Concerning the survey, It might have been good to replace some of the absolute choices with ranges. For example, “Display sizes” and “How long have you been using HSM Mega Bezel Reflection Shader”. I use 55" & 40" TVs so it was a bit confusing as to how I should answer. I just chose 65" & 48" since they seemed to be the closest answers. Also, I’ve been using HSM Mega Bezel Reflection Shader for about 10-11 Months so I chose 1 year since I felt like that was the closest valid response.
Hey… Sorry for the delay. I just sent you the log file via email 
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Hey, I just discovered this amazing project due to the post on libretro.com. Wow!!
Just one question, is it normal that these shaders take about 35-45 seconds to load? This happens on my laptop (glcore) as well as desktop (vulkan), both are powerful gaming PCs (RTX 2070 on the laptop, 1080 Ti on desktop).
I have a log, but there’s no button here to attach it. I put it on pastebin: https://pastebin.com/YnVVi90x
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So they should not be taking that long to load. The first time a shader loads it gets cached, so it should load faster the next time.
After I’ve loaded the shader once on my machine which is a desktop with a RTX 2060 The next time I load it it loads in maybe 5 seconds.
I’ll take a look at the log to see if there’s anything in there which might point to the problem.
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Can you tell us a little more about these systems you’re attempting to run RetroArch on please?
What OS, What version of RetroArch, what graphics driver?
How much RAM? Are you loading from an SSD, mechanical hard drive, flash drive or network location?
Did you follow all setup instructions to a tee?
You can try to setup a separate clean install if you want to rule out something in your existing RetroArch configuration.
By the way, are you trying to run the Windows version of RetroArch in Linux or are you using the native Linux version? Why are you running GLCore instead of Vulkan?
You might have to double check that the config file is saved when you change it to Vulkan.
Edit!:
Perhaps this has something and his long load times are related.
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Mega Bezel is updated to V 1.0.002 2022-07-14 Rev 1
- Fixed Resolution Printing to show even integers when scaling should be at integer scale
- Fixed Frame Color so it always uses it’s own noise amount
- Added Ambient 2 image
- Ambient Image now has a contrast option to reduce or increase contrast
- Guest Updated to crt-guest-advanced-2022-07-02-release3
- Now with new halation brightness and black level controls
HERE ARE THE LINKS!
INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS
-
You MUST use Retroarch Version 1.9.8 or Later (It will fail to load on earlier versions)
- If you have a previous Mega Bezel install:
- Delete the old Mega Bezel from shaders/shaders_slang/bezel
- Inside the .zip is a bezel folder, copy the bezel folder into your Retroarch/shaders/shaders_slang folder
- The final path to the Mega bezel should be
Retroarch/shaders/shaders_slang/bezel/Mega_Bezel - The final path to the examples should be
Retroarch/shaders/Mega_Bezel_Community_Collections/HSM_Mega_Bezel_Examples
- The final path to the Mega bezel should be
- Set video driver to Vulcan
- It will run in GLCore but seems faster in Vulcan
- D3D IS NOT RECOMMENDED. If it loads in D3D it has a VERY slow load time
- Restart Retroarch after changing the video driver
- Open the Settings Menu and Set:
- User Interface / Show Advanced Settings to ON
-
Video / Scaling / Aspect Ratio to Full
- This will match your monitor aspect aspect ratio
- Video / Scaling / Integer Scale to OFF
- Video / Output / Video Rotation to Normal
- Core / Allow Rotation to OFF – Important for FB Neo
- Do this before loading content
-
Load a preset in the shaders menu, Mega Bezel shader presets are found in:
shaders/shaders_slang/bezel/Mega_Bezel/Presets
- When you save a preset make sure you have the Simple Presets feature set to ON
- This will save a preset with a reference to the preset you loaded plus whatever parameter changes you made
- This will keep your presets loading properly when the shader updates in the future
- If you have a previous Mega Bezel install:
Vertical Guest preset with fixed Mask Halation
Standard Night Lighting:
2nd Night Lighting image applied to Bezel & Frame
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Thanks for following up, and sorry for not including that info right off the bat. On my desktop PC, Vulkan works, but Vulkan is broken on my laptop. You found my post here about it, and I also posted on Linux Mint forums and Nvidia’s forums.
My desktop PC: https://termbin.com/erg7 Linux Mint 20.2, i7-4790k, 32 GB RAM, SSD, GTX 1080 Ti
My laptop PC: https://termbin.com/uuga Linux Mint 20.2, i7-9700, 32 GB RAM, M.2 SSD, RTX 2070
RA native Linux version from PPA. Graphics driver: 510, not the latest 515, which doesn’t work on Linux Mint 20.2 (see here).
I’m definitely gonna try with a clean install and report back.
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Completely purged RetroArch from my desktop, reinstalled from scratch, made no custom settings at all, followed the installation instructions to the letter and ran a game on Vulkan. Takes about 25 seconds to load the MBZ__0__SMOOTH-ADV-GLASS.slangp shader preset, and 15 seconds for MBZ__5__POTATO.slangp.
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Does it take the same amount of time the second time you load the glass preset?
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Oops, I wrote the wrong thing above. I didn’t load the glass preset for my reply above, but MBZ__0__SMOOTH-ADV.slangp. So that took ~25 seconds.
I just tried both MBZ__0__SMOOTH-ADV.slangp and MBZ__0__SMOOTH-ADV-GLASS.slangp twice in a row each, looking at the exact timings.
- MBZ__0__SMOOTH-ADV-GLASS.slangp: 19 seconds both times
- MBZ__0__SMOOTH-ADV.slangp: 23 seconds both times
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Give that modern CPUs also take a few seconds, 19 - 23 seconds and 15 seconds for potato to load for an i7-4790K may not seem all that abnormal.
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Strange; I only encountered these issues myself when I used DirectX and Mega Bezel.
It doesn’t take me more than 5 secs to load the current presets.
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So on my RTX 2060 & Intel i7-9700 3ghz for the MBZ__0__SMOOTH-ADV.slangp preset the first time I loaded it it took 17 seconds, then the second time it 4-5 seconds.
So I’m not sure why your loading is consistently so slow…
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To be honest, I’m happy to live with it. 20ish seconds isn’t awesome, but it’s not the end of the world, especially considering the awesomeness of the shaders.
Linux Mint 21 is coming out in two weeks or so and I’ll reformat both my PCs then. Who knows, perhaps the system refresh will kick something loose and it’ll work better.
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Can I update to this version using the Online Updater?
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Not yet, I haven’t updated the repo yet, I thought I would have it here for a day or two, just in case there are any bugs reported with the new version.
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That makes perfect sense!
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Hello everybody 
I haven’t updated my package yet. Which parameters of each layer does this option allow to control?
Sorry to say this but I’ve noticed a regression between
0.9.107 2022-04-17 Rev 1
and
1.0.002 2022-07-14 Rev 1
My presets look less sharp in the new version and there seems to be a slight reduction in contrast as well.
I’ve been able to reproduce the difference in two different presets.
To me it’s obvious but if you can’t see it, you can zoom in and pay attention to the edges of the white text on the blue background.
In the older version every other blue dot from top to bottom is slightly darker than the one above and below it, while in the new version all of the dots are the same brightness.
Another thing to look for is that in the old version, white text is more spikey than in the new version and the subpixel detail in grey lines also appears more blended and less detailed than before.
Output file sizes are also slightly larger in the new version. All else being equal, darker screenshots tend to compress better than brighter ones. This corresponds with my findings about the differences in the dot pattern.
To summarize the woven slot mask dot pattern that Mask 6, height 1 width 3, size 2 produced before has been replaced by a more uniform, straight grid pattern.
0.9.107.2022-04-17 Rev 1
CyberLab__Slot_Mask_II_for_CyberLab_or_Core_Blargg_Composite_or_S-Video_Filter.slangp + Blargg_NTSC_Turbo_Duo_SNES_PSX_S-Video_CyberLab_Special_Edition.filt
1.0.002 2022-07-14 Rev 1
CyberLab__Slot_Mask_II_for_CyberLab_or_Core_Blargg_Composite_or_S-Video_Filter.slangp + Blargg_NTSC_Turbo_Duo_SNES_PSX_S-Video_CyberLab_Special_Edition.filt
I’m also seeing something similar in
Version 1.0.001 2022-06-24 Rev 1.
CyberLab__Slot_Mask_II_for_CyberLab_or_Core_Blargg_Composite_or_S-Video_Filter.slangp + Blargg_NTSC_Turbo_Duo_SNES_PSX_S-Video_CyberLab_Special_Edition.filt
It probably would be good to try your settings straight in the latest guest shader to see if there is some difference inside the Mega Bezel or if it’s just what the shader looks like.
If you want to do a comparison it would be best to set the Mega Bezel ‘s aspect ratio to full, so that the scaling is similar when you load up guest’ s shaders with no Mega Bezel
Also of note is that there was a big update to the guest shaders in Mega Bezel V 0.9.109 2022-06-24 Rev 1.
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