*UPDATE 3* PS1 compression tips: remove dead space beforehand
Garrett sent us a rather informative email about playing PS1 games on your PSP. He seems to have found a way to make the games run without all the extra padding originally placed on the disc. If you’re wondering what that means, it’s this: Imagine playing a 500MB game using only 50 MB of space.
You’ll need something called CDGenPS2, which we’ve placed for download below. If you follow the steps, you should be able to get a game to play with a drastically smaller file size. We’re currently testing it, but you’re free to try out the procedure, too. Garrett says he’ll make a more in-depth tutorial on it if people run into problems, which is really nice of him. For now, you’ll do well to read through his email below (with some slight changes for grammar and clarity).
PS1 and PS2 games use a very strict architecture for how the binary files of the games are organized on a discs. When a disc copying program copies these discs, it’s known that they will leave the padding of empty bits (0xFF) for the remainder of the XXXMB media.
For example, Tetris Plus for the PS1 has a total file size on the disc of 43.0 MB and the image from CloneCD is 566MB. However, if you try to remove the padding from a disc, it will no longer work with emulators, including POPS. A utility for those who load games from their PS2 hard drives to lessen the size of the images, known as CDGENPS2 (Much like UMD-GEN), has the ability to remove this padding and keep the structure of the disc intact. Using this utility with some software that can extract an ISO to its contents can bring the 566MB Tetris Plus image down to about 50MB (POPS compresses it to about 400MB).
UPDATE 3:
Garrett added an additional note that we noticed just now on the comments. It seems the LBA arrangement will have a big impact on whether or not the game you’re tweaking will actually run.
For the sake of clarity, we’re going to post two additional comments made by Garrett and Devilgun that should fix most of your problems. If not, then there may be something else getting in the way of getting your games to work properly.
Garrett’s comment:
You can do so with ISOBuster by exporting a Tree File, and then using CDGENPS2’s advanced menu to import it (this is a new discovery to me too, as none of my LBA’s were changed thru drag + drop).
Also, you can fix them manually by comparing the LBA section from whatever ISO utility you are using with the LBA in CDGENPS2. Starting from the top, compare the LBA and change it accordingly by: right-clicking the file, and clicking propeties. Check the FIX LBA box type in the correct LBA value.
Devilgun’s comment happens to explain the manual fix by having many exclamation points. We took notice of that, and Garrett did too, as he confirms Devilgun’s comment. Here’s his step-by-step guide, though you’ll need MagicISO for it:
- Open the iso/bin with MagicISO
- Now you can see the data AND the !!!LBA!!! Information
- Copy the Data to a new Folder on Harddisk or just drag and drop it to CDGENPS2
- !!!!!NOW!!!!! LOOK AT THE LBA Information in CDGENPS2. IT has to be the SAME for each File as in MagicISO – So order the files, so that the LBA is exactly the same.
- Make the IMG
- Compress it with pops.
- Play it!
Installation instructions and previous updates after the jump!
Download: [CDGenPS2]
Download: [ISOBuster v2.0]
Discussion and Walkthrough: [Forum Thread]
Garrett sent us a rather informative email about playing PS1 games on your PSP. He seems to have found a way to make the games run without all the extra padding originally placed on the disc. If you’re wondering what that means, it’s this: Imagine playing a 500MB game using only 50 MB of space.
You’ll need something called CDGenPS2, which we’ve placed for download below. If you follow the steps, you should be able to get a game to play with a drastically smaller file size. We’re currently testing it, but you’re free to try out the procedure, too. Garrett says he’ll make a more in-depth tutorial on it if people run into problems, which is really nice of him. For now, you’ll do well to read through his email below (with some slight changes for grammar and clarity).
PS1 and PS2 games use a very strict architecture for how the binary files of the games are organized on a discs. When a disc copying program copies these discs, it’s known that they will leave the padding of empty bits (0xFF) for the remainder of the XXXMB media.
For example, Tetris Plus for the PS1 has a total file size on the disc of 43.0 MB and the image from CloneCD is 566MB. However, if you try to remove the padding from a disc, it will no longer work with emulators, including POPS. A utility for those who load games from their PS2 hard drives to lessen the size of the images, known as CDGENPS2 (Much like UMD-GEN), has the ability to remove this padding and keep the structure of the disc intact. Using this utility with some software that can extract an ISO to its contents can bring the 566MB Tetris Plus image down to about 50MB (POPS compresses it to about 400MB).
How to do it:
- Extract the ISO contents to a folder on your hard drive.
- Open that folder and select ALL of the extracted contents from the root of the disc.
- Open CDGENPS2.
- Drag the contents of the folder into the CDGENPS2 window (the giant white space that says ISO near the top)
- (Optional) Go to file-> Edit Volume and change the name of the volume so that it matches the original title of the game (for archival reasons only).
- Click the IMG button on the left-hand side of the screen and save the Bin/ISO/IMG to whatever directory you want , and use POPS to convert to PSP EBOOT and test it.
If it doesn’t work and I get enough emails about it not working I will write a more in-depth tutorial about it with screenshots and everything on the forums.
UPDATE 1: We tested it and the process seems to be working fine. Our test used R-Type Delta as the subject.
Normal file size: 323 MB
Using the usual compression methods: around 234 MB
Using Garrett’s method: around 191 MB
As you can see, that seems pretty good. Your mileage will vary depending on the type of game you picked up and how much of the space in the disc is just dummy data. While you might say “Duh,” we just felt the need to check. Right now, we’re all pretty excited to see how drastic some changes wil be. Expect some data-filled games (like RPGs) to still remain big, as there’s less dummy space that gets taken out.
UPDATE 2:
Due to insistent public demand (or frustration…both apply), Garrett (or Zero-X) has posted a graphical walkthrough of sorts for his compression tips. He’s also using a program called ISOBuster for his procedure, so we’ve opted to add it as a download.
Note, however, that your mileage will still vary. Not every game will work on PopStation, and the amount of space saved by procedure will differ depending on the game and the content involved. Zero-X has a couple of comments on the forum link which should explain that a bit more.
UPDATE 3:
Garrett added an additional note that we noticed just now on the comments. It seems the LBA arrangement will have a big impact on whether or not the game you’re tweaking will actually run.
For the sake of clarity, we’re going to post two additional comments made by Garrett and Devilgun that should fix most of your problems. If not, then there may be something else getting in the way of getting your games to work properly.
Garrett’s comment:
You can do so with ISOBuster by exporting a Tree File, and then using CDGENPS2’s advanced menu to import it (this is a new discovery to me too, as none of my LBA’s were changed thru drag + drop).
Also, you can fix them manually by comparing the LBA section from whatever ISO utility you are using with the LBA in CDGENPS2. Starting from the top, compare the LBA and change it accordingly by: right-clicking the file, and clicking propeties. Check the FIX LBA box type in the correct LBA value.
Devilgun’s comment happens to explain the manual fix by having many exclamation points. We took notice of that, and Garrett did too, as he confirms Devilgun’s comment. Here’s his step-by-step guide, though you’ll need MagicISO for it:
- Open the iso/bin with MagicISO
- Now you can see the data AND the !!!LBA!!! Information
- Copy the Data to a new Folder on Harddisk or just drag and drop it to CDGENPS2
- !!!!!NOW!!!!! LOOK AT THE LBA Information in CDGENPS2. IT has to be the SAME for each File as in MagicISO – So order the files, so that the LBA is exactly the same.
- Make the IMG
- Compress it with pops.
- Play it!
Download: [CDGenPS2]
Download: [ISOBuster v2.0]
Discussion and Walkthrough: [Forum Thread]
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