How to use Diskspan GUI v2+
 

First You Start DiskSpan Gui, you have to enter the Game Directory like this

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648207

Make sure you have enough Free space. For each game you must have Double Space free.
Example: the Game is 90 GB you must Have 180 GB free space. after that
check the Conversion Used Steam or GOG like in the Picture above. then Choose Compress method like this.
if you would use no Compression choose the first one FA-STORE

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648356

or you can choose Custom Compression the you have to Select the Custom tab like this

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648387

Now DiskSpan Compress your game. This can take a long Time, depending witch compress method you use, and the game size. like this

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648436

after this the Game is Compressed with DiskSpan GUI. Like this

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648436

For the Developer mode press the CTRL key and double Click DiskSpan_GUI.exe will show you this

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648571

Here you can Choose collection that Preconfig. Your Game Collection Like this

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648873

now Your Collection is Preconfigured like this

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648792

or you can Chosse database in Game Register like this

https://fileforums.com/attachment.ph...1&d=1625648935

This is all for Preconfiguration your Conversion i hope this Helps all Little bit to Learn how to use The new DiskSpan_Gui

Cheers

If You using the Plugin Download Like this
and You bekame an Message Try again Later
don't Panic

The files are hosted on google drive, and google drive has a limitation on the number of files per hour...
So as the message on the DSG shows... try again later

#3 reserved

how to add pass?

Hello mausschieber,
Thanks for your tutorial.
Can you tell me how to use the "XDelta path" check function?
Thank you in advance

XDelta patch i for using patching the Setup.exe
an you can use it for Patching Games itself
its on Folder Resources/Tools

if i wrong please other tell how

How to use (or better: how you can use)

• 1. Run DSG in Developer Mode -> Go to "Game 1" tab -> Apply Patch XD3: ON -> Compress the game
• 2. Create patch files for all files which have changed
• - personaly I use ISXPM for this to create diff files, but you can also use the "Xdelta3 GUI" in TOOLS folder.
• 3. Compress the diff files with FA, 7Z or RAR while keeping the folder structure. Add the archive to records.ini and change the Delta record to last number (example: [Record1] = Main archive, [Record2] = patch archive, [Record3] = Delta)
• - Keeping the folder structure is important. Make sure old files and diff files are in the same folder after extracting.
• 4. Install with DSG -> Tools -> Unpacker. DSG will patch the files after extracting automatically.

This way is only sensible if you don't want to compress a game again after a patch came out.

That way I was doing in my tests months ago and it worked great. However, there could be a possible easier solution for all this :rolleyes:

You must use XDelta3 with the parameters "-S djw -vfs" for ISDone.dll to apply the patch without errors.
There is an example in "Resources\TOOLS\XDelta3 Patch Maker"

P.S: In the latest versions of DSG it is no longer necessary to change anything in Records.ini.

It is only necessary to enable the XDelta patch, keep the "Create mask patch" option checked and select a threshold percentage (trackbar) so that the position of the installer's progress bar is calculated when starting apply the path.

Help
 

I need to compress and install this method script

reflate:m2:l6:t75p:p5:s240+srep+lzma2

Dear KaktoR & Cesar82,
Can you please post pictures of the settings for XDelta & ISXPM as I can't get my patch to work properly with DSG and my installer.
Thank you in advance

See attached video file.

Tutorial Updated for Plugins Download See Post #2
@ mods where are the Sticky?

How to set-up configuration with file exclusions

In this example I will choose the game "Hearts of Iron IV", which requires you to exclude a specific file for a given compression method, because of incompatiblities of OGGRE tool.

First run DiskSpan_GUI in developer mode. You have two choices how to make this.

• Hold CTRL key and double click on DiskSpan_GUI.exe
• Run the bat file "_Developer MODE.bat"

I created simple images because I think it is better to understand.

https://i.imgur.com/wMbSoy2.png
https://i.imgur.com/wMbSoy2.png

https://i.imgur.com/S189iRa.png
https://i.imgur.com/S189iRa.png

https://i.imgur.com/qrnqITj.png
https://i.imgur.com/qrnqITj.png

https://i.imgur.com/Tchy5lL.png
https://i.imgur.com/Tchy5lL.png

https://i.imgur.com/NfM8cuX.png
https://i.imgur.com/NfM8cuX.png

https://i.imgur.com/ZGplU4N.png
https://i.imgur.com/ZGplU4N.png

Personally I do all this stuff via notepad, because it is faster for me. Here is a example how it could look like if you follow above instructions.
https://i.imgur.com/HSe9raA.png

With the above settings you can compress the game down to ~3GB, while plain packing with 7-zip Ultra preset it is ~3.4GB. So you save around 400mb size.

-- Reserved --

In future here I will give some informations to work with batch files in DiskSpan_GUI and different tools like quickbms

--- Reserved ---

In future here I will give some informations to detect compression algorithms and how to process them with XTool and DiskSpan_GUI with use of different libraries and what the settings are.

Masked/SPLIT mode vs DiskSpan/CLS mode usage disk size
 

Thank you so much KaktoR for giving this real class. :D:D:D
If you haven't seen it, read the #post

Now let's get to the information I decided to share (again):
I will remind users that although the DiskSpan GUI has a "Masked" mode, I do not recommend using it for compressions that generate a very large Data#.bin file for the following reason.

The "Masked" mode splits the file after creating it, so during compression you will have to have that extra space of the Data#bin file size so you can compress.
So far nothing much, the problem is that a similar process is performed when installing/unpacking the file.

When installing, before extracting the Data#.bin file that was divided, a temporary file will be created on the disk in which all parts of this divided file will be merged and later this temporary file will be extracted.

Example:
Assuming that you compress a 150 GB game and that you use a "Masked" compression (Split Mode), and that after the final compression you get 110 GB (Ratio 73.0%), and choose "BD 50" as media.

When compressing, a single temporary file of 110 GB will be generated, and then this file will be processed, generating 3 new files with sizes of 46.56 GB, 46.56 GB and 16.88 GB respectively.
To compress this game, you will need at least 370 GB of disk space, 150 GB for installing the original game, 110 GB for the temporary file that will be deleted after completion, and 110 GB for the final conversion.

And if you want to test this conversion before uninstalling the original game?
Now the problems begin, as you'll need more space for this as well.

To install using an installer or unpack using the DiskSpan GUI's own features, you will need an additional 260GB.
Of those 260 GB, 150 GB will be occupied by installing/unpacking the game and 110 GB will be occupied by the merged file before the extraction starts.

So in summary:
To create this conversion and test that everything is working before deleting the original game you will need at least: 150 GB (original game size) + 110 GB (Conversion files size) + 110 GB (Temporary merged file size) + 150 GB (Installation test folder size) = 520 GB.

These 520 GB do not necessarily need to be on the same disk or partition. It would take 150GB to install the game on a partition, 220GB on the DiskSpan GUI destination partition to create the conversion, and 260GB (110GB + 150GB) on the chosen partition for the test unpack/installation.

If using DiskSpan mode (Not "Masked/SPLIT" mode), the temporary 110 GB for compression and also the 110 GB for installation/unpacking would not be needed because CLS-DiskSpan.dll (by Razor12911) helps unpack without being necessary merging the Data#.bin file again, and these additional tasks are not time consuming.

Complement:
One way to reduce this inconvenience would be to configure it to create multiple Data#.bin files and use the extension-based or directory-based include/exclude list to specify which files will be in each Data#.bin.

That way it would create smaller Data#.bin files, requiring less space to merge them, or even not being necessary to merge depending on the chosen media.

In the same example above, if you use 3 Data#.bin files, you can configure the first one to occupy a little less than the chosen media size (something like 45 GB) and the second one a little bigger than the chosen media (something like 49 GB), it would only be necessary to merge the second Data#.bin file because the second file would have parts on Disk1, most of it would be on Disk2, and the rest would be on Disk3, and the other 2 files would be whole one on each disk without need to split or merge them in the installation..

So make your choice wisely!

Whenever I click on Change Method (on Kaktor's guide) for the first step it gives me an error "Could not call proc" and suddenly the program "breaks". If I exit that menu I cannot change included and excluded files.

(edit: nevermind you mentioned that there was the bug.)
But is there a workaround for this? And if you don't mind, can I get access to 2.0.1.8?
Thanks.

How to know what compression method a game has

Here I will show you how to know what compression method a game has, so you know what precompression you can apply (or should) to achieve a good ratio.

I will make this more superficial, because I don't really want to dig deeper inside this rabbit hole, I could write a book about this otherwise. Another reason is simply that I don't know all about this. Furthermore I will explain only oodle compression here, just because oodle is nowadays very common.

First things first. In this showcase I will use xtool.exe + xtoolui.dll, just for simplification.

https://i.imgur.com/jtBUHUF.png
https://i.imgur.com/jtBUHUF.png

In the first example I will work with the game "The Last of Us Part 1", just because it's a current game. However I can tell you that this game use oodle compression, just before I made any efforts in testing with the game files in any way. How can I tell without doing anything? In the past, most games which used oodle compression had a file called "oo2core_x_win64.dll" somewhere in the game folder (replace "x" with an integer starting from 3 up to 9). In this example it is the case aswell. If you look in the root game folder you will notice the file "oo2core_9_win64.dll", so you can see directly that there is somewhere oodle compression used.

Ok, but oodle compression family has several codecs, like kraken, mermaid, selkie, hydra and leviathan. How to know what codec to use? First step is to scan an input, like a game file, with the oodle scanner by Razor12911.

In this example I use the file "common.psarc" as an input to test with. So just drag&drop this file onto "oo2scan_7_win64.exe", which opens a cmd window.

https://i.imgur.com/kG30rO9.png
https://i.imgur.com/kG30rO9.png
Now you see stream list with some informations. The important information is the codec used. In the above example it is [1], which means kraken codec is used.

---------------------------

If you ever feel the need to check over, note the offset (Pos: 000xxxxx) and search for this offset in HxD (Search -> Go to... -> ...). As an example, I search for the first oodle stream (Pos: 00013750). So go to "Search" -> "Go to..." and type in as hex "13750".

https://i.imgur.com/kj7YOfU.png
https://i.imgur.com/kj7YOfU.png

As a side note, kraken header is "8C 06". If you want to dig deeper, you can also find out CSize and DSize (CompressedSize and DecompressedSize for this stream), but this will go too deep into this on this topic.

---------------------------

Anyways, we should move along with the more easier stuff. So we know now that the game is using oodle kraken compression. Now copy the file "oo2core_9_win64.dll" from the game folder in the same folder where xtool.exe is located and open xtool.exe and set the input to the file "common.psarc". For the beginning, you can leave all the settings to default. Now you press the "Configure" button, which will open a new window. There you select the Oodle option and tick the checkbox "Kraken"

https://i.imgur.com/NOBqfy1.png
https://i.imgur.com/NOBqfy1.png
Then just press "OK" and then press "Start" to begin the process. It looks like this then when it's finished.

https://i.imgur.com/WbgL7OK.png
https://i.imgur.com/WbgL7OK.png
There you can see some helpful informations, like the Original size and decompressed size of the file, the time it has needed and the amount of streams which were processed. In this case not all the streams were processed, but it is not that much, so in this case we can ignore it. Either it is because an incorrect library (oo2core_x_Win64.dll) was used or something else.

Repeating this step, but in addition with the verbose mode, we will see something like this.

https://i.imgur.com/86AT2Bt.png
https://i.imgur.com/86AT2Bt.png
In verbose mode we get even more usefull informations about all the streams, for example which level they are using (level means the compression level of the kraken codec: l1 - l9, where l4 is somewhat like medium compression).

The l# option is sometimes usefull to speed up the process a bit, but don't except big time saves here.

Another usefull option is "Number of scan iterations", which will increase the streams that could potentially be found. If set to n128 for example, you will find a bit more streams, which means that the output will be a bit bigger.

Example:
As you can see, n128 finds more streams, the output is a bit larger, but the time to process this is also higher. So for a full game you have to ask yourself, if this additional time is worth it.

Another example with n256
As you can see here, the time between n32 default and n256 has more then doubled to find and process the streams, and the output size just increased marginal. So it is always a consideration.

Now the question could be: is the overall output - after deduplication and compression - worth it to increase the scan iterations?
Not that much, just a bit. However keep in mind that this was a test with fast-lzma2, so to get meaningful results you should test it with stronger lzma or lolz.

As a side note, this game also has several deflate streams behind the "oodle wall", if you can say so. A simplified example for imagination purposes: Imagine an egg, the eggshell is oodle compression, behind this shell there are some zlib streams, and the inner yellow is the raw data. Or the vise-versa way: some of the raw data are compressed with zlib -> then all data is compressed with oodle.

Example file "core.psarc"
This will make a difference in final compression. Let's take a look at this:
50mb saved. But here again, this is a test with fast-lzma2 plugin, so better test such things with stronger lzma or lolz to get meaningful results.

Now that we know something about the main data for this game, we can write a method for DiskSpan_GUI.
Personally I would suggest to use something like this:
:core_2.9.9 is important in the method command line, because it will tell DiskSpan_GUI which oodle library to use for this game. 2.9.9 is the library version the game is actually shipped with. In most cases this is always the correct library, but there are also exceptions like "Elden Ring", which is shipped with a different oodle library which will not work correctly processing the streams, or games which even doesn't has any library outside the executable, which will lead us to the next case.

---------------------------

As a side note, "The Last of Us Part 1" has also some video files in bink2 format. In older titles we just used binkpack (bpk) to compress them, but the newer titles use a codec which binkpack cannot process. In those cases you can open the bk2 file in HxD and look directly in the file header for "KB2n". If there is "n", then go ahead and just store this files, or use weak compression with deduplication to get some mb's out of it, if at all tbh.

---------------------------

So, what to do if a game use oodle compression but there is no library inside the game folder? For this example I will use "Assassin's Creed Valhalla", simply because I have installed it at the moment. In those cases it could be useful to know when development of a game has begun, or at least try to guess it. Or instead go for the release date of the game. The oodle development history can help you with this to pick the correct library version, or at least get near enough to it.

Ok so, "Assassin's Creed Valhalla" has no oodle library. The library code is somewhere inside the binaries of the game, so no way we can safely say what library version to use at this point. But we know that the release date of this game was "10. November 2020". So we look at the list I linked above. I would say, oodle library v2.8.X should be used, but which one exactly? Here comes the library checker, which is a part of xtool.

Here again, first check a file with the oodle scanner. I choose "DataPC.forge" for this.

https://i.imgur.com/3wooheG.png
https://i.imgur.com/3wooheG.png
In this case we see [2], which means the oodle mermaid codec is used, So we check xtoolui again and make some settings.

https://i.imgur.com/ZMXfN8h.png
https://i.imgur.com/ZMXfN8h.png
So now we use the library checker. For this just select the drop-down menu and select "Oodle". Now you have to point to a folder, which contains different oodle libraries. For this purpose we have this. Just download the attachment and extract it somewhere.

https://i.imgur.com/U0OOO0l.png
https://i.imgur.com/U0OOO0l.png
Like I said already, my guess is that this game was compressed with a oodle version 2.8.X, but we don't know which version exactly. Now point to the folder ".\Oodle\v2.8.x" and select it, like in the image above.

Now start the process and wait until it's finished. This will take some time because XTool is now checking the file with different libraries one after another. To know the correct library watch out for the library which gives you the best results. Just compare amount of streams, times and sizes.

https://i.imgur.com/qNDAuDa.png
https://i.imgur.com/qNDAuDa.png
As you can see here it is very likely that a library from v2.8.0 to v2.8.4 was used for the game. It is now up to you which library to use. Additionaly you can check more game files and if the results are the same, then pick up any library you want. Personally I would use v2.8.4 library because there were some fixes to the oodle code before v2.8.4.

Some games, as games built with Anvil Forge engine (Assassin's Creed for example) have a xtool plugin you can use.

Here is a example with the anvil plugin on the same file as above
So here again a command line method for DiskSpan_GUI
I hope I had forgot nothing here to explain.

Edit: Corrected some things.

This is still a beta version (Replace the file).
The final version 2.0.1.8 will have other changes, so when the final version is available delete that version and use the final version.

Thank you very much. Unfortunately I found another problem mentioned here.

I'm trying to repack a game with language selection using this tool. I created a separate .bin files with required languages and created a chekboxes in the installer. Now i can't figure out where in the script to indicate the connection between the language files and chekboxes. I use a script file included with this tool. Can someone help me?

Hello. Screenshots not working.

Determine which libraries should be used by XTool/oo2rec in DiskSpan_GUI

In DiskSpan_GUI (DSG) you have an option to determine which library version the tools should use.

For oodle algorithm you can either use

1. :3..9
   or
2. :core_#.#.#

I. The first option is using predifined libraries, which will not work well in many cases.
Example:
II. The second option should the way to go in most cases, or if you want to max out detected streams. However because some of you may not know what library to use at all, you should read this, especially the part about the library checker.
Example:
There are even examples which using different libraries. Perfect example is the game Elden Ring, which - in fact - is using two different oodle versions. You can determine different libraries for this game to get near 100% of all oodle streams.
Example:
The underlined part refers to the "--oodle=" xtool arc.ini setting.

In those cases start with the lower library version, the second one a higher version. Detecting those rare cases is annoying.


The same can be done with LZ4 (including LZ4HC and LZ4F) and ZSTD algorithms.

In those cases you could use something like this:
Keep in mind that you cannot use LZ4 or LZ4HC directly without any plugin.

A bit out of scope here in this thread, but I don't want to open a new thread just for this...

How to know what library to use for oodle/zstd precompression?

In the following example I will take the game Monster Hunter Rise, which should be a good example of how to find out which library to use. Here again I will use XTool in UI mode (xtool.exe + xtoolui.dll which you can get from latest xtool packages).

Just taking the file "re_chunk_000.pak.patch_001.pak" to test with, we set our settings as follows.

https://i.imgur.com/zn3Xu0V.png
https://i.imgur.com/zn3Xu0V.png

Set "Stop after [10] streams" should be enough in most cases to see if it's the correct library.

In the following output I have already marked all libraries which work as of now.

With library versions 1.1.4, 1.2.0, 1.3.3 and 1.3.4, xtool can process zstd streams at least, were with all other libraries we get 0 streams. Out of 24 libraries, we now have 4 libraries which we can test with further. Things get clearer here.

One would say, just use the newer library, but in this case it is not a good idea. Here is why.

So this is the evidence we need to decide what library to use.

The same principle applies to oodle codecs and LZ4F.

As for LZ4/LZ4HC, things will get a bit complicated, because this codecs cannot be used directly without a plugin.

WinRAR doesn't work
 

I tried to use licenced winrar from Diskspan GUI
and it errors out like below/attached image

Is there enough memory for the compressing?? A 32GB dictionary requires about ~50GB of RAM!

It's the missing spaces between the parameters...
Edit directly in EDIT after confirming the method by adding the spaces before each "-"

P.S: In hotfix 2 (DSG 2.0.2.2 HF2) this has already been fixed.

yes ,my PC specs:
64 gb of RAM
12600k
4070
8tb

Hi, I just read this thread twice but I don't understand what's a library and a dictionary.
Also, how can I know what compressions method each game has other than oodle ?

Edit : Forgot to ask why do files get bigger at first ? (e.g. in this thread : Size: 2.12 GB >> 3.37 GB >> 3.30 GB >> 2.52 GB >> 1.95 GB)

post #24 give you the answer

Thank you. I've surmised, from your location and your name, that you are German, and therefore a language barrier may be a factor. But I was wondering if there might be a tutorial of some kind on this, perhaps with highlighted text. You see, I'm neurodivergent (I have Autism with Attention Deficit-Hyperactivity Disorder), and this is the sort of thing that tightens my chest and makes it hard to breathe when I try to learn it on my own. I know it may sound dramatic, but it's more like traumatic, strangely enough. The kind of thing that makes you feel stupid when you know you're smart. But I digress. If you could help at all, that would be much appreciated.

On an unrelated note: I tried to find your Thank You button and failed. Most likely, another casualty of being neurodivergent. If you could help with that, I will thank you profusely as much as I can.

you're welcome the Thanks Button is in the right Corner below the test at the Post

can someone help to use this on my own installer
 

Can anyone help me to use diskspan gui on my own installer for repacking?:)

cant understand your question. do you want to use cls-diskspan to split bin files on your repacks ?

i don't know what script u using but compatible scripts for Diskspan Gui u can use these https://fileforums.com/showpost.php?...87&postcount=3

I have figured it out to use it on my own installer
 

I downloaded that ASIS installer and read the script properly yesterday, Later this morning I editing my own custom script and it did worked like a charm.
Special thanks goes to the person who created the ASIS template ofc, without that template I cound'nt figured out how to apply that on my own installer