ARpiCADE 4.3 (for RPi4)

[cool_factor]

Last question, since this is in an actual arcade cabinet does the power supply for the pi4 still run off the arcades built in power supply? I have already upgraded the fuse to a 2A on your board.

[dee2eR]

you'll be fine with a 2A fuse.

I'm now fitting 2.5A in new boards but thats largely down to the 2A model I was using being discontinued as well as the RPi3 and 4 both being rated to 2.5A. I haven't seen close to 2A draw on my test bench, even overclocking.

One thing to look out for: cheap JAMMA looms will need the power supply wiring for 5v and GND upgraded in some way. The worst harness' were intended for a 60in1 and have one tiny aluminium wire for 5v that won't cut it. Pi4 throttles hard in low power conditions. Any regular JAMMA loom from the 80s or 90s should be fine though, they were usually built with plenty of power wire (and with better quality wire). There are still good new looms to be found though... Pi3B+ was already borderline on the worst offending JAMMA harness' I've seen, Pi4 uses a bit more power than the 3B+...

EDIT: yes you still use the cab power supply with Pi4. Works just like any other Pi in (RaspberryJAMMA/ARpiCADE) arcade use.

[cool_factor]

I used these in both my cabs.

https://twistedquarter.com/index.php?ma ... cts_id=859

[ffollim]

Hi, thanks for the great update - I'm chuffed that I can get S.T.U.N runner running at a decent framerate in my cab.

One question - are you planning to add additional screen modes in the config.txt file? I have a 4:3 LCD setup, and with my Pi3 I have been using 480p with no res switching which gives excellent frame rates and a seamless experience. With v4.3 on the Pi4 and using 640x480p@60 (high res), the display is off centre, and I am seeing a lot of screen tearing.

Many thanks,
Matt

[dee2eR]

Thanks for the feedback, I'll continue working on it, the high res side gets a lot less of my time so there's no doubt lots of config improvements to be made.

The screen tearing can probably be fixed via the launchers, any particular MAME version you're seeing it in? I'm happy to look for a quick fix for you.

The picture location may be fixable with the auto adjust of your monitor, if it has it. In future releases I should have the regular highres mode as used in 3.X working properly again (pretty sure updating the Linux side of things will fix it, but also pretty sure other bits will break doing it...).

[ffollim]

No problem, you are doing a grand job, and I can imagine a great deal of work and tweaking is involved on your part- Linux can be fiddly at the best of times let alone dealing with multiple emulators and their unique & sometimes eccentric configurations.. Your time and effort does give us and others a lot of pleasure (my kids are hooked on the cab!).

I'm using AdvMame mostly (all my ROMS reside in the boot/mame-106 folder). The screen I can use the auto-adjust although it means removing it from the cabinet to do so, however if you can resolve the screen tearing and framerate drops, that would be great (R-Type frame rate is jerky when compared to running on the Pi3 - my assumption is it being a side-affect of the screen mode being used).

Of course, I am happy to wait for future releases as and when you release them so don't bust a gut if it isn't a quick fix.

Many thanks,
Matt

[dee2eR]

I get it now. AdvMAME is bound to tear on Pi4 especially with a game like R-Type (56hz or something similar, I think), at least in high res mode (in low res mode the Pi is outputting the video at the original refresh rate so it would be less of an issue).

In case you're interested the difference pi3 to pi4 in this case is the video driver being used for AdvMAME. If I'm right, you could see the same behavious on Pi3 by adding R-Type to the nosdl array in the AdvMAME launcher (but don't bother unless you're curious, it won't acheive anything). The Pi4 and it's video chip don't have the same modified for RPi DISPMANX SDL 1.2 implementation which works so well on earlier Pis and among other things had very good vsync that didn't hurt performance at all (on the plus side Pi4 doesn't really need it either, once the teething issues are sorted out...).

Not sure why it would be stuttering if you're giving the Pi4 enough power, but I haven't checked R-Type in AdvMAME on Pi4 in highres and could easily have missed (or messed up) something. Or it could be to do with the framerate differing quite a bit from 60hz, in which case settings should be able to improve it. It runs great in MAME 0.230, I assume it would also be great in 172 - I only tried low res but it's probably worth trying the later MAME verisons if you have a newer romset. You won't be getting the most out of Pi4 continuing to run everything in AdvMAME. 172 runs heaps of stuff fantastically on Pi4, 230 is pretty good too (especially with the Pi4 overclocked but even at stock speeds lots of stuff runs great) - both are better versions of MAME to use on Pi4 for most titles.

I'll do some testing tomorrow to see if I've missed the v-sync setting in AdvMAME (but it may not work too).

[ffollim]

Hi, thanks for your reply and for taking the time to look into this.

The great thing about AdvMame is that it is pixel perfect on a lot of games and is not blurred or scaled like the others. I've found that the MAME menus are all messed up or have missing text in 172, but perhaps this is a fix for this. 230 is certainly better and the framerate is good, however I am finding a number of ROMS are not working so perhaps need a more compatible ROM set. S.T.U.N Runner in 230 seems to run very slowly and the audio is stuttering, when it works well in 172.

Thanks for clarifying the difference in video driver being used for the pi4. The Pi3 (and the RPi DISPMANX SDL 1.2) have been working perfectly in the past, so I might have to stick with the Pi3 for the meantime. I have a scanline generator on my cab and having sharp pixels is important for a decent effect. With AdvMame they seem to line up perfectly.

[ffollim]

Further to my last post, I'm sorry if it sounded a little negative but I hope it is of some help with your refinements of the software(!)

As we all know, there are pros and cons to the different versions of MAME and sometimes it is a case of running ROMS from different versions to get the best out of them. From my perspective, if AdvMame can be fixed so that it works as well as it does on the Pi3 using the non-resolution switching then that would be fantastic.

[petkorazzi]

Finally got around to updating to 4.3; as this seems to be considered a more "completed" version of ARpiCADE for Pi 4 I figured I'd list off a few of my admittedly trivial issues I've discovered thus far. Note that at this time I've done no testing with P2 controls and my machine (a Capcom Impress with a 2L12B layout an 15khz monitor) is currently set in the vertical orientation. I'm using a Pi 4 4GB.

1. FBA button mapping is wrong (but at least the P1 joystick directions are correct in this version; they weren't in 4.2). This includes the Service and Test buttons. The only button I've confirmed correct is the P1 Start button. As mapping these in RetroArch is an absolute bitch (especially for those of us with vertical monitor applications as the RetroArch menu doesn't rotate along with everything else), it'd be nice if this could get sorted at the release level. Normally I wouldn't mess with FBA but it seems to be the only place some games will run well enough to play (certain CAVE shooters and Gaiapolis are notable examples I've come across).

2. Naomi Service and Test buttons are non-functional. Also, the P1 Start + P1 B1 coin "hotkey" doesn't work - I have to open my coin mech and flick the switch lever.

3. MAME .172 Service and Test buttons are non-functional.

4. I'm not sure how ROM saves work in the arcade emulation environment, but only MAME .172 seems to save high scores across play sessions.

5. attract-mode in 15khz (240p) is almost unusable as the text becomes mostly unreadable; it's better to upscale to 32khz and deal with the flickering - but this gets annoying after a while. I'm guessing this is something to do with the theme but I don't know attract-mode very well.

6. The ARpiCADE ROM Compatibility List is just straight wrong in a lot of cases (I'm assuming it's for 3.x versions of ARpiCADE). Maybe it's time to fork it and make a new version for 4.x. I'll be more than happy to offer myself for testing of any vertically-oriented ROMs to assist in this process.

7. Maybe it's just me, but MAME .230 seems to...well, suck. It doesn't seem to run anything better than .172 that I've come across, and in fact seems to almost always be worse than .172 for the same ROM (for example, Espgaluda runs perfectly in .172 but is so slow it's unplayable in .230). A really odd example is the arcade classic Dig Dug - it runs perfectly fine in .172, but refuses to load in .230 at all.

I'm going to keep testing but I figured it'd be good to let you know this stuff. If there's any testing I can help you with please let me know; I'm more than happy to assist in any way I can with improving ARpiCADE for Pi 4.

**UPDATE** Two more things:

1. System volume goes to a blank screen still; exiting to shell and getting to alsamixer via command line works though.
2. Any updates on WiFi functionality? Gets annoying having to pull the SD card every time I want to test a new ROM thing.