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All the recent chd commotion reminded me that MAME still only supports one Area 51 Site 4 chd, so I thought I would again state why it should support two.
I own a dedicated cab and have sold HD replacements that use an SD card and IDE adapter. So I have done some research and have purchased enough board sets and HD's that I have some idea what I'm talking about.
Hell, I even sent Guru the MB so he could dump the V1.0h bios as well as a Jammit chip for Dr. Decapitator to decap.
Anyhoo, The currently supported image is Rev. 2.01 as is still sold by happ. The only difference between the current MAME chd and a fresh Happ HD is that the MAME chd has had it's serial # cleared, but it STILL has statistical data saved. IE. credits inserted, games played, play times, etc...
I know it's that version by the size of the CHD. I have compressed several STOCK HD's including my own and they all are the same size. The only HD that I have compressed that was the same as the currently supported chd was a happ replacement HD.
So in conclusion, There are two different versions of the Area 51 Site 4 HD one that was shipped in dedicated cabs dated Sep. 11 1998 and another Rev. 2.01 dated Sep. 7 1998 for whatever reason I cannot say.
I do have clean copies of both in chd format, stripped of ALL statistical info. but they still retain their serial #'s.
BTW: I did use chdman to copy the currently supported chd to a card and put it in my cab just to clear all the stats. and make a clean copy as it should be.
Also, Just to be clear the size of the chd is not determined by the original HD as I'm talking about their size after using chdman to put them onto a SD card and then using chdman to make a chd from the SD card. They are different sizes!
I have offered all this info before but maybe this time someone will want it???
[ATTACHED IMAGE]
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The only reason I brought this up again was because I thought it was MAME's purpose to document and preserve such information.
I can share the images and any info required if needed, I've already tried previously! I hope that even though the game isn't playable this is not simply overlooked.
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Tafoid |
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I keep on testing.. testing.. testing... into the future!
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> The only reason I brought this up again was because I thought it was MAME's purpose
> to document and preserve such information.
>
> I can share the images and any info required if needed, I've already tried
> previously! I hope that even though the game isn't playable this is not simply
> overlooked.
The best way to get the information to MAMEDEV is to email directly to [email protected]*. Be sure to be as verbose as possible, adding links to any data you would like examined or feel should be added to MAME.
*New submission details: http://mamedev.org/devwiki/index.php/Submitting_Source_Code
Edited by Smitdogg (05/08/12 06:17 PM)
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: Tafoid]
#276877 - 02/22/12 08:32 AM
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Honestly, I have done everything I can to share this with MAME DEV.
I put a copy of the unsupportded ver. on Megaupload at Smitdogg's request ages ago. Whatever became of that I do not know. I'm not even sure if anyone even bothered to download it.
As for pointing to any INFO on the web there is NONE! The game was destined to fail. I had to buy 4 boardsets before I found one that didn't suffer from the HORRID reset problem they suffer from!
I will save what I have for the future, but I wish it wasn't put upon me to do so by ignorance.
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It takes forever to get dumps added sometimes and there is nothing much you can do about it. Almost every Golden Tee Fore game is dumped, Midways Skins is dumped, the Virtual Pool prototype is dumped, the Classic NFL Football game I looked for for years is dumped, I can't even keep up with the games I have dumped that haven't been added. I have System 246/256 games that I just gave up on because my old ones weren't added. So join the club but it's not because of "no interest" and posts like this probably aren't going to help. You could try sending in a diff file, that might work, and adding clones sometimes isn't much more than knowing English. I think you worked on a driver at some point so you should know how to add a clone. My 3 cents.
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: Smitdogg]
#276880 - 02/22/12 09:02 AM
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Thank You, Smitdogg!
You actually made me see it in another light.
Until the time comes I guess....
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| GatKong |
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Tetris Mason
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>>I think you worked on a driver at some point so you should know how to add a clone. My 3 cents.
> Thank You, Smitdogg! You actually made me see it in another light. Until the time comes I guess....
The hint from Smit was that if you want it added faster than "until that time comes"... since you have the technical know-how... YOU could make that time come by adding the clone to the driver, and submit that. I hope that helps.
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: GatKong]
#276906 - 02/22/12 05:40 PM
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That's not a guarantee, I'm just saying it will raise the chances. There's still work involved on someone else's end even if he makes a diff.
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| R. Belmont |
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Cuckoo for IGAvania
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: Smitdogg]
#276935 - 02/22/12 09:46 PM
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>Midways Skins is dumped,
Huh? I'm sure I added Skins Game ages ago.
Anyway, for clones in already-existing drivers the assumption by the devs is that people who have submit access specifically for that purpose (Tafoid and Brian Troha and to an extent etabeta) will add them. When those gentlemen fail to do so, the sound you hear is the game falling through the cracks.
Also, maintaining a web site listing dumps that haven't been added would help. f205v's stuff always gets added, because he's got that super-useful site.
Edited by R. Belmont (02/22/12 09:50 PM)
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: R. Belmont]
#276937 - 02/22/12 09:53 PM
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| R. Belmont |
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Cuckoo for IGAvania
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: Smitdogg]
#276970 - 02/23/12 05:15 AM
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> I'm not hosting roms ever. I've resent links to the missing dumps a few times, can do
> it again later.
I don't care about hosting, but a list would be super-useful. I get a lot of email in a day, and a lot of times something gets dumped while I'm at work and it's scrolled off to page 3 by the time I can do anything about it.
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: R. Belmont]
#276974 - 02/23/12 05:26 AM
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I'll figure out a list plan for after u2. Tafoid is adding some stuff for me now and I'll crawl over everything after that and u2 comes out.
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: Smitdogg]
#277453 - 02/27/12 06:02 AM
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To whom ever it was that added it I thank you!
I was actually taking Smitdogs advice and started to do my own compiling and medeling in years when you made it so! LOL
As for it not booting and whether that image is of an SD copy of an HD or an actual HD dump, I believe that it is an SD copy but after reading your comment and doing my own compiles. I have found that the driver doesn't seem to accept anything but the original supported chd, as a matter of fact I can use chdman and copy the supported chd to a factory original HD then use chdman to create a chd and it will not work! It passes all the MAME requirements but fails with the ATARI screen saying no disk found.
I have tried it now with 3 seperate factory images straight from factory HD's and none work. It's strange as I could swear I had MAME loading a non supported image before without any significant changes!
Anyway now that I have a compile environment in place again I will mess with it myself, You have already done all the difficult work!
For what it's worth every image I have tried throwing at MAME, I use an original site 4 HD and they all boot without issue on my cab.
I'm almost thinking there is an issue with the driver expecting certain parameters that the actual hardware doesn't require.
PM me if you want straight HD images to try and solve it!
Thank You!!!
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Tafoid added it when he was adding some backlog dumps for me.
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MAME Punk
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Re: No interest at all?
[Re: Smitdogg]
#277455 - 02/27/12 06:13 AM
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ahh, ok well I'll see if I can't figure out why it doesn't boot.
Thanks again!
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| Naoki |
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> ahh, ok well I'll see if I can't figure out why it doesn't boot.
>
> Thanks again!
Considering it's a custom bios by atari with the integrated game loader, most likely the bios is causing the drive to not be read, not the driver. My theory anyway
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On a quest for Digital 573 and Dancing Stage EuroMix 2
By gods I've found it!
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Ok, I figured out what was wrong and got it to boot!
The issue was that the chd I sent in was dumped using an IDE to USB adapter and when you use one of those the HD cylinder and head info created by chdman is different than it is if you dump a HD connected straight to IDE.
In this case when dumped with the adapter the cylinders reported were 311 and heads were 255. When dumped connected straight to IDE the cylinders were 4968 and heads were 16.
Just out of curiosity I dumped an SD card that does work in the cab. The cylinders were 246 and the heads were 255.
Anyway I assume that I will need to send in a new chd (Smitdogg PM me!) and the SHA1 in the driver will need to be corrected.
Attached is a snapshot of my chd running in Mame 145.u2 using the a51site4a driver! If you look at the bottom right you will see the serial # matches that in the picture I posted previously.
Thanks again Tafoid and Smitdogg!!!
[ATTACHED IMAGE]
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Rar it into chunks under 300 MB each and upload them to sendspace and PM me with the links.
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DONE! nt
[Re: Smitdogg]
#277777 - 02/29/12 07:45 AM
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| Tafoid |
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I keep on testing.. testing.. testing... into the future!
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It may not be a problem, but the CHD you provided is 2 versions behind the current CHD version (3 vs 5). If you happen to make more CHD's in the future, please try to use the latest available CHDMAN from the last major integer release from mamedev.org.
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I have just looked at the source change.
http://mess.dorando.at/svn/?rev=14586
I really do not want to sound rude but putting an url in the source code isn't really a good idea and should be avoided if possible. In the grand scheme of things the source should last, while the url not. I hate the idea that 100 years from now the source could be full of 404 hyperlinks, just saying... It's better to reproduce in the source whatever info is necessary from that link and remove it.
And while I appreciate you provide informations about that set, you may have been a bit too verbose about it. Speaking at first person should be avoided. Plus it's not really necessary to put your signature in the source in that particular case, the change logs exist for that purpose.
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| Tafoid |
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I keep on testing.. testing.. testing... into the future!
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I hope you are DONE!
[Re: ReadOnly]
#277818 - 02/29/12 07:51 PM
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> I have just looked at the source change.
> http://mess.dorando.at/svn/?rev=14586
>
> I really do not want to sound rude but putting an url in the source code isn't really
> a good idea and should be avoided if possible. In the grand scheme of things the
> source should last, while the url not. I hate the idea that 100 years from now the
> source could be full of 404 hyperlinks, just saying...
>
> And while I appreciate you provide informations about that set, you may have been a
> bit too verbose about it. Speaking at first person should be avoided. Plus it's not
> really necessary to put your signature in the source, the change logs exist for that
> purpose.
Urls are checked periodically in source, so it should not be a concern you should worry yourself about. I was the one who submitted the initial dump and given it was not working as the other and there were uncertainty as to the source, I felt it vital to let whomever will work on it know the exact details for the dump, so I added some of the discussion and the link. This was one week ago. Fast forward to today, we now have a booting and working image which has been added, so this dialog is not needed anymore and will be summarily stripped or deleted entirely.
Please don't start drama where none exists.. external micromanagement is not appreciated. Thank you.
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MAME Punk
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Re: DONE!?
[Re: Tafoid]
#277858 - 03/01/12 02:52 AM
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Yeah, actually I made it with the older version because I was trying to retrace the steps I made when I had it booting in MAME long ago and of course newer chd versions won't work with older MAME versions.
I can easily redump it with the latest chdman and upload that if wanted.
Thanks Again!
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| Tafoid |
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I keep on testing.. testing.. testing... into the future!
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> Yeah, actually I made it with the older version because I was trying to retrace the
> steps I made when I had it booting in MAME long ago and of course newer chd versions
> won't work with older MAME versions.
>
> I can easily redump it with the latest chdman and upload that if wanted.
>
> Thanks Again!
It seemed to convert to version 5 ok with current CHDMAN... just need someone to figure out the unique speedups as it still runs pretty slow.
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| B2K24 |
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MAME @ 15 kHz Sony Trinitron CRT user
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Re: DONE!?
[Re: Tafoid]
#277861 - 03/01/12 03:19 AM
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info command needs to be executed on that.
Remember this useful information that was posted?
To clarify, if "chdman info" shows this:
Metadata: Tag='CHTR' Index=0 Length=45 bytes
then it's a bad dump.
If it shows this:
Metadata: Tag='CHT2' Index=0 Length=88 bytes
then it's a good dump.
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Re: DONE!?
[Re: Tafoid]
#277883 - 03/01/12 06:16 AM
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BTW: The HD that this image came on and was dumped from is a "Quantum Fireball EL", I believe it's 2.5 GB.
Not sure if it helps or matters but I figure it can't hurt to know!
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Re: DONE!?
[Re: B2K24]
#277897 - 03/01/12 12:48 PM
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that applies to CDs only (and apparently to GDROMs, but for a different reason).
there are no metadata missing when we talk about Hard Disks (because there are no pregaps/postgaps), so you can simply run "chdman copy" to update it to v5 and the result does not miss anything 
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| R. Belmont |
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Cuckoo for IGAvania
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Re: DONE! nt
[Re: ReadOnly]
#277925 - 03/01/12 07:45 PM
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> I really do not want to sound rude but putting an url in the source code isn't really
> a good idea and should be avoided if possible. In the grand scheme of things the
> source should last, while the url not. I hate the idea that 100 years from now the
> source could be full of 404 hyperlinks, just saying... It's better to reproduce in
> the source whatever info is necessary from that link and remove it.
Disagree. I like having both the contents and the original source available.
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Re: DONE! nt
[Re: R. Belmont]
#278133 - 03/04/12 07:38 PM
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> > I really do not want to sound rude but putting an url in the source code isn't
> really
> > a good idea and should be avoided if possible. In the grand scheme of things the
> > source should last, while the url not. I hate the idea that 100 years from now the
> > source could be full of 404 hyperlinks, just saying... It's better to reproduce in
> > the source whatever info is necessary from that link and remove it.
>
> Disagree. I like having both the contents and the original source available.
Well I can understand that. They may indeed contain useful extra infos. Infos that can not be reproduced easily, infos that are overlooked or updated. As long as there is a minimal effort to reproduce infos into the source and as long as the links are checked periodically. Also I hope those useful web pages are somehow archived before they go down. 
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Playing a bit more with the driver and dumps, I have found:
The current Supported MAME image as well as the Happ image (both rev. 2.01) have attract audio on as default. Where as the others do not.
The Happ dump I have will play in MAME full speed, but none of the non rev. 2.01 dumps will. They all suffer from lag.
BTW: the Happ drive I have is a Seagate ST320014A
Just more useless information!
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| Tafoid |
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I keep on testing.. testing.. testing... into the future!
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> Playing a bit more with the driver and dumps, I have found:
> The current Supported MAME image as well as the Happ image (both rev. 2.01) have
> attract audio on as default. Where as the others do not.
>
> The Happ dump I have will play in MAME full speed, but none of the non rev. 2.01
> dumps will. They all suffer from lag.
>
> BTW: the Happ drive I have is a Seagate ST320014A
>
> Just more useless information!
When I added it, I assume it was simply a matter that your CHD had different addresses needed to apply speedups - so the speedup hacks in the parent set would not work for the one added.
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Sorry for bringing back such an old thread, I debated starting a new one but figured I should keep it all together.
I was just browsing ebay and noticed that the stock hard drives actually have a sticker stating the version as "2.0" and like I said I have a Happ replacement that states the version as "2.01". My original 2.0 HD has the bottom half of the SHOCK sticker torn off so I had never seen the 2.0 sticker.
I just figured I would pass this along so the naming convention in Mame could be corrected.
2.0 would be the version I recently submitted and 2.01 is the chd that was originally supported in Mame. Why the 2.0 drive has a program date later than the 2.01 drive I cannot explain????
Attached is a photo I took off an ebay listing where you can zoom in and see the 2.0 sticker on the stock HD.
I will post a pic of my Happ 2.01 drive aswell.
[ATTACHED IMAGE - CLICK FOR FULL SIZE]
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MAME Punk
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You can go to the Happ site and search for part # A-22509 and see that they label this drive as version 2.01.
[ATTACHED IMAGE - CLICK FOR FULL SIZE]
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Index 
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Area 51 Site 4 .CHD
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[Re: 
