GD-ROM backups/ripping

[viking_uk]

First of all I have got a couple of tip sheets (Echelon etc) in how to rip, but I need a couple of direct pointers if anyone can advise.

When I left my DC backing up one of my games overnight I took a look and the terminal session had ended with a couple of ASCII characters - I assume it was aborted abnormally?? Should I receive a success message?

Also on the tip sheets I have there are 2 files mentioned - 1st_readme.bin and ip.bin. What is the deal with these - do I need specific ones for EACH of my games, or can I just get hold of one of each and use the 2 for my games?

Finally is there a way I can calculate how long it would take to backup a GD-ROM?

Any useful advice would be appreciated.

[DarkFish]

first thing that i need to know is what ripping guide are you using? are you using the bba or the serial cable? i am assuming the serial cable, and if you are using tera to upload to your computer, you will get those symbols, and if you look in your teratemp directory, you should see a .iso.gz file...is it there?

[viking_uk]

Hi - thanks for the reply.

I am using the serial cable and using Echelon's guide for backing up and so on.

I am seeing the data being transmitted - I let it go for about 6 hours and it was fine, when I looked the following morning no data was being transmitted and the macro seemed to have finished but there was no confirmation message. I do have the 3 files in the same directory, but I guess the extract failed.

Is there anything I am doing incorrect? Can you advise me for my other questions?

[DarkFish]

well, i am sorry to say that i can help you no further. i have no idea what to do with the files after you get them unzipped. but for somereason, people are not very good here at responding to you or i. have you tried other forums? i am havin one of my friends help me with this and when we get it all figured out i will do the best that i can to help you and everyone else since the guides that are out there are not very good. Until then, i suggest you ask questions at other forums.

http://www.cdrom-guide.com
http://exiso.netfirms.com <------this is a new forum that i was just introduced to. make sure that you have no www in it. have fun and good luck........i will post back here when i get more info........look at about 10 pm tonight

"Victims aren't we all"

[viking_uk]

Thank you kindly for your reply.

I will not be on the net on the evenings this week but I shall be on here tomorrow to see how you both get on!!!!

As I have not successfully ripped a GD ROM yet maybe the 2 boot files will be created automatically.

Worst case scenario I will not go the self boot route .... I think I know why I get a corrupt extract though so it has been useful.

[DreamcastKeV]

shrugs.. there are millions of guides to doing this and i usually hate people who ask questions like that but i guess you figured out how to copy and took the step of getting the cable and copying so your cool... anyway, you'll get a track03.iso.gz, track04.raw.gz, and track05.iso.gz (at least 90% of the time you'll get these 3 files). get winrar if you don't already have it and extract these files (the first and last anyway.. delete the raw file as it is just the "this disc was intended for the sega dreamcast" message. get the program extract.exe (should have come with dreamrip). get to a dos prompt and type extract track03.iso track05.iso xxxxxx (where xxxxxx is the LBA number of the last track it ripped. if you didn't write this down, start ripping the same game again and pause the macro. now open the lid and close it and continue till you get to the last track. next to it there will be a 5 or 6 digit number... this is the lba) so anyway, it will extract all of the discs content to the directory. its a good idea at this point to move the iso files, extract program, and any files that were already there to another folder on your HD so you don't get them mixed up with the games files. Okay, now there will be a bunch of files there. get the echelon self boot toolkit and follow the instructions. ill sum up here anyway. put all files in C:\selfboot\data cut 1st_read.bin (your binary) and ip.bin (your bootstrap) and paste to C:\selfboot . now, if you have dc-cdr (came with the ripping toolkit... should get it) click data and hit burn audio session or whatever the first button says. then go into the options, change the name of the disc to whatever you want (the name of the game wouldn't be a bad idea) and hit get offset. then hit view offset. a window will give you a number like 45000 or 45002. close the little window and type what it gave you into the box in the settings. click ok or save to get out of the options and hit patch to patch the ip and 1st read. now move the 1st_read.bin into the data file with everything else (leave the ip for now). Now hit "make iso". it will make the iso (duh..hehe). then hit patch iso... it will patch the iso with your ip.bin bootstrap. then hit burn iso. it will burn (again with the "duh") then open your drive and close it again and look in my computer and see if it has the right name... if it does, the iso was created and burned successfully. so pop it and and put it in your dreamcast. if it works, then your good. if it only gets to the sXga screen, talk to Xena about copy protection... hope this at least gets you started. (note that most games are too big to fit on a cd... guides on how to downsample are available at xenas site). also, if anyone on the board is totally clueless on how to burn, send them to this post, as im not typing it again :P

[xena]

site link

http://luna.spaceports.com/~selfboot/Tutorial_Index/tutorial_index.htm

[viking_uk]

Well thank you kindly both - it looks like I will have to go through your instructions step by step as they look very concise. Even though there are a lot of guides - they start off well but like a lot of I.T stuff there is no proof reading and so a lot of assumptions are made. With a lot of software on the market that have the instructions written by developers - you have to spend a lot of time "reading between the lines" but I understand that there is no perfection.

I guess what confused me is that my rips turned out to be incomplete so I was only seeing 3 files - with 3 files inside. It was the bootstrap files that were missing so I wasn't sure.

Well thanks heaps for your instructions and time anyway - I'll get there eventually!!

O kool i didn't know u can rip DC game...
ON dc copy they say u can't copy it yet...
well can u give me the link where i can find the info about riping and burning DC cd?
plz plz
THX