Hi

Is it possible to playback a MAC INP on a PC ???

Is there a conversion program or something?

Thanks

Darren Game Guru

-- Game Guru (virtualinsanity@blueyonder.co.uk), January 24, 2002

Answers

i think it's impossible, although there are exceptions (barry just got a mac recording to playback with mame32). most of the older mac recordings i've seen DONT have a header line in the inp file, similar to how xmame makes inps. But even if you had a converter program that added the header it would still not playback in dos mame. i believe xmame will playback mac recordings but this is from possibly obsolete expereince.

this indeed sucks since it means a lot of people won't be able to playback some good recordings.

-- Chad (churritz@crash.cts.com), January 24, 2002.

All inps are, are a log on the input ports throughout a game (ie: controls and DIP switches). The format is more or less the same across ports, with just a few exceptions. MAME (DOS and Win32 console) and XMAME have 32-byte header, which contains the romset (short name) that it was recorded with. MAME32 adds to it, by including the version number as well. MacMAME, as mentioned, has no header at all. Other MAME ports will see this, and requires the romset to be named (or selected in the case of MAME32). After the header (if there is one), it's just a log of the input ports (40 bytes per frame).

Anyway, the main reason why many non-windows inps won't playback correctly under win32, is because the CPU cores differ. Of course, if all the CPU cores in MAME were perfect, it wouldn't be an issue. But unfortunately they aren't. MAME and MAME32 use ASM 68000 (not 68020), Z80 and 6809 cores, which cannot work under a Mac or a non- x86 based Unix/Linux PC, and the 68000 is used in a fair share of arcade games in MAME.

Basically, it is just trial and error to see if an inp from MacMAME will work with MAME or MAME32 (or whatever).

Anyway, that's enough waffle from me. ;)

-- Barry Rodewald (bsr@hnpl.net), January 24, 2002.