MAME Onboard Audio and VGA

[Paul_Gio]

Hi All,

I have recently been working on a cabinet in which I have been utilising AdvanceMame and AdvanceMenu (in DOS) to get things working. I also used a NVIDIA MX440graphics card and SoundblasterPCI64 sound card with a J-PAC board. It is nearing completion (thanks to assistance from members of this forum), with some minor bugs still to sort out.

I am also working on another project with a friend and we were wondering if it is possible to set up AdvMame and AdvMenu (in DOS) utilising Onboard VGA and Audio (AC97)? :confused: I read somewhere you can emulate a SoundBlaster but I am not able to do this in my BIOS. Any other options?

At the moment we are working with a 17" CRT Monitor but hope to get our hands on an arcade monitor shortly!

Other specs include:
Celeron 2.4Ghz Processor
256MB DDR RAM (PC2700)
10GB HDD

If anyone has had experience with this your input would be greatly appreciated! If it helps, the motherboard we are using is a P4VMM2 found here:

http://www.ecs.com.tw/ECSWeb/Products/ProductsDetail.aspx?DetailID=436&MenuID=22&LanID=0

Thankyou in advance!
Paul

[hagbard]

About the onboard AC97, I think you should get a compatible MS-DOS driver, AC97 it's similar to SB AFAIK

[Paul_Gio]

Hi,

Still having trouble utilising the Onboard audio.

Hagbard, I am not sure where to find the driver you suggested.

I have been trying to utilise some DOS audio installs that are meant to work with AC97 however, whenever I try to install them I get the following message:

"Cannot find VIA Audio device"

I find this odd as the documentation for the motherboard tells that it uses a VIA VT8235 Southbridge with AC97 Audio.

Any ideas anyone?

Also, is it possible to create and add your own snapshots to the snaps folder?

Cheers,
Paul

[-=VampyR=-]

Also, is it possible to create and add your own snapshots to the snaps folder?
Sure,press F12 during gameplay.

[Paul_Gio]

Thanks Vampyr - so simple it works!

Another thing I am trying to work out is displaying all available roms in Advance Menu. I can do this utilising the menu in which I can select to show ALL ROMS (even thoses I do not have). However, when I select to show only ROMS that are present, there are a few that do not show up, even though they work fine in AdvanceMAME.

Is there a way to make these appear in AdvanceMenu?

[-=VampyR=-]

Do you know exactly what motherboard you have ?
I have AC'97 onboard 5.1 sound.Mame works perfect.

[Paul_Gio]

I have a P4VMM2 mainboard. It has a VIA P2M266/A Northbridge and VT8235 Southbridge supporting AC97 audio codec (2.1 specification). I am running everything within DOS (system boots DOS into AdvanceMenu).

I appreciate any advice/assistance you can offer!

[hagbard]

Do you know exactly what motherboard you have ?
I have AC'97 onboard 5.1 sound.Mame works perfect.
He's talking about MAME, more exactlly AdvanceMame, MS-DOS build. The problem is to find a driver to get that AC-97 work on MS-DOS.
Does your board BIOS setup have an option about AC97 "legacy support"? I'll check again later

Edit: looks like that MoBo uses VIA chipset, so probably is the AC97 codec.

[-=VampyR=-]

http://www.motherboard.cz/mb/ecs/P4VMM2V73.htm
http://www.ecs.com.tw/ECSWeb/Downloads/ProductsDetail_Download.aspx?categoryid=1&typeid=1&detailid=140&DetailName=Driver&DetailDesc=P4VMM2(3.1)&MenuID=0&LanID=9
http://www.ecsusa.com/downloads/p4vmm2-v8.html

Hope these links will help in a way.I'm not good with DOS. (read forever n00b)

[Paul_Gio]

Hagbard,

Yes, I have the option I have in the BIOS is to enable/disable 'Onboard AC97 Audio'. Currently I have it enabled.

Cheers,
Paul

[hagbard]

Ok, I mean the legacy option is usually needed for MS-DOS compatibility

[Paul_Gio]

Doesn't look like it. The only option I have is to enable/disable the AC97 Audio chip. It does not have an option for enabling audio legacy support. The only legacy support it seems to offer is for USB devices :(

[Paul_Gio]

Well, I solved the sound problem by purchasing a used Soundblaster PCI card.

Back to a previous question I am still having trouble with...

Another thing I am trying to work out is displaying all available roms in Advance Menu. I can do this utilising the menu in which I can select to show ALL ROMS (even thoses I do not have). However, when I select to show only ROMS that are present, there are a few that do not show up, even though they work fine in AdvanceMAME.

Is there a way to make these appear in AdvanceMenu?

[hagbard]

I'm not sure how advance menu works, but perhaps you have some merged sets and it looks for split sets, so those will work but won't show up