Topic: dink's FBN Development & Fixes thread

[barbudreadmon]

The accurate refresh rate for Thunder Hoop is 57.42Hz, and this is what FBNeo is using, however you should be able to override it by using our "force 60Hz" setting to match your monitor's refresh rate. Note that the game will run faster by doing this.

Also note that earlier versions of MAME/FBNeo had this refresh rate wrong, and it was actually causing a black screen when dying in 4th stage. It was fixed sometime in late 2021 (and should be fine even if you force 60Hz), so arcade 0.220 is probably affected.

[dink]

Pelucon8, a little while back we changed the refreshrate to 57.42, it was found that this is the refreshrate thoop pcb uses, and if you don't use this refreshrate internally, it will crash on level 4.  A big thanks to Peter Ferrie for doing RE and figuring out this emu-bug.  Newer version of arcade (.250) has this same rate.  In fbneo you can set it to "force 60hz" refresh rate option and play it more smoothly, it will still use 57.42 for its internal calculations to prevent crash in level 4. (in theory, I haven't tested this)

best regards,
- dink

[Pelucon8]

@barbudreadmon y @dink

Doubts clarified. Thank you for your response. 

[dink]

Dear friends and fbneo fans - a little news update:
Spent the past week and 1/2 getting ZX Spectrum emulation to pass every single timing test for 48k and 128k.  The timing was previously pretty good - it could do all multicolor efx, and demos, .. but recently Gab75 found a HB game called Castle Escape... which gave us some glitches.   First I tackled all of the timing problems reported by the tests, but the game still glitched.  The problem turned out being something more simple, the ula drawing code was off by 4 cycles every other line in 128k mode.... d'oh!!    Well - it was fun, at least

barbudreadmon and dink finished emulation of Nintendo's Radar Scope, you'll want to use this samples file, because it can't be found anywhere else (linked below)

best regards,
- dink

[Haze]

This is not a mistake, but I would like to be cleared of doubt.

In the game "thunder hoop", when I play it in arcade 0.220, it goes smoothly in the scroll, it tells me: 320x240 (H) 60.000000 Hz. On the other hand in FBN the scroll makes me small jerks, as if it was at less Hz.

In the current versions of mame, does this game lower the amount of Hz?

As I say, it is a doubt more than a bug.

Regards.

I have not checked the new updates of mame, as they are too slow or do not load in XP.

The game has protection checks relating to the speed the game runs at.  If you run the game at 60hz it will crash when you die on level 4.

If you run the game at the correct hz, as current MAME does, and FBN does, the protection passes and the game does not crash.

[Pelucon8]

The game has protection checks relating to the speed the game runs at.  If you run the game at 60hz it will crash when you die on level 4.

If you run the game at the correct hz, as current MAME does, and FBN does, the protection passes and the game does not crash.

Thank you, @haze for the explanation 

regarding @dink statement: "In fbneo you can set it to "force 60hz" refresh rate option and play it more smoothly, it will still use 57.42 for its internal calculations to prevent crash in level 4. (in theory, I haven't tested this)"

@dink, I put the option you pointed out to me:



And the game runs smoothly and the black screen error does not appear on level 4. I have let myself get lost about 5 times and the error has not appeared. The game is fully playable at 60hz with that option enabled and, of course, can be finished without problems:



And regarding @barbudreadmon comment: "Note that the game will run faster by doing this". The truth is that I don't notice such a noticeable increase in speed, it seems normal to me. In sound either, maybe it's because I have a bad ear , but it doesn't bother me.

In fact, I play pretty much the same as before after they upgraded to 57.42 Hz with the "force 60hz" option enabled.

Thanks so much to all 3 of you, you guys are great. 

[dink]

Pelucon8, excellent!  thanks for testing the theory

best regards,
- dink

[dink]

Hi Friends and FBNeo fans,
Here's some recent fixes I forgot to mention:

Added support for 2bpp sprites in PCEngine, fixes the game Fighting Run
Fixed a glitch w/Deep Blue - Kaitei Shinwa on PCEngine (glitches on the inactive area of the screen)
Honoo no Toukyuuji - Dodge Danpei (Jpn) fixed on Megadrive, wouldn't boot
* thanks Gab75 for finding the bugs

best regards,
- dink

[Bad Dude]

Hi guys,
ported the Hardware FX Shaders from Fightcade (by JordiRos / shine)
They are available under the Alt blitter's options under HardFX.
The attached shaders zip will need to be unzipped into fbneo's support subdirectory!
Some need atleast window of 3x size to work properly(!)
A decent (not onboard) video card is recommended for performance
NOTE: Zoom (click) the images to see each effect

best regards,
- dink

I love shaders effects, especially those that remind old tv monitors, like CTR effects and Scanlines. But I don't know why, when you put it on fullscreen, all shaders effects and scanlines looks distorted. Too bad. 

[Joni422]

I love shaders effects, especially those that remind old tv monitors, like CTR effects and Scanlines. But I don't know why, when you put it on fullscreen, all shaders effects and scanlines looks distorted. Too bad.

Hi Bad Dude,

you solve this by setting Blitter options -> "Point filtering" and then selecting the desired shader under HardFX.   

[Bad Dude]

Hi Bad Dude,

you solve this by setting Blitter options -> "Point filtering" and then selecting the desired shader under HardFX.

Thanks for the reply! I appreciate your attention!
In older versions of FBN or FBA, the scanlines were perfect, but in fullscreen there were black bars decreasing the screen size. They remove the black bars, but the effect was never perfect again! 

[dink]

Thanks for the reply! I appreciate your attention!
In older versions of FBN or FBA, the scanlines were perfect, but in fullscreen there were black bars decreasing the screen size. They remove the black bars, but the effect was never perfect again!

Hi Bad Dude,
Can you make sure that your Fullscreen Resolution (Vertical and Horizontal) are set properly, I think this and the setting under "Video -> Monitor Properties" being set wrongly will be the main factor for things not looking perfect.  I think it's most important that the Fullscreen Resolutions are set to the native resolution of your monitor.

best regards,
- dink

[Bad Dude]

Hi Bad Dude,
Can you make sure that your Fullscreen Resolution (Vertical and Horizontal) are set properly, I think this and the setting under "Video -> Monitor Properties" being set wrongly will be the main factor for things not looking perfect.  I think it's most important that the Fullscreen Resolutions are set to the native resolution of your monitor.

best regards,
- dink

Don't worry about that. I'm using "Small faint RGB mask" which looks the same in all games. In think the problem is that some games have different resolutions, so the scanline looks distorted, depending on the game you are playing. In older versions, this problem was solved because the emulator changed the resolution of the game in full screen and effect looks proportional. I'm downloaded the Final Burn Alpha to demonstrate. You can see that in FBA the image is scaled down so that the effect appears in the correct proportion! You can see the difference between the two images. The fist one is FBN and the second, FBA.

[dink]

Don't worry about that. I'm using "Small faint RGB mask" which looks the same in all games. In think the problem is that some games have different resolutions, so the scanline looks distorted, depending on the game you are playing. In older versions, this problem was solved because the emulator changed the resolution of the game in full screen and effect looks proportional. I'm downloaded the Final Burn Alpha to demonstrate. You can see that in FBA the image is scaled down so that the effect appears in the correct proportion! You can see the difference between the two images. The fist one is FBN and the second, FBA.

Can you send me your ini file from fba (config\fba*.ini) and ini file from fbneo (config\fbneo*.ini) so I can investigate?

thanks & best regards,
- dink

[Bad Dude]

Can you send me your ini file from fba (config\fba*.ini) and ini file from fbneo (config\fbneo*.ini) so I can investigate?

thanks & best regards,
- dink

I send you a private message too.