Hacking Proper CDDA support with PSX Eboots

Gamemaster1379

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Hello everyone, I have a problem that I've been working with for a while, but seem to have come to an impasse on.

I have recently gotten ahold of an old PSP-1000 unit, and have softmodded it to run 6.60 ME-1.6 (Lite). I have converted quite a few of my old PSX ISOs into EBOOTs for the system, and while almost all of them have worked well, I have been running into complications with games that used CDDA audio. No matter what I've tried, I can't seem to get any of them to play music when in-game. I have attempted two or three different workarounds that I've found online, but none seem to do anything.

So far, I've tried:

-POPSLoader v3 and tried several different versions on this, including 6.60, 3.71 (as a poopular CDDA choice), and 3.70. Some numbers lower than that seem to have problems running the game, with the PSP spitting back errors about corruption or trouble starting the app.

-Modified popstation.exe for PopstationGUI which supposedly fixes CDDA audio. While I can still compile EBOOTs, the games will not run on the PSP with this modified popstation.exe--the PSP spits back errors about the file not being able to run

-Different disc formats. I've attempted a few different formats when creating the EBOOT. Most popularly was using .img/.cue; less popularly a .bin/.cue setup. Neither of these seem to have any impact either.

So, with that, I'm stumped. Could anybody shed some light onto what I could do to get these working?
 

ILuvGames

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Most of the solutions I have seen involve ccd images and/or converting the audio and rebuilding the image. It might be a good idea to mention what games you are having issues with as I don't think you will find a 'fix all' solution.
 

ILuvGames

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I have a modded psp myself. If you would like me to, I can try those games over the weekend and (should they work) let you know what I did and which firmware and pops version I used.
 

reprep

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just did one myself, so i might help you.

use the latest popstaion. (1.4.2). no need for a modified exe as it is already built-in in latest versions.

use .ccd .img .sub format, unfortunately that is the only format supported for cdda. .bin, .cue will not work.

use a pops below 3.71 for cdda support.

to test the cd image before converting, mount it with daemon tools or something like that and be sure your pc detects extra audio tracks and play them just as it would play an audio cd.
 
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ILuvGames

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Thanks for the good advice, reprep. Don't take offence if I put a specific guide for some of (but will try to find solutions for all) the games he was having problems with ;).

Vigilante 8 [NTSC][SLUS-00510] :-

Using Alcohol 120% and an original disc (skip this step if you already have a good ccd dump).
Using the 'make image' option with 'playstation' datatype (making sure skip reading errors is unticked and read subchannel data is ticked).
Alcohol 120% should make a ccd image for Vigilante 8.
Test the image with an emulator like epsxe to see if you got a good dump like me.
Using latest popstation (1.4.2 Gui) with 0 compression (for compatibility incase the compression level causes errors) and the correct game id.

I am using the last 6.60 Pro CFW released with the last version of popsloader for 6.xx Pro CFW. I also used pops 4.01 (last version with CDDA audio support) as 3.71 black screened on me. As far as I can see and hear, all is present and correct (including the CDDA).

Vigilante 8 2nd Offence most probably needs redumping from an original disc to ccd format (as per Vigilante 8 and reprep's advice). Converting from other formats without losing something (like the audio you want) would be difficult and would very probably be pointless. If I find an alternative, I will have to give you a pm.

The others you mentioned are already in ccd format elsewhere (in places we cannot mention in open in the forum here ;) ) and should just require different pops and a compression level that is not too high when converting with popstation gui.
 
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ILuvGames

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If you have any more issues, please ask. There are plenty of people like reprep and myself who are prepared to try and help in the boards, here.
 

Gamemaster1379

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Fantastic, I'll give this a try later today and get back to you both on how it went. I appreciate the assistance!

And no worries on getting ahold of the images, I already have the original discs--I can convert them, that should be no problem. They are fully functional and the CDDA audio is detected. A little conversion should do it.
 
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ILuvGames

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Well, they would be slow to load on 0 compression like I used. Popstation defaults to it's highest compression level which may cause it's own problems. Vigilante 8 was slow to load for me as I used no compression but it loaded and ran correctly for me using the method I used (had to stare at a black screen for 5-10 seconds at one point) ? Have you tried another pops version like reprep suggested or looked at one of the (albeit old) compatibility lists on the net as each game normally requires a different version of pops ? Maybe try changing firmware if you are willing to. Is it that none of the eboots work, or just some of them ? The isos that you make are meant to be burnt and played on a PSX don't forget. They may have had copy protection that needed to be removed by ppf patching the iso or hex editing the iso.
 

Gamemaster1379

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are you using popsloader and choosing a version below 4.01?
I attempted 4.01, several versions below, and 6.60. None seemed to work.

And ILuvGames, I forgot to check compression settings. Perhaps that's the source of my problem. I'll look into it and report back on my findings.
 

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