philexile Posted January 3, 2019 Share Posted January 3, 2019 Hello, I'm a new user of LaunchBox/Big Box and I've come across an issue. The sound in the frontend's menu works great, but when I launch a game in GroovyMame .205 there isn't any sound. I have Portaudio enabled and I have a feeling that this is causing the issue. Portaudio needs to be the only sound device running to work properly. Here is the code from my Mame INI: # OSD SOUND OPTIONS # sound portaudio audio_latency 1 # # PORTAUDIO OPTIONS # pa_api "Windows WDM-KS" pa_device "Speakers (Realtek(R) Audio)" pa_latency 0.00075 Could you please advise? Thank you Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neil9000 Posted January 3, 2019 Share Posted January 3, 2019 4 minutes ago, philexile said: Hello, I'm a new user of LaunchBox/Big Box and I've come across an issue. The sound in the frontend's menu works great, but when I launch a game in GroovyMame .205 there isn't any sound. I have Portaudio enabled and I have a feeling that this is causing the issue. Portaudio needs to be the only sound device running to work properly. Here is the code from my Mame INI: # OSD SOUND OPTIONS # sound portaudio audio_latency 1 # # PORTAUDIO OPTIONS # pa_api "Windows WDM-KS" pa_device "Speakers (Realtek(R) Audio)" pa_latency 0.00075 Could you please advise? Thank you Ill tag @Lordmonkus here as i know he uses Groovy MAME himself, may be two or three hours until he is around to answer though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
philexile Posted January 3, 2019 Author Share Posted January 3, 2019 Thank you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cyborc Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Hi Phil, I'm having the same issue. Groovymame (when launched via bigbox) has sound with portaudio when using WASAPI, but not WDM-KS. Ideally I'd rather use WDM-KS because it's lower latency, but WASAPI isn't too far behind. On my setup, WASAPi is about 3ms and WDM-KS is 2ms. Probably not even enough for the human ear to notice but you know how OCD us groovymame users are! ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lordmonkus Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I just spent some time with this trying out the settings posted here and the settings I have posted in my Mame Tutorial: # OSD SOUND OPTIONS # sound portaudio audio_latency 1 # # PORTAUDIO OPTIONS # pa_api "Windows WASAPI" pa_device default pa_latency 0.003334 I had very weird and mixed results. With the settings posted here by @philexile but changing the pa_device to default worked at first but then stopped working. I also tried my settings posted here and it also worked at first but then stopped working. What I get happening is a weird high pitch garbled screeching sound, not fun to listen to so it is trying to make sound. Both settings also stopped working when launching from just the command line outside of Launchbox with Launcbox closed. I really don't know what is going on here. I don't use port audio generally because I like to listen to other sounds from my computer while playing like music or talking to friends in discord while playing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
philexile Posted January 5, 2019 Author Share Posted January 5, 2019 (edited) Hello, I was able to restore the sound by switching to WASAPI instead of WDM-KS. The garbled sound you experienced means that your computer can't handle that low of a setting. If you pushed it up to a higher value, it would work. You just have to experiment. LordMonkus, what kind of computer are you using? Ideally, we'd be able to use WDM-KS. I have a feeling the issue is with the video previews in Launchbox. Would there be a way to add a line of code to Launchbox that tells it to "kill" any audio before launching a game? I think that this would fix the issue. Thank you! Edited January 5, 2019 by philexile Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lordmonkus Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I am using an AMD Ryzen 2700X but I was able to run Port Audio perfectly fine with the settings I posted on my old PC which was an AMD 8350 which is of course slower. 14 minutes ago, philexile said: Would there be a way to add a line of code to Launchbox that tells it to "kill" any audio before launching a game? I think that this would fix the issue. While I won't say this wouldn't work but I had troubles even with everything else closed down (including LB) and running just GroovyMame through the command line. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
philexile Posted January 5, 2019 Author Share Posted January 5, 2019 (edited) I built an i9 9900k to be able to push Groovymame to the limits. Even with that sort of CPU, some games can only run with frame_delay set to 7 or 8 – like Out Run for example. That PC is pretty good, it's odd there is an issue. Edited January 5, 2019 by philexile Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lordmonkus Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Ok, doing some more testing and Port Audio with both WASAPI and Windows WDM-KS they both work through LB with a pa_latency setting of 0.02, going any lower than that resulted in messed up sound. I don't use preview videos in my LB setup to test whether or not that causes any issues at all. I also don't use any frame delay in my setup because I have a G-Sync display but I would imagine using Port Audio with a really low latency setting combined with frame delay would be quite a demanding load on a CPU. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cyborc Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Here are my findings: Using Lord Monkus' pa_latency setting, I still had no sound with WDM-KS. I renamed all of my video folders so launchbox wouldn't play any videos, and also disabled all sound in bigbox, but there's still no sound with WDM-KS. WASAPI works fine though. According to logs WASAPI is 3.33ms latency on my setup and WDM-KS is 2.00ms latency. I tested back and forth with both outside of launchbox by launching mame via the command line and I couldn't tell the difference so I'm okay with using WASAPI unless this issue is figured out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BuckoA51 Posted July 9, 2020 Share Posted July 9, 2020 Sorry to necro-bump this but did anyone find a solution? Seems a bit odd that Bigbox should interfere with an emulator like this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BuckoA51 Posted January 11, 2021 Share Posted January 11, 2021 Bumping this again because it's still an issue on my machine and I'm a paid premium user. I'm not able to use WASAPI sound on my Groovymame box. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lordmonkus Posted January 11, 2021 Share Posted January 11, 2021 I just tested it here in my setup and there is no problem with sound at all. I don't use any videos fancy themes with extra sounds though so maybe that could be an issue. I just use a very basic theme (Fundamental Dark) and the basic sound effects in BB. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BuckoA51 Posted August 6, 2022 Share Posted August 6, 2022 All these years and I still haven't been able to solve this issue, default theme in Bigbox... launch game with Groovymame and PortAudio = silence. Launch same game with Launchbox and it's fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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