Enter 1999 November/ENTER11_1.bin/OS2/MAME/readme.os2

Text File | 1999-09-01 | 9.5 KB | 191 lines

MAME for OS/2 (version .35 beta 11)
===================================
OS/2 port by Marty Amodeo ([e-mail])



Getting started quickly
-----------------------

[[ IMPORTANT NOTE!! ]]:  If you scan for ROMs, some games that were
approved by previous versions of MAME may be rejected now.  This is because
some games now require some more files.  If MAME complains about a file
missing, you will have to look for a more up to date version of the ROMs.

If you're anything like me, you never read these stupid files and try to run
the executable and figure it out yourself.  If you'd like to try that, you're
more than welcome to, except you may miss out on some features.  Here's the
fastest way to get up and running:

1] Copy the MAMEOS2.EXE file into your normal MAME directory.
2] Run MAMEOS2.
3] Select "Scan and Create Quick List" from the File menu.
4] Select "Open Game from Quick List" from the File menu.
5] Select the game you want to play and press the "Run Game" button.

That's it.  During the game, press P to pause, TAB for settings, and other
normal DOS MAME operations, such as F3 to reset, F2 for self test, etc.


What's new?
-----------

Check the web page!  It's more up-to-date than this file could ever be.
Visit http://emuos2.davesvgc.com.

[[ STANDARD DISCLAIMER ]]:  This is by no means a mature product.  I
do not guarantee all or any of the functionality contained herein.
I, and everyone on the MAME team, take no responsibility and cannot
be held accountable for any loss, be it in the form of data or
physical health, due to the use of this product.  I cannot and will
not be held accountable for any crimes that are committed, nor the
destruction of any large landmasses during the use of this product.
Your use of this product marks your agreement to these terms.


Questions you may have
----------------------

See the FAQ web page.  Visit http://emuos2.davesvgc.com.


Product documentation
---------------------

Command line-
  This version of MAME does not have command line parameters like the DOS
  version.  The only parameter that is accepted is the name of the initial
  game to run or a diagnostic switch "-diag".  Anything else is ignored.

Diagnostic mode-
  If you are having a specific problem that is not documented on the Bugs web
  page, I may ask you to run MAME in diagnostic mode.  If you do, MAME will
  test your TIMER0 capability, joystick driver, and DIVE capabilities and
  write the results to what should be a very informative DEBUG.LOG file for
  me.  When you run in this mode, you will see one window pop up with the
  16 bit greyscale pattern.  Close this window.  Another one will pop up
  with vertical bars of different colors.  Close this and the test is complete.

Game control-
  While in a game, use the controls defined for that game to play.  Press TAB
  to view or change these settings.  Press P to pause or resume.  Press ESC
  to stop the game.

The Quick List-
  MAME will maintain a "quick list" of games that it can find that have a
  full, valid set of ROMS.  You may specify the directories where these ROM
  files reside using the "ROM Search Path" option from the file menu.  The
  default settings search the current directory and a directory named "ROMS"
  under the current directory.  Your ROM files may be ZIPped up, so long as
  the ZIP file has the same name as the name of the game.  If you have your
  ROMs unzipped, the must be inside of a directory with the same name as the
  game.  If a game does not show up on your quick list it is because
  1] This version of MAME does not support this game,
  2] the directory or ZIP file is not named properly, or
  3] the ROM set is incomplete or corrupt.
  Any errors are reported in Debug.Log during the scan.

  The Quick List is an exhaustive list of everything that you can run with
  MAMEOS2.  This list can get to around 1000 or more entries depending on
  how many ROM sets you have.  This can be very inconvient to search through
  especially if you mainly only play a handful of games.  Because of this, I
  created a Favorites List.  You may add to or remove from this list and select
  and run games from it.  You can still run games from the Quick List itself (a
  game does not have to be on the favorites list in order to run).  This is
  just (hopefully) a convenient way of getting to games you like best.

Input Options-
  If no game is running, you will be able to access and change the default
  input options.  If a game is running, the options you change will apply
  only to that game.  You can select keys (CTRL-Left click for multiple
  selections) from the "Rapid Fire Keys" list box to make these keys
  automatically repeat at the specified interval.  This is nice for games
  like 1943 where you have to fire many shots very quickly.  Mouse input can
  be enabled or disabled here also.  You can choose whether or not MAME can
  grab the mouse pointer while the games are running (I recommend that you let
  it).  Also if some game has weird X or Y axis settings, you can flip these
  axises.  You can choose to emulate an analog joystick with the mouse if you
  don't have (or want to use) a real joystick for games that require one (like
  Star Wars and others).  If your joystick calibration is off, you can
  recalibrate it here by clicking the "Recalibrate" button and moving the
  joystick to all extremes.  The crosshair will move as you move the joystick.
  You can also disable joystick input altogether here.

Scan lines-
  You can enable scan lines in the Display menu.  You will have to restart
  your emulation (using Game->Reset) or start a different game for the
  setting to take effect.  To actually see the scan lines, you will need to
  scale the window to double size at least.  Scaling to "actual size" will
  guarantee that you will not see any scan lines.

Frame counter-
  You can enable a frames per second indicator using this menu option.  The
  indicator will appear in the game window itself and also show how many
  frames are dropped.

Enable TIMER0-
  This menu item will enable or disable the use of the TIMER0 device driver.
  I recommend you enable it for best performance.

Frame rate regulation-
  These options allow you to choose how your frame rate is regulated (if at
  all) by MAMEOS2.  I added these options because the sound will sound
  horrible if you are not emulating 100% of the CPU cycles in the proper
  time.  Frame skipping allows one of the most time consuming parts of the
  emulation process to be bypassed from time to time.

  You can choose to automatically regulate the frame skipping if you want
  MAMEOS2 to determine on-the-fly what it would need to operate at 100%.
  This setting will lead to the best audio quality, regardless of your
  audio settings.  If you see that too many frames are being dropped,
  making it difficult to play the game, you can set the maximum number
  of frames to skip in a row.  This may make your audio choppy, however.
  A game is probably unplayable if you have to skip more than 3 frames in
  a row (the equivalent of "Skip 3" in previous versions).

  You can also choose to enable or disable the automatic slowing down of
  the emulation when it is needed.  This option will only kick in if the
  frame rate is more than the game's desired frame rate and will give
  back some CPU slices to the OS if TIMER0 is used in conjunction with it.
  This can be (and probably should be) used in conjunction with the frame
  skip options.  I highly recommend it for the best speed regulation.  If
  it is disabled and you have a fast computer, the video will get far ahead
  of the audio because the audio always plays at its proper rate.

Audio options-
  Here you can set which audio driver you wish to use, DART or MMPM.  I
  suggest you choose DART initially, but if you have problems, choose
  MMPM.

  You can select the sound quality settings.  The frequency determines
  how often audio data is sent to your sound card.  High frequency sound
  (44KHz) will result in the best sound quality, but will be a large
  drag on your CPU.  Lower frequency sound will be less of a strain, but
  may sound "tinny" and of low quality.

  You can also choose whether you wish to send 8 bit or 16 bit audio data.
  16 bit is higher quality, but involves moving double the amount of data
  to the sound card and can slow things down a bit.

  You may also select the audio buffer size and audio latency here.  The
  audio buffer size directly impacts the audio latency.  The bigger the
  audio buffer, the less synchronized the audio stream will be with the
  video.  The latency value is how much time elapses between the display
  of a given frame and the playing of the sound which accompanies it.

  If you make the buffer size too large, then your frame rate may become
  erratic because the sound is processed in bigger chunks less often.
  If you make the buffer size too small, then the program may crash.
  Currently, I don't know of any way to determine how small is too small
  because it varies from one sound driver to another.  Generally, keeping
  the audio latency to .1 seconds (or 100 milliseconds) will work for
  most drivers.  If you find this is not the case, please let me know.


That's it!
----------
  I hope you enjoy this version of MAME.  If you have any questions,
  suggestions, or comments, feel free to e-mail me ([e-mail]).

  Be sure to visit http://emuos2.davesvgc.com for the latest information
  on this project.  Thanks!