>The files are not-needed for correct operation of mame. These files are just a waste of space.

See...and that's the point. We don't talk about correct operation of MAME here. Don't mix mame-loading-rom-accuracy with set-accuracy. MAME loads the files from nearly any place and doesn't care about mixed up sets at all. It loads the files where it finds them, even without caring about names.

If you like it that way, you won't need to check for romnames, romname case etc... in fact you can stick with mame's verifyroms check then. clrmamepro on the other side does strict checking on set definitions. This includes names, and to quote Nicola again: Different files-different names, equal files-equal names. If they're listed differently they're handled differently.
There are a lot other stuff which is effected in an equal manner....like these fake clones 'natodefa' etc.

Live with it. This behaviour won't change....and for the diskspace note: If you got several gigabyte of useless baddumps and not working files on your harddisk you don't have to care about 10 kbyte of double-files. Ask the MAMEdevs how they care about diskspace issues...


Roman Scherzer