43 replies to this topic

[Carny_Priest]

I was messing around with screen order on my machine tonight, and had to reset FutureDMD.ini. Here is my workflow.

 

1. Cut FutureDMD.ini and copy it someplace else outside of your Future Pinball folder. This will be your back-up.

 

2. Run a table in BAM+FP. Are the playfield and BG showing up correctly? If not, you need to fix that before you can proceed.

 

3. Close FP and make sure that you are using a desktop theme that will allow you to see the DMD window. I use Windows Basic.

 

3. Run FutureDMD. You will get an error message that it can't read the ini file. That's because it no longer exists in the folder. FutureDMD will create a new ini file.

 

4. Run FutureDMD again. You should see a window on the top left corner of one of your screens. Is it on the playfield? Is it on the BG? Is it on the DMD screen?

 

5. Find the DMD window and drag it where you want your DMD displayed.

 

6. Right-click. You will see a context menu including a pair of options for resizing the display. You can re-size while maintaining the correct aspect ratio or you can stretch the display to fit an opening on a panel. There are options for rotating or reversing the image if you need to. Close the DMD and check your settings in FutureDMD.ini. You can fine tune here. If you make changes, save the file before you proceed. 

 

7. Run FutureDMD again, Is the display where you expected it to be? If so, you are done.

 

8. If not, you will need to test various settings for PosScreen in the ini file. Close the DMD window and change the PosScreen setting starting with PosScreen=0. Save and run FutureDMD again. Is the display where you expected it to be? If so, you are done.

 

8. If not, repeat step 8 except increment the PosScreen setting by 1 and so on...  (Ex. PosScreen=1. PosScreen=2, etc.) One of these will work.

 

7. Once FutureDMD is displaying in the right location. Keep the window open and test with a table using FP+BAM.

 

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[DKong]

I will test that next, thanks so much for the detailed write up. I really appreciate it.

One other question I have before I try this is you mention running FP+BAM. Just so I'm clear, do I need to do something different than running FP by opening FPLaunch.exe?

I have FPLaunch.exe inside my BAM folder, which is inside my FP folder. I don't open FP on its own, I only use FPLauncher.exe.

Is there something else I should be doing or when you say FP+BAM, do you just mean opening FP via the FPLauncher.exe?

[Carny_Priest]

You mean FPLoader.exe, correct? 

[DKong]

You mean FPLoader.exe, correct? 

 

Yes, FPLoader.exe

[DKong]

After performing all steps you suggested above, I now see the DMD window on the correct screen (when I launch FutureDMD outside of FP).  When I launch FPLoader, the DMD goes away and the table and backglass screens show the loading images and progress bar appears on the playfield.  The DMD monitor now only shows the Windows logo (my theme) and nothing else.

 

When I launch Jaws, Iron Man or High Speed, the DMD is still on the top left corner of the rotated playfield.  It's as if tables have the DMD embedded in this position and I can't move it.

[Carny_Priest]

Yes, FP renders the DMD for single screen users or for desktop/landscape orientation. What FutureDMD does is listen in from outside FP, intercept the DMD frames to be rendered and mirror them in another window that you can locate on a third screen. Both DMD displays will be present. What you are looking for is the DMD window rendered by FutureDMD and that it is located where you expected it. Once you have that then you can go to the editor, locate the DMD that FP renders on the playfield (in the editor this is usually located on the translite), and simply drag it off the screen so that it no longer shows up in-game. 

[DKong]

Should the DMD on the third screen be showing the score while the embedded DMD on the playfield is as well (before I move the embedded DMD in the editor)?

Even when I see the DMD on the third screen, it is not displaying anything, no text, score.

Will this be fixed after I move the embedded DMD in the editor?

[Carny_Priest]

FutureDMD should be displaying the same thing as the DMD on the playfield. You should verify that before you move the DMD in the editor. So, you are saying that you see the FutureDMD window where you expect it while running a table, that you see a grid of faint dots (what Future DMD renders as pixels in the off-state), but it doesn't appear to be mirroring any DMD from the playfield?

 

Does the table have a DMD that is supported by FutureDMD. It must be 128x32.

 

Every dll in the Future Pinball directly and subfolders including BAM is verified as unblocked? All exe are unblocked and checked as Run as administrator? 

[DKong]

I verified every dll is unblocked in properties and exe are unblocked and running as admin.  When I run a table that supports DMD (Iron Man, Jaws), I can see a grid of faint orange dots inside a black rectangle box on my third monitor.  

 

When looking at my FutureDMD.ini, I see Mirror=0.  I thought changing this to either 1, 2 or 3 or even yes would turn on mirroring the embedded DMD.  Unfortunately, it did not change anything on the DMD monitor.

 

Where do I check to see/change the DMD resolution to 128x32?  I can't seem to locate this.

 

Here is my FutureDMD.ini, in case there is something you see I should change:

 

[default]

red=245

green=100

blue=50

highscore_1_1=" is #1|"

highscore_1_2=" Rules|"

highscore_1_3="HIGH SCORE|"

highscore_1_3_2=" "

highscore_1_4="Can you beat|"

highscore_1_4_2=" ?"

avg_time_1_1="Average Game Length.."

avg_time_1_2="Average|Survival Time.."

avg_time_1_3="Most Balls Drained in.."

avg_time_1_4="Can you last longer than?.."

PosScreen=2

PosX=4008

PosY=167

SizeW=1026

SizeH=435

Orientation=0

Mirror=0

Shades=0000000000000000

[Carny_Priest]

Orientation and mirror are for rotating or reversing the image. If, say, you have a Pinball 2000 style design or you have a backglass TV set up in portrait orientation.

Jaws should work. It has a supported DMD. If you see it on the playfield then FutureDMD should pick it up and replicate it where you have it defined in the ini.

In your FP video settings does the resolution of your playfield match your Windows resolution (ex. 1920x1080)? Does the resolution defined for the BG match your Windows resolution?

If not, then I could see the settings in the ini being off as you would be configuring FutureDMD under conditions that are different from when you are actually playing.

It should not make any difference but you could take BAM out of the equation and just test with vanilla FP until you get this figured out.

Always re-check the settings in your ini especially if you are changing the value of PosScreen. You may have to change your settings if you see that FutureDMD placed the window where you did not expect it.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[DKong]

First off, thank you Carny_Priest and Outhere, for all your help in helping me through this setup issue.  I hope this thread will help others who may be stuck as some point as well.

 

Okay, so I finally have the third monitor DMD displaying/mirroring the images from the Backglass DMD (with some tables).  The only thing different I did to get this working was move the FutureDMD.exe, FutureDMD_Relay.exe, ledwiz.dll, OpenGL32.dll and FutureDMD.ini files out of the BAM folder and back in to the Future Pinball folder.  I thought this is how I originally had it setup, per the Setup PDF.  For some (or many) reason, it wasn't working in the FP folder, so I moved these files a while back to the BAM folder, since that is where I launch FPLauncher.exe.

 

Now, the following tables I've test have the DMD working on the third monitor (YEAH!): Jaws, Iron man, Jurassic park, Shrek, Goonies, Star Wars Empire, Elvis and Tron Legacy.

 

However, the DMD is blank on the third monitor on tables such as Die Hard, World Cup Soccer, Metallica and TeedOff.  The embedded DMD on the backglass is working on these tables, but the third monitor DMD is the grid of faint orange dots inside the black rectangle box (like before, when I couldn't get any tables to run with FutureDMD).

 

I checked and these tables' DMDs are running at 128x32 and I have attached a screenshot of my FP with WorldCup loaded.

 

I'm guessing there are going to be a lot of other tables that have the same issue as these four that don't seem to be using or working with FutureDMD.

 

Any idea why this is happening with these tables and what I can do to fix them?

Attached Files

•  FP WorldCup94 MyDMD.PNG   499.77KB   4 downloads

[Carny_Priest]

Ah, yes, FutureDMD does need to be in the same folder as Future Pinball. Glad that you got it running. Getting FutureDMD working outside of PinballX will now make it much easier to get it all working within PinballX.

One thing that stymied me for a day was getting custom colors working within PinballX. Tables will run fine if the files for each table are in their own folder. It is tempting to structure your folders this way because it is more organized. But custom colors will only work within PinballX if all of your files are in the same Tables folder (not recursed into individual folders).

On the issue of FutureDMD not picking up the DMD of some tables, I'd love an answer too. I have that issue with Tutenkahn. It looks like it should be detected and other tables from the same author work fine. The tables that you list having this issue with, I don't have any of these installed. I can't say that they work for me. I'm guessing I would have the same issue. I haven't had a chance to investigate very deeply myself.

For now, I would just move the DMD for these tables to the apron so that it will be off of the playfield but you can still see it. Your eyes are going to be on the flippers most of the time anyway.

[DKong]

Thanks.  Happy 4th of July!

 

One other question about running tables from PinballX.  

 

Some tables don't seem to run unless they are inside of their own folder with the needed files.  Some examples of these tables are Metalica, Back to the Future, Funhouse.  These types of tables seem to need their included files such as music, sounds, etc.

 

If I move the .fpt from these tables from out of their own folders (currently inside of the Tables folder) and on their own within the Tables folder, the tables don't load and I get many errors.  If I leave these tables inside of their own folders, but within the Tables folder, the tables run okay.

 

How will this affect my ability to run these tables from PinballX?

[Carny_Priest]

Basically, when you download a table from pinsimdb.org or whereever, you unpack all of the contents of the archive straight to the Tables folder. In other words, all of the supplementary files need to be in the Tables folder also. This is if you want to launch from PinballX and run FutureDMD with custom colors defined for specific tables in the ini. (And why wouldn't you?). Try that first to get FutureDMD working within PinballX. Try to test some custom colors as described in the documentation.

 

I don't have tons of FP tables installed, a couple dozen maybe. But so far, even though the Tables folder looks cluttered I have not run into an issue where I have overwritten some file with another from a second table.

 

Once you get a solution working THEN maybe try to get it to work organized with the files associated with a table in its own folder if you really want it that way. You may have to test different launch parameters or insert part of the path in the game name tag in the xml. I don't know if it will work in a way that you can still get custom colors with the DMD, but maybe... I stopped experimenting when I got to a working solution. Don't know if you have VP installed. With VP, all the vpt files do need to be in the Tables folder AFAIK.   

Edited by Carny_Priest, 05 July 2015 - 12:02 AM.

[DKong]

I moved those tables out of their own folders and into the tables folder. As you said it's kind of a mess inside the table folder, but most tables now load just fine.

Thanks!

[gimli246]

are there any DMD based tables you have that are not displaying the DMD now?

 

Sometimes you just have to do the old DMD shell game on the translite editor screen.

If there are more than one DMD, Future DMD only intercepts the first DMD created by the table designer (regardless of the DMD's name)

 

For example dispDMD2 (which could be a blank DMD, or for something else) might be the intercepted one, if it was actually created prior to dispDMD1

 

So to change this, rename dispDMD2 to dispDMD3 (it is still first in priority),  now create a new DMD and call it dispDMD2 (this will be of last priority as it was created last).  now DELETE dispDMD3.  dispDMD1 now has been promoted to first priority and FutureDMD will intercept it

[Carny_Priest]

Thanks for the tip. The only table that I am having trouble with is HappyCab's Tutenkahm table. There is only 1 DMD on display, but I'll have to dig in and see if there was another one defined somewhere.

[DKong]

are there any DMD based tables you have that are not displaying the DMD now?

 

Sometimes you just have to do the old DMD shell game on the translite editor screen.

If there are more than one DMD, Future DMD only intercepts the first DMD created by the table designer (regardless of the DMD's name)

 

For example dispDMD2 (which could be a blank DMD, or for something else) might be the intercepted one, if it was actually created prior to dispDMD1

 

So to change this, rename dispDMD2 to dispDMD3 (it is still first in priority),  now create a new DMD and call it dispDMD2 (this will be of last priority as it was created last).  now DELETE dispDMD3.  dispDMD1 now has been promoted to first priority and FutureDMD will intercept it

 

I only had one FP table that I know of, (World Cup 94) that was not showing the DMD on the third screen, but on the playfield.  Your tip worked perfectly.  Thanks!

[Carny_Priest]

Yep, there was a DMD on the translite that was not documented anywhere in the script. Deleted it out, and I'm in business. Thanks.

[gimli246]

Hey great guys, glad it worked.

This is an obvious nuance but sometimes the table will have several DMD's and they are almost the same , but the author has decided to make them slightly different

for whatever reason.

 

So if the DMD that you are intercepting with Future DMD works but is lacking some stuff, try the same tip and rearrange DMD priority such that the other DMD is intercepted

 

.

Edited by gimli246, 14 July 2015 - 03:24 PM.