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    Please do not post a support request without first reading and following the advice in https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/3/read-this-first

    lr-mame2003 aspect ratio

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    • dankcushionsD
      dankcushions Global Moderator
      last edited by

      it's pixels. how else could it be measured? :P

      http://elinux.org/R-Pi_Troubleshooting#Big_black_borders_around_small_image_on_HD_monitors

      RiverstormR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
      • mediamogulM
        mediamogul Global Moderator
        last edited by mediamogul

        Yeah, sorry about that. I could have been more clear. I meant 22 pixels. Your settings will of course vary based on the intricacies of your own monitor should you choose to fine tune in this way.

        RetroPie v4.5 • RPi3 Model B • 5.1V 2.5A PSU • 16GB SanDisk microSD • 512GB External Drive

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • RiverstormR
          Riverstorm
          last edited by

          Oh, thanks guys! @dankcushions that link is a much better explanation!

          mediamogulM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • mediamogulM
            mediamogul Global Moderator @Riverstorm
            last edited by mediamogul

            @Riverstorm

            If you're still interested in knowing more about the usage of "overscan_scale=1", get in line. It seems to be the go-to response in these situations, but no one ever mentions what it is doing. I take it that it is simply scaling everything to the known screen borders. This would still leave a few TVs with a bit obscured here and there based on how they happened to be manufactured. Below are a few samples of past recommendations in other locations. Perhaps they go into greater detail throughout one of the threads.

            https://github.com/RetroPie/RetroPie-Setup/issues/205
            https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=78&t=50100
            https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/15311/how-do-i-shrink-the-screen-with-composite-out

            RetroPie v4.5 • RPi3 Model B • 5.1V 2.5A PSU • 16GB SanDisk microSD • 512GB External Drive

            dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • dankcushionsD
              dankcushions Global Moderator @mediamogul
              last edited by

              @mediamogul check the link I posted to understand overscan_scale :)

              mediamogulM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • mediamogulM
                mediamogul Global Moderator @dankcushions
                last edited by mediamogul

                @dankcushions

                And to think, with two simple strokes of my scroll wheel, all would have become clear. Very useful indeed, thank you.

                RetroPie v4.5 • RPi3 Model B • 5.1V 2.5A PSU • 16GB SanDisk microSD • 512GB External Drive

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • RiverstormR
                  Riverstorm @dankcushions
                  last edited by

                  @dankcushions said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                  it's pixels. how else could it be measured? :P

                  http://elinux.org/R-Pi_Troubleshooting#Big_black_borders_around_small_image_on_HD_monitors

                  Dank thanks again for this link. I was able to also resolve a long running issue with getting the Pi to run on a big ol' LG flat screen we have downstairs. It's really great playing on such a large screen.

                  Also overscan_scale=1 seemed to be the only option to "shrink" ES to fit on the screen. I tried enabling and disabling overscan_scale=1 in combination with disable_overscan=1 then adjusting different settings for overscan_left=150 and overscan_right=150. Nothing changed ES except overscan_scale=1. It was the same for both an LG TV and also a Best Buy house brand TV.

                  The thing that was changing when I was tweaking the options was the RetroPie logo screen (blue screen with cupcake controller) but ES was unaffected from overscan_left, right, top & bottom.

                  Anyway I am still quite happy with the end result and was also able to resolve the other issue of getting a Pi to work on a bigger TV which the wife can kick me down the stairs to use that TV now so thanks Dank! :)

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • dankcushionsD
                    dankcushions Global Moderator
                    last edited by

                    yep, as my link shows, your overscan settings only affect console/desktop, not hardware rendering (ie, emulationstation, games). the only way to get them to affect hardware rendering, is with overscan_scale=1. both settings need to be changed in parallel.

                    RiverstormR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • RiverstormR
                      Riverstorm @dankcushions
                      last edited by

                      @dankcushions said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                      yep, as my link shows, your overscan settings only affect console/desktop, not hardware rendering (ie, emulationstation, games). the only way to get them to affect hardware rendering, is with overscan_scale=1. both settings need to be changed in parallel.

                      Ok, now it makes sense what I was seeing. I appreciate all the help in getting that straightened around. overscan_scale=1 is hardware layers only and overscan_left, right, etc. are console/desktop. The lightbulb has been lit! :)

                      dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • dankcushionsD
                        dankcushions Global Moderator @Riverstorm
                        last edited by

                        @Riverstorm said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                        @dankcushions said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                        yep, as my link shows, your overscan settings only affect console/desktop, not hardware rendering (ie, emulationstation, games). the only way to get them to affect hardware rendering, is with overscan_scale=1. both settings need to be changed in parallel.

                        Ok, now it makes sense what I was seeing. I appreciate all the help in getting that straightened around. overscan_scale=1 is hardware layers only and overscan_left, right, etc. are console/desktop. The lightbulb has been lit! :)

                        i'm not so sure it has... overscan_left/etc is for both, but it only affects hardware layers if you turn overscan_scale on. overscan_scale doesn't do anything by itself.

                        RiverstormR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • RiverstormR
                          Riverstorm @dankcushions
                          last edited by Riverstorm

                          @dankcushions said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                          overscan_scale doesn't do anything by itself.

                          I can you tell with 100% certainty it does on both an LG TV and Best Buy house brand. ES is off screen and also games in lr-imame4all have clipping on the top and bottom. overscan_scale=1 is the the only tweak I am using.

                          It does fill ES left and right 100% but top and bottom have a small black border that overscan_top & bottom isn't fixing except for the RetroPie boot screen is changing with those options. Here's my config.txt:

                          # uncomment this if your display has a black border of unused pixels visible
                          # and your display can output without overscan
                          #disable_overscan=1
                          
                          # uncomment the following to adjust overscan. Use positive numbers if console
                          # goes off screen, and negative if there is too much border
                          #overscan_left=16
                          #overscan_right=16
                          #overscan_top=16
                          #overscan_bottom=16
                          
                          # Overscan_scale adjusts screen output (reduces overscan)
                          overscan_scale=1
                          
                          dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • dankcushionsD
                            dankcushions Global Moderator @Riverstorm
                            last edited by

                            @Riverstorm said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                            @dankcushions said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                            overscan_scale doesn't do anything by itself.

                            I can you tell with 100% certainty it does on both an LG TV and Best Buy house brand. ES is off screen and also games in lr-imame4all have clipping on the top and bottom. overscan_scale=1 is the the only tweak I am using.

                            It does fill ES left and right 100% but top and bottom have a small black border that overscan_top & bottom isn't fixing except for the RetroPie boot screen is changing with those options. Here's my config.txt:

                            # uncomment this if your display has a black border of unused pixels visible
                            # and your display can output without overscan
                            #disable_overscan=1
                            
                            # uncomment the following to adjust overscan. Use positive numbers if console
                            # goes off screen, and negative if there is too much border
                            #overscan_left=16
                            #overscan_right=16
                            #overscan_top=16
                            #overscan_bottom=16
                            
                            # Overscan_scale adjusts screen output (reduces overscan)
                            overscan_scale=1
                            

                            i believe you - it must be some bug in the firmware, as the command is well documented. i personally had to redo my overscan settings on my pi3 compared to my pi2 on the same tv, which seemed like a bug, so i will look into it and report the issue if necessary.

                            i don't see why overscan_top/bottom aren't working for you, though. even if you put like overscan_top=100 it doesn't do ANYTHING? again, that's surely a bug if it's not working as that is entirely what it should do. i will check on my pi3 later.

                            RiverstormR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • RiverstormR
                              Riverstorm @dankcushions
                              last edited by Riverstorm

                              @dankcushions said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                              i don't see why overscan_top/bottom aren't working for you, though. even if you put like overscan_top=100 it doesn't do ANYTHING?

                              Yeah, it does move the boot logo (blue screen with cupcake controller) but the ES screen itself doesn't change position. That cut and paste above is from the exact image I am using. If I uncomment overscan_left=16 and change it to something like 100 the logo moves nicely from the left with a black border but ES itself doesn't change at all. I will verify it again just to make sure. If I could do any testing just let me know or if pasting my entire config.txt or another file is helpful I can do that too.

                              dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • dankcushionsD
                                dankcushions Global Moderator @Riverstorm
                                last edited by

                                @Riverstorm please paste your entire config.txt as I'm convinced there's something. wrong with it as left/right absolutely works for me and others!

                                mediamogulM RiverstormR 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                • mediamogulM
                                  mediamogul Global Moderator @dankcushions
                                  last edited by

                                  @dankcushions

                                  I can confirm that the directional overscans settings work perfectly for me in every part of RetroPie with the exception of Emulation Station. Using "overscan_scale=1" was the only way I could find to bring it in line uniformly.

                                  RetroPie v4.5 • RPi3 Model B • 5.1V 2.5A PSU • 16GB SanDisk microSD • 512GB External Drive

                                  dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • BuZzB
                                    BuZz administrators
                                    last edited by BuZz

                                    Yeh it is always a good idea to post complete configs / logs etc. It's not possible to help properly from a snippet as you don't get the overall picture.

                                    To help us help you - please make sure you read the sticky topics before posting - https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/3/read-this-first

                                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                    • dankcushionsD
                                      dankcushions Global Moderator @mediamogul
                                      last edited by

                                      @mediamogul there's no question of overscan_scale being needed to influence overscan in emulationstation. it basically turns on the ability to adjust the overscan via overscan_left/etc, as per the docs. please give full details of your config.txt and experiments if you want to help :)

                                      mediamogulM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                      • FinheadF
                                        Finhead
                                        last edited by

                                        Hope it's ok to add to this thread with my question/problem.
                                        Trying to get the proper aspect ratio on lr-mame2003 as well but it's a bit different and I can't seem figure it out. I have tried changing the cfg file with some of the settings posted here but they don't seem to change anything.
                                        Is this the proper file to change for these settings to take effect?
                                        /opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch.cfg

                                        Here is what I am dealing with for the aspect ratio problem. I have reverted back to the stock cfg file now from the back up file since nothing I changed seemed to work.
                                        This is a RPi 3 retropie 3.7 on a 5:4 monitor rotated 90 deg in the boot config file.

                                        alt text

                                        dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • dankcushionsD
                                          dankcushions Global Moderator @Finhead
                                          last edited by

                                          @Finhead don't edit files, use the config editor IMO: https://github.com/retropie/retropie-setup/wiki/Configuration-Editor

                                          the setting I think you want is
                                          video_allow_rotate - change to false. that should respect the original aspect ratio. however if you've already changed settings it might not work as desired. I guess you've done something to rotate also?

                                          FinheadF 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                          • FinheadF
                                            Finhead @dankcushions
                                            last edited by

                                            @dankcushions said in lr-mame2003 aspect ratio:

                                            @Finhead don't edit files, use the config editor IMO: https://github.com/retropie/retropie-setup/wiki/Configuration-Editor

                                            the setting I think you want is
                                            video_allow_rotate - change to false. that should respect the original aspect ratio. however if you've already changed settings it might not work as desired. I guess you've done something to rotate also?

                                            I made a backup of the cfg file I changed before I started to play with it, I deleted and renamed my backup so it's back to 100% the way it was installed.
                                            Ok got where to change the settings and tried your setting and didn't change anything after a reboot. I went back and checked and the setting are changed in the editor but didn't do anything for my issue.

                                            Like I say I have in my boot config.txt file
                                            display_rotate=1 This is to allow me to run my screen vertical as it will be palced in the cab I'm making.
                                            All other emulators including the lr-mame4all fill the screen out to 4:3 (sides have 2 small strips unsed as it should) lr-mame2003 is the only one that seems to want to cram it into half the space for some reason.

                                            dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
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