Crush

I had similar problems with my Ultrasticks drifting with various emulators and games. With some of them increasing the joystick deadzone helped.

Got a crash with v13 when updating the game ratings from the database.

12.10 final release (free version) crashes when selecting Manage Launchbox Themes...

Found it!

Is there an option to disable automatic Retroarch updates? I don't want to mess my carefully setup Retroarch.

Eye candy is nice, but not at the expense of functionality (with more memory consumed, slower scrolling, e.t.c). That's just my personal opinion of course, others may prefer more eye candy over functionality. The old default is much more practical and responsive for my configuration - i don't care for blurred backgrounds or smooth corners on images for example, i want to be able to find and launch a game quickly...

Win 10 are a resource hog! Avoid them since your specs are low. For as long as LB supports Win7 you can use it. Later you can upgrade to Win10 if there's no other option. If a Linux version of LB ever comes out you can ditch Win entirely...

Upgrade from 1.7.7 to 1.7.8 went fine. I only had to re-apply the shaders using the new save option because video_shader is removed from the config files.

Visual Pinball doesn't need anything special to add it to Launchbox... The command-line parameters are: -minimized /exit /play

Correct! You can use the 8 buttons for normal play, define a shift button and use this with the normal 7 buttons for secondary functions like Insert Coin, Player 1 Start, OK, Cancel, TAB, F2. With just one Ultrastick i can play any MAME game requiring a single joystick and also access the TAB/F2 menu and change settings with no need of a keyboard.

You don't need an extra encoder as Ultrastick has an encoder attached at the bottom which can drive up to 8 arcade buttons. You can define one of the buttons as a modifier key so by keeping it pressed the other buttons can execute different actions. So in practice you have 15 different button actions from a single Ultrastick. Ultrasticks connect directly to a USB port.

Ultrasticks are arcade quality magnetic analog joysticks (no touching parts so there's minimal wear). They come with a soft or hard spring around the stick and that provides resistance as you move it around. You can also add an octagonal restrictor at the base if you want to "feel" the directions. I use hard springs and circular restrictors as i also use them as pure analog sticks. Here's a controller i made a few years ago using an Ultrastick joystick (for left or right handed players):

The nice thing with Ultrasticks is that they are auto-configurable in MAME, so they change to correct mode (4-way, 4-way diagonal, 8-way, ..) when you load a rom.

Here's my layered .psd with images for many consoles using a PS4 controller. Feel free to modify as you wish! I leave the background transparent and i display the controller image as a Retroarch overlay when i press the pause button on the controller (using an Autohotkey script). PS4_Controller.7z

The trackball is recognized as a mouse device and the joysticks as a keyboard device.