Running ROMs from USB

dankcushions

@felleg that's a different thing. there are automatic and manual modes of running games from external drive. this is not to do with rom transfer.

felleg

@dankcushions Ah.. The reason I asked my question is because I use a USB stick to store PS1 games, and run from the USB stick because memory is less expensive that way. I had to disable the automatic copying of USB files for this to work.

Sorry I couldn't be of much help!

morpie

Copying from USB - I got that... not what I am trying to do.

I want to store and run them from USB. Like I said, the automatic method in the link worked for me... most of the time. Sometimes the ROMs didn't show up.

I was told the Manual method is what I want - as it is more dependable and less likely to give me the problem the Automatic method was giving me.

Perhaps that is bad advice I got, and the automatic method is just as good? If so, should I stick with it? I am having trouble with the manual method getting the ROM's to show up and can't figure out where I am going wrong.

dankcushions

@morpie the manual method works fine. i used it for months. i wrote that part of the guide :) if it hasn't worked for you you must have made a mistake - i can only suggest checking all the various files again. you could also check out the various folders via the command line.

that said, i've been running the automatic mode for a couple of weeks and had no problems. ultimately i was going to remove the manual method from the guide as there's no need for a complex method if we have a simple one. i'm not sure i understand why you'd get issues :/

morpie

@dankcushions said in Running ROMs from USB:

hasn't worked for you you must have made a mistake - i can only suggest checking all the various files again. you could also check out the various folders via the command line.

Thanks Dank... I am gonna make a few tweaks tonight. Based on your suggestion I will stick with the Auto method. I am pretty new to all of this so I am sure there is something I missed. That said, using manual method was smooth, it did transfer all folders to the USB... it was adding the ROMs that seemed to be my hurdle.

TimZett

Sorry for poking into this old thread again but same issue here even with automatic method.
-Mostly - on Pi startup or reboot, all ROMS stored on the USB are missing.
When I restart Emulation Station they show back up.
Must be a bug.

omen_peter

@TimZett said in Running ROMs from USB:

If I restart Emulation Station they show back up.
Must be a bug.

The same thing happens to me (I use a WD Elements external hard drive). I'm not sure it's a bug as such. I've always just assumed it is down to EmulationStation loading up on first boot before the external device can be read. As you say, restarting EmulationStationfrom the menu solves it.

TimZett

@omen_peter said

...I've always just assumed it is down to EmulationStation loading up on first boot before the external device can be read...

...or here also on reboot ;-)
If what you wrote is the case, it might be a nice "feature request" to make ES wait for the USB devices being read, especially because it's a documented feature of RetroPie to source out ROMs.
Hence I still would call it a necessary fix, not really a feature.

dankcushions

@TimZett i think it's on you to add a boot delay to config.txt or something like that.

https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/33037/how-to-add-delay-at-boot

TimZett

@dankcushions Thanks for that link. I will try it.
Right now when I booted up the Pi it "mounted" the ROMs perfectly. So it seems to happen spontaneously - weird.