What's merging anyway ? Some sets are so called 'parent' or 'clone' sets. They share some ROMs and it's possible to put these files in the same sets. That's merging. There are three kinds of storing sets:
Unmerging is the opposite of merging and it will create sets which aren't
merged. (Compare 'No Merging')
Merging can last from seconds to hours. That depends on the amount of files, the filesizes, your CPU, your
HD the zipcompressionlevel and the thread priority. It's possible to stop the process at any time.
Be warned: The backup option in the settings dialog doesn't work for merging ! Use (disable) the CleanSet/Remove Old Parent/Clones instead if you don't want to
lose any data. It's extremely importanat that all ROMnames are 100% ok before
merging ! So do a name scan first and fix wrong named ROMs
! You shouldn't have any missing doubled ROMs either. So disable the 'hide
missing double' option.
Hint: in most case the Rebuilder is
the better choice.
The titlebar shows the current number of enabled games. For further information check out the settings dialog. Always be careful if the number doesn't match your selected number.
With the following two options you set your wanted merge method.
Not Merged Sets
Enables the unmerge mode.
Split
Enables the split (merge) mode.
Merged Sets
Enables the (full) merge mode.
Now you can also specify what to do with the files and the old files.
Clean Set
Enable this option if you want to delete unneeded files in a gameset while doing a merge
operation. Otherwise the files 'stay alive' and the ROMs are added to the archives.
Zip Files
Enable this option if the destination files should be zipped. The files will be zipped with the
compression level which is set in the settings dialog.
With the placement options you specify where the new merged roms will be put to.
Keep Original Position
If this option is enabled, ClrMamePro will store the merged set in the path of the parent set (full
merging) or in the path of the parent and clone set (split merging). Same for unmerging.
(Un)Merge Parents/Clones To
Here you can enter a folder name. Click the right button to browse for a folder. ClrMamePro will
(un-)merge the files in this folder.
And finally the two important buttons to start the unmerging or merging process.
Go
Starts the merging or unmerging process (depends on the chosen
mode).