First time user, needing some help

hansolo77

Hey everybody! I just joined this site yesterday because I thought of this great idea to put in a Pi into an old NES console. Through some browsing I discovered a lot of people are actually doing just that, so this will be a great resource for me. I'm glad a site like this exists. I installed RetroPie on a RPi3 and spent all day yesterday getting things set up. I don't yet have my NES I'm going to put it in, so I'm pretty much just working on the software bits. My plan is to have all the ROMs on an external USB drive. I have all that working now. I have a 1tb drive, and spent a large part of the day putting ROMs on it. Now on to my issues:

While playing around with RetroPie, I found the way to install different themes and change them. I really like the "Zoid" theme, but after putting all my ROMs on the drive and booted up I got that "White Screen of Death". I'm curious as to what causes this. It appears like the screen is just showing the background layer of the various systems, without showing any other layers. If this is the case, would that be something that can be fixed with tweaking of the programs? I'm not good at programming, it was just an idea. I saw on the wiki that you might be able to fix it by changing the memory split or by removing some systems. I'd rather not remove systems. What memory split should I use? Is there any impact to the system if I set it really high? I followed the installation tutorial video that said to set it to 320. I'm using a RPi3, with an 8gb SD card. The other thing that kinda confused me is where the wiki said this was also caused because the non-static background images. I don't think this is the case. I installed the "Metapixel" theme, and each background is different based on the system. So I really feel like there might be something else going on.
Like I said, I spent all day yesterday putting ROMs on the drive. I went to bed last night with the script running to scrape all the metadata. That completed overnight and when I rebooted just now everything looks great. But when I look at various systems, some of the ROMs don't have any metadata. Is there a way to scrape for just 1 game, or the games it missed, without having to go through and scan the entire drive again?
I tested 3 games yesterday (Contra/NES, Sonic the Hedgehog/GENESIS, Super Mario World/SNES) to see if the system was set up to run the ROMs ok. These games loaded up without any problems, so I assumed everything was "preset" to run any system. That doesn't seem to be the case, at least for the game I tested this morning. I tried to load "Adventure" for the Atari 2600. Nothing happened. The screen went black like it was about to load, then just sat there. I pressed all the buttons on my controller, and couldn't get it to load. I have a keyboard connected, so I hit ESCAPE thinking it would return me back to the menus. What it actually did was start the ROM. I'm not sure what happened. I closed out of the game, returned to the menu, and re-launched it. This 2nd time it did the same thing as far as going all black. But I wasn't able to get the game to start by pressing ESCAPE. All it did was display ^[ on the screen every time I pressed it. Pressing ENTER displayed some other characters on the screen too. I could not get out of the "console" if that's what that was. I never got the game to restart. I had to completely reboot the Pi. Any ideas?

backstander

hello @hansolo77

From my understanding, The "White Screen of Death" is an issue when the theme you are using in EmulationStation getting too big to fit in the Raspberry Pi's memory. This varies by theme but on most of the themes that have a unique wallpaper per system will have this issue (but not all of them like Metapixel). It might also have to do with the resolution of the pictures used in the theme but I'm not sure.
Which scrapper are you using? The one built into EmulationStation or Steven Selph's Scraper that's built into the RetroPie Setup Script? You should be able to just pick 1 system to scrape. Also I believe both will/can scrape just for games without metadata. You will have some games that just aren't found for whatever reason.
You'll have to give us more information like which Atari 2600 emulator you're using. I think the Tab key on the keyboard is for the Configuration Menu.

hansolo77

@backstander Thanks so much for replying.

I think the resolution could be key. When I have some free time, I'll see if I can't figure out where the artwork for the themes is being kept, and compare the resolution between the Zoid theme (not working) and the Metapixel (working) one. I suspect you may be right, and if this is the case, I can certainly do a bit of Photoshop on the Zoid images and resize them. Maybe they're 1920x1080 (1080p). If I reduce it down to 720p, that might solve the problem. "Maybe". I'd still like to know more, like if increasing the memory split will have any adverse affects elsewhere...
I tried using the built in scraper first, and didn't really like how it was working. It looked like it was asking me to pick a game from a list, for EACH game... I then saw something (maybe on the wiki?) about the Selph's Scraper, and gave that a try. It appeared to be running via the console and doing all the work without needing verification by me. So that was the one I ended up running with over night. I remember though that while scanning and I watched, there were some ROMs that it couldn't detect a proper hash on. Maybe my ROMs are out of date compared to the dat file it uses, so that's the cause. Maybe my ROMs are damaged? In either case, I'd like to just rescan the ones it couldn't find rather than have to scan them all. Maybe using the built in scraper will work better for this? But I have a bunch of systems and a bunch of ROMs to re-scrape. Just though there might be an easier way.
To be honest, I'm not sure which RetroArch core it is using. It's whatever the default is (I've not made any changes to preferred emulators yet). I need to go back and re-enable the screen that pops up prior to launching, saying to press a key to set up. I thought that was annoying, so I turned it off. Maybe I should wait till everything is working before I do that heh. I'll get more information when I have the time to provide it. I have to go to bed soon (worked late tonight, then my schedule has me coming in early tomorrow!). I do have my Xbox controller configured in RetroArch though, and can bring up the RetroArch menu with the GUIDE button. In fact, since doing that I've lost the ability to completely close out of a game with START+SELECT (back). So I need some help figuring that out too. But I want to tackle the Atari 2600 problem first.

Thanks again! I'll report back my findings tomorrow after work, and if anybody has any solutions for me in the mean time, please feel free to chime in!

backstander

In either case, I'd like to just rescan the ones it couldn't find rather than have to scan them all.

I believe both scrapers have the option to just look the games with missing game art. Steven Selph's Scraper uses a hash database to find your games (but doesn't have every version of every game) and the built in one I believe uses the filename (and also doesn't have every games ever made). I guess the games that don't scrape, you could try downloading a different version (like US vs Europe, etc.).

Here's a video from @Floob showing the build in scraper:

I need to go back and re-enable the screen that pops up prior to launching, saying to press a key to set up. I thought that was annoying, so I turned it off. Maybe I should wait till everything is working before I do that heh.

That's called the Runcommand and it would be a good idea to get everything working before disabling it :-)

Another option is to just replace the default "annoying" Runcommand with a beautiful pixel theme inspired splashscreen:
https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/4611/runcommand-system-splashscreens

To fix the SELECT+START issue, you can edit /opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch.cfg manually and change the values to something like this:

# Hotkey button
input_enable_hotkey_btn = 8 #Select
# Exit emulator
input_exit_emulator_btn = 9 #Start

Here's another video from @Floob showing how to test your joystick to find the numbers representing each button press:

hansolo77

@backstander Wow thank you so much for all that great info! Now I have something to work on. :)

hansolo77

Ok, using the Forum Rules as a guide...

Pi Model: (B, B+, 2 B etc..) - 3B
RetroPie Version Used: (3.6, 3.8.1, 4.01 etc..) - v4.0.2
Built From: (Pre made SD Image on RetroPie website, Berryboot, or on top of existing OS etc..) - Pre made SD Image on RetroPie website
USB Devices connected: - Keyboard, Wireless Xbox360 Dongle, WD My Passport Ultra 1tb Drive
Controller used: - Wireless Xbox 360 Controller
Error messages received: - none
Log found in /dev/shm/runcommand.log (if relevant): - N/A
Guide used: (Mention if you followed a guide) - N/A
File: (File with issue - with FULL path) - /home/pi/RetroPie/roms/atari2600/Adventure (1978) (Atari).a26
Emulator: (Name of emulator - if applicable) - Stella 3.9.3 (lr-stella)
Attachment of config files: (PLEASE USE PASTEBIN.COM FOR LARGE LOGS) - N/A
How to replicate the problem: - Just Launch the ROM. I didn't make any changes to the RetroPie's scripts, or anything to RetroArch. The only thing that might be pertinent is that when I first ran RetroPie, I went into the setup scripts and launched RetroArch directly so I could remap the controller. I also disabled the "runcommand" screen after a few games because it was annoying to see. But I've sense re-enabled that screen, and now it's not doing it. >>SHRUG<< ????? I saw in the wiki for the Atari 2600 system that you can press TAB to change controller settings, but that doesn't work for me either... But, the Atari 2600 problem seems to have resolved itself for the most part. I'm going to test other systems now.

hansolo77

Ok, so I'm getting closer to having the software side of things complete. I was looking through the wiki last night and saw a page about controller modules
https://github.com/RetroPie/RetroPie-Setup/wiki/GPIO-Modules
Since I'm planning on putting this into an NES case, I was wondering which is more ideal. I don't have any NES controllers yet, but they're pretty easy to come by. Would it be better to run wires from the existing controller ports over to the GPIO, or get something like this that converts it to USB? I'm thinking the best way to do it would be with the GPIO, so I'm not losing any USB real estate. On the other hand, if this works, I was also thinking about installing a couple of DB9 connectors right above the existing NES controller ports so I could connect Sega Genesis and Atari controllers too. The problem with that, I don't know if I can use multiple wires on the GPIO. I mean, I wouldn't have BOTH controller types connected simultaneously, but would it be possible to splice wires that share the same pins? Maybe by using some kind of inline thing that prevents feed back. I'm not an electrician, so I'm not even sure what that device is called (Resister, Transistor, Capacitor, etc). But I'm sure such a thing exists that allows you to make sure the signal only goes one way, so as to not pick up a signal from the unused wire:

DB9 --- -> ---+
              +-----GPIO
NES --- -> ---+

Any thoughts?

hansolo77

So I had some time to think about this while at work, and I think it might be easier to just use that NES to USB circuit (link). By using that circuit, I can combine both NES ports into a single USB plug. I saw some walkthrough examples where somebody had used that exact circuit in an NES, and the ports line up perfectly. I was also looking last night, and found a DB9 to USB adapter that might work well for Sega and Atari controllers. I've only heard of the Raphnet NES adapters from other builds, and don't know how well the Mayflash Adapter will work, and if it will work with ATARI as well.. I'd really like somebody to help me figure out if this is a good option, because I'd really like to have the option to install a way to use original controllers where possible.

Since I'm on the topic of controllers.. I have another major question. Does the system handle correctly the mappings for multiple controllers and types? So far, while waiting for all my hardware, I've been testing with just a Wireless Xbox 360 controller. I also have a Saitek P2500 controller that I was originally using before I got the Wireless Xbox 360 dongle. So does RetroPie/RetroArch still work if I have say.. 2 Xbox controllers? What if I have an Xbox Controller and the P2500? What if I don't have those, and just have 2 NES controllers? What if I'm really crazy and I'm using an NES controller and a Sega Master System controller (they're the same design more or less). Does the system handle multiple controllers, mix and match controllers, or even just 1 different controller per system? Since I'm still in the build phase, I don't have this issue NOW, but I'd like to know if this has come up and if there is a way through it.

Thanks guys! Also, I got my NES console in the mail today.. so I'm getting closer to build time!