A new rom load type:
ROM_IGNORE( )
This is interesting mostly just for 1 rom in Neo-Geo:
ROM_REGION( 0x2000000, REGION_CPU1, 0 )
ROM_LOAD16_WORD_SWAP( "269-p1.bin", 0x000000, 0x2000000, CRC(432cfdfc) SHA1(19b40d32188a8bace6d2d570c6cf3d2f1e31e379) )
You can now load it this way (I think)
ROM_REGION( 0x800000, REGION_CPU1, 0 )
ROM_LOAD16_WORD_SWAP( "269-p1.bin", 0x000000, 0x800000, CRC(432cfdfc) SHA1(19b40d32188a8bace6d2d570c6cf3d2f1e31e379) )
ROM_IGNORE( 0x1800000 )
And it should save you 24mb of ram (hopefully), someone please test this.