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Thread: [RESOLVED] SOLVED - Game Emulator Front End with VB Express 2010

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    Resolved [RESOLVED] SOLVED - Game Emulator Front End with VB Express 2010

    Dear Friends.

    I really need your help.

    I'm developing a (pseudo) front end in VB.Net. This will run some SNES games, Mega Drive (Sega Genesis) and Arcade, like a "Hyper Spin" or "Attract Mode". After booting, the system opens this front end, without loading the operating system. I created a retro-gamepad USB interface, with this, the user can navigate in the front end menu to choose the gamewith a SNES controller. There is also entry for Mega Drive (Sega Genesis) controllers, can't use for navigate in the System Menu at this moment, but it will be soon .

    When I programmed, I used a Samsung notebook, with Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit, Celeron 1.6 GHz processor soldered to the board, a mini SATA HD with 500 Gb and a 4GB DDR2 memory.

    I know, maybe your question at this time is: how did it work to open the game directly, how does Hyper Spin and Attract Mode work?

    Here is the answer: I put the games and emulators in the C: directory and created a save state right at the start of the ROM loading. Then, I configured that save state, can only open with its emulator. Hence, I created in VB.Net an execution process that opened this save state, through "Process Start". Anyway, the game opens directly in the emulator and already configured the controls and everything else that is necessary.

    It worked perfectly on this notebook. But, the HD has been damaged. However, I saved the entire project on an external hard drive before this problem. Now, I use my "test PC" with the following configuration: 1.6 Ghz Celeron processor, 1.50 GHz DDR2 memory, Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit and a 160 Gb IDE HD.

    Here is the project working in my old notebook. Audio in Portuguese, no english subtitles. I'm Brazilian.

    http://youtube.com/watch?v=7mdbAGXDHCg

    With this PC, my program does not work anymore. Run the file, but the game does not open. And I've tried everything. I changed the platform in VB to x86, x64, "Any platform", everything. Still not working. I've already disabled Firewall, protections, but, it does not work. And I do not have another computer to test at this point.


    Am I right in thinking that the problem has to do with the hardware settings of that PC? or, it may be some other problem? It's the same program. The Visual Basic installed is the same too: Visual Basic 2010 Express. Why is this happening?

    Please, help me! Thank you very much for your attention!
    Last edited by vbnewbieuser; Sep 6th, 2018 at 02:16 PM. Reason: solved

  2. #2
    Super Moderator Shaggy Hiker's Avatar
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    Re: Game Emulator Front End with VB Express 2010

    You didn't mention the memory on the new system. That's unlikely to be the issue, since you had it running with 4GB, which is pretty minimal for a 64-bit OS, but just to confirm: You have at least that much in the new system, right?

    I really don't think that the platform would fail in the way you are seeing. If you have a platform mismatch, that usually fails at compile time, in my experience. Therefore, I'd set it to whatever you had it at and leave it alone. You didn't change OS, so I would expect that if it worked, it would keep working.

    Aside from that, it doesn't sound like you have much choice other than doing some logging to figure out where it is failing. I assume you can't attach a debugger, so logging is the only alternative. You could start by sprinkling log statements into the startup code, but they'd have to write to a file. The last one written, in that case would be as far as you made it. It's an ugly way to go about debugging, it just doesn't seem like you have much choice.

    One thing you didn't mention is the video system you have in the two different computers. With everything else appearing to be the same (size and SATA vs IDE differences shouldn't matter for the HD), the video system seems a more likely culprit.
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    Re: Game Emulator Front End with VB Express 2010

    Quote Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker View Post
    You didn't mention the memory on the new system. That's unlikely to be the issue, since you had it running with 4GB, which is pretty minimal for a 64-bit OS, but just to confirm: You have at least that much in the new system, right?[...]

    Sir Shaggy. First of all, thank you for your time. Today is my day off here. Just today I have time to develop my project. I almost do not have breaks. And I will not be able to take a vacation so soon.

    I think I had described about the memory of the current PC. they are two memories, one of 1 Gb and the other of 512 Mb. Both memories are DDR2 type. In my notebook, the video is onboard, a Intel HD Graphics. But in this PC, I'm using a ATI Radeon HD 6450 2Gb Gddr3. You are right! memory is a possible issue.


    But now that you have spoken, I think to myself: "what an irresponsible computer technician I am". I did not pay attention to this detail : video.

    I'm going to redo an installation of the video drive here.


    If you fix the problem, I'll fix the case as fixed. But if I do not correct it, I'll ask for help again. Thank you!

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    Re: SOLVED - Game Emulator Front End with VB Express 2010

    Sorry for the time I left the topic active. But in my country, I hardly have day off. My luck is that tomorrow is a holiday here. At this point, for my specific case, the doubt is over. I fixed the problem by installing a Radeon video card. If the moderation of the forum wishes, please, can close my question. I can now develop specific frontends for various emulators of various consoles. I was able to adapt some concepts developed in C # to my particular project. Also, I was able to get the FrontEnd to read the inputs from the USB controllers I developed myself. Thank you all. Now, I made a FrontEnd exclusive of some of the most classic consoles of Nintendo. Soon, I''ll do a similar for Sega, one for games of CPS1, CPS2 and CPS3 and the next, will be for Playstation One. Thanks to all.

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    Super Moderator Shaggy Hiker's Avatar
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    Re: SOLVED - Game Emulator Front End with VB Express 2010

    We don't close threads just because the question has been answered. You can mark the thread RESOLVED, though, with the option on the Thread Tools menu.
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    Re: SOLVED - Game Emulator Front End with VB Express 2010

    Quote Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker View Post
    We don't close threads just because the question has been answered. You can mark the thread RESOLVED, though, with the option on the Thread Tools menu.
    Really sorry about this, Sir. Shaggy. Now is done. Thank you!

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