robertmo3 wrote on 2024-05-15, 18:13:

you may like to check descent2 too i am sure it wasn't working before 13 if you already have a pilot name there: when you hear m […]
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you may like to check descent2 too
i am sure it wasn't working before 13
if you already have a pilot name there:
when you hear music skip movie with esc
wait a while for new music and keep pressing enter
when you hear new music press esc to skip movie
now you hear music with sound of typing briefing, press esc
when you hear new sounds you are in game
you can shoot with space and ctrl
------------
before 13 you could only get to the second music

Will do, there're a lot of new commands in EF2000, one I think is an alternative swap command without V_FIFO_DISPLAY.

Haven't got a lot of time left. A job for tomorrow.

There's bad news. EF2000's menu is rendered using standard VGA calls using a paletted 256 VGA colour mode, which is why you don't see anything. I have[EDIT]n't[/EDIT] re-implemented VGA functionality.

Yup that works too, with a black screen. Dunno how you managed to persevere with black screen navigation, but well done.

i just compared what to do in a software mode in dosbox

No build today, unfortunately. Code is stuck in a debuggable state.

Got EF2000's frame swapping to work, but I'm not entirely convinced it's right.

Fixing a bug with V_FIFO_MEMWRITE. I think this is what's randomly crashing it.

i was wondering if you know how you made that lower"s" mistake

robertmo3 wrote on 2024-05-16, 16:37:

i was wondering if you know how you made that lower"s" mistake

??? Lower s?

DOSBox version Rendition
Copyright 2002-2021 DOSBox Team, published under GNU GPL.
---
CONFIG: Generating default configuration.
Writing it to C:\Users\.......\AppData\Local\DOSBox\dosbox-Rendition.conf
CONFIG: Loading primary settings from config file C:\Users\........\AppData\Local\DO
SBox\dosbox-Rendition.conf
"lowers" is not a valid value for variable: inactive.
It might now be reset to the default value: normal
MIDI: Opened device:win32

priority = lower,lowers

robertmo3 wrote on 2024-05-16, 17:16:

priority = lower,lowers

I'll fix it. I've set it back to higher,normal at the moment as the default. I had stability issues with lower, lower.

I'm trawling through the F1 source dump to see if there's anything I can see there to fix the dma problem. Really need to get it going on my Sandy Bridge machine without a discrete gpu.

what's the dma problem?

i read that dma=1 requires pentium cpu for stability

i am not sure if dosbox emulates pentium
in the past dosbox only emulated 486 and faked pentium for cpu detectors in games

"USING THE RENDITION VERSION OF THE GAME

You may be able to use a version that is optimized to use the DMA
capabilities of your computer. Please see below for detail of which
computers will be able to use this version. To start the Rendition
version with DMA support in DOS, type RENDDMA <enter> from your
NASCAR Racing 2 directory. From Windows 95, select the Run command on
your start menu and type C:\SIERRA\NASCAR2\RENDDMA.BAT and click OK.

Can you use the dma optimization?
It runs at normal efficiency by default, using the N2REND.BAT file or the
icon in the Sierra Folder in Windows 95. Some Pentium systems,
(generally only the most recent), have updated chipsets that use the
newest version of DMA. NASCAR Racing 2 for Rendition, when optimized to
run on Pentium machines with updated DMA, can see a fairly significant
increase in performance over the normal version of the product. We felt
that there was a significant number of new Pentium machines to justify
the addition of a switch to access this feature.

NASCAR Racing 2 for Rendition has been proven to run on Pentium and Cyrix
machines without a problem using the N2REND.BAT file, or the icon in the
Sierra Folder in Windows 95. It will not execute on AMD's and 486's.

When NASCAR Racing 2 for Rendition is launched using enhanced dma
(RENDDMA.BAT), newer Pentium machines with updated DMA will pass the
compatibility test and the game should function normally. Normal
Pentiums and Cyrix's will fail the initial compatibility test, causing
the program to halt.

Machines running DMA enhanced version may experience a higher level of
performance than when they run the default version. If you launch using
DMA and experience any type or crash or lockup, your system is most likely
not compatible with the DMA enhanced version of NASCAR Racing 2 for
Rendtion, and you should go back to running the normal version (N2REND.BAT)."

The dma problem is the random crashing. That's caused by an incorrect implementation of Verité dma by dosbox-rendition.

above readme says that random crashes may happen on older pentium systems. Maybe dosbox is emulating older pentium system.

robertmo3 wrote on 2024-05-16, 19:34:

above readme says that random crashes may happen on older pentium systems. Maybe dosbox is emulating older pentium system.

I wrote the code and I'm not specifically emulating a pentium. On your machine setting dosbox's priorities to lower,lower reduces the risk of crashing. On mine it's higher, higher.

Nascar always crashes because of this. I'm pretty sure it's a bug in my code.

Nascar will pretty much never crash in FIFO mode, if you can put up with the slow mo bits.

btw i was able to force dosbox-rendition crush on 2 cores when lowering cpu MHz to 50% in control panel - power options
the moment i lower mhz - dosbox crushes - may be usefull for debugging i guess
switching from 50% to 100% doesn't crush

cannot reproduce it though

robertmo3 wrote on 2024-05-17, 03:47:

btw i was able to force dosbox-rendition crush on 2 cores when lowering cpu MHz to 50% in control panel - power options
the moment i lower mhz - dosbox crushes - may be usefull for debugging i guess
switching from 50% to 100% doesn't crush

I think dosbox's main thread priority has to be lower than dosbox's rendition threads and dosclient's, It's a thread safety issue. I'm not entirely sure how to fix this.

Still working on it.

robertmo3 wrote on 2024-05-17, 04:09:

cannot reproduce it though

It's a thread safety/locking issue. A structure one thread is reading is updated while it's reading it so bits of it may be read in a halfway state. It may work or it may not work depending on how busy the CPU and its scheduler is.

There're way to prevent that generally. In this case, it's a bit difficult.

Point in time build:
https://1drv.ms/u/c/5277ef8d4f2a9dcf/Eb09ReWc … KCf0PQ?e=wuWjZy
MD5: ffe747fe654f3757eaa7e43de737daba

- Eurofighter should swap more often.
- DMA and FIFO processing is slightly different. They will be reworked along with mem writes in the next release.
- Whiplash no longer has momentary full screen flashes (blue), but does appear to run slower in DMA and FIFO modes.
- DMA related instability is still there. The upcoming mem write and FIFO processing is designed to deal with this.
[EDIT]
- Tomb Raider should be functional again.