Viewing Issue Advanced Details
ID Category [?] Severity [?] Reproducibility Date Submitted Last Update
08607 Interface Feature Have not tried Apr 21, 2023, 01:43 2 hours ago
Tester Augusto View Status Public Platform
Assigned To Resolution Open OS
Status [?] Acknowledged Driver
Version 0.253 Fixed in Version Build
Fixed in Git Commit Github Pull Request #
Summary 08607: Feature Request : New menu "debug" with overclocking settings, cpu frequency and screen refresh rate
Description Hello.
Thanks for reading my topic.

Several emulators have options allowing users to overclock the emulated cpu to an "better" gameplay experience.
However MAME cpu, device and sound overclock are for debug and not for an "better" gameplay.
CPU overclocking settings and screen refresh rate are enabled in OSD enabling the option "cheats" that strangely the name not is exactly related with overclock, screen Hz or debug.
MAME devs and some testers use overclocking for debug.
I have used overclock for debug in some games. When an game have bugs I try play using overclock and if the bug is "fixed" will be reported it. Example karatedou (voice slow), robocop (van sound), ddragon3 (game over and ending music) and some others if sound cpu use 110 % fixes all sounds bugs.

Unhappily some users think that overclocking settings in OSD are related for gameplay because are there if cheat is enabled and "cheat" is an naming related with gameplay.

Other detail is cpu overclocking settings in OSD only show percentage value.
If showing both percentage and frequency value will be better for debug having an precise setting.

Thus an new option "debug" enabled in ini file or UI will show all overclocking settings and screen refresh rate moved from OSD Slider menu to that new debug menu.

Have an nice week.
Steps To Reproduce
Additional Information
Github Commit
Flags
Regression Version
Affected Sets / Systems
Attached Files
 
Relationships
There are no relationship linked to this issue.
Notes
4
User avatar
No.23343
Kale
Developer
2 days ago
I'm not sure where -cheat hasn't this already covered in full.
User avatar
No.23351
Augusto
Tester
7 hours ago
edited on: 7 hours ago
Boss ... not exactly about if cheats had covered all it.
We use these settings for debugging and not for gameplay.
A high number of MAME users use these settings for gameplay being an wrong action to do.
If you search the internet you'll see mame users posting encouraging others to use overclocking for gameplay thus doing a mess.
Whenever possible I keep telling for that type of mame user not to use overclocking for gameplay because the use is only for debug. They ignore it.
Moving "cpu overclocking", "sound device overclocking" and "refresh rate" for an new OSD menu "debug" being enabled in mame.ini avoid it and so used for mamedevs and good sense mametesters only for debugging.
User avatar
No.23354
StHiryu
Tester
2 hours ago
I use cpu overclocking for playing games like double dragon or metal slug 2 with no slowdowns, no testing or debugging here.

Don't see the point for this report. Let the users configure the emulator the way they wish...
User avatar
No.23355
Augusto
Tester
2 hours ago
edited on: 2 hours ago
About cpu overclocking only exceptions I know are ddragon and ddragon2.
ddragon is almost impossible to play mainly in the last area of the last mission without overclock in main and secondary cpus.
The slowdown is absurd to the point happen extreme input delay.
However changing cpu overclock settings break the game code internal logic.

In my knowledge mamedevs don't like seeing users changing cpu overclocking settings.
That my topic not is about removing cpu overclocking settings, but moving to another OSD menu.
Since begin these settings were added in MAME for debugging.
Thus users will understand that these settings are for use by mamedevs and for debugging.

You should use these settings to debug mametesters report bugs.