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tomahawk51

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  1. OK, long overdue update - but I had some vacation time to dabble and progress. @Pixelpiper - here's an update. Overall, I'm fully moved over to emulating my games on a ShieldTV (new Pro model, as well as the old Pro model). I can play all sorts of systems up to PS1, N64, Dreamcast, Saturn era. I may play with more, but Dolphin isn't exactly smooth in initial testing. I use ArcBrowser and primarily RetroArch. I'm sad to say I don't have reason to keep Launchbox up and running anymore. I don't expect LB on Android to resurrect, but I'm crossing fingers. The Experience of doing this native on the Shield is worlds better/faster/smoother than trying to stream Launchbox/BigBox via Steam - on a Shield or on the dedicated SteamLink box. The app opens quicker, looks better, is super responsive, etc. I've got PS2/3/4 controllers working near natively and very well. It's made such a difference in picking up and enjoying these games by lowering the barrier of patience needed. It's also nice to see the games interleaved on my AndroidTV home page. Furthermore, I love the ShieldTV as a streamer/Plex box anyway. The new model has a truly impressive AI powered upscaling feature (check out videos if you haven't seen it). I'm watching 720/1080p content on my 4k TV and it looks noticeably better now thanks to the Shield. ArcBrowser isn't anywhere near perfect, but after some learning curve I've figured it out. The community isn't as big, and customizations aren't easy/obvious, but it's serving my purposes. I'm pretty much just going to run it stock and not tweak. Maybe that will end up saving me time (at the cost of looking less awesome). Moving forward, I do want to be able to play some specific older PC games. I may still need to use a Steam streaming solution for that on the Shield I guess. I wanted to report back, as this is my personal best experience in many decades of trying to bring casual emulated gaming to my living room after many decades. I'm very thankful for LB and the community around it.
  2. Nudge nudge....make it all work on Docker (says a guy with no appreciation of what it would take)! And for getting the word out, ask SpaceInvaderOne to do a Launchbox on Docker on Unraid video. OK, I had to pitch this. Feel no compulsion to dignify this with a. response. Great work on LB!
  3. Thank you Pixelpiper, Nice to see another Unraid user. I actually wish Launchbox was available as a Docker on Unraid, but I expect I'm a minority in the user base on this. I did find that emulation on Android and on my ShieldTV client was pretty great, and was enjoying the Launchbox Android app and the premise of having a well organized library and UX! I am understanding my options better, and think they are: Option 1 - move away from LB and to just Android apps. I suppose I could continue down the Android emulation road, use Retroarch or Arc Browser (thanks for mentioning this app) and basically leave the Launchbox/Bigbox ecosystem. This would definitely simplify things overall in some ways, and I might even retire a VM as a result. Option 2 - Bolster my emulation on the server w/ a video card, and expect better streaming experience Start the search to figure out a card that fits in whatever slot my "enterprise" motherboard offers, and is a good mix of power/performance/cost. It's been ages since I bought a video card. I'll spend some time debating this further. I may want to play around with Option 1 more to be better informed - as investing in the VM for something I only rarely use might not make as much sense. Thanks for this input and direction!
  4. I never really "finished" or finalized my Launchbox/BigBox setup and I need some help to do so. I've been a user for years and really want to make this easier and more accessible for my kids, and of course me. I'm hoping there's some input out there for me. I was hoping that there would be a client/server approach with the Android development, but I see that LB for Android is dead so I'm moving on. I'm sad, as the ShieldTV was seemingly a great client from my tests. What I've got: Launchbox "server": Big and Heavy (dual Xeon) Unraid server running a Win10 VM that hosts LB. Note: it has NO video card, which is desirable for power savings, but I wonder if that would improve my gaming (I can't emulate N64, etc. currently as it's too slow/choppy). Resides in my basement, not co-located with any TV for playing. At the TV: I have a physical SteamLink that I use to connect to BB on the aforementioned server. It's not really a great experience, kind of choppy to start up and laggy at times. I also have a ShieldTV and have used the SteamLink app with results about the same. I don't want to run a full PC at my TV to play games. I really want a "client" that I can rely on. Should I get an Nvidia Video card and try the "GameStream" on my Shield TV? Are there any other ideas on how I should do this? Does this server-esque setup even make sense? - I hope it can work reliably and easily. Thx for reading.
  5. I saw that Steam Link was on sale at a-zon for $15. So cheap! I have been using 2 in my house to stream Bigbox fron a central computer. It's made using ps3,4 controllers cake, so just wanted to endorse this big box approach fwiw.
  6. Thanks for all the input, sincerely. I started to go through build options, struggled with the balance of a Living Room friendly form factor and the budget for a machine dedicated to playing old school games essentially. Considering the myriad of possible build permutations, knowing I have a pretty powerful server running anyway, and seeing a deal on a Steam Link, I thought I'll at least give that a stab - and postpone a new build. I'll report back, for anyone who could benefit. my cross post on the Steam Link...
  7. I'm using Launchbox on an (Win 19) AMD 350 PC. I'm amazed it works all the way up to SNES, and is actually smooth when in emulation. It's either this PC, or very close http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16856119050. I want to do more emulation (PS1, N64, and whatever I can achieve e.g. Gamecube...), and see much snappier BigBox Performance. I need a new PC, and would love input on what to look for. I use Big Box in a my living room, in a media console. I'll want something small form factor (so no towers, nor am I interested in laptops). I liked the small all encased unit linked above, and note options like this: intel skull canyon i7 . Off topic - I'm starting to play around with Kodi, so it would be nice if this thing could also run that... Innovation opportunity: I also recently established a semi-crazy dual Xeon Unraid server that has PLENTY of head room for running Virtual Machines (got a number of those and Dockers going). It's on this opposite side of the house, in the basement, and running cables to my family room doesn't seem viable (assume I'd need a KVM, right?). If there are any ideas for how I might try to leverage a VM though, something I'm niave to, that would be excellent to try! So, with the requirements of a smallish form factor (and I'm not opposed to BYO), what should I be looking for to achieve the broadest scope of emulation for a reasonable value? I am not interested in being on the bleeding edge of pushing emulation, if it requires a lot of time in tuning/tweaking - this is for kids and neighbors to easily pick up. Should I stay away from the laptop chips? Any PCs I should look at (Nuc, Brix...). I'm overwhelmed, and Black Friday is almost here
  8. I could replace my .bat script with this, so count me as interested in the quit back to explorer option!
  9. FWIW - I've been using the .bat approach at startup, and it does bring BigBox directly into focus - no alt-tabing. I can use my controller to quit from the BigBox interface to go back to Explorer, which is great so I never need to see my keyboard on a good day (updates are an example where that comes out). It's so cool btw to have a dedicated pc that loads up and shuts down so easily. Thanks to Jason/Brad/whoever for those simple improvements to allow Shut Down and Exit, etc.
  10. SentaiBrad said I was thinking more of a way so that it can be launched with a controller from inside BigBox, but I still think if you need to go in to explorer you need a mouse and keyboard, so Ctrl + Shift + Esc and launching Explorer that way works. Thanks again, I can tell you are passionate about the registry approach! Anyway, just for clarity, I do have a very nice wireless all in one Logitech keyboard attached to this PC but the goal is for that thing to (almost) never be needed. But, if it is needed for some reason, I'm very certain I'll have better luck helping my 5 year old and even my wife with an approach that doesn't require knowing to execute a Ctrl + Shift + Esc sequence. I just thought I'd share dimensions of the use case for your benefit. Like I said, I'm now close to utopia on my BigBox experience. I only await a planned update to the SCP Bluetooth Controller software that will remove an annoying Update Not Needed prompt (which does require that keyboard to come out).
  11. SentaiBrad said Actually the Registry way is reversable. It is easy to create two bat files. One to change the registry so that Explorer doesn't load, and if you need to get in to Explorer Ctrl + Shift + Esc, File -> Run New Task. That is if you need back in, to reverse the changes the second bat can change the registry back to what it was, and when you restart Explorer will launch. The method @cejpe created is perfectly viable, but Explorer is still technically launching and just being closed. It is as if you opened Task Manager and closed the explorer process, just automatically. The registry stops explorer from launching all together, but is still reversable. I understand better; thank you. The "Ctrl + Shift + Esc, File -> Run New Task" approach probably isn't too game-controller-only friendly, which is a goal for my dedicated box (i.e. to never require a keyboard/mouse). But, the registry approach may be relevant for me if the enhancement request I just submitted is seen as valuable (i.e. the idea of executing a .bat/whatever from BigBox). Either way, again thanks and I'm very pleased right now with my mildly-lashed-up BigBox solution.
  12. cejpe said I made a batch file that you can place in your startup folder. Upon starting Windows/Logging in it will stop explorer.exe and run BigBox instead. Upon exiting BigBox (if you need to do so) it will start explorer.exe. taskkill /f /im explorer.exe cd C:\<Path to BigBox Directory>\ BigBox.exe start explorer.exe THANK YOU for this simple approach. It is working perfectly for me, and I really appreciate the light weight and quickly reversible approach (vs. the Registry approach which I appreciate has a defensible virtue). With this major victory, I'm only thinking that an ability to shut down the computer from the Big Box interface (controller) would be slick. I'm thinking about the ability to call another .bat file or something. I'll make it a feature suggestion now. Thanks all! Very happy with my setup now, and so is my 5 yr old.
  13. Thank you for this approach suggestion. I very well may look to do this, but will try to research a bit more if there is a more.. native.. way to do this in Windows. It strikes me as odd that it would be hard to do this. I don't suggest that BigBox as an app is missing something, but I wonder if other "launcher" apps like Kodi do not see this happen. It just occurred to me that I could use something like Kodi in my equation (though that would be more overhead and steps than desired). Again, thanks for a very possible solution for me.
  14. I have a dedicated PC running Windows 10 and would like to be able to simply push the power button, let things boot up, and find myself in BigBox's interface. I'd pick up my controller and never touch a mouse / keyboard. I'm so close to that!!! It's all working, except that windows somehow steals back focus (I see the task bar at the bottom of the screen even when bigbox is in the underlined/current app). How can I force BigBox to have full focus / full screen @ startup? Note: I theorized that the SCP Toolkit I use for BT controllers might be stealing focus, which is why I tried a delayed start. I've tried: 1 The standard startup of BigBox in Windows 2 A .bat file to delay startup by 30 seconds (is there a command to force focus instead of just starting the app) 3 Tried WinPatrol, but it didn't seem to launch the program at all at startup. I uninstalled it, as I'd like to keep this wimpy PC as lightweight as possible. In many ways, conquering this is the last step in letting my little kids enjoy aspects of the retro gaming experience. I'm certain there must be a way to conquer this! Help me LB pros, you're my only hope!
  15. SentaiBrad said ... Grab Turbo Engine for these reasons... This is highly valuable guidance for an emulation novice (me) - thanks for this advice. But after a few hours I'm still not there :( . Maybe you can help further? If not I'll take this to the Turbo Engine 16 forum. So, TurboEngine is working well outside of LB but I haven't been able to get it going from LB. I believe that this prompt may be the reason. Everytime I open Turbo Engine 16 (whether from Windows .exe or calling it via Command Prompt), I get this message about CDROM drive. I'm using a pc with no optical drive, and all I care to load are the TurboGrafx16 ROMs (not CDs like .iso/.bin ...). Is there something I can do to supress this prompt, which I assume will help me load from LB? Within the app's config...or a command prompt command? In TurboEngine, I did get a CD ROM bios and associated it in the paths. I also selected CD Image Driver, but it seems not to notice that. I even installed VirtualClone Drive hoping I could trick it (but couldn't). Like I said, I've been researching for hours...but nothing yet seems to help. Given how troublesome TGfx16 is, I wonder how NeoGeo and Arcade will be for me in the future!
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