Bulk change ROM path's

[Retro808]

5 hours ago, damageinc86 said:

Just used this to update my arcade roms path and it said that 7 of the files selected do not exist in the new directory so i selected don't update those but update the rest.  Is there a way to find out which 7 games it didn't find in the new path?

Click on the arcade platform and run >Tools>Audit Arcade. When it is done sort the rom path column and you will see which ones are different.

[earthprime]

This thread is perfect, as I want to upgrade my drive (buy a larger one) and change the drive path from D to something like M.

Do you guys have any guidance on what drive letter you use?  I've figured that D is already taken on most PCs, so for future use I'm considering re-assign it something way out there, like 'M'.

Has anyone out there successfully changed the drive letter and not destroyed their LB installation?

[mickbench]

On 4/27/2017 at 6:36 AM, Lordmonkus said:

There is no bulk edit rom path feature in Launchbox yet though it is something I have been asking Jason for a while.

The easiest ways right now is to either remove your games from LB and re-import them or use a text editor like Notepad++ to "find and replace" the path in the platform.xml, this is the way I did it when I moved my roms before.

If you do the re-import you can turn off the data and image scraping in the import wizard to speed it up.

Know this is an old thread but MANY thanks for this, moved Launchbox to a new drive and this tip was an absolute live saver for me .... Saved me hours of work. Much appreciated. Made updating thousands of roms so much easier.  

[neil9000]

6 minutes ago, mickbench said:

Know this is an old thread but MANY thanks for this, moved Launchbox to a new drive and this tip was an absolute live saver for me .... Saved me hours of work. Much appreciated. Made updating thousands of roms so much easier.  

You can do it per platform in the UI. Tools/change rom path for selected games.

[mickbench]

49 minutes ago, neil9000 said:

You can do it per platform in the UI. Tools/change rom path for selected games.

Ha - hadn't noticed this till you pointed it out, obvious once you see it. 

[mtib]

Regarding this subject, to make it clear, Roms whose are inside a subfolder with the same name will the changing not work, right?

 

[adamtoth]

I'm trying to change the ROM folder path for my MAME Arcade platform using this Change ROM Path method, but I'm getting a message that 330 files do not exist in the selected folder. The original ROMS folder and the new ROMS folder are identical copies of each other, with the same exact numbers of files, so no differences. Why would it not see all the files?

I've got my roms stored locally on D:\Games\Roms\Mame, and imported them into Launchbox as a MAME full set, and left them in their original location. I also chose to skip importing adult, gambling, Playchoice, etc games, and chose the option to combine similar games.

Now I'd like to just repoint all these games to the Roms folder on my NAS server: \\HOMESERVER\GAMES\ROMS\MAME.

The local and network folder have an identical number of files, basically a full 0.193 MAME split rom set.

When I select all the imported games in the Arcade platform in LaunchBox and choose Tools > Change ROMS folder path for selected games, it gives me the warning that 330 games are not in the new folder. Why would that be? Is it because my games are combined? Do I need to expand all the combined games first?

 

[BLite]

Okay, this is a bit ridiculous.

I tried the tool in the UI.  Sometimes it hangs, but it never seems to fully update the path to my arcade ROMs (yes, I select them.  If I edit them manually, it works).  

Sure would be easy if I could open the Arcade.xml file, as described here, do a find and replace, and fix it.  I do that, save the file (re-open to verify), then, the next time I open LaunchBox, BOOM, the original path is back for the majority of the files. Clearly something is cached or some other database is at work SOMEWHERE.

Instead of just saying "use the UI", does someone have any idea where LaunchBox is getting the original path?!  I just want to change a single friggin' string.  It shouldn't be that hard.

[Retro808]

48 minutes ago, BLite said:

Okay, this is a bit ridiculous.

I tried the tool in the UI.  Sometimes it hangs, but it never seems to fully update the path to my arcade ROMs (yes, I select them.  If I edit them manually, it works).  

Sure would be easy if I could open the Arcade.xml file, as described here, do a find and replace, and fix it.  I do that, save the file (re-open to verify), then, the next time I open LaunchBox, BOOM, the original path is back for the majority of the files. Clearly something is cached or some other database is at work SOMEWHERE.

Instead of just saying "use the UI", does someone have any idea where LaunchBox is getting the original path?!  I just want to change a single friggin' string.  It shouldn't be that hard.

Its not that hard, the steps mentioned work.

When you edit the xaml is LB open at the same time?

[BLite]

Just now, Retro808 said:

When you edit the xaml is LB open at the same time?

Nope, definitely not.  I feel like I'm going mad.  

Decided to just remove and re-import. Pooh.

[Retro808]

2 minutes ago, BLite said:

Nope, definitely not.  I feel like I'm going mad.  

Decided to just remove and re-import. Pooh.

You have something going on then. I just tested 5 platforms without issue.

In that \Data\Platform folder with all your platform xml files do you by chance have any backups of those platform xml files stored?

[BLite]

19 minutes ago, Retro808 said:

You have something going on then. I just tested 5 platforms without issue.

In that \Data\Platform folder with all your platform xml files do you by chance have any backups of those platform xml files stored?

I did make a backup of the Arcade.xml prior to making my edits... and left it in Platforms (don't recall what it was named as I've blown it all away now).  If it was reading from that, I'm gonna go have a little cry.

 

[Retro808]

If you were editing the Arcade.xml and had a backup of it in the same folder that was the issue. Backups of those xaml files should not be kept in the \Data\Platform folder. LB will try to read it as well. 
 

[BLite]

2 hours ago, Retro808 said:

If you were editing the Arcade.xml and had a backup of it in the same folder that was the issue. Backups of those xaml files should not be kept in the \Data\Platform folder. LB will try to read it as well. 
 

Ah... good to know. Thank you!

[EMH]

On 4/14/2020 at 1:20 AM, damageinc86 said:

Just used this to update my arcade roms path and it said that 7 of the files selected do not exist in the new directory so i selected don't update those but update the rest.  Is there a way to find out which 7 games it didn't find in the new path?

Same issue for me. When I change ROM paths in bulk there's always files that appear to not exist (even though it's exactly the same ROM folder I used for the original import). My OCD makes me just reimport everything

Edited September 7, 2020 by EMH
spelling mistake

[Ingabagovinanana]

That is my motto, when in doubt, re-import....  I think that has gotten me into a lot of trouble, and I have spent way too many hours doing that, just to mess things up even more.   I had everything working then I added a couple SSD drives for more storage and hopefully to speed things up a bit, and tried to emulate what I had done in the beginning and had to delete everything and start all over (which I have done a few times).  Now I am tempted to do that again because I have run into more problems. Specifically with 3DO Roms, emulation, and set up.  

When importing 3DO, I decided not to use RetroArch because that gave me nothing but problems before and 4DO emulator was not a choice anymore in Retroarch, so I tried to use it outside of retro-arch. It almost worked but I had to point to the bios every time I opened up a game, and then it would say there was no CD, as if I was just turning on the Console with out a game.  So I decided to change the emulator back to retroarch and use 3DO-opera, Moved some things around to make space, reimported a few times and the 3DO games said the rom did not exist.   

I then decided to unzip them and see if that worked, it did not. So, I did what I always do, deleted and tried to reimport, then they didn't even say Rom did not exist, I get absolutely nothing... So, I started over again, I accidentally reimported them into ALL platform.   So now I have two ALL platforms, with all my games and no 3DO platform.  I tried to play a 3DO game anyways and still, no dice.... I am worse off than I was before.  Any suggestions on how to fix this before I just delete everything and start from scratch again?  Please be gentle, I am not very familiar with all the subfolders and xml folders, etc, and think if I learned that, I would not have to start over every time.  I bit off a little more than I can chew with this COVID project.  Any help is appreciated.

The Noobiest Noob ever,

Ingabagovinanana

[Retro808]

@Ingabagovinanana Setting aside all the imports, deletions, reimports and now games in a second All platform let's start from what should always be step 1 when you plan to add games/platforms to Launchbox.

Do your 3DO games work directly in the emulator you want to use? This should always be the first thing you do. Set the emulator up by itself and test the games. Some might disagree with that logic saying LB is user friendly enough to not need to do that. In over 3 years of using LB and doing it this way it has never failed me and has made it easy to know I messed up a LB setting.

I know many tutorials start by importing the games to LB, adding the emulator, then finishing the set-up. If users would set up the emulator and test the games directly in the emulator first it would mitigate some of the "my games do not work" issues. At best, for troubleshooting it would eliminate it being an emulator/rom issue.

Also, I would always recommend trying to fix directly in the LB UI first before messing in the xml.

[Ingabagovinanana]

Thanks for the quick reply.  I definitely should have checked on that first, but it is a bit confusing on whether I should check using the core in retroarch or the emulator itself.  I guess I should try both by working backwards? In the tutorial they made it seem like using the 3DO, emulator is hard to do or daunting to get working, but maybe 3DO-opera is easier.  I figured I wouldn't get that working either.  I'll try that out and let you know.

Edited September 11, 2020 by Ingabagovinanana

[Retro808]

2 hours ago, Ingabagovinanana said:

Thanks for the quick reply.  I definitely should have checked on that first, but it is a bit confusing on whether I should check using the core in retroarch or the emulator itself.  I guess I should try both by working backwards? In the tutorial they made it seem like using the 3DO, emulator is hard to do or daunting to get working, but maybe 3DO-opera is easier.  I figured I wouldn't get that working either.  I'll try that out and let you know.

I do not emulate 3DO so I cannot say what to sue. I recommend trying whatever emulator you can. Set it up, set your controls, test some games. If you get the emulator set up and games work inside it, LB is next. LB does not care what emulator you use. So getting the emulator and games working first takes care of the biggest hassle.

[Ingabagovinanana]

Retro808,

Alright, I did some testing.  I still have the 4DO emulator, there are two files in 3DO roms, .bin and .cue.  When you start the emulator it uses the .cue, which really just turns on the emulated console, then you have to pick the game by choosing the .bin file..(or it could be the other way around; .bin and .cue) 4DO gives you that choice under file at the top of the screen.  All games work perfectly.  

I tried to use Retroarch and I think I have a setting messed up because the frame rate is wrong, and I cannot find the setting for FPS.  I think I might have changed something because I was looking for the option to show FPS during game play and they moved that option somewhere... Even in the UI, makes me feel like if I had epilepsy, I would have a seizure, and that is how the games play as well, then there was a pop up saying it was playing at 24 fps in one of the games, which makes sense.  I can't find the setting. Now all I want to do is change it back to default and I can't find any information on that anywhere.   

So the games do work on both emulators, based on my input above 4DO seems better...  Either way nothing happens when I click on the games in LB.   

 

Edited September 11, 2020 by Ingabagovinanana