Help With Setup

[underthesky00]

First off, I currently have two working Hyperspin setups. I have an arcade cab and an HTPC. I decided to take pieces from my HTPC setup for my new Shield Portable setup. I wanted to be space conscious so I only copied over certain things to my external hard drive. My Hard Drive letter is H. In the root of H I have the Hyperspin folder. Instead of that I have the following folders: Databases, Emulators, HyperLaunch (do I even need this?), and Media. Those folders are mostly from my HTPC but modified a bit. I'll explain that in a moment. I also downloaded the Android Settings file as referenced in another post on here. It's labeled as Settings_Android. 

 

For Databases, I copied over the wheels that I wanted to be on my Shield. I mostly chose cart based systems and MAME. I left the files inside the folders as they were. I think most have the regular XML with all the ROM's, a favorites list, and a genre list. Side note: I did notice that Hyperspin Android seems to boot to favorites. Although I feel like it adds some more games in the mix also. But MAME for instance, is for sure not running on the full XML file. Can you elaborate on what file Hyperspin uses to create the wheels? If it does boot into favorites, is there a way to back out into the genre list so I can select all games like on Windows Hyperspin?

 

For Emulators, I have a folder for each system and the only thing in each folder is a ROMS folder with all the ROMS. I left the ROM names exactly as they were on my HTPC so that the media files and the XML would all match up.

 

I copied the full HyperLaunch folder over so all the normal stuff is in there but as I was asking above...do I even need this folder? I would assume that I don't and I can just delete it.

 

For Media, I copied over the folders for the systems I wanted. I kept the contents inside the same as it was on my HTPC.

 

With all that out the way...Hyperspin boots fine. I can control it with my Shield. All the wheels, arts, and videos are there. MAME seems to work perfectly. I select a ROM and it boots MAME4Droid. But all the other systems (NES, SNES, Gameboy, Game Gear, Genesis, etc) do not work. I get one of two errors. With NES, it appears that the ROM tries to load but then I get a RetroArch error. Specifically I get "Unfortunately, RetroArch has stopped." I have the option to report or OK that prompt. OK takes me back into NES or closes our Hyperspin altogether. I've tried several ROMs in NES and the same thing always happens. SNES, Sega Master System, Sega Genesis, Sega Game Gear and Atari 7800 all do the same exact thing. I haven't tested Retroarch extensively but I can say that the one game I did test didn't work direclty in Retroarch. I tried loading all three different NES cores and it crashed each time. I also have NES.emu installed and that's the NES app I typically use. I tried the same game in that app, booted perfectly. So something must be off for me in Retroarch. Any tips there or could I just modify the exe line of each of those ini files to point to other emulators? If I can, how do I do that exactly? I'm not sure what needs to go in that line. I see how Retroarch is in there now but I'm not sure how to replicate that with other emulators and what else might need to be changed.

 

For all the other systems (Atari 2600, 5200, Lynx, GB, GB Color, GBA, PC Engine, TurboGrafx 16 and Neo Geo Pocket) I get a simple error message "Warning - Attempting to launch missing rom" when I try and load a game. I think all my paths match...I've checked several times but obviously I must be missing something, unless this another Retroarch issue and not a Hyperspin issue. But Gameboy for instance...the ini file says: 

 

path=H:\hyperspin\emulators\Game Boy\

rompath=Emulators/Game Boy/roms/

 

And that's the exact path to my Game Boy folder. Now inside of Databases, the Game Boy folder there is called Nintendo Game Boy and not just Game Boy but I imagine that doesn't matter. The Main Menu database XML also contains Nintendo Game Boy and the XML file for the GB ROMs is called Nintendo Game Boy as well. So Game Boy is prefaced for Nintendo in those three places inside the Database folder.

 

My issues are probably some sort of silly quick fix but I can't seem to figure out what I'm missing here.

 

[reznnate]

The hyperlaunch/modules folders aren't needed for Android.

 

The Android app only uses the base database .xml file and won't look at favorites, genres, etc.

If you are seeing something odd, I'll bet one of my sample .ini files is filtering on the available roms, themes, etc.  Check the [filters] section of the related .ini file.

 

The windows paths don't match Android paths syntax.  Within the .ini, "Path=" is ignored.   You need to edit the 'rompath' setting and ensure it's pointing at your roms.  My samples may not match yours.    If your roms are here "path=H:\hyperspin\emulators\Game Boy\", rompath should be "rompath=emulators/Game Boy/"

 

Although nightly retroarch seems a bit unstable, most of the retroarch cores (in nightly builds) work for me --  but 7800/Prosystem is broken (I think).   

[underthesky00]

I'm making some progress here. My RetroArch problems seem to center around the ROMs being on an external HD. I've tried everything and nothing seems to work to get RetroArch to load my ROMs either in Hyperspin or by opening up the app itself. I finally decided to test my theory about it having to do with the external and I copied one of my ROMs from the external right to the Shield's internal storage. ROM worked like a champ. Maybe RetroArch would like an SD card but it doesn't seem to like an external drive.

 

My workaround was to edit most of the emulators with the info you posted elsewhere in the forum. I changed most of my emulators to the .emu emulators that I use now anyways. Now my only hold up is Atari Lynx and Game Gear. 

 

Oh...I fixed "Warning - Attempting to launch missing rom" issue by making sure all my folders matched. Using Game Boy as an example...beforehand I had Game Boy ROMs in a folder named Game Boy. I went back and changed that folder name to Nintendo Game Boy so that it matched your INI file name and I changed the destination of the ROMs in the INI to Nintendo Game Boy as well. I just made sure that every reference to Game Boy said Nintendo Game Boy and that there were no variations. That fixed it for every system except for Atari Lynx. I'm still getting the error there for some reason. But I have so many emulators working at this point that I'm not too worried about these last few if I can't figure them out.

 

I do have this question...how are you figuring out the EXE path section in your INI. If I want to add an emulator that's not RetroArch and not in your current list, I'm not sure how to go about doing it. Is that something I can easily figure out how to customize and test or what? I did have to customize some of the .EMU emulators like the SNES one for example since you don't have that one in your list. But that was simple since the program was developed by the same person who did the NES.EMU which you did provide the EXE path for. I just copied that line over to the SNES INI and changed NESEMU to SNES9X or whatever it was and it worked.

[underthesky00]

Ahah!

 

I figured out why I was still getting the "Warning - Attempting to launch missing rom" message on Atari 2600 and Atari Lynx. The file extension in the INI file was bin for 2600 and lyx (or something to that effect) for Lynx. I added in zip and voila! It looks like I have every system that I want running now with the exception of Lynx. The problem I'm now having with Lynx is that I can't find another emulator to run it but RetroArch and RetroArch isn't playing nice with my external hard drive. I'm going to move all my files over to an SD card though and just run it all off of that so that should fix that. Just wanted to update the post in case anyone else gets that error message and can't figure out what they are missing.

 

You mentioned earlier that HS is only looking for the main XML. So does that mean that favorites aren't supported right now? I saw some code in the INI file for favorites but I haven't tried messing with it yet. 

 

Just have to say that I'm super impressed with this app. Having Hyperspin on a handheld device is AWESOME. If I can just get favorites to work, I'll be done with this setup! Thanks for all the time and energy you put in to making this happen. You launched at a great time with the Shield TV release imminent. As more and more people flock to Android for gaming this app will start to look like a better alternative for folks looking to upgrade their current rig or even to get into HS for the first time. I feel like this app is MILES easier to setup than the Windows version. 

[reznnate]

Which Android device are you using?  Do you have the latest version/OTA installed?   I'm having no issues with Retroarch and sdcards and usb  hard drives.    Which version of Retroarch are you using?   I've been using nightly builds and a few daily builds over the past month have been B- R- O- K- E- N..  :-)

 

I haven't had much luck with Mednafen lynx emulator but they handy core works fairly well.  My favorite test ROM with Lynx is generally California games and that game seems to hit a bug/race-condition in retroarch or that core... sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't...  If you are testing a single ROM, I suggest testing a few others just in case...

 

Favorites aren't supported yet.   It's on the to-do list though.   The next feature is likely going to be fast-skip-letter-navigation.

 

Thanks for the kind words!  

[underthesky00]

I'm using the Shield Portable (not the tablet). I'm on 4.4.2 stock. I'm rooted but I don't have a custom ROM. I'm on the latest update of RetroArch but the app hasn't been updated in forever either (at least not the Google Play version). The version is 1.0.0.2 and Google Play says it was last updated on March 9th of 2014. So it's 14+ months old. I see I can download nightlies and stable builds from the Liberto.com site. I guess I could try that. I see there are two types of stable releases: armebi-v7a and x86. Which one would be best for my Shield?

 

The RetroArch error I'm getting with Lynx is the same error I get with every ROM on every system. I've tested 15-20 in total. The only workaround for me is to take the file from my external and put it on my internal memory. Then RetroArch boots it just fine. So it must be that this 14+ month old RetroArch didn't have full support of external hard drives yet.

 

Looking forward to those future updates! 

[OniKyanAE86]

I'm using the Shield Portable (not the tablet). I'm on 4.4.2 stock. I'm rooted but I don't have a custom ROM. I'm on the latest update of RetroArch but the app hasn't been updated in forever either (at least not the Google Play version). The version is 1.0.0.2 and Google Play says it was last updated on March 9th of 2014. So it's 14+ months old. I see I can download nightlies and stable builds from the Liberto.com site. I guess I could try that. I see there are two types of stable releases: armebi-v7a and x86. Which one would be best for my Shield?

 

The RetroArch error I'm getting with Lynx is the same error I get with every ROM on every system. I've tested 15-20 in total. The only workaround for me is to take the file from my external and put it on my internal memory. Then RetroArch boots it just fine. So it must be that this 14+ month old RetroArch didn't have full support of external hard drives yet.

 

Looking forward to those future updates! 

I just posted about this in another topic, you can fix the read/write permissions and my tutorial should help you with the External Storage access issues you are having with your Shield Portable since Google changed the read/write permissions with KitKat and Lollipop. I am able to access extenal hard drives with no issues and have full access to my 128GB Micro SD card in my Shield Portable: http://www.hyperspin-fe.com/topic/9220-basic-set-up-questions/?p=152014

[underthesky00]

Interesting info on the CPU Throttling. It looks like that article is almost a year old now...does anyone know if Nvidia fixed those issues? I tested out Bump N Jump and I didn't have any of the problems he was showing in his video.

 

I installed Xposed Framework and followed the steps as you indicated (great writeup by the way) and I still can't access those ROMs with RetroArch. I think the issue you are outlining does have something to with it though...I have no issues accessing the ROMs when they are on my internal storage but if they are zipped and on the external, it's a no go for RetroArch. .EMU emulators will run the zipped files from my internal just fine though. I also just tried creating a save state and then loading it and NES.EMU handled that just fine, again with a zipped file on my external. I tried another test with RetroArch...this time I unzipped the ROM directly on to my external and it worked. 

 

So with .EMU, it all just works. With RetroArch I either have to move the ZIP file to internal or unzip the file on external. I'm really confused as to what's going on here. LOL.

[reznnate]

The version of Retroarch from the play store attempts to unzip on external storage and this fails due to write permissions (on Android L).   If you snag a nightly build (http://buildbot.libretro.com/nightly/android/), it extracts zipped roms in it's local folderso it works on Android L again.

[underthesky00]

I finally received my 128gb micro SD yesterday. I spent the night copying over 100gigs of stuff from my external that I was using on the Shield to the new SD card...get this...RetroArch works perfectly now. For some reason, it just didn't like my external. So now I have all the stuff I want for now on my Shield. At some point I want to put some PSP stuff on here but I obviously don't have enough space for all those ISO's right now so I'll probably just have to bring over the top 10 or 20 ISO's and leave the rest. I'm not even sure if I have a full set of PSP stuff. I read somewhere online that it's 2tb! I don't know how much I have on my HTPC but I would imagine it's in the 100-200gb range. I guess I'm missing a lot! 

 

I can't say enough how awesome this project is reznnate! Once you get favorites added, I'll have everything I ever dreamed of on here. It would be cool if a search program like Hyper Search could work but the app as is, is KILLER. 

[underthesky00]

Quick question about XML files...I'm pretty sure I already know the answer to this but I wanted to check before I spend a couple of hours working on this.

 

I have a list of 600 or so games in my favorites list for MAME. Since the Android version doesn't support favorites yet, the text file with my favorites is kinda useless. Is there an easy way to convert that text file into an XML file with full game details? I can only think of two ways to create a favorites list XML.

 

1. I could rummage through the text doc and then pull all my favorite ROMs out and use HyperROM2XML to create an XML from the ROMs I pull out. But that would take a while and I wouldn't have full details in the XML since stuff like description, date, genre, etc wouldn't be there. 

 

2. I could manually create an XML file by copying the lines for each of my favorite ROMs into a new document. That would take even longer than number one above but I'd have full details then.

 

Neither of these are ideal because of how long they will take but I have a feeling those are my only options. If anyone has any better ideas, feel free to chime in. Otherwise I know how I'll be spending my Saturday.

[reznnate]

I am not familiar with the format of the favorites file. If it is merely a flat game list, not sure if a tool called favorites2xml exists but that is what you'd probably need.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[jlrechtenwald]

Hi there!

I was having the same issue "Warning - Attempting to launch missing rom". Tried to rename folder and put the correct path at .ini

MAME worked perfectly, BUT all the others are now "blinking" black screen when I select the rom to play instead of showing the "warning...." message.

Anyone knows how to deal with it?

Thanks

[reznnate]

In the .ini file, make sure the ROM file extensions match your romset.

 

If you can connect ADB and watch the 'logcat', this will often help with debugging your errors.

[jlrechtenwald]

Already done that! Every ini was double checked, still receiving a "black blink screen" when try to run a rom.

Appears like it would run, but stay at rom menu.

 

anyone?

[reznnate]

Getting stuck at a blank, black, screen as you describe is generally a problem with the emulator and not Hyperspin.

This is for GBA?   Can you test with other games and roms?    Is the bios is the expected place?   Does the game run okay stand-alone in that emulator?

[Sting]

Are you using

Already done that! Every ini was double checked, still receiving a "black blink screen" when try to run a rom.

Appears like it would run, but stay at rom menu.

 

anyone?

Are you using retroarch? If so make sure you have (cores/) before your cores!!!

Example:

Atari 2600 core:

parameters=cores/stella_libretro_android.so

PSX core:

parameters=cores/pcsx_rearmed_libretro_neon_android.so