Local Cache for Network Storage of ROMs

[Dayle Rees]

Hi all,

I'm curious if this already exists in any form, otherwise I'd be tempted to build it. Basically a local cache for roms accessed via NAS, it would function as follows:

1. Launch emulator by prefixing with a wrapper script, for example, something like:

/path/to/cacher.exe /path/to/emulator.exe --with --various --switches %ROM%

2. The caching script checks the cache location to see if the rom already exists. If it does, it loads loads the rom from there.
3. If it doesn't exist in the cache, it copies the rom to the cache, and then launches it from there.
4. Finally some kind of interval clean up to empty the cache after a duration (optional).

 

The primary purpose for this would be read performance. Loading roms over a network is slow. The first read would be slow in this case, and anything subsequent would be a lot faster. The second reason is to reduce stress on the NAS, which is likely full of crunchy plate drives.

I'd be surprised if this doesn't already exist? But if anyone else would find it useful, then I'd be happy to build it. Seems easy enough!

Thanks,

D.

[lones710]

Any news on this? This is exactly what I need.

[fraganator]

I wrote a plugin called Archive Cache Manager for (almost) this exact purpose. It will store the contents of zipped roms in a cache folder, then load them directly from the cache rather than decompressing the zip every time. In my case I have roms on a file server, so the network copy time plus the decompression time can be slow. Once the roms are in the cache, load times are generally under a second or two.

FYI the current plugin version is incompatible with the latest LaunchBox, but a new version of the plugin will be available very soon. More info here.