312 replies to this topic

[xman72]

I was having a bad flickering issue with my PinDMD and I didn't know what to do. All my tables worked fine. I decided to get a new video card and the flickering is completely gone. Everything runs super smooth. I guess that extra power helped.

 

In retrospect, the whole process is actually not that difficult to setup. You definitely want to test first with dmdext test in the cmd prompt. Once you know it works, just follow Freezy's instructions. The instructions really couldn't be any easier.

 

The only command I had to enter in the cmd prompt was: dmdtext mirror --source=pinballfx2

 

That's it... nothing else needed and it works like a charm.

 

Thanks Freezy for everything! Let me know where/when I can buy you a beer!

Edited by xman72, 22 September 2016 - 05:34 PM.

[darkangel359]

 

Pinball FX2

1. Enable cabinet options in Pinball FX2
2. Resize the DMD to:
   • Width: 1040
   • Height: 272
3. Move the DMD to somewhere hidden like off-screen or behind the playfield (usually at 0/0).
4. Open a command prompt ([Windows]+[R], cmd, [enter])
5. Type dmdext mirror --source=pinballfx2 --destination=virtual --virtual-hide-grip --virtual-position [your x position] [your y position] [desired width in pixels] -q [enter]
6. Start Pinball FX2

 

In other words, you still have to enable the cabinet mode DMD in Pinball FX2 Settings but you can hide it behind the playfield and dmd-extensions will pick up frames for mirroring the game's DMD whereever you want your virtual display.

 

Works great man, thanks for the help.  Is there anyway to change colors on this, or colorize it?

[Carny_Priest]

No, but I think the source could be modified to do something if you were really needing it. How's your .NET skills? 

[freezy]

Glad you sorted it out. Feel free to share what the problem finally was so others can benefit from it (or if it's a special case, I can  update the README).

 

Custom colors are coming. Also I've changed the algorithm for rendering the colors so the "white effect" on yellow DMDs should be gone in the next release.

[Carny_Priest]

You probably know this already but a reminder anyway: in hot seat/multiple player games the DMD color changes to distinguish which player is up.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[TerryRed]

A common thing that causes issues, is trying to run the dmdext as a cmd or BAT file, but it's not run as Administrator. For me, I needed to create a shortcut for my BAT file, and have that shortcut run as admin for it to work.

[freezy]

Hmm if you're not mirroring TPA you shouldn't need admin privileges, that's the only use case where it's necessary because we're injecting code into another process.

 

For all the other stuff you should be fine with non-admin privileges.

[TerryRed]

If I'm running PFX2 and Pinball X each as Admin, would that be the reason why running as admin made it work for me?

Edited by TerryRed, 22 September 2016 - 08:09 PM.

[freezy]

That would be weird. Screen grabbing should work independently if the grabbed content is running as admin or not.

[darkangel359]

You probably know this already but a reminder anyway: in hot seat/multiple player games the DMD color changes to distinguish which player is up.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Actually, I was not aware of this.  Thanks for telling me, it's a very nice feature.

No, but I think the source could be modified to do something if you were really needing it. How's your .NET skills? 

Not bad at all, but looks like freezy is already on the ball with this one.  You the man! freezy. 

[darkangel359]

Glad you sorted it out. Feel free to share what the problem finally was so others can benefit from it (or if it's a special case, I can  update the README).

 

Custom colors are coming. Also I've changed the algorithm for rendering the colors so the "white effect" on yellow DMDs should be gone in the next release.

I set dmdext to run as Admin.  Still trying to figure out how to get it to run automatically with PBX.

[darkangel359]

Any reason for the Virtual DMD to be displaying like this?

Pinball FX2 on top, dmdext VDMD on bottom.

url=http://postimg.org/image/qopq0oubz/][/url]

 

 

Ahh yes, figured it out.  Kept changing the size of the DMD in FX2 until it matched perfect. 

Edited by darkangel359, 24 September 2016 - 06:24 AM.

[ronaldvg]

I have a problem using the DMDEXT program and cannot find the solution.

 

As soon as I start a table on TPA, TPA crashes. The DMDEXT windows only says that it is receiving input from TPA but that is not happening anymore obviously.

 

On the cab, everything else runs very good. FX2, VPX, Pinball Pro and Pinball X all work perfectly with the RGB LED DMD I use. Only TPA I cannot run. If I not run the DMDEXT program, TPA works fine.

 

I had this problem using Windows 10 also, so I decided to install Windows 7 back and reinstall all software. That solved nothing.

 

Any idea's ??

I am running everything as Admin, running the latest version of TPA in DX11, windowed with the resolution settings in the TPA config program at 1080 x 1920 (also tried 1080x2200). DMDEXT version 1.30 beta (1.24 doe not work with the latest TPA I think ?)

Edited by ronaldvg, 27 September 2016 - 08:06 PM.

[freezy]

Yeah, it doesn't work with the last TPA build because Noex didn't find the time to update the code injection for dmdext yet.

[ronaldvg]

Ah ok, thanks. We'll just have to wait then. By the way thanks for your great work on this !

[Totaltimo]

After having upgraded to Windows 10 "Anniversary update" I've had several problems with my VPin and my PinDMD3. I solved most of them, but one problem still persists:

 

DMDext doesn't work any more with PinballFX2. It does recognise the PinDMD3, it does also recognise the PinballFX2 task, but it doesn't mirror the DMD to my PinDMD3. This is what the console shows:

 

 

What's going wrong here?

 

 

[Totaltimo]

Okay, I found it out. Maybe it helps others:

 

1) PinballFX2 forgot the code for the cabinet support

2) the DMD size in the PBFX2 cabinet settings resetted to 0x0. I set them back to 1040x272 and everything works again!

[Azurden]

This really was awesome to be able to use in FX2.  Question...  I have wanted to automate the start of this and also FX2 at system start up.  Eventually I would like to just set up to shell right to FX2.  In testing, I basically just took the command line and write it in a .bat file.  Then I just call the bat file at system startup from the scheduler.  It will run it fine to get it started.  But, the issue is that the DMD will blink in and out "twitch" and will not run the DMD display in a fluid manner.  If I just launch a cmd windows and paste in the same startup commands it runs fine.  Any ideas?

 

 

 

Loaded with scheduled task or bat: https://1drv.ms/v/s!...-wpHLei_Ky5-bsw

 

Loaded by manually doing RUN: CMD - then typing in (or pasting) the switches for dmdext: https://1drv.ms/v/s!...9VQh1k86PezA8cA

 

Any ideas as to why this would work with manual and not via bat or scheduled task?

Edited by Azurden, 21 October 2016 - 03:34 PM.

[Azurden]

This really was awesome to be able to use in FX2.  Question...  I have wanted to automate the start of this and also FX2 at system start up.  Eventually I would like to just set up to shell right to FX2.  In testing, I basically just took the command line and write it in a .bat file.  Then I just call the bat file at system startup from the scheduler.  It will run it fine to get it started.  But, the issue is that the DMD will blink in and out "twitch" and will not run the DMD display in a fluid manner.  If I just launch a cmd windows and paste in the same startup commands it runs fine.  Any ideas?

 

 

 

Loaded with scheduled task or bat: https://1drv.ms/v/s!...-wpHLei_Ky5-bsw

 

Loaded by manually doing RUN: CMD - then typing in (or pasting) the switches for dmdext: https://1drv.ms/v/s!...9VQh1k86PezA8cA

 

Any ideas as to why this would work with manual and not via bat or scheduled task?

 

 

ADDITIONAL INFO

 

I have found that I can replicate the issue all the time.  If I run dmdext prior to starting pinball fx2 the DMD will blink in and out when displaying.  If I reverse this by starting FX2 first and launch a game, then start dmdext it will work perfect everytime.

[bent98]

Can someone provide a screenshot on the Pinball X config for launching FX2 via  pin2dmd?