How to update your MAME ROMset to a newer version with CLRmamepro

[CriticalCid]

You can keep it in there but you definitely don’t have to. Clrmamepro copies all needed files from the update packs to your main set during the rebuilding process; your 0.182 set basically became a fully-fledged 0.183 set that doesn't need any update packs in order to work. So if you want to save disk space it’s safe to remove the update pack from the add-on paths and delete the update folder from your hard drive once you’ve successfully updated your ROMset but it also doesn't harm if you prefer to keep it for whatever reason. The choice is yours

[mbrogz3000]

I keep the original romset zip, and all the subsequent romset zip updates in a separate backup folder outside of Launchbox.  It's a bit redundant, and it does consume some capacity, but I don't want to have to download those ever again and storage (hard drive) is very cheap now.  

[spectral]

Is there an easy way to update roms if you dont have a full romset? I only have the roms I am interested in playing as the full set takes up way too much space and mostly with things I have no interest in. I basically have 200 or so roms from the non merged 184 set with the corresponding CHD's where neccessary. I want to update mame to 0.186 but from what I've seen would run into problems with the Qsound file among possibly other things.

[CriticalCid]

Unfortunately not that I'm aware of.

Of course you can still update your set with this methode but you would need to go through your whole collection again and remove all the games that were added by the update process.

[spectral]

Thanks, not what I wanted to hear but good to know. So far everything I've tried which admittedly is not many yet has worked on 0.185. Push comes to shove I'll download 0.184 to match the roms. I usually like keeping things up to date but this seems very much like an if it aint broke dont fix it situation. I checked my Arcade games and they come in just short of 6GB and may even shrink from there once I start playing. It doesn't seem worth the extra 500GB+ for the full set with CHD's or 50GB or so without it would take to easily update.

[Soundtrackgeek]

I get as far as the "new scan" option, then I get this message:

Any ideas?

[CriticalCid]

It looks like that you have included SoftwareLists in your profile and it can’t properly assign the paths to every system. I never used it for SoftwareLists so unfortunately I can’t help you with that.

If you just wanted to update your arcade ROMs than I suggests to start the tutorial all over again from the beginning and choose “no” when the profiler asks you if you want to include SoftwareLists as well.

[retroFuture]

DAMMIT! I was gonna settle for the MAME2014 RetroArch core due to its compatibility with my romset (v0.158) (in spite of the core having annoying quirks.)
Now, thanks to this tutorial, I have no excuse not to update. Arcade emulation has been chewing up hours / months / years of my time and just as I thought I'd had it licked, now I realize I have to do even more work if I want to benefit from the RA MAME core updates.
Thanks for the tutorial

[Shades2585]

Was I supposed to add the CHD in the Add Paths or Roms folder?

Also my CHDs are not zipped but my ROMs are so I can't just copy my CHDs to the ROMs. Am I going to have to Zip all my CHDs? (NOTE: I have the 185 merged set.)

Thanks,

Shades

[spycat]

Hi @Shades2585

CHD files are already compressed and should not be zipped.
Each CHD file for a game should be put in a normal (not zipped) folder named after the game's rom; this is important as some chds have different names to their working roms.
These chd folders can be either added to the folder where you keep your roms or to a separate folder. If you decide to keep the chd folders in a folder other than the roms one then you will need to add the path to the MAME configuration settings file mame.ini so MAME knows about them.

[Saskwatch]

Question about the backup folder:  So I followed the guide for the purpose of converting a 185 romset to 188.  When I did the first scan, it backed up 25,120 items.  Since, include the backup folder in the add-path, it looks like it put those items back into my source folder when I used the rebuilder.  Is this how it is supposed to work?  Did the 185 stuff overwrite whatever 188 was supposed to look like?  I hope I articulated the question well.

[CriticalCid]

Yes that’s completely normal and the reason why you have to add the Backup folder as Add-Path in the first place. The scanner does remove absolutely everything that is not 100% correct in the source folder. Besides outdated files that can also mean files that were simply renamed or moved around in the newer MAME version. The rebuilder will automatically fix/update these files and put them back to the source folder.

[cedron]

Thanks for the detailed instructions how to use CLRMAMEPRO. This helped me out a lot.

After I do the update, do I need to update the Launchbox program somehow? How do I get new and fixed ROMs into Launchbox without manually adding each file after an update?

[MapleLeaf]

Anyway to put the tutorial images back in the OP? They aren't loading. Not sure if it's my browser or the images/links are broken.

[DOS76]

unfortunately this was before the forums were switched to a new engine and the images didn't come over with the text part.

[CriticalCid]

Actually I've replaced them after the forum switch and they were working the last time I checked. No clue what happened here.

[MapleLeaf]

Would it be possible for you guys to create a clrmamepro tutorial video for your YouTube channel? The quality of your tutorial videos is usually excellent. 

Since updating sets is a fairly in-depth process involving many steps, I'm surprised that I don't see one on your channel at all. Written tutorials of this scope are a bit intimidating due to the sheer number of steps involved and lets be honest, I don't think most people are jumping for joy over playing Tiger Handheld and Big Buck Hunter arcade. Video tutorials are simply easier to follow. 

Updating is a daunting task; questions do arise and things CAN go wrong. A younger generation will have to carry the torch eventually and I don't see a lot of younger people getting involved with MAME because It's complicated. Just my 2c.
Also, maybe use .dat file/creating a .dat file instead of using mame.exe would be good.

 

[DOS76]

I don't know if @ETAPRIME would be willing to undertake that on his own but really it isn't all that relevant to the program itself so I don't know if it is something that the official tutorial channel would cover.

[Replay]

A ClrMAMEPro isn't really necessary as almost everyone and their grandma knows where to get full sets that are marked [FREE]

 

You can avoid the software entirely by downloading the latest set over your old set then remove what isn't needed with TorrentCheck that's on their forums.

[Chris Kant]

Funny, I absolutely avoid the use of any torrents. And I cannot find any current uptodate  one click Hoster sources for mame.