How to get attract to detect game from cd tray

[mxstar1]

So, my question is, how would i get a game to pop up in a system if i was to insert an actual cd into the cd tray on my pc.

So lets say i bust out my Sonic CD, i pop it in the pc's cd/dvd drive. how could i get attract to recognize the game...without having to scrape?

1. i understand i would need to add the drive path to the cd in the emulator cfg. thats easy, but i dont want to scrape the romlist every time for the game to show up.

i dont care if the title of the game matches any media...just something that shows in the sega CD wheel that a disc/game is present and i can click on it and play it.


Any ideas? Possible/Not possible?

[iOtero]

Are the cd's still being used? 

[keilmillerjr]

I don’t see the point in using a front end if that be the case. You can create an auto hot key script that can eject and load the cd tray/drive and mount it to a drive letter. Then load mame with the rom file on the cd and wait for mame to close to eject and start the process all over again.

But why? Hard disk space is cheap now.

[hermine.potter]

There is a list of game IDs for Sega CD.
But I do not have Sega Mega CD.
Maybe there is a file on CD or CD-Name match to this ID?

[iOtero]

It would not be better to create isos of the cd's and use them? 

[progets]

I would agree that this method is dated... probably obsolete. It could be done using RocketLauncher, creating a script or using "dummy" .txt files that are named the same as your games.

The question is why would you want that setup and is it worth the configuration time vs. converting your CDs/DVDs to files (which would load and play faster and require no physical intervention)?

Check these out to see how most do it today http://forum.attractmode.org/index.php?topic=2290.msg15484#msg15484 and http://forum.attractmode.org/index.php?topic=2307.15

[mxstar1]

The main reason is...just because. Yes making iso's would be easier, and just downloading them would be even easier. It was just a "what if" thought. I feel like it would be a cool idea, just grab an old game cd, toss it in your drive, and have it pop up in the system. I wanted to do it that way as if it was a console. i understand i could manually start the emulator and run the disc, but was just trying to see if it could be done more like a console in the sense that the cd is inserted, click the game and play.

Obviously no one here shares that interest...lol. No biggie guys, just tinkering around, thought i would ask.

[KTURNER]

I kinda like the idea.

[jedione]

if it can just be built in to AM why not.....just makes us stronger.

following suite..    i would submit it. great idea.

[hermine.potter]

@ mxstar1
you didn't ask my answer in post#3.
Is there a file on CD, or the name of inserted CD, thats matching to the game ID?
Check => tell us (I do not have a Sega Mega CD; so I can not test it).

[progets]

AM is a FE (FrontEnd). By definition a FE launches games from a graphical interface. What is described here is not using a FE to launch games but using the CD tray.

I'm not saying it can't be done but AM isn't designed to launch from a CD being inserted. If you really want to use physical CDs the easiest thing to do is to make a romlist that contains the roms and then insert the CD and launch the game by clicking on the game in AM from the romlist like you normally would in a FE.

There are many issues that you would need to overcome to launch from inserting a CD vs. launching from the AM romlist after inserting the CD.
- how will the computer know what platform the CD you inserted needs? (Mega Drive, Dreamcast, Saturn, etc.)
- how will you tell the FE to listen for the OS noticing a new CD has been inserted?
- if you want to play a game that is already in the drive you would need to open and close the drive to run it
- most modern computers don't even use CD/DVD/BR drives anymore
- some systems require very specific model CD/DVD drives to even read the games

I'm not against your idea, but it's not for me. My advice is to buy the actual console if you want it to act like a console or convert the games to files to use them. I have seen some systems that use RFID to do what you're looking for but that seems like a lot of work for an inferior way to play games.

Unless you have mad coding skills, a ton of time, and a wild hair itching you I would advise an alternative method (like using the discs but launching from the AM romlist mentioned above). Emulating is all about moving away from any OEM physical hardware or software so I don't think there are a lot of people trying to take the path you suggest.

P.S. Why even use a FE to launch from a CD being inserted? You could write a script that has a loop to check for a new disc and run an emulator when it sees it. No FE is needed, just the right emulator(s). You would of course need separate scripts or more complex code if you want to be able to launch games from different game systems.