VICE - Sound Config (Retropie 4.1)

RumblinBuffalo

I'm running Retropie 4.1 (RPi3) and just installed the updated version of VICE. After some reading here and tinkering, I've got it up and running. However, I'm noticing a bit of a difference in sound from my previous image (Retropie 3.8).

My example, is Space Taxi. The sounds seem right for just about everything else, but the voices in the game ("Hey Taxi") are very quiet compared to the rest of the sound effects. It's possible that the emulation has simply changed and impacted that game, but from reading about the many different settings and options (many of which I do not understand yet) I'm wondering if there is simply a setting difference from the 3.8 version to the 4.1 version.

Does anyone know if there is a configuration difference that would effect "parts" of the sound volume? Are there any differences in the default config used for the new version?

columboscoat

@RumblinBuffalo RetroPie don't "mess" with the emulators. If something has changed in VICE that would be down to the VICE devs. However, bear in mind that RetroPie is really just a suite of programs, scripts and configs brought together and so many things could have been changed by so many people at so many points ... I don't know how they keep up. They do this as a hobby, not a full time job.

edmaul69

@RumblinBuffalo did you update or do a fresh install? If fresh you can try adjusting the volume in the emulationstation menu from 77% to 100% and see if that helps any. In vice you could try to change the sound output to 44100 or something else and see if that helps.

RumblinBuffalo

Thanks for the replies.

@columboscoat I agree - I didn't mean to imply it came from Retropie, but I know the 4.1 image came with a new version of VICE. I had read that there is a specific VICE config file that comes with the Retropie image to optimize it for the RPi, so I was thinking maybe therein lies a setting changed that may/may not effect the sound performance. My example is very specific so it does SEEM like it must be a result of the actual emulation by the newer VICE version (when I was using the Retropie 3.8 install - and that version of VICE - it worked fine).

@edmaul69
I did a fresh 4.1 Retropie image, and then installed VICE from source. I noticed the differences then, and actually removed VICE (and deleted the VICE config file) and re-installed it using binary. Results were the same. I have tinkered with every sound setting I could find but haven't had positive results yet, but I'll try a little more experimentation.

Greatly appreciate the suggestions.

edmaul69

@RumblinBuffalo because of the issues newer vice had with saving settings i actually just stuck my old 3.8.1 vice + config back on. I havent had any issues with it so i dont see a need to update it until i am certain the bugs are out.

RumblinBuffalo

@edmaul69

That is what I am thinking of doing as well since it worked well for me. So to clarify, are you using Retropie 4.1 - but with the 3.8.1 version of vice? If so - how would I go about installing the older version?

Pardon the rookie question - I haven't mastered this part yet. I'm assuming it requires downloading and copying the correct version of VICE onto the RPi someplace and executing a command line to install?

Or I could start over with a 3.8.1 image and only update the stuff I need to (not vice of course).

Thanks again for the help!

edmaul69

@RumblinBuffalo you could go about which ever way works best. I always backup my /opt/retropie/ folder along with /home/pi/retropie/roms/ (this one i delete the old version) and the /boot/cmdline.txt and /boot/config.txt everytime i update and keep them so i just copied the emulater and config file overwriting the new one.

RumblinBuffalo

@edmaul69

Thanks for the info. So to clarify, do you simply copy the /opt/retropie/emulators/vice/ folder from the older image (or from your backup in this case) to the active SD card (just overwrite the folder?)

Then do the same with the sdl-vicerc (config) file?

BuZz

Please can you tell me what audio settings you changed on the new vice ?

There are various things that can affect speech volume. From the sid emulation (Fast vs accurate resid emulation), and sid model (6581 vs 8580).

BuZz

I've just tested this. The speech is quieter with the default Fast SID emulation. If you have a RPI3 you should have enough power for the more accurate floating point resid emulation. You can switch this via Settings -> Machine Settings -> Model settings.

RumblinBuffalo

@BuZz

Thank you so much - that did the trick!

Weird part for me is that I tested the Retropie 3.8.1 image on a spare SD card and could not get it to work as I said it did before. I don't remember ever touching the audio settings on my first go-round so maybe it was quieter then and I simply hadn't noticed.

Regardless - that helps me huge (I have a soft spot for Space Taxi, and the C64 in general).

Thanks again everyone for the responses.