Rom and mame versions

[dragon_sa]

I just about have all the 161 rom and chd files from emuparadise.. I am running a win 7 system with mame and mala...is it necessary to run same version of mame...ie 161...or can I use the 168 or 169 versions of mame currently available with this rom and chd set?
What is going to give me best results with compatibility and working roms...thanks

[Zorlon]

Roms & chd files also get updates as well as Mame, but not all roms/chd's and some games may be more playable in a newer version of MAME while the rom and or chd for that game has not changed

so best option while not updating the rom set is to keep the older version of MAME (just add a version number to the exe file so instead of being named MAME or MAMEUI ect ect rename it to MAME161) and have the new version of MAME in the same folder as the older version keeping all the roms and chd's in one place but use two or more versions of MAME from a single folder

The above will give you a full set for 161 that may not be fully compatible with the latest version of mame and take advantage of the new version for a few games that may not play well in 161 but the roms and chd's did not change

[dragon_sa]

thanks zorlon for the info, is it configurable in mala to select different versions of mame to run different roms? I dont really want to run all 10000 roms I have narrowed the list down somewhat as there are lots of undesirable and repeat/clone style games...Im just trying to set up a nice single interface to run all the games I have selected in the most user friendly way