09249: vectrex: Several Vectrex games hang MAME

ID	Category [?]	Severity [?]	Reproducibility	Date Submitted	Last Update
09249	Crash/Freeze	Major	Always	3 days ago	3 hours ago

Tester	Ziggy	View Status	Public	Platform	MAME (Official Binary)
Assigned To	hap	Resolution	Fixed	OS	Windows 11/10 (64-bit)
Status [?]	Resolved			Driver	miltonbradley/vectrex.cpp
Version	0.280	Fixed in Version	0.281GIT	Build	64-bit
		Fixed in Git Commit	a7351e5	Github Pull Request #

Summary	09249: vectrex: Several Vectrex games hang MAME
Description	Several Vectrex games hang in MAME 0.280.
Steps To Reproduce	1. Start a vectrex game like Pole Position. Example: mame vectrex -cart polepos 2. Hold spacebar to accelerate. 3. Game hangs within 5 to 10 seconds.
Additional Information	Also, got several other Vectrex games to hang such as berzerk and armora (Armor Attack). Vectrex games do work fine with MAME 0.276. MAME 0.277 through 0.280 have the hang issue I'm describing here. According to happppp, it broke on April 12, 2025 in the changes to 6522via in this commit: https://github.com/mamedev/mame/commit/9cdce3047e51b92002f6ea33bb2e1550b2ab5293
Github Commit

Flags
Regression Version	0.277
Affected Sets / Systems	vectrex

Attached Files

No.23626 hap Developer 2 days ago edited on: 2 days ago	Posted here 1st: https://github.com/mamedev/mame/issues/14109 6522 official documentation doesn't say anything about setting timer counter to 0 from what I see, but I suspect MAME 0.276 was more correct than what that commit introduced. FWIW to test the victor9k high-pitch sound bug. Maybe there's another way with other software, but since MAME's swlist only has 2 items, this is what I did: - victor9k.cpp victor9k_mem increase RAM to 256KB (so up to 0x3ffff, and comment out the noprw too), otherwise gwbasic won't load - mame victor9k audiokit - set date, load gwbasic - beep (or play"cde")
No.23627 Foxhack Tester 2 days ago edited on: 2 days ago	I tested Pole Position and the freeze seems to be random. It took me 20-30 seconds to get the hang the first time (manifested as a blank screen with a single sound tone playing back), then I reset with F3, then it took me a bit longer, until after I ran out of time in the game.
No.23628 john_iv Senior Tester 2 days ago	I played Berzerk for two screens and one screen and got the high-pitched whine and white/blueout out in tip of main on Win11 x64. 0.280 (mame0280-98-g86ccea91c23).
No.23642 Ziggy Tester 5 hours ago	Thanks for the quick response hap! Once again, you come to the rescue!