horizontal and vertical position.

G )   E x t r a   t i p s

Calamity also provides us with the following advices for some particular situations:

G.1) Improving performance on games with switching resolutions

Windows 7's video stack adds an absurd overhead to video mode switching -- it's something you're not supposed to do so often in normal applications. With regards to games that dynamically witch resolutions, there are some things that can be done to avoid issues:

- Disable the changeres option in mame.ini. This will leave the game all the time at its default resolution, the one that's reported by MAME's XML. There'll be a single mode change on load, then no in-game mode switching. The problem with this is yhat, very often, the resolution reported is the first one assigned by the hardware initialization, which doesn't match the main video mode used by the game.

- Force a given resolution by means of the resolution option. This by itself will disable mode switching (same as nochangeres) but you can specify the main video mode that's actually used during the game.

- Use super resolutions. By using super resolutions, most mode changes will be unneeded. Only vertical resolution changes will trigger an actual video mode change. This is ideal for some systems (such as Sega Mega Drive) which change horizontal frequency quite often while leaving vertical unchanged. For systems that also change vertical resolution, the previous method is preferred.

Besides this, follow these recommendations when possible:

- Try to keep the mode list as short as possible; this will make mode changes work faster. Super resolutions will be of help here.

- Only enable the outputs you actually use. Each extra output that's enabled exponentially increases the time required by certain graphic API calls (e. g. EnumDisplaySettings).

- Use your frontend as your system shell (instead of explorer.exe). Having the default shell at the background means that upon a mode change, Windows will send messages to all the little things that live on your desktop, asking them to redraw themselves etc., which takes a lot of time.

G.2) Forcing single scan on games with double-scanned graphics

This comes in handy, for instance, with the systems where MAME mistakenly reports a vertical resolution which doubles the native one. Let's illustrate this with MSX 2 computer series emulation -- MAME always reports a vertical display resolution of 466 pixels for most MSX2/MSXP games, but, in actuality, MSX 2's Screen 5~7 modes displayed either, single-scan (233 lines) or interlaced (466 lines), and very few games used the interlaced modality (and those which did, only used it at some very particular moments). So, when emulating these games on a 15-kHz monitor, the correct approach consists in getting progressive modes of 233 lines instead of the interlaced mode at 466 lines, which, if anything, should only be called at those moments to make the change dynamically.

Until MAME fixes it in the driver's code, other than hardware de-interlacing, this can only be achieved by installing a super wide resolution of 233 lines in this case, setting it through machinename.ini and the resolution command, and also setting cleanstretch 2.

(Note: From Groovy MAME 0.177 onwards, cleanstretch options are no longer used, so set -ues (unevenstretch 1) in machinename.ini. This is required so fractional stretching is forced. We need to apply a fractional scale factor of 0.5 to the vertical axis. Integer subscaling is not possible since the minimum possible integer factor is 1. The trick to avoid scaling artifacts is to choose a resolution whose height is the exact half of MAME's reported resolution (466). The width is not a problem because we have a super wide resolution.)

Using nochangeres 1 is recommended too if the emulated system makes constant resolution changes, as these make the emulation too slow.

End of the guide

You're more than welcome. I've been meaning to update for Windows 7 but haven't had the time, saved me a job ;) Great work!

Nice. Thanks to everyone involved. I'll wait a couple of versions before properly updating the guide just in case, but does this still apply?

Groovy MAME will choose Direct 3-D when leaving this option in auto except for the case of the games using interlaced modes, where Groovy MAME will automatically pick Direct Draw.

That is so nice to hear... you are a true arcade lover... :) big thumbs for this.

Updated again to add Intealls' Groovy MAME build with ASIO/ASIO-4-All compatibility and a mention of the drawback of using super resolutions against the native mode (check E. Per-game configuration, 1. Resolution).

That's an aspect Calamity is working on currently, I believe. The guide is for GM 0.170. Many changes are expected to come, little by little.

As for the rest, those are mostly "correct" depending on what you want to emulate and how. For games using vertically-mounted monitors you'll need to change the -orientation as explained if you're indeed using a vertically-mounted monitor. The hi-score patch, I believe, was removed from 0.171 onwards.

Edited a bit the F.2 chapter, by the way. You must not unlock V-freq in A-OSD when just making porch changes.