Galaga sound issues

wscol

I downloaded several roms for Galaga and put them into the mame libreto folder. On some games I cannot get the sound to work at all and on other games it works only after I play the initial round. The runcommand.log is here http://paste.ubuntu.com/23385794/ This is from one of the galaga games that the sound will not work at all.

Lyle_JP

First of all, you "downloaded a bunch of Galaga roms" is not a promising start. If you want to use Mame2003 you MUST use roms from the 0.78 romset. If you don't know what romset your file comes from, it's the wrong one.

Secondly, depending on the version of Mame you're using, you may need a samples file for all of the sound effects. Some versions of Mame use the Galaxian samples file for the sound of your ship exploding.

wscol

@Lyle_JP I downloaded the Mame 2003 reference set and ran it through the clrmamepro utility to get the 0.78 romset. I found the sample file you were referring to and placed it in the ../Retropie/Bios/mame2003/samples folder. This fixed the issue with the sound effects not working but I still need to play at least 1 game before the sound "kicks in". Does that make sense. For example I start Galaga 3 and initially there is no sound but then after playing 1 game the sound starts to work.

mediamogul

@wscol said in Galaga sound issues:

I downloaded the Mame 2003 reference set and ran it through the clrmamepro utility to get the 0.78 romset.

The 'Mame 2003 reference set' already is the the '0.78 romset'. Have you tried just dropping 'galaga.zip' into /home/pi/RetroPie/roms/mame-libretro without doing anything to it? You would of course need to make sure that you have 'lr-mame2003' selected as your emulator.

wscol

@mediamogul Ok I did what you said and that seemed to have solved part of the sound issue. The sound effects are better and it plays the music now. But I still need to play at least one game before it will kick in with sound. Also it occasionally will play in fast forward motion. What I mean by that is it's like you would press the fast forward button on a remote. The graphics go by real fast and you end up losing a game. But maybe this is expected because when you start the game it comes up with a message that the graphics are not 100% accurate.

mediamogul

@wscol said in Galaga sound issues:

But maybe this is expected because when you start the game it comes up with a message that the graphics are not 100% accurate.

I've read into that warning in the past and it just means that the background star field is not emulated %100 pixel perfectly. It could be that you've inadvertently mapped the fast forward function in RetroArch to a common button. Check you're hotkeys in the RetroArch menu to see.

Lyle_JP

Galaga 3 is actually a game called Gaplus, and it has its own samples file iirc.

mediamogul

@Lyle_JP

Ah, I missed the '3' in there. Still, there should be no issues with fast forwarding in either the parent or clone rom. Definitely try 'gaplus.zip' to confirm though. Also, I've never had to use samples for that game, but maybe I've been missing out on some additional sound.

wscol

@mediamogul and @Lyle_JP I take back what I said about the sound issues being partially resolved. Now it seems that I randomly experience sound going in and out. I don't know if it is because I am using a VM or I am missing some sample files. I could not find a gaplus.zip file.

Lyle_JP

@wscol Using a VM? Are you saying that you're also emulating the pi environment itself? You'll get better results using a Mame emulator created for your hardware and running directly on it.

wscol

@Lyle_JP The reason I am running a VM is because I want to see what issues I would face if I decide to go out and purchase a Rasberry Pi. That said have you had any issues with sound using a Rasberry Pi?

dankcushions

@wscol

I could not find a gaplus.zip file

https://github.com/RetroPie/RetroPie-Setup/wiki/lr-mame2003#samples

mediamogul

@wscol said in Galaga sound issues:

The reason I am running a VM is because I want to see what issues I would face

That's a good idea in theory, but you're already running into major issues that could very well be isolated to the VM environment and never even be seen when using an actual Pi.

That said have you had any issues with sound using a Rasberry Pi?

Personally, I have not. However, seeing as this is a computer we're talking about here, there has of course been people who have had sound issues in one way or another, but I have personally never heard of anyone having the specific issue you're describing.

wscol

@mediamogul

That's a good idea in theory, but you're already running into major issues that could very well be isolated to the VM environment and never even be seen when using an actual Pi.

I think your right. Hopefully I will get a RPi3 Model B for Xmas.