1790 replies to this topic

[Thalamus]

I will have to try Black Hole out,

it wasn't - before, only sound issues.

 

Pinmame used became "sick", and I don't remember exactly how I came to that conclusion.Only that after playing that rom, a reboot of the cab was needed - ALWAYS, to solved it.

Maybe you guys changed compiler options or something ? I simply haven't played that one in a long time because of the extra hazzle.

 

High hopes that it is now fixed.

[digitalarts]

just a quick sound test in playing of all my Zaccaria tables:

ok:

Robot, Farfalla, Spooky, Pinball Champ 82, Magic Castle, Locomotion, House of Diamonds, Space City, Soccer Kings, Time Machine, Devil Riders, Hot Wheels, Future World, Shooting the Rapids, Star God, Earth Wind Fire

not ok:

Mexico 86  (maybe bad ROM dump ? - but vpinmame checkroms says all ok, both mexico and mexicofp) 

[wiesshund]

The glitchy part refers to the fact that although we did not touch that code recently, it now seems to work for you.

So there must still be something like uninitialized memory or the like somewhere that makes it work with some builds (or setups), but not with others.  :/

 

Something has changed, and very much so.
 

That i have been testing, it has never worked with some builds but not others
it either got better or it didnt, but dont recall it going backwards

I also do not recall it getting better, except when you were trying to address it
So i am thinking that something you have done has directly addressed it rather than a mistake.

The difference is too hugely profound.

[toxie]

I fear that this is really just a glitch, even if its at the moment a very very positive glitch.

 

Could be that we're back with worse black hole sound at some random time as we change something else in the source base.

That's the sad thing with these mystery bugs. There is some sideeffect coming in from somewhere completely else usually.

[wiesshund]

I fear that this is really just a glitch, even if its at the moment a very very positive glitch.

 

Could be that we're back with worse black hole sound at some random time as we change something else in the source base.

That's the sad thing with these mystery bugs. There is some sideeffect coming in from somewhere completely else usually.

 

There has to be some way to analyze what vpm is doing now, as opposed to the previous version?

Votrax also seems different on cavalier negro, though it speaks portuguese terribly, but nothing to be done for that without a time machine

[Gaston]

The improvements for Votrax and the Gottlieb games using it were all done by September 2022 already, so they should be part of the 3.5 release actually...

[wiesshund]

The improvements for Votrax and the Gottlieb games using it were all done by September 2022 already, so they should be part of the 3.5 release actually...

Unfortunately they are either not, as i tested all that stuff back then heavily.

Or you have made more improvements and either noone knows it or it wasnt documented.

 

3.6 and latest are entire galaxies apart.
Put it this way
If you take 3.5 and current build and run blackhole side by side
You will point at 3.5 and ask who the hell would want to run that.
It is that different.

 

So, if nobody really knows why it is better, what do we do to find out why it is better, before something else gets changed and suddenly makes it not better
and potentially worse than previous?

[toxie]

The problem is that usually even just having a debug build that would allow to 'look into things' more carefully already changes behavior.

I haven't tried that yet with the current status, but this is the common 'experience' with such issues (i will still try though).

What i already did in the past is to use static code analyzers and runtime memory checkers on that core, but both with no substantial outcome.  :/

 

For comparison: We also had an issue with 64bit builds and Capcom emulation. In february i 'fixed' this by restructuring some code.

So no real fix, just trying to clean up fishy stuff, but that already did the trick due to some sideeffect.

At some point this may haunt us again, but as there was also nothing i could find while debugging, this was the best 'solution'.

not ok:

Mexico 86  (maybe bad ROM dump ? - but vpinmame checkroms says all ok, both mexico and mexicofp) 

Thanks for the tests!

Mexico 86 is simply not finished up yet, as a lot of missing pieces for complete sound emulation are still missing.

[Gaston]

The improvements for Votrax and the Gottlieb games using it were all done by September 2022 already, so they should be part of the 3.5 release actually...

Unfortunately they are either not, as i tested all that stuff back then heavily.

Or you have made more improvements and either noone knows it or it wasnt documented.

...
 

I installed the official 3.5 release files from here:

https://github.com/v....VPinMAME35.zip


... and all the Votrax improvements we applied are in there, in the standalone exe as well as in the DLL!

Could it be possible you tested some pre-release beta version?

[Mrtr32]

I'm using VPinMAME-sc-3.6-369-102e419-win-x86 (Beta) and don't have any sound issues.

Edited by Mrtr32, 25 May 2023 - 11:54 AM.

[wiesshund]

 

 

The improvements for Votrax and the Gottlieb games using it were all done by September 2022 already, so they should be part of the 3.5 release actually...

Unfortunately they are either not, as i tested all that stuff back then heavily.

Or you have made more improvements and either noone knows it or it wasnt documented.

...
 

I installed the official 3.5 release files from here:

https://github.com/v....VPinMAME35.zip


... and all the Votrax improvements we applied are in there, in the standalone exe as well as in the DLL!

Could it be possible you tested some pre-release beta version?

 

 

No, you were present in the testing discussion and findings etc.
there was a very long documented part just about blackhole alone.

[Mitchell]

Two gunshot roms doesn't match. Old roms, bad roms or redump or what?

 

MAME

 

missing rom: m-177_gun_shot_rom_0_version_0.4.ci3 [size: 65536] [CRC32: f0f4e01e] [SHA1: 27b28ce3a81e01d9c1bacebe078c135e24b637a7]

missing rom: m-177_gun_shot_rom_1_version_0.0.ic9 [size: 65536] [CRC32: 737ea656] [SHA1: 0bb16ae4bef2800681aaa7741506f40a337e6af0]

 

PinMAME

 

missing rom: m-177_gun_shot_rom_0_version_0.4.ci3 [size: 16384] [CRC32: 4754a983] [SHA1: 21c517c78624af41e0295877cc6d6ba7a66fe0fa]

missing rom: m-177_gun_shot_rom_1_version_0.0.ic9 [size: 8192] [CRC32: 19fcec2d] [SHA1: ff69de0652a54d5c00738c8144897e33df972eee]

 

----------------------------------

 

MAME and PinMAME matches.

 

m-177_gun_shot_rom_2_version_0.0.ic16 [size: 524288] [CRC32: f91ddd0c] [SHA1: cc4e1440e76330872f512d56376f45b92a8dbee6]

Edited by Mitchell, 01 August 2023 - 05:08 AM.

[toxie]

The PinMAME ones are 'cleaned'/shortened to the actual data. In MAME (i just checked) also the same rom regions are used (just the beginning) in the end, same as in PinMAME.

Attached Files

•  gunshot.zip   276.93KB   9 downloads

[Mitchell]

Thanks.

 

The PinMAME ones are 'cleaned'/shortened to the actual data. In MAME (i just checked) also the same rom regions are used (just the beginning) in the end, same as in PinMAME.

[toxie]

New beta in the 1st post 

 

Core

- Improved HC55516 CVSD sound emulation once more (most Williams/Bally machines in the Gorgar up to Twilight Zone range)
- Refined Bally-32 sound emulation (so it also does not require the sample package s3250u3.zip anymore now)
- Disabled mechanical sample use (solenoids, bumpers, etc) via the pinmame.zip sample package if running VPinMAME or libPinMAME (as this should be handled by the table itself then)
- Fixed regressions by reducing the pre-shutdown time for Joctronic, NSM, Juegos Populares, after fixing timeslice issue related to the VGM file dump feature (which uses a fast timer)
- Added support for the old SC-01 Votrax ROM version (wired only to the Mars - God of War Prototype so far)
- Fixed regression/crashes for Elvis and Monopoly (introduced in 3.1)
- Improved emulation robustness when running multiple machines from the same generation (e.g. System11) one after another (e.g. from within VPX)
  or when resetting certain machines

ROMs

New:

Spinball: Gun Shot (vending machine in a pinball cabinet - https://www.recreati...90-spinball-sa)

 

Clones:

Black Knight L-2
Cue Ball Wizard (older display rev.)
Elvis 1.00
Farfalla (French Speech)
Mexico 86 (Italian Speech)
Mr. & Mrs. Pac-Man Pinball (alternate version)
Odin (Prototype)
Pinball Champ (French Speech)
Royal Flush Deluxe rev. 1
Time Machine (Zaccaria, Italian Speech)

[toxie]

..oh, and not to forget the revamped Altsound 1 implementation, which also includes a new, upcoming sound package format

[GInsonic]

Thanks for everything Toxie!

[toxie]

I could use some help please.. I need testing for all the games that use the HC55516 chip, which means basically all Williams/Midway/Bally machines from Gorgar up to Twilight Zone.

Cause we got a bug report that at least Jokerz and BOP has some clipping/noise issues now, which means we need to rebalance the volume for some games..

[wiesshund]

I am not hearing anything off?

the only thing that sounds a little edgy, in twilight zone, is the prerecorded samples, but those always sound that way, i would assume to being compressed to hell during digitization and being sourced for god knows how old media

[jpsalas]

I have tested my table Jokerz, and I can hear some pop noises from time to time, but BOP is too busy with sounds and music so I can't hear any of those clips/pop noises. I don't which other tables have that chip, but I have tried some other Williams tables from that era 1988, like Taxi or Sword of Fury, and they sound fine.