[faroukzidane]

Firstly, I don't know how to

use solo mode in combination with Openbox

as you said. But it's ok, something like the sound issue is getting vanished.
Secondly, I've another issue that really happens to me many times. Many times when I open RCB, the info and fanarts don't appear. However, when I press Down two times (as I'm going to scroll by letters and go back again) the info and fanarts appear.

When I open RCB, it's like this:



After pressing Down two times:





XBMC Skin: Aeon Nox

[teeedubb]

I can't use solo mode because I'm using XBMCBuntu. And installing STEAM through openbox doesn't allow me to play ROM's.

Openbox can be used for xbmc, steam, firefox etc, its just a window manager - like the desktop in windows, osx, ubuntu etc. The xbmc session (the default) in xbmcbuntu has xbmc acting as the window manager and because of this exiting xbmc takes you to the login screen, hence why solo mode doesnt work in the xbmc session in xbmcbuntu. Do you have xbmcbuntu booting into the openbox session which auto starts xbmc?

[wacind]

Hi

Sorry if this has been posted on here before but i've been searching for 2 days and haven't yet found a solution.

Does this method of loading emulator games work on the raspberry pi running OpenElec?
I installed RCB and pointed it to the source for FCEUX (fceux-2.2.2.src.tar.gz)

I am able to load rom for Super Mario Bros and it loads up on the menu but when i try to run the game, the screen shrinks to about 1/4th the size and hovers on the top left of my TV for about a second or two and then just returns to the Game Menu

Thanks

[teeedubb]

Try this for emulators in openelec

http://sourceforge.net/projects/zaggxbmcaddons/

[Scratch]

Hello everyone, I have searched and searched but have not found good instructions on how to manually add artwork for Mame games. Otherwise fantastic add on.

*stupid phone

[bs0d]

I can't use solo mode because I'm using XBMCBuntu. And installing STEAM through openbox doesn't allow me to play ROM's.

Openbox can be used for xbmc, steam, firefox etc, its just a window manager - like the desktop in windows, osx, ubuntu etc. The xbmc session (the default) in xbmcbuntu has xbmc acting as the window manager and because of this exiting xbmc takes you to the login screen, hence why solo mode doesnt work in the xbmc session in xbmcbuntu. Do you have xbmcbuntu booting into the openbox session which auto starts xbmc?

My HTPC boots directly to XBMC Frodo in full screen (10 ft interface). I can select "EXIT" and login to openbox or xbmcbuntu. I logged in to openbox and installed STEAM following your thread. But I guess I don't know what I'm doing. I can open that window manager in OpenBox, but no link exists within XBMC after install- and I'm still clueless on using Steam to launch mednafen and pass commands to open a ROM.

[teeedubb]

Dont worry about steam, just the part about autostarting xbmc in openbx with a black wallpaper (add the extra menus if you wish). Then you can use rcb in solo mode which solves alot of problems.

[bs0d]

For those interested that may have the same new-user questions: I found a solution to volume issues in mednafen. Turns out, mednafen wasn't really the issue. However, I did need to make these changes in the mednafen config file:

Code:

sounddriver default
sounddevice default

to:

Code:

sounddriver alsa
sounddevice sexyal-literal-default

You can see that it's working if you test in XBMCBuntu, the terminal window will show any errors if the audio driver can't be found. Otherwise, the bitrate and other details are provided.

The "real" issue was no sound at all in XBMCBuntu. So I installed Install "PulseAudio Volume Control" (via Terminal)

Code:

sudo apt-get install pavucontrol

Then you can open the PulseAudio Volume Control GUI and also open the emulator or X application and change the output to HDMI. It was that simple.

A few more mednafen settings that may help for a better experience and using RCB, you can also change full screen to be the default (in the config file):

Code:

fs 1

This saves you from passing any of these commands in RCB.

Another bit, if you're on an HDTV like most of us, you can change the full screen resolutions to:

Code:

nes.xres 1920
nes.yres 1080

You may need to make this change for the different consoles that you have games for. Also, this doesn't actually increase the game area. I think that's another setting I need to look into. If anyone knows that ahead of time, let me know!

[faroukzidane]

Also, when I open a game and there's a music playing on the background of XBMC, the game launches and the music is still running on XBMC. Is there an option like "Stop media on launching emulators" ?

[Komerad]

Ok so when i install this addon (superrepo) I start it, select yes to create a config file, select to scrape online, select platform(snes) and then for the emulator path i get directed to the superrepo url...

Eh whats next?

[bs0d]

Also, when I open a game and there's a music playing on the background of XBMC, the game launches and the music is still running on XBMC. Is there an option like "Stop media on launching emulators" ?

I have the same issue. I read that RCB has a script that essentially pauses XBMC and starts the emulator. Then upon emulator exit, continues XBMC. The caveat to that is- the sound is still "stuck" to XBMC. Pressing left and right results in the XBMC program sounds of scrolling through the menu's.

I continue to read where users have their own scripts to do this?? Can anyone with this experience provide some input? How can we run a script to do this:

Code:

/usr/bin/killall -STOP xbmc.bin
open emulator %ROM%
/usr/bin/killall -CONT xbmc.bin

Or is that the solution? From my experience, again XBMC still seems to be open in the background while my emulator is at focus (without sound)- and confirmed sound to work via XBMCBuntu. Looking for the non-solo mode solution

[rob hodge]

Also, when I open a game and there's a music playing on the background of XBMC, the game launches and the music is still running on XBMC. Is there an option like "Stop media on launching emulators" ?

I have the same issue. I read that RCB has a script that essentially pauses XBMC and starts the emulator. Then upon emulator exit, continues XBMC. The caveat to that is- the sound is still "stuck" to XBMC. Pressing left and right results in the XBMC program sounds of scrolling through the menu's.

I continue to read where users have their own scripts to do this?? Can anyone with this experience provide some input? How can we run a script to do this:

Code:

/usr/bin/killall -STOP xbmc.bin
open emulator %ROM%
/usr/bin/killall -CONT xbmc.bin

Or is that the solution? From my experience, again XBMC still seems to be open in the background while my emulator is at focus (without sound)- and confirmed sound to work via XBMCBuntu. Looking for the non-solo mode solution

here's my solution script that i used to get sound and focus issues vanquished in XBMCbuntu. this isn't exactly what you are looking for, but it may shed some light on things for you and give yo some perspective.

Code:

#!/bin/bash
openbox &
padsp mednafen "$1" >  ~/Launchers/mednafen-log
kill %1

This script does a few things.

Code:

#!/bin/bash

tells this that it is a bash script.

Code:

openbox &

this opens open box in the background, then goes to the next line. openbox is a window manager. a window manager is a program that controls display placement and focus (what program is attached to the keyboard). you need this to be running for focus to be transferred to the emulator, as well as having the fullscreen and resolution changes to fall into place. this is why keyboard presses are not be ing transferred to the emulator; there was no window manager running to transfer focus to it. you are looking at the emulator dropped on top of xbmc but xbmc still is being controlled by the keyboard, hence the key press noises.

Code:

padsp mednafen "$1" >  ~/Launchers/mednafen-log

first, padsp. this is an OSS wrapper for pulseaudio. see, i never managed to get mednafen to play nice with the sound config in
XBMCbuntu using ALSA, since my sound card couldn't do hardware dmixing and mednafen and pulse audio would fight over the sound hardware that could only take a single input. so, i set my configuration to use OSS and used padsp to create a OSS socket into Pulseaudio. this lets pulseaudio grab the hardware and do it's job. you might not have this issue if you have a better sound card than me, but it sounds like you might be hitting this issue as well.

second, 'mednafen "$1"' passes the rom name and parameters to mednafem. '> ~/launchers/mednafen-log' pipes the standard out to a file, so you can read any error messages. this file gets overwritten each time you run mednafen. it's handy for diagnosis.

Code:

kill %1

this kills open box after mednafen exits, returning you to XBMC running in standalone mode.

[bs0d]

Also, when I open a game and there's a music playing on the background of XBMC, the game launches and the music is still running on XBMC. Is there an option like "Stop media on launching emulators" ?

I have the same issue. I read that RCB has a script that essentially pauses XBMC and starts the emulator. Then upon emulator exit, continues XBMC. The caveat to that is- the sound is still "stuck" to XBMC. Pressing left and right results in the XBMC program sounds of scrolling through the menu's.

I continue to read where users have their own scripts to do this?? Can anyone with this experience provide some input? How can we run a script to do this:

Code:

/usr/bin/killall -STOP xbmc.bin
open emulator %ROM%
/usr/bin/killall -CONT xbmc.bin

Or is that the solution? From my experience, again XBMC still seems to be open in the background while my emulator is at focus (without sound)- and confirmed sound to work via XBMCBuntu. Looking for the non-solo mode solution

here's my solution script that i used to get sound and focus issues vanquished in XBMCbuntu. this isn't exactly what you are looking for, but it may shed some light on things for you and give yo some perspective.

Code:

#!/bin/bash
openbox &
padsp mednafen "$1" >  ~/Launchers/mednafen-log
kill %1

This script does a few things.

Code:

#!/bin/bash

tells this that it is a bash script.

Code:

openbox &

this opens open box in the background, then goes to the next line. openbox is a window manager. a window manager is a program that controls display placement and focus (what program is attached to the keyboard). you need this to be running for focus to be transferred to the emulator, as well as having the fullscreen and resolution changes to fall into place. this is why keyboard presses are not be ing transferred to the emulator; there was no window manager running to transfer focus to it. you are looking at the emulator dropped on top of xbmc but xbmc still is being controlled by the keyboard, hence the key press noises.

Code:

padsp mednafen "$1" >  ~/Launchers/mednafen-log

first, padsp. this is an OSS wrapper for pulseaudio. see, i never managed to get mednafen to play nice with the sound config in
XBMCbuntu using ALSA, since my sound card couldn't do hardware dmixing and mednafen and pulse audio would fight over the sound hardware that could only take a single input. so, i set my configuration to use OSS and used padsp to create a OSS socket into Pulseaudio. this lets pulseaudio grab the hardware and do it's job. you might not have this issue if you have a better sound card than me, but it sounds like you might be hitting this issue as well.

second, 'mednafen "$1"' passes the rom name and parameters to mednafem. '> ~/launchers/mednafen-log' pipes the standard out to a file, so you can read any error messages. this file gets overwritten each time you run mednafen. it's handy for diagnosis.

Code:

kill %1

this kills open box after mednafen exits, returning you to XBMC running in standalone mode.

Thanks Rob. What extension does this script use? Can I write it in Notepad, and save as --> .xxx file? Where should it be saved? And finally, how do I tell RCB to run this script before calling mednafen and subsequent %ROM%? Or does any of the input to RCB even change? Regarding openbox, I have the XBMCBuntu package. When I login, I can select openbox to login to. Is this the same openbox, or do I need to install an XBMC software app?

[rob hodge]

Thanks Rob. What extension does this script use? Can I write it in Notepad, and save as --> .xxx file? Where should it be saved? And finally, how do I tell RCB to run this script before calling mednafen and subsequent %ROM%? Or does any of the input to RCB even change? Regarding openbox, I have the XBMCBuntu package. When I login, I can select openbox to login to. Is this the same openbox, or do I need to install an XBMC software app?

first, i can tell you're coming from the windows world.

extensions are not really necessary in a linux environment; yo ucan name this whatever yo want. i call mine 'mednafen-launcher' you will need to run 'chmod a+x filename' on it, to tell the operating system it is an executable file for all users on the system.

you can create it with any text editor; i use leafpad. however, you will run into problems if you create it in windows and copy it over. windows and unix define the end of a line differently so it'll just be easier to make it in linux.

as for where, linux convention would probably be /usr/local/bin; however i jus keep mine in a directory called ~/Launchers

as for how to tell RCB to run this, when it asks path to emulator, instead of telling it where mednafen's program file is, point it to this, and pass it the rom as an argument.

openbox is a component of the operating system; what you are referring to is the openbox desktop session that is built around this and a slew off other programs. this is more of an environment than you need for xvmc. what we are doing is running the one specific part of that environment that you need to manage multiple programs, control, and focus only while we have more than one program running.

see, the linux environment and operating system is very component based. it's a set of building blocks. one program may add the ability to manage bluetooth devices, one is the sound system, one adds backwards compatibility for an older set of sound drivers, one manages what programs are running, one adds a task bar, one adds a program launch/start button, one puts the clock i nthe corner of the screen, etc.

with XBMCbuntu in the XBMC mode, you are running just enough pieces to accomplish that one task; running XBMC. what this script does is temporarily run the one piece you need to manage two applications running and playing well together at the same time until you drop back down to XBMC, then leave things as it found it.

[kidllotus]

I'm having the strangest issue with RCB. When launching a ROM (using SNES 9x for example) I get an "Invalid ZIP archive" error. Here's the info that I have and the troubleshooting steps I've followed.

1. My roms are on a fileshare (set to 0777 so there shouldn't be any permissions issues)
2. I have added the fileshare location into the library using smb://194.xx.xx.xxx/sharelocation/Emulation
3. I have tried launching test games from the emulator directly (navigating through open game dialog)
4. I have executed the following from cmd -> c:\Docs\Emulation\SNES 9x>snes9x.exe "\\194.xx.xx.xxx\filesharelocation\Emulation\SNES Roms\Aladdin.zip" and it loaded fine.
5. I have mounted the fileshare locally to R: and executed the following from cmd -> c:\Docs\Emulation\SNES 9x>snes9x.exe "R:\SNES Roms\Aladdin.zip" and it loaded fine.
6. I have the launcher to use %ROMFILE% as the argument to send to SNES 9x
7. I have "do not extract zip" turned on (this is the only way I could even get it to start up SNES 9x, otherwise it doesn't even load)

I could run it in stand-alone mode, but I'm trying to get it running so it's easy for my wife to use (that Ease of Wife Use is important).

Could someone give me a hand with this please? I'm willing to grant access through TeamViewer if need be.