ARpiCADE Forums

Hey guys.

Im a proud owner of an Arpicade v3 with pi3b+
Spent the day customising to my hearts content.
VERY happy with it so far, though a few minor snags which Im wondering if there is any solution. Most of it is likely me being a noob with it all, so appreciate the help and patience up front.

1. As I understand the audio out is not amplified natively. Just wondering if something like say, Pandoras box 3.5mm is amplified in contrast?

I have an Edifier S330D (https://www.edifier.com/int/en/speakers ... g-speakers) which I used to run on a Pandora (Edifier is RCA , used RCA to Aux 3.5 adapter), but when I tried it on the arpicade, the audio was absolutely horrible. Putting it back straight to jamma with stock speakers was literally 100 times better. It sounded like earphones almost.
Being the Edifier advertises RMS output, I was under the assumption it was an amplifier/would act as the required amplifier? Connecting Edifier to my phone blasts audio too.
Have I missed something?

2. I'm an NBA Jam lover, but I cant get NBA JAM TE to come up in my game list using the recommended emulator.

078 Per https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... 1166197682

I put NBAJAM.zip and NBAJAMTE.ZIP into the 078 rom folder, but only NBA JAM comes up in the game list.
I obtained both roms from an 078 romset.

I tried 037: it shows up, but the screen was all squished and narrow
I then tried it in another mame version, it might have been 172 - again, both games show up, but glitchy audio and slow performance - I understand why 078 is the recommended emulator for performance, just unsure why it wont show up when the rom is in the 078 folder though

3. Key mapping - MAME 078
There were a few instances where I wanted to change particular buttons to 'None' and have no assignment. Generally done by choosing the button assigner, pressing enter, then pressing 'ESC' on the keyboard. Seemed to work on another mame emu (cant remember if it was 106), but when trying to do it in 078, it escapes the entire game back to the main menu.
If I recall, with the other version mame emulator, it would let me use ESC to set buttons to 'None' and would only escape out of the game itself with ESC key with the menu closed maybe
Is there another way to set keys to 'None' in this particular emulator.

4. Key mapping - retroarch/fba
SVC Chaos is a 4 button fighter, instead of your traditional 6. Issue there is, top 3 buttons are a mix of punch/kick, and button 4 (1st in the bottom row) is the final button. I wanted to change it to say button 1+2 punches, button 4+5 kicks.
I pressed F1 on the keyboard, went to controls menu using joystick, entered it by pressing button 1, but it seems no matter what i change in there - it doesnt do anything at all.
I even tried changing all player ones buttons from what they were, to be nothing at all (just ---- dashes), and my controls were still all working, when it shouldnt have been.
I even tried going to f1 menu > configurations, save new configuration (highlight it, press button 1), and even save current configuration - and didnt seem to do anything at all. I know im probably pressing the wrong things.


Thanks guys !

1. Generally, with the exceptions of headphone outputs, a 3.5mm audio output should be line level (un-amplified) just like an RCA output. It looks like those speakers are a powered 2.1 system, I'm a bit surprised they don't sound better than the mono 2W amp on the RaspberryJAMMA. Perhaps it has to do with the 2.1 systems input impedance or a bad cable or bad connection... I'm not sure.

Are the speakers grounded? (3 prong plug or 2 prong?) I guess it could also be a ground loop issue, maybe.

Sorry not sure what may be happening there. It is possible to redirect the audio output to the Pi rather than the DAC, it may be worth trying that output with your 2.1 system, then again it may do nothing different... hard to say.

2. NBA Jam TE should show up, had a quick look and it's missing from the rom scan reference file for 078. Replace the file mame078.aml in /boot/launchers/aml/ with this one: https://drive.google.com/open?id=18ZWJ9 ... LgVBjD8ihz and rescan the roms and it should appear.

3. The problem here is 078 is a Retroarch core, 'esc' is causing Retroarch to end, with the side effect of stopping anything else you're trying to achieve. Perhaps instead of setting the inputs to none you can set them to unused keyboard inputs or something that will be functionally the same as none when you're playing.

4. Yeah, remapping Retroarch stuff is very confusing (unless they have a dedicated menu for the emulator like some of the Retroarch MAME cores). Many settings can effect other settings and various cores refer to buttons in different ways... it's my least favourite thing about Retroarch. Remapping can be done, but I don't have a quick easy guide to it - in fact I still struggle with it sometimes..

I'd recommend running SVC Chaos in AdvMAME (MAME 106), performance should be fine and you should be able to remap easily in AdvMAME.

Hi dee2er

Thank you for your ongoing support. Truly priceless.


1. Yeah unfortunately it does sound worse than mono onboard jamma.
It doesnt even have any bass from the subwoofer, its weird.
It also sounds fuzzy/crackly

The speakers have a positive and negative each, which connect directly to the sub/amp. The power cord itself is two prong (live and neutral).
Pic of what it looks like here



I dunno. Wouldnt think itd be a bad cable or connection, as I disconnect from the Pi DAC, and connect the identical plug directly to my Samsung phones earphone jack and its back to itself again - bassy, clear, punchy, loud etc.

The Edifider uses a remote knob for audio volume. Tried putting volume up, the volume increases, but poor quality.

I checked the Arpicade service menus audio level, it says '89', so didnt touch it.

The volume knob on the pi does nothing for stereo (assume its just for jamma audio, as it works fine with that)

Im out of ideas. Purely incompatibility of some sort between Pi and this speaker set? What is everyone else running?

Just regarding "It is possible to redirect the audio output to the Pi rather than the DAC, it may be worth trying that output with your 2.1 system" - how does one do this, and what 3.5 jack would you then use instead of the DAC.
any info on steps for this?

Thank you


2. Thanks, that update file fixed it perfecty ! NBA JAM TE loads now


3. That's another weird thing. I tried remapping to a keyboard key, and its like it wouldnt recognise keyboard keys being pressed at all (other than say TAB).
e.g. I ran a test with a random assigned key. In this case 'tilt' just for sake of testing.
Originally assigned to key 't' . I temporarily changed it to one of the arcade buttons, so it was changed. Then tried to change it back to 't' and it wouldnt recognise the keyboard key being pressed, nor a few other keyboard keys. Its like this emulator is selective in which keys it wants to register.


4. Thanks - using 106 now - fixed it 106 menus and keymapping are so beautiful.
Shame the one emulator cant run everything


5. Sorry - also a new thing to ask about.
Dreaded lightning bolt intermittently popping up. Mainly on and off in attract mode. No keyboard/USB devices connected.
I checked voltage at the JAMMA connector, under load with pi connected and powered on. I set voltage to 5.05v under load so its a touch over 5, but still intermittently popping up. Sometimes as I keep the meter on the voltage drops under load to 4.95 or something, but most of the time is at 5 or above

EDIT: I maxed out my 5v adjustment on my Astro City PSU to as far as it can go. Didnt dramatically do much of an increase under load.
The PSU is probably a bit weak in its age, but under load, it still roughly maintains about 5v at its lowest or thereabouts. On odd occasion a touch under 5.

Still had some minor intermittent bolt, so edited config.txt
# remove lightning bolt warning
avoid_warnings=1

So far no bolt due to that warning removal.

Should I be concerned though, or just the way they are?


6. MK2 plays well- but MK1 is choppy and laggy. I have the proper rom for 078 in the 078 folder. Is this normal/fault with this game being emulated?
Update- now nba jams doing it too unfortunately. Unplayable with lag. 078 thing?

update- was playing more games and then ssf2 had intermittent lag which runs on 172 emu
Re enabled lightning bolt and didnt come on at any time when lag occurred - bolt only happened on boot up /loading nothing in the game so dont think it's a voltage issue
Is pi possibly faulty and throttling?

7. Vertical games.
This one here Im assuming is pure limitation.
Horizontal cab and setup, was just hoping to add galaga and donkey kong. Have them in 106. The games work, but its like theyre permanently every so slightly shaky.
Tried Hhold and Vhold on the cab. Nothing to do with it. Not much I can do I assume?
I know its asking a lot for vertical game on a horizontal setup, but if any tweaks or tricks to get it a lot better, ill give it a shot.
I tried dkong in another emu (admittedly cant remember version), and it seemed more stable,but audio was all off, which i believe to be that particular emulator versions fault id say

1. Software wise in /boot/run.sh add this line before the now loading message bit (if it's already there but commented out just uncomment it):

amixer cset numid=3 1

If you use Windows and don't already have Notepad++ I recommend getting it, it's far better than the WIndows built in text editors and it is free. The built in Windows text editor can cause issues with Linux files.

That should divert the audio 3.5mm to the RPi rather than from the DAC. You can move the 3.5mm cable from the DAC to the RPi (on the right of the HDMI).

I don't know if that will help with your speaker set, I haven't encountered this before so I'm just shooting ideas around. Hopefully.

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3. This will be to do with the input driver setting in Retroarch. It will be set to 'Linux Raw' so the hotkeys work, but it has the side effect of making real keyboards hit and miss. Changing it to 'UDEV' then restarting the game will make the keyboard work normally, don't forget to change it back after you're finished so the hotkeys will work.

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5. Generally for a Pi3 you will want between 5.1v and 5.2v at the JAMMA edge. Even the official power supplies for Pi3 are 5.1v rather than 5v. You cabs power supply should be able to adjust to 5.1v, it may be a sign that the power supply is aging and worth looking at rebuilding it or replacing it. If you're using only the RaspberryJAMMA in the cab and are using the 2.1 speaker system you don't need 12v and could actually get away with using a normal Raspberry Pi 3 power supply. If you use other boards too I'd recommend making sure your power supply is good as most JAMMA boards are getting pretty expensive.

You shouldn't see the lightning bolt much if at all with the power supply adjusted. I don't recommend turning off the warnings but it does work, but better to just have it running right. The Pi will throttle when the voltage is low, it can effect performance.

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6. All those games should work fine, I would suggest the Pi is throttling due to the low voltage but MK2 is probably the hardest of those games to run so it's a bit weird it's the OK one. 078 is usually good for Midway stuff, if NBA Jam developed this fault something else maybe going on. The Pi3 will throttle hard when the voltage drops, in some games you can basically adjust the game speed by turning down your power supply a little (Double Dragon in a newer version of MAME comes to mind).

If you've been making changes it's possible something was changed inadvertently, it may be worth trying restoring the SD card from a backup image to see if it helps (but if it was just some 078 setting SSF2 in 172 would be OK....).

I would be surprised if the pi was faulty but it is possible, I only tested it for an hour or so prior to sending it to you (their failure rate is pretty low from what I've seen).

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7. Unfortunately vertical games on a horizontal CRT can be tricky. The default behaviour is to run them interlaced for the extra screen real estate, that could be responsible for the shake (but then changing to a different emulator wouldn't change it...). I'd recommend trying 172 or 203 if there is an emulator caused difference the newest MAMEs should be the most accurate (172 is my goto MAME for Pi3...).

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EDIT: MK1 and NBAJam should run well in 106, maybe 172 too. MK2 and later will need to be in 078 as it has a hack for the fancy audio system Midway were using.

Thanks for the response

For the time being I'm going to pull out the power supply and send it to Jomac who said he can fully refurbish it replacing every capacitor and related component that he does as a part of the service on them.
He is confident it will be strong as new

When I get the power supply back I'm going to fully test everything again and see how I go before I start playing around with other emulators and other things

I will keep the post updated once that's all done.

Also for 3. - is this UDEV thing to change in an onscreen menu?

Thx

Jomac should do a great job, they're really good at what they do.

The input driver Retroarch setting can be reached in the menus. While a game is running in the emulator you want to adjust press 'Start+b6' or keyboard 'f1' to open the Retroarch menu. In the Retroarch menu b1 is select and b2 is back. It will open in the 'quick menu', press b2 to get to the main menu then select 'settings' -> 'driver' and you should see the input driver setting. To get back into the game from the menu press b2 until you're back at the main menu and select 'quick menu' -> 'resume'.

Agreed, Joey is amazing. Good to know he does repairs outside of chassis.
Also, yes I have been using notepad++ , its way better than normal notepad.

Ok, a Bit of an update - a very positive one so far.

My Astro City PSU (the beefier 5v 12a model 400-5261) was fully reconditioned with all new caps, transistors and filter cap by Jomac.
I got it back this morning and reinstalled into the cabinet.
With a multimeter it seems to be keeping voltages steady under load now, rather than dipping down intermittently here and there.
Ive set it at the pcb under load to 5.15v (just above the required 5.1 needed for pi3+).

The lightning bolt feature remains enabled for diagnostic purpose. Thus far have not received one lightning bolt at all, not even at the loading screen on power up, and none at the game menu yet and of course none during gameplay.

Whilst I do need to continue to test thoroughly, the machine has been on the entire day, I've switched a few games including NBA Jams, MK series, CPS2 and CPS1 (so various emulators running) - and zero lag in any game thus far.
Everything seems to be running very happy at this present point in time.
Appears to be 100% psu related.

Now something really trippy. A second issue resolved.
My stereo sound setup is working 100% spot on now, without even needing to make the edits to change the source aux port suggested above. I'm still using that DAC thingy as the source.

So just to give some background - my edifier amp uses RCA cables. On Pandora I was using 'RCA female to a male aux 3.5'
I tried the same setup into the Pi's DAC and had all those issues last week.

It was a bit crammed anyway so I ditched that adapter and was running JAMMA audio since.

Then I ended up grabbing a a 'female RCA to FEMALE aux 3.5' from a friend.
This way I could use the short aux cable provided with the pi to connect into the adapter - give it some room basically, instead of using the other adapter directly into the pi.

So basically I connected the short aux cable between the DAC and to the female 3.5 adapter (which then adapts to RCA) - perfect stereo with subwoofer now.

It was either the original male adapter incompatible, OR PSU related somehow (although the stereo amp runs on its on 240v) - not sure, and either way I'm not going to question it. I'm just happy I have the full experience now

The only things I havent played around more with yet, are the key assignments for mame 078 via the retroarch setting change suggested, and havent tried Galaga and vertical games in 172 or 203 yet. But this is just real minor stuff. When I get motivated I'll have a play and ill post up some results.


Thank you so much again for all the guidance! This device is an amazing all-in-1 solution.

No lagging, no lightning bolt, stereo working . Just an update that all is well. Thanks again

I wonder what fixed the audio output in the end...

Anyway, very happy it's all working right now that the power supply is sorted out.