RPCS3 now boots up .iso files

[bundangdon]

Just a nice little PSA for the emulation community out there. The RPC3 team has just rolled out a major update to RPCS3 that I never thought would happen,but actually did (happen) in their most recent alpha. Iso files are now loadable, and this not a photoshop mock-up or anything of that nature

Edited January 10 by bundangdon

[zugswang]

Works perfectly 👍

[bundangdon]

1 minute ago, zugswang said:

Works perfectly 👍

Yep, this was a very unexpected and surprisingly nice update

[zugswang]

17 minutes ago, bundangdon said:

Yep, this was a very unexpected and surprisingly nice update

Yeah I never thought it would happen either.

Now to convert 1,200 folders 🙁

[SiriusVI]

3 hours ago, zugswang said:

Yeah I never thought it would happen either.

Now to convert 1,200 folders 🙁

Aren't the .iso files a lot larger than the folders? CHD support would be nice, though.

[JoeViking245]

8 minutes ago, SiriusVI said:

Aren't the .iso files a lot larger than the folders? CHD support would be nice, though.

iso files are generally the same size as the "expanded" folders.  "Expanded" as in, not all put into one "book cover".  It's still all the same "pages".  aka, iso file are generally not compressed at all.

[bundangdon]

7 hours ago, SiriusVI said:

Aren't the .iso files a lot larger than the folders? CHD support would be nice, though.

From my experience, they're almost exactly the same in terms of size. I can imagine CHD support will happen in the future, but for now it's just nice to have everything in one file and it also makes it easier to import the games into frontends like Launchbox.

[SiriusVI]

7 hours ago, bundangdon said:

From my experience, they're almost exactly the same in terms of size. I can imagine CHD support will happen in the future, but for now it's just nice to have everything in one file and it also makes it easier to import the games into frontends like Launchbox.

That's true. Personally, I use the digital versions for most PS3 games, since I found that many disc games install a significant amount of data onto the virtual hdd. So having the .iso present would just occupy a lot of space unnecessarily.

But if the .iso files are the same as the expanded folders for the disc-based games, I might convert the disc-based games that I have.

[zugswang]

15 hours ago, SiriusVI said:

Aren't the .iso files a lot larger than the folders? CHD support would be nice, though.

No, they look like they are the same luckily, or at least very close.

[zugswang]

19 hours ago, zugswang said:

Yeah I never thought it would happen either.

Now to convert 1,200 folders 🙁

Update ...

24 hours just to convert 150 folders to iso !!!!

[SiriusVI]

41 minutes ago, zugswang said:

Update ...

24 hours just to convert 150 folders to iso !!!!

Yeah, it's a project. I'd do a few every day and not worry about when it's done.

[zugswang]

41 minutes ago, SiriusVI said:

Yeah, it's a project. I'd do a few every day and not worry about when it's done.

Totally grinds my PC to a halt using all the ram, so I literally have to do it when not using the PC overnight.

Like you say .. it's a project ... but I have done much worse over the years, like converting all PS2 (2,700) from gz to iso then to chd for example !!

[SiriusVI]

18 minutes ago, zugswang said:

Totally grinds my PC to a halt using all the ram, so I literally have to do it when not using the PC overnight.

Like you say .. it's a project ... but I have done much worse over the years, like converting all PS2 (2,700) from gz to iso then to chd for example !!

you and me both! Haha. But chd is just too good to not convert.

[zugswang]

Just now, SiriusVI said:

you and me both! Haha. But chd is just too good to not convert.

Yes, I have converted literally 10,000's of bin/cue or iso to chd, so now everything I have that can run as chd's are done.

Literally took months, but saved a lot of space as well as being cleaner generally.

This saves no space, but is so much better than folders.

[SiriusVI]

3 minutes ago, zugswang said:

Yes, I have converted literally 10,000's of bin/cue or iso to chd, so now everything I have that can run as chd's are done.

Literally took months, but saved a lot of space as well as being cleaner generally.

This saves no space, but is so much better than folders.

I might have to do it again some time, though, since I had to use the makecd command for all ps2 games, but most of the ps2 games are of course DVDs and so the makedvd command should be used. But at the time of conversion, this format was not compatible with the ps2 retroarch core, I believe. Same for PSP games. Makedvd is compatible with emulators, but retroachievements won't work with them.

[zugswang]

56 minutes ago, SiriusVI said:

I might have to do it again some time, though, since I had to use the makecd command for all ps2 games, but most of the ps2 games are of course DVDs and so the makedvd command should be used. But at the time of conversion, this format was not compatible with the ps2 retroarch core, I believe. Same for PSP games. Makedvd is compatible with emulators, but retroachievements won't work with them.

I use PCSX2 and PPSSPP so not an issue.

RA with these systems is poor in comparison.

[SiriusVI]

3 minutes ago, zugswang said:

I use PCSX2 and PPSSPP so not an issue.

RA with these systems is poor in comparison.

I know, but for me, shaders are more important than anything else. I might switch to the standalone emulators once I find a convenient enough solution to autoload shaderglass with my shader presets when launching a rom. I think it's already possible, but I simply do not have the time to dig deeper into it, right now. 

[zugswang]

On 1/11/2026 at 9:40 AM, SiriusVI said:

Yeah, it's a project. I'd do a few every day and not worry about when it's done.

FYI, I had an issue with the ram on my PC, hence why it was taking so long just to do 150 folders.

I used another PC to do the rest (over 1,000) and it took 50 hours straight day and night to complete.

But at least it's done.

So much better than the folders.

[SiriusVI]

10 hours ago, zugswang said:

FYI, I had an issue with the ram on my PC, hence why it was taking so long just to do 150 folders.

I used another PC to do the rest (over 1,000) and it took 50 hours straight day and night to complete.

But at least it's done.

So much better than the folders.

I might reconsider switching from hdd based games to disk based games, too. But it's gonna be a long process. Especially if it's not possible to delete the HHD game, but leave the dlc and update data in tact. Ah well, we'll see.