Headrush69

If you start MAME with the -v option using either Power Shell or Command Prompt are the devices show there? Should see something like this:

I don't use MAME in Retroarch, I just find it adds another layer of complexity I don't need and it doesn't really add anything. (MAME does bezels and has HLSL for shading). I have a lot of different input devices on my cabinet and standalone MAME just handles it easier and can do things like split inputs between devices for a single game which is incredibly handy for some games. (For example, on racing games I can use my steering wheel, but use the LED buttons on the cabinet still for things like view buttons in Daytona games. Another example is using my spinner and flight stick at the same time for Tron.) MAME is always a moving target and you'll have to match your rom set with your MAME version, there is no best version. The nice thing about using the 2003-plus core in Retroarch is the rom set is fairly static and even though it's based on a much older mame source base, games in the set work well and you probably won't notice changes that newer versions may have. (Sometimes improvements MAME aren't always on screen noticeable, which is most important to the majority of end users.) Bottom line, if you you want to use MAME in Retroarch, I'd stick to 2003-plus and the latest core, don't mess with 2000, 2010 etc.

Agreed and I think you'll find a default value for spinners isn't as helpful as you would think. The values are incredibly different between games. (That's if you're trying to get realistic values to the original machines)

Retroarch github has dat files but they are more useful for using the internal Retroarch database, not necessarily for what works. Retroarch DAT files

I think there is some confusion about what exactly you want to do. My guess: Romcenter allows playing games directly and you want to use have it use Retroarch directly from there?

For the basis of my cabinet I bought a used i3-7100 system for $300 Canadian. I upgraded the motherboard and GPU to a Nvidia 970 GTX for about $200. No problems handling emulation up to the Nintendo switch emulator Yuzu, and newer titles through Teknoparrot as well. You don’t have to break the bank, especially if your happy with latest consoles for newer titles. I probably spent more on constantly changing joysticks, buttons, etc than the underlying hardware.

All the CHD games have a corresponding rom as well. You start the rom not the CHD file. Make sure you have started Demul manually, and and set the location where your CHDs are stored. It's easiest just to store them in the same folder as the roms, but you can use different directories.

I use RL less and less all the time and I've been able to learn and take some parts from RL's AHK scripts and incorporate them into LB. Sometimes it's just simpler to let RL fill a void when someone else has a working solution and you don't want to invest a lot of time doing the same thing in LB. Like everything, RL is a tool and serves a purpose, but other than some more advanced uses, I think some of those features are beyond a lot of users anyways.

You should only have to set up your iPac once. The keys get mapped to a virtual RetroPad that is similar to an XBOX controller. So all cores think that a controller is attached. If you have a core/directory or game you want to change the controls, you make the changes within Retroarch and save a remap that will be applied automatically. Manually changing configs for this is just making it a more complicated procedure. For any bezel that has a reduced screen size, you will have to manually adjust the video parameters.

I don't know if game pad mode is easier. At least when it comes to Retroarch, if you have other XInput devices as well, I find keyboard mode allows both to be used simultaneously. Not sure what you mean by down + l key? Is that a lowercase L or uppercase i? Did you switch to game pad mode? You shouldn't be getting keyboard characters if you are in the proper mode. Usually if I get a "blip" like that, properly resetting the iPac by unplugging usually fixes it. If not a re-flash and proper reset always fixed my issues.

Ditto. I only keep games I played in my youth and popular ones for each mainstream platform. I find there are diminishing returns for having huge collections on my arcade cabinet. People spend more time looking and searching rather than playing. If a friends ask for a specific rom for a specific system, I will add it then.

Guess I got the view name mixed up. Yes I meant from within the Game view, and then into the Game detail view. What a doh moment. I disabled that option but didn't look careful enough to the wording. It's Skip the game details screen, so actually enable that option to disable that screen. ? I don't know if this is a design decision but it if you have a key mapping for exit in BB, the options in Security to not allow exiting, only seem to apply to using the menu to exit, key map still exits. So if you're clamping down your cabinet, don't miss that option.

Is it possible in BB to only allow game starting within a platform view by using the Play key mapping only, and disable users going into the Game detail view and selecting play from within? (Looking for either GUI options or editing theme XML files.)

FYI, if you set a longer time for the LB startup screen to stay on screen, you can hide the TeknoParrot game running screen completely. As soon as the game in TeknoParrot goes into exclusive full screen mode, the LB startup screen will end.

I would suggest installing a second copy of Retroarch somewhere and running the same game from there. (Don't change any settings) If it works fine there, we know it's not Retroarch itself but a settings somewhere and we can work from there.

Best to stick to 1 when diagnosing. I wondered why our settings were different, I'm using GLcore video driver. A couple suggestions, try changing CD to preloaded, eliminated disc reading as an issue. Also disable GTE overloading for now. Do you have any shaders enabled? Maybe also trying running the Mednefan standalone, and help determine if it's Retroarch specific or not.

Are you using the Vulkan video driver by chance?

Were you setting the default.cfg read only or the game specific cfg read only? Game specific cfgs will override the default.cfg

Are you cores up to date? My config items are different. If you have Retroarch 1.8.4, it now has built in core updating.

As Neil9000 said there is no correlation between LB and the emulators when it comes to controllers. (I assume when you say works in LB, what you mean is Dolphinbar controls worked in Dolphin emu when launched from LB)

Sounds like it was the wrong file then as that can't be possible. MAME standalone uses the default.cfg in the cfg folder, not the root MAME folder. If you are using Retroarch, that changes everything. I only use standalone MAME because it has much better multi device handling. The only advantage for me with Retroarch MAME core would be shaders, but I use Lordmonkus HLSL settings which I am happy with.

Yes the software core does up scaling of internal resolution which does help graphic fidelity. SilverDragon81, maybe post the options you have set for the core. Seems your spec should be able to handle either PSX core fine. Edit: You could start the Task Manager and switch to the performance tab and see your CPU utilization as you run PSX and that might help narrow down where the bottleneck is. (If you right click the graphin task manager you can switch to a per logical core view)

By chance are you controllers dynamic? (Can be unplugged sometimes) If so, MAME erases mappings for controllers that aren't attached. The simplest solution is once you set your mappings up, make the file read-only.

Which exact Vice64 are you using? There are a ton of different versions. I use the Retroarch Vice64 core almost exclusively and it has work well.

Since Neatmouse has several key options for enabling, why not just set it to run at startup, and than in WiniPac set a shift key to one of those activation keys? I don't use Neatmouse myself, but I'm guessing you will need to set fairly high acceleration if available to make using a joystick instead of a mouse feel somewhat decent.