Thomas Jentzsch Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 (edited) Just to get you right: The Overscan is either full on or full off? And unlike for Nathan, the Overscan percentages make no difference? Can you post two screenshots with the setting dialog open and with and without Overscan enabled? Like Nathan did above. As for the paddles: 1. Are they detected correctly? 2. Have to tried to remap them or reset the mapping in Advanced Settings - Input dialog? Edited February 13, 2020 by Thomas Jentzsch Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unixdude Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 1 minute ago, Thomas Jentzsch said: Just to get you right: The Overscan is either full on or full off? And unlike for Nathan, the Overscan percentages make no difference? Can you post two screenshots with the setting dialog open and with and without Overscan enabled? Like Nathan did above. Yes, that's exactly it: overscan is either full on or full off. Dunno why I couldn't state it so simply before - lol. Anyway, pics: I found that in order to have the overscan setting apply the first time, I had to reboot my system after setting it. After the initial setting of the overscan option, it doesn't seem to do anything anymore. And, my paddles don't work at all on RC1... not even jittery. They simply do nothing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 So you cannot select intermediate values for Overscan in the UI? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unixdude Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 (edited) I can select anything from 0 to 10, it just doesn't change the image on the screen. I've tried basic settings and advanced settings, and I've tried every option between 1 and 10. I've tried just hitting "OK" after setting the overscan option, and I've tried rebooting my R77 after changing the option (after pressing "OK" of course). Nothing makes a difference. Note that one of my screenshots shows 0% and the other shows 10% -- but the black border around the image has not changed in size. I rebooted my R77 between the first and second screenshots (third is just a closeup of the 2nd), and that makes no difference to the image show on the screen. Edited to add: Just now I inserted the SD chip into my iMac, and erased /stella/settings.sqlite3* (all 3 files), then inserted the chip back into my R77 and powered it. Image was cropped again of course, but before setting the overscan, I tried Ciricus Atari. Paddles don't work when plugged into the DB9 (I don't have a 2600-dapter to try). I then changed Overscan from "off" to 10%, and hit OK. No change to display. Rebooted R77, and now I have black borders as expected. Any further changes to the overscan setting are ignored, even after a reboot. Edited February 13, 2020 by unixdude Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 Thanks for the detailed description, I will try to replicated the issue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unixdude Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 Sure thing. Hope it helps. I'm happy to try other builds if you like. I don't mind the letterboxing, because that's better than the cropped image. But like you I wonder if I've stumbled onto some sort of bug. I know paddles are supposed to work now too, and they did work better in a previous version, it's just that now the R77 sees my paddles as being turned "far left" and then it never moves from that position. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nathan Strum Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 Changing the overscan settings does nothing for the UI on my RetroN77 either. I didn't worry about that because nothing was cut off, and for the UI that's all I cared about. But it does change overscan for the games (you have to press OK each time you change the percentage in the menu - it doesn't dynamically adjust as you move the slider). Try loading up a game with a light background, and see if it works there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 The ROM launcher won't change size until after a reboot, due to the way it's being drawn. So it should be taking overscan into account, but only after a reboot will you see the results. In game mode, the effect should happen immediately. If it doesn't work, then it's probably a bug. However, the overscan setting not taking effect for the UI immediately is not something we can fix easily, because of the way the UI code works in Stella. So for the foreseeable future, you will always need to reboot to change its size. This is exactly the same as on desktop Stella, where changing the dimensions of the UI requires you to quit Stella and restart it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unixdude Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 Thanks for the info. What was the program that Nathan was showing earlier, the one with the numbers? I can use that to get the overscan set properly for my TV. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 I assume that it was a test ROM he has; maybe he can post it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 58 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said: Thanks for the detailed description, I will try to replicated the issue. @Thomas Jentzsch, as mentioned above, the UI change won't be done until after Stella restarts (since the UI isn't dynamically resizeable). However, there is another issue. After the overscan is set to non-zero, it reduces the ROM launcher resolution (as it should). But then when overscan is turned off, the old dimensions are still used (and not reset back to 1280x720). So I think that the resolution that the overscan option uses should not be saved to settings. IOW, if the UI res is 1280x720 and overscan is on, the UI res should still be saved to settings as 1280x720, with overscan always dynamically being used to calculate the current dimensions to use. Therefore, it's used as a modifier, but the modified values shouldn't be saved. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 (edited) 3 hours ago, unixdude said: I know paddles are supposed to work now too, and they did work better in a previous version, it's just that now the R77 sees my paddles as being turned "far left" and then it never moves from that position. We completely reworked the mapping code and this is a side effect. By default the paddles are mapped to the same axis as in the desktop version, but for R77 we have to use different axis. This is a bug we can fix with the next RC. For now you have to map the paddles manually. Which is a bit complicated: Open the settings dialog and switch to advanced settings Open the settings dialog again Open the input settings Mark Paddle 0 Analog Select Map... Turn the paddle until the Stella detects the movement Repeat 4..6 for all other paddles you want to use Close the dialog Edited February 13, 2020 by Thomas Jentzsch Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unixdude Posted February 13, 2020 Share Posted February 13, 2020 13 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said: We completely reworked the mapping code and this is a side effect. By default the paddles are mapped to the same axis as in the desktop version, but for R77 we have to use different axis. This is a bug we can fix with the next RC. For now you have to map the paddles manually. Which is a bit complicated: Open the settings dialog and switch to advanced settings Open the settings dialog again Open the input settings Mark Paddle 0 Analog Select Map... Turn the paddle until the Stella detects the movement Repeat 4..6 for all other paddles you want to use Close the dialog This is excellent info - thanks! I will need to redo it, since I remapped the fire button as in the original version of this post. And, I wasn't able to get "Paddle 1 Analog" mapped for the 2nd paddle controller, but the first one does work after this. Thanks so much to all of you guys who are working on this build. It really is quite excellent. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nathan Strum Posted February 14, 2020 Share Posted February 14, 2020 17 hours ago, unixdude said: Thanks for the info. What was the program that Nathan was showing earlier, the one with the numbers? I can use that to get the overscan set properly for my TV. 17 hours ago, stephena said: I assume that it was a test ROM he has; maybe he can post it? Here you go. I think Chris Walton wrote it. 240lines.bin 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DonValor Posted February 15, 2020 Share Posted February 15, 2020 (edited) Hello everyone! First off, I wanted to thank all the programmers who made Stella 6 on the Retron 77 possible! I actually purchased it once I saw that the old Stella 3 emulator had been updated, and am very happy with it, all thanks to your hard work! I updated my Retron 77 from Beta2 to RC1 by way of overwriting the uimage, and ran into a strange issue. If the TV mode in the Basic Settings window is switched from RGB to Composite, it seems to break the phosphor blend and games that make use of flickering will end up "losing" sprites. This is most noticeable in Pac-Man, when 2 of the four ghosts disappear. Going into the menu screen and switching to Disabled will rectify this issue. I thought at first that it was due to me just updating via uimage, so I reimaged my SD card with a clean image, and did not change any settings save the TV mode. After playing Pac-Man for a bit, the issue returned. Note that I did not run into this issue using Beta2. I am happy to try different things or collect additional details, if it would help determine what is causing the issue (assuming that it IS an issue, and not a byproduct of the updates/improvements that are being made). Edited February 15, 2020 by DonValor Fixed that switching to TV Mode>Disabled seems to fix issue. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DirtyHairy Posted February 15, 2020 Author Share Posted February 15, 2020 36 minutes ago, DonValor said: Hello everyone! First off, I wanted to thank all the programmers who made Stella 6 on the Retron 77 possible! I actually purchased it once I saw that the old Stella 3 emulator had been updated, and am very happy with it, all thanks to your hard work! I updated my Retron 77 from Beta2 to RC1 by way of overwriting the uimage, and ran into a strange issue. If the TV mode in the Basic Settings window is switched from RGB to Composite, it seems to break the phosphor blend and games that make use of flickering will end up "losing" sprites. This is most noticeable in Pac-Man, when 2 of the four ghosts disappear. Going into the menu screen and switching to Disabled will rectify this issue. I thought at first that it was due to me just updating via uimage, so I reimaged my SD card with a clean image, and did not change any settings save the TV mode. After playing Pac-Man for a bit, the issue returned. Note that I did not run into this issue using Beta2. I am happy to try different things or collect additional details, if it would help determine what is causing the issue (assuming that it IS an issue, and not a byproduct of the updates/improvements that are being made). Thanks for your report! Yes, this sounds like frame skipping --- I have ran into that several times during firmware development, but I thought we had been able to resolve this for good. I'll investigate... ? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DonValor Posted February 15, 2020 Share Posted February 15, 2020 1 hour ago, DirtyHairy said: Thanks for your report! Yes, this sounds like frame skipping --- I have ran into that several times during firmware development, but I thought we had been able to resolve this for good. I'll investigate... ? Good deal! Thanks for looking into this! Please let me know if there is anything I can do to assist (test, logs, etc). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BitMerge6502 Posted February 16, 2020 Share Posted February 16, 2020 7 hours ago, DirtyHairy said: Thanks for your report! Yes, this sounds like frame skipping --- I have ran into that several times during firmware development, but I thought we had been able to resolve this for good. I'll investigate... ? Yes, I had the same problem. It happens when games switch objects on/off rapidly each frame, (especially on games like Solaris). It happened to me right when I switched to RC1 from beta as well. The frames don't skip if you turn phosphor effect off. I didn't report it because I just thought it was normal behavior for that function (kinda like epilepsy mode on NES Classic Edition). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BitMerge6502 Posted February 16, 2020 Share Posted February 16, 2020 I had a suggestion/request as well for future versions: the game description text on the game selection menu (under the screenshot photo) is almost too small a font to read. Could there be a way to make it larger, or scale/change the font? Another idea might be to allow the user to just omit/disable the text box altogether and/or display a second jpeg there instead (like box label art). I think that would be a nice customization feature to have on the R77. I like seeing the box art with consoles like AtGames Flashback, but I also like screenshots as well because they can help show what the gameplay is like for games I've might not have played before. There's certainly enough empty whitespace to display both kinds of photos, would be neat to make use of it. Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted February 16, 2020 Share Posted February 16, 2020 (edited) 9 hours ago, BitMerge6502 said: I had a suggestion/request as well for future versions: the game description text on the game selection menu (under the screenshot photo) is almost too small a font to read. Is it? My eyes are not very good, but I still can read it. Are you usually far away from your TV? Anyone else having problems here? Edited February 16, 2020 by Thomas Jentzsch Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fluxit Posted February 17, 2020 Share Posted February 17, 2020 It'd actually be nice if a version of HiDPI mode(or otherwise larger fonts) was available for the R77. I can read Stella's text if I'm right in front of the TV, but I usually play from the couch which is about 6 or seven feet away. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted February 17, 2020 Share Posted February 17, 2020 Interesting about the HiDPI suggestion; I was just working on that right now. Here's an image illustrating the current work. Note that we still have some work to do, as the fonts are a little too large ATM. However, if we enable this, it means the image needs to be smaller (1x mode) instead of what's in the current R77 build (2x mode). This is the tradeoff we may need to make based on the limitations of the current UI code. EDIT: I don't want anyone to get too excited yet. This will only work if we can get 1920x1080 mode working on the device, and that is by no means certain yet (although it's looking good). Also, the fonts above need to be adjusted. The filelist font needs to be a little smaller, and the description font under the image a little bigger. 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BitMerge6502 Posted February 17, 2020 Share Posted February 17, 2020 3 hours ago, stephena said: Note that we still have some work to do, as the fonts are a little too large ATM. However, if we enable this, it means the image needs to be smaller (1x mode) instead of what's in the current R77 build (2x mode). This is the tradeoff we may need to make based on the limitations of the current UI code I like the large fonts better. I just don't understand why all the text simply can't utilize the same font? The games list font is perfect for the device. It reminds me of the standard IBM DOS 9x14 bitmapped font. It's aesthetically balanced and easily readable. The smaller fonts just dont seem "full" enough, or appear too skinny and less than 8x8 in size. I don't really mind that the screenshot is only 1x scale being it's 2600 graphics. I've been using Stella for a long time, and the UI always looked to me as it was rendered in 640x480 VGA mode, so your latest screenshot post looks comfortable to me as what Stella should look like. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted February 17, 2020 Share Posted February 17, 2020 My point is that this is still a WIP. We may indeed keep the large font, and make the smaller one larger too. This is only a mockup of what we can do, and have to go through more testing to finalize it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted February 17, 2020 Share Posted February 17, 2020 3 hours ago, BitMerge6502 said: I just don't understand why all the text simply can't utilize the same font? Simply because it doesn't fit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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