crimsonnight Posted September 16, 2015 Author Share Posted September 16, 2015 Hi guys, I have a collection of Dreamcast games, to get them to run seamlessly through LaunchBox (ie a game to run after double-clicking the box-art) I think I need to do the following: 1. Convert all games to .cdi format. Currently some are in .cdi format, whereas others are .bin (+.cue) and even some .nrg. I think the first thing I need to do is convert everything to .cdi format, this is where I encounter my first error. 'Bin 2 Boot' doesn't run on 64bit systems - is there a way around this? 2. Make all images self-booting. Again, I'm not sure how to do this really, the games I've tried running through emulators currently treat my images as music CDs. I suppose an alternative would be to automatically run something like the Utopia boot CD and then switch to the selected game, but again, I wouldn't know how to do this. 3. Set up an emulator within LaunchBox. Again, based on my research, I think Demul would work best, but I'm guessing it'll need to be configured in a certain way depending on how we tackle the above points. If someone could help me with this process (maybe someone who's already got it functioning as intended?) that'd be awesome :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DOS76 Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 http://www.epforums.org/showthread.php?71021-Covert-bin-cue-to-CDI I don't know how valid it is but a poster named Zorlon explains that it is difficult (or not possible) to convert cue + bin to cdi. I use NullDC for Dreamcast but also have Demul working too. There is a good tutorial on how to set up NullDC here Spoilerhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZNBYdz-4tA 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crimsonnight Posted September 16, 2015 Author Share Posted September 16, 2015 Hi DOS76, Thanks for the link, but NullDC always seems to crash when booting a disc (perhaps incompatible with my version of Windows), but I have Demul set up and working fine. As I said though, the cdi images I currently have aren't self-booting though so I'm looking either for a patcher/converter, or a way to automatically run Utopia first. It's a shame about the .bin files, but that contradicts a lot of what I've read beforehand... why would bin2boot be so popular for example if it doesn't work? He does sound like he knows what he's talking about though. Does anyone have more information on this? I can't find .cdi versions of the games I own so would like to find a solution. Cheers, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DOS76 Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 @crimsonnight I was using NullDC today on my Windows 10 64x machine I don't ever use disc just files. I got all of the files from Emuparadise. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bil Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 There are also .gdi/bin games that can be used with demul and nulldc. For demul use the commandline: -run=dc -image= And check - "No space before ROM" on the edit emulator window. If you have the latest version of LaunchBox (maybe beta), there is a autohotkey script, which enables demul to be exited using the ESC key Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SentaiBrad Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 There is also the RetroArch cores. If you want iso / cue or bin / cue files ISO Buster is the program I use. It can convert the image to a lot of different formats and create a cue sheet for you. It will rename it to "CD" as will the cue sheet, but internally the cue sheet will be pointing to "CD" so you'd have to edit the cue sheet with Notepad++ as well if you want to change the names. They all have to be matching. Though, you can just select in LB to use the folder as its name. When selecting to load a game for Dreamcast, if it's got a cue sheet, try loading that. Especially if you create a bunch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ianrace Posted September 16, 2015 Share Posted September 16, 2015 I have nifty AutoIT script to pretty much do what you're asking. It loads Demul, loads the game, and then send the emulator to full screen. It even makes it easy to close the game when you're done. If you want each game to have its own memory card, go to the Demul game save directory and make a copies of the blank memory card for every game you own. Also make copies of the Demul.ini file. Place each game, its associated memory card file, and a copy of the ini file into separate directories. Open the ini file. In the VMSA0 line, enter the file path and name of the memory card file. Once that's done, just run the following AutoIt script (you will need a copy of AutoIT [it's free!] to either run or compile the script). Opt("WinTitleMatchMode", 1) HotKeySet("{ESC}", "Terminate") $app = "C:\Emulators\Demul\demul.exe" ; replace this with the correct Demul path $game = "C:\filepath\game.cdi" ; replace this with the file path and file name of the game ; The script will copy the new ini file to the Demul directory, thus giving each game its own memory card. ; Make sure you replace "filepath\Demul.ini" and the emulator file path with the correct file paths. ; Note that the ini file must stay name "Demul.ini", or Demul will not recognize it. FileCopy("C:\filepath\Demul.ini", "C:\Emulators\Demul\Demul.ini", 1) Run($app & ' -run=dc -image="' & $game & '"', "C:\Emulators\Demul") WinWaitActive ( "gpu" ) Send("!{ENTER}") While 1 Sleep(100) WEnd Func Terminate() ProcessClose ( "demul.exe" ) Exit 0 EndFunc Enjoy!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CADScott Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 I had issues with Demul in Win10, but changed to NullDC, which works flawlessly on every rom I have tried using the default settings from LaunchBox. I don't have any roms in cue / bin format, but I have other strange formats (mds / mdf), which work fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garbanzo Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 I have 248 Dreacast games in gdi/bin/raw format, and they all load fine with DEmul :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eric Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 nulldc works great in LB but some games you need Demul like "Sturmwind.cdi" "Alice Moms Rescue.cdi" here is the AHK for Demul witch is now in the latest beta Vs of LB... #NoEnv SendMode Event DetectHiddenWindows, on #singleinstance Force $Esc:: { Process, Close, demul.exe return } return Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eric Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 Hay Garbanzo any chance you can upload your box art file for the DC,,,,please please please TX.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SentaiBrad Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 It's not a single file its several hundreds, and it's probably going to really large. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garbanzo Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 eric said Hay Garbanzo any chance you can upload your box art file for the DC,,,,please please please TX.. I just ran them through the scraper and it downloaded 95% of them. The rest I just found online. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eric Posted September 17, 2015 Share Posted September 17, 2015 this sounds good Tx... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crimsonnight Posted September 17, 2015 Author Share Posted September 17, 2015 garbanzo said I have 248 Dreacast games in gdi/bin/raw format, and they all load fine with DEmul :) Hey guys, thanks a lot for all your responses! I'm a little confused so I'll let you know where I'm at. I've imported my DC library, and am using Demul as my emulator. Whenever I load a .cdi game, the Dreamcast 'boots' and goes to the music-cd screen. Whenever I try to run a cue/bin game, it just opens the emulator and nothing happens. I know you've all posted code, but what exactly needs to go where to fix this problem? I'm using the latest LB beta. Cheers, *EDIT* That's strange, even Utopia is just taking me to the music CD screen... *EDIT2* I managed to get nullDC working and that can boot the cdi images, but is failing to launch the cue/bin games. I get an error message saying: 'default image "null" failed to load. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maddoc1007 Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 as far as i know null dc wont play bin cue files only gdi cdi mds etc google will tell you the formats also null dc wont play any games that are Wince you need to use demul for any of the dreamcast games that are Wince again google. Also another reason that your bin cue files might not have been working in demul is that they were missing the image files from them. So if you can stick to cdi files for null dc they will all work and if playing atomiswave, naomi and naomi 2 with demul roms must be in zip form. have a look at this post http://ngemu.com/threads/how-to-convert-your-bin-files-to-work-with-nulldc.99420/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crimsonnight Posted September 18, 2015 Author Share Posted September 18, 2015 Hey there, I've seen that link already, but I can't run boot2bin as I'm on a 64bit system. Also a lot of forums give conflicting information, eg: http://www.vizzed.com/boards/thread.php?id=10640. As @garbanzo said that you can run bin/cue files on Demul, could someone please help me get Demul working? As I said, at the moment, nothing seems to happen after opening a cue/bin file. Cheers, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maddoc1007 Posted September 19, 2015 Share Posted September 19, 2015 Iv read that post but it doesnt give any proper explanation at all. See this post http://www.emutalk.net/threads/49077-reading-a-bin-cd?highlight=bin+cue as you can see from it bin cue files will not boot in null dc or in demul either an i could never get a dreamcast bin cue file to run in either demul or null dc except unless they were atomiswave or naomi games. You will have to ask garbanzo how he got them to work as the majority of people tend to stick to cdi for dreamcast. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crimsonnight Posted September 19, 2015 Author Share Posted September 19, 2015 Lame. I appreciate the info though. The reply on that thread said that the reason they can't be run is because they're not self-booting - what if you ran something like Utopia beforehand? What about if you set LaunchBox to automatically mount the cue/bin file before loading the emulator/game and this dismount when you exit the game (ESC)? Half my collection's cue/bin files, so it'd be really great to figure out a solution! *EDIT* http://www.emutalk.net/threads/55763-Is-disc-(image)-swapping-possible-Booting-cue-bin-files Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.