Ok, I've used the search tool and still can't find an answer to my problem.

I want to run tape games, but the ones I have are in several files, and start with a .ldr or .bas file.

Seems easy enough. However, I need to know what emulator I have to use to run these!! I'm using ParaMSX right now, which allows me to select a tape file, which I duly do. I run the emulator, and up pops MSX basic with Disk Basic. If I type Load "cas:",r I get device IO error. If I type load "feud.ldr" it tells me disk is offline.

I tried taking the disk bios out of the bios directory, but I still get device IO error.

I've downloaded several other MSX emu's today, including RuMSX (which appears only allow .cas files) and OpenMSX, which does seems completely useless and unecessarily complicated. Even the frontend does nothing useful. I can't work out where I should put the rom bioses, or how to point it at the directory where my roms are or anything.

Sorry I'm so retarded, ParaMSX lets me play dumps of my konami carts just fine, but just won't play ball for tape stuff. And even though it's a crappy old mastertronic effort, it's one I enjoyed a lot almost 20 years ago <sigh>

OK ignore it. I found a disk image tool, and created a disk image, and put the files onto that. Works a dream. YAY!!!!!!

Disks are much more convenient than cassettes anyway Good to hear you got things going though.

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I've downloaded several other MSX emu's today, including RuMSX (which appears only allow .cas files) and OpenMSX, which does seems completely useless and unecessarily complicated. Even the frontend does nothing useful. I can't work out where I should put the rom bioses, or how to point it at the directory where my roms are or anything.

Uhm, did you try to check out the manual? It's pretty well explained there.

You hurt my feelings by saying that openMSX seems useless!
It's not unnecessarily complicated, it's *legal* because it doesn't provide ROM BIOS images. That makes you have to read the manual to know where to put them. THat's it, should work immediately after that, or alternatively you should be able to run loads of ROM images using the free BIOS replacement C-BIOS which gets installed by default.

If you use the Windows installer, everything except the ROM BIOS images get installed on a good directory by default. Accept the defaults in Catapult and it runs out of the box. (Using C-BIOS.)
Add the ROM images to the right dir (see manual) and the other machines also run.

Sorry, wasn't intending to hurt anyone's feelings. I did check out the manual... and at the risk of hurting feelings again, it seemed overly verbose and I couldn't find the necessary information where I expected to see it, and having spent the entire morning tryinig to sort the problem, ditched it to find an alternative solution.

However, I'm about to study the manual, and see about making it do something.
I must admit though, that even having run the frontend, the whole list of machines to choose from doesn't add to the program's appeal. The fact that it also seems without asking to have made entries in the My Documents folder makes it less appealing still, as it further adds to the whole "Where should I be adding stuff?" question. All my other emulators are REALLY simple. Directories like "Roms" or "BIOS" etc. leave little doubt as to where you should dump stuff. Those which don't automatically create directories, usually have a .ini file, which can be easily edited to point everything in the right places.
This could be the best emulator out there, but it's not exactly intuitive, and there are any number of alternatives available for download. Perhaps tomorrow, I'll be writing on this very page to worship the program.

If you want to try an intuitive MSX emulator with an excellent quality, a good interface and all conceived for the comfort of the end-user, you should try blueMSX : http://www.bluemsx.com

If accuracy is any measure for emulation (and it usually is), the quality of BlueMSX isn't as high as mars2000you tries to convince you of...

BTW, mars2000you, have you considered a carreer in advertising? It looks to me like you could sell milk to a cow!

LMAO. I'll give it a look. I'm gonna persevere with openMSX too, 'cos it appears to have a lot of fancy display options. The whole machines thing puts me off though. All the other emulators I have... dump your roms in the roms or bios directory, point the emulator there (if it needs it) run the program, select your msx type (1 or 2, etc. NOT which specific machine) choose a disk or cartridge image, and your off. I have a pile of roms, all named for use in the other emulators. I'm guessing I've got to use that program the manual speaks of to check checksums and work out which roms I have (the only 2 I'm sure of are dumps from my own Canon V20 and Toshiba HX10 machines)

GuyveR800, it was very previsible that you should answer !

Thanks again, GuyveR800 and let's the end-user decide !

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The whole machines thing puts me off though. All the other emulators I have... dump your roms in the roms or bios directory, point the emulator there (if it needs it) run the program, select your msx type (1 or 2, etc. NOT which specific machine) choose a disk or cartridge image, and your off.

Next version of openMSX will probably feature a single directory for all your roms too.
Another useful option already available in the current version is the Boosted_MSX2_EN machine. You can just set it as the default machine in the settings.xml file and most software should run

This is feeling like a chatroom almost. Thanks guys for your rapid responses. I'll try the boosted version, I'm studying the manual, and about to see if I can load a disk image, though I suspect I need to put roms in places that are not clear in order to make it happen. Space Manbow is cool with OpenGL renderer and some filter playing around though. I bought the original on cartridge in London, having been told by the salesman that it was compatible with MSX1 also. Imagine my heartbreak when neither the Canon nor Toshiba wanted anything to do with it though. I'm surprised Nemesis 2 didn't get welded in the machine after that (I used the Canon primarily btw, it had great big funky cursor keys, although the bottom one is a little dodgy now)

You should try Catapult (it comes with openMSX 0.4.0 and higher), it's a graphic user interface for openMSX. Opening a disk image is as easy as opening any other file in windows

I tried that, but the emulator sits there saying no cartridge

That's because the default machine is something called 'cbios', which is not a real MSX, but a completely copyright free replacement. Unfortunately it only supports cartridges at the moment.
Once you get that Boosted_MSX2_EN machine running and set as default, you should have no probs.

hehehehe, this is amusing. This whole thing started for me, because I've moved country, and still have not shipped a pile of stuff over yet. I just had an urge to play a couple of old games. Now I have a zillion and 1 MSX emulators, and I thought it'd be a relief not to wait 5 or 6 minutes for a game to load. Instead, it took me half a day :|