Linux SegaCD/Saturn Burning HOWTO

K

kahuna

Introduction:

I wrote this HOWTO because I'm a hardcore *nix user and also a big fan of my Saturn. I've used these techniques under FreeBSD 4.8 and Redhat Linux 9, but they should also work for your distribution of *nix, provided you have all the software installed correctly. There's virtually nothing out there in the way of tutorials for Saturn/Sega CD burning for Linux/Unix. I've developed these by reading man pages, searching google, and trial and error basically for the sole purpose of avoiding the pain of booting into my windows partition.

I won't cover the basics of Burning, since it's already covered on SegaXtreme and I really don't want to reinvent the wheel here. If you need a basic grounding in SCD/SAT burning, I suggest that you go to http://www.segaxtreme.net for a basic tutorial and list of tools. I also will not cover getting CD burning to work in your *nix system. I will assume that you already have that figured out. If you don't, for linux, you'll want to check out the excellent CD-Writing HOWTO at http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/CD-Writing-HOWTO.html

DISCLAIMER

Also, I need to say that this HOWTO is not a guide to pirating software, but provides a way for you to backup your precious and rare games which are no longer being made. I, the author of this guide will not be responsible for the use/misuse of the information herein. The author of this guide is not reponsible for any damage to hardware or software on the console or PC as a result of following this guide. In other words, if you screw up, it's all your fault.

Required Software:

These software packages are required to burn SCD/Saturn backups on a *nix system. There are other ways to do things described here. You can mix and match different tools that you're comfortable with at your discretion.

cdrdao:

*the* DAO cd burning software package for *nix. There's a few other commercial alternatives out there, but this one hasn't given me any coasters yet.

mpg123:

Command line MP3 player for *nix. Can also output wave files. If you don't have an objection to the license terms, use this, since anecdoatal eveidence says that this one is faster.

mpg321:

A GPL alternative to mpg123 for the free software fanatic.

Useful Software:

Unrar

This is the unrar software for linux. Many people use rar to archive their backups, and this program is just nice to have around.

CFV:

A SFV checker for linux.

satburn:

My new all-in-one script to region patch and burn ISO/MP3 and BIN/CUE images

satconv:

If you're not using satburn you need satconv if you plan on changing the region of the iso.

Burning cue/bin images:

Explanation:

Cue/Bin images are easy to burn with cdrdao. You may want to use satconv on the bin before you burn it. To burn with cdrda o, you'll need to know what driver your cdrw uses. You can find the info at http://cdrdao.sourceforge.net/drives.html.

Burn It!:

The command to burn a cue/bin with cdrdao is:

cdrdao write --driver <driver name> --device <device name> --speed <speed> cuesheet.

as an example, I would type:

cdrdao write --driver generic-mmc-raw --device 0,0,0 --speed 2 mygame.cue

I always burn at 2 speed, since I seem to get better copies that way. The only real way to figure out the max of your burner and media is to experiment. You can also use the -eject option if you want the cd to be spit out when it's done burning.



Burning ISO+MP3:

Explanaton:

ISO+MP3 is a little bit more tricky to burn with cdrdao. the MP3 files must first be converted to wave format, and cdrdao cannot understand ISO+WAV cue sheets, so we must make a TOC file for use with cdrdao.

Another alternative is to just use the satburn utility that I've provided.

For this, just uncompress your game into an empty folder and run satburn. Do note that you must set a few options in the satburn script if you want it to work.

So basically - unrar e <game name>

run satburn and that's it.

Without satburn:

Convert MP3 to WAV:

It's easy to convert a bunch of MP3 files to wav format in *nix. In the bash shell (or bourne shell), you can do them all in 1 command with mpg123 and some shell magic:

for i in *.[mM][pP]3; do mpg123 -w "$i.wav" "$i";done

After running the command you should have a bunch of wav files that are the same name as the mp3 files with .wav tacked onto the end. You can delete the MP3 files, as we no longer need them. The next step is to create a TOC sheet for the ISO+WAV files that we have in the working directory.

Here is a sample TOC sheet to get you started:

CD_ROM

TRACK MODE1

DATAFILE "MyGame.iso"

ZERO 00:02:00 // post-gap



TRACK AUDIO

SILENCE 00:02:00 // pre-gap

START

FILE "Track_2.mp3.wav" 0



TRACK AUDIO

FILE "Track_3.mp3.wav" 0

TRACK AUDIO

FILE "Track_4.mp3.wav" 0

Just change the name in the FILE line to the ISO and WAV files and add additional audio tracks as needed. This will seem easy if you are used to cue files.

Burn it!:

Once your TOC file is finished, you can burn your backup. the cdrdao command is exactly the same as it is for the cue/bin example, except you'll use the TOC sheet file in place of the cuesheet.

cdrdao write --driver generic-mmc-raw --device 0,0,0 --speed 2 Mygame.toc

Wasn't that easy?

Most games can be recorded with just a couple of commands on the command line. Once you master this, you'll be burning games faster and with less effort than you ever have on windows.

So long for now. In a while, I'll post a thread about ripping SCD/SAT games on *nix.
 
Attached is the linux version of satconv, I assume that is what you were looking for, Piratero? I could not find this anywhere on the web, but was lucky to find it on an old dvd that I had.The rest of the software can be obtained easily through a google search or through your distribution's package manager, except probably sat2toc.py.You can build a script for that yourself if you really need it.
 

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I haven't been around for a while, nor have I written up a guide about saturn ripping with Linux. I've been way to busy to even pull my saturn out of the drawer where I keep all my old consoles! :(

Looks like somehow this sat2toc.py file is no longer available and I don't have it on my hard drive. I'l rewrite it, but I'm thinking about doing it in perl or ruby. In any case, I'll have something that runs on linux and spits out a TOC file up here soon.
 
I've written a bash script which generates the TOC with the help of this thread.

#!/bin/bash

for i in *.[mM][pP]3; do mpg123 -w "$i.wav" "$i";rm "$i";done

touch game.toc.tmp;

echo "CD_ROM" >> game.toc.tmp;

echo "TRACK MODE1" >> game.toc.tmp;

for i in *.[iI][sS][oO]; do

echo "DATAFILE \"$i\"" >> game.toc.tmp;

done

echo "ZERO 00:02:00 // post-gap" >> game.toc.tmp;

echo "" >> game.toc.tmp;

for i in *.[wW][aA][vV]; do

echo "TRACK AUDIO" >> game.toc.tmp;

echo "FILE \"$i\" 0" >> game.toc.tmp;

done

sed -e 7\i\START -e 7\i\SILENCE\ 00:02:00\ //\ pre-gap game.toc.tmp > game.toc;

rm game.toc.tmp

exit

# End

I've use it on a couple games with no problems, but I can't gurantee it works 100% of the time. Thanks to kahuna for the "for i in" bit
 
Could anyone give me some help creating a backup copy of a Sega Saturn disc?

I'm been trying to make a working Bin / Cue backup of my original Dragon Force. Been using cdrdao to create the bin and bin2iso to create cue file. I have loads of saturn games that I want to play with yabause, but I want to use some file of disc image. From what I've read only bin files will workt and ISOs won't
 
What program have you been using to create the bin/cue files?

In my experience, if you're using alcohol 120% -- the images it creates from saturn games won't work.

I haven't tried this personally, but you could try ImgBurn and see if it makes valid images -- I'd be curious to see if it does (It can make bin/cue). It's an excellent free program regardless:

http://www.imgburn.com
 
dibz said:
What program have you been using to create the bin/cue files?


In my experience, if you're using alcohol 120% -- the images it creates from saturn games won't work.


I haven't tried this personally, but you could try ImgBurn and see if it makes valid images -- I'd be curious to see if it does (It can make bin/cue). It's an excellent free program regardless:


http://www.imgburn.com


dibz, thank you sooo much!


I was trying to get Dragon Force in a working bin format all day! Originally I was using a linux program called cdrdao which should create bin files. Using the command #:
Code:
cdrdao read-cd --read-raw --datafile ~/image.bin --source-device 0,0,0 --driver generic-mmc-raw ~/image.toc

Dragon Force would start to load in yabause, but would then kick me back into the Saturn System Settings.

I dragged out my old windows 2k box plugged my dvd burner in, and downloaded a copy of CDRWIN..... Which didn't work either! After more testing I found CDRwin just didn't like Dragon Force, but worked fine with Guardian Heros.


So I when back to linux and created a bin of Guardian Heros with cdrdao... and that worked fine!!! I guess neither cdrdao nor CDRwin likes Guardian Heros (at least the way i was doing it).


Finally I read your Post today and installed ImgBurn under wine.


IT FINALLY WORKED!!!!!!!!!!!!


I am happy to say I have a working bin now of Dragon Force using ImgBurn + Wine


Thanx again!!!! :D
 
Hey I have never heard about what you have posted here. Can you share any more information with me relating to it? I think it is a older version but somewhere it is good. I search out for its newer version but I didn't find even this version also. I am using my burning software my Linux operating system and it is good working.
 
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