Hacking Two seperate instances of usb loader gx?

[citrus3000psi]

Is it possible to run two separate instances of usb loader gx? Say one for gamecube games and the other for wii games.

I'm trying to hook up two hard drives, one filled with gc games (1tb) and the other with wii (2tb).

Dios mios won't work when I have two hard drives plugged in. Its easy to solve the issue by simply turning the wii hard drive off. But usb loader gx hangs for a minute while trying to mount a usb drive to port 1 (since the drive is off). Not to mention the cache issues with show new games, when switching from one hard drive to the other.

So I'm looking for one loader to use usb port 0 and the other loader to usb port 1. And when I want to play gc I just have to make sure to turn off the wii 2tb harddrive and open the correct loader.

I could use a totally different loader than gx for wii games. But I like gx alot; so if it all possible I'd like to make it happen.

Thanks
Dan

 

[AbdallahTerro]

it's possible in gx if you:
1. use the correct cIOS (Hermes or d2x-10-beta53)
2. enable all drives/partitions view in settings
3. make sure GC games HDD is in port 0 and wii is in port 1

 

[citrus3000psi]

it's possible in gx if you:
1. use the correct cIOS (Hermes or d2x-10-beta53)
2. enable all drives/partitions view in settings
3. make sure GC games HDD is in port 0 and wii is in port 1

I'm using the latest d2x and have already tried this in test. With both drives connected I can see all the games just fine. But when actually trying to play a gc game. Dios mios just turns the system off if both hard drives are plugged. If there is nothing in usb port1 or the hard drive doesn't have power, dios mios works perfectly fine.

 

[AbdallahTerro]

use nintendont

 

[citrus3000psi]

use nintendont

I use both, and since neither have 100% compatibility will continue to do so.

 

[Cyan]

DIOS MIOS (should) check port1 only if port0 is not present, so port1 being connected shouldn't affect it.
if you have your Gamecube games on port0, it shuts down if port1 is connected?

Disconnecting HDD physically is maybe bothering, but it's a solution when you want to play Gamecube games. Disconnect Port1.

Your 2TB is full?
You can't store both Wii and GC games on the same partition? unless it's not FAT32 and you don't want to format it, which I'll understand.

 

[citrus3000psi]

DIOS MIOS (should) check port1 only if port0 is not present, so port1 being connected shouldn't affect it.
if you have your Gamecube games on port0, it shuts down if port1 is connected?

Disconnecting HDD physically is maybe bothering, but it's a solution when you want to play Gamecube games. Disconnect Port1.

Your 2TB is full?
You can't store both Wii and GC games on the same partition? unless it's not FAT32 and you don't want to format it, which I'll understand.

Gamecube games are on a fat32 1tb drive (full, well almost 150gigs free or so). Its plugged into port0. The 2tb drive NTFS (20gigs free) of wii games if plugged into port1. With this setup dios mios will just turn the system off. If I simply turn off the wii hard drive, dios mios works.

I have no problem disconnecting port1; thats actually what I was planning on doing. The issue is, when usb loader gx is setup for both usb ports it hangs for 30-45 seconds trying to mount usb1. Thats why I simply wondering if you could have two instances installed of usb loader gx. One for gamecube, which only uses usb0. And another install that uses only usb1. So when I want to play gc games, i simply turn off the 2tb wii drive and loader up the correct usb loader gx.

Also does the cache get rebuilt every time it detects new/different games?

I also did spend quite some time trying to get a 3tb drive to work that had everything on one drive, but dios mios is not a fan of the 4k sectors.

 

[Cyan]

ahh, I understand what you meant.
The issue is because you still have both ports in the settings, so it tries to mount port1.
I'll see if I can add a second "press B to skip port1 checking", to prevent waiting 20 seconds.


There's no way to define the path for a different setting (I could add it in meta.xml too, but there's not a lot of request for that).


There's actually a possibility to have two configs, but it's not a feature. It's more the way it's programmed.
The loader is checking config files on SD first THEN on USB.
If you put the loader on port0 (FAT32) USB:/apps/usbloader_gx/boot.dol and set HBC to list USB, then you can have two different settings : one on SD and one on USB.
When the SD card is inserted, it loads the one on SD.
When you eject the SD card, it will load the one on USB.

GXGlobal can be in different places, it's checked in this order and stops on the first found.

1. sd:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
2. sd:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg
3. usb1:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
4. usb1:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg
5. usb2:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
etc.

USB are checked from 1st to 8th partition.

 

[citrus3000psi]

Interesting. So I could simply put the usb loader config on the gc drive and the wii drive. I would just need to make sure one drive is always turned OFF and it would pick up the correct config.

 

[Cyan]

After a quick look at the sources, it seems the cache doesn't keep missing games.
The cache is built based on the current game list.

If the game list had the missing games, they would be listed even if they are not present. and the cache is created based on the games listed.
It would require another method to list games. (load the cache first and compare the gamelist to add only new games instead of creating it based on the list only)

I'm not the one who wrote that part (I'm only the last dev on the project, most work has been done by previous developers)
I don't know if I will change it, it's not planed for the moment.

 

[citrus3000psi]

After a quick look at the sources, it seems the cache doesn't keep missing games.
The cache is built based on the current game list.

If the game list had the missing games, they would be listed even if they are not present. and the cache is created based on the games listed.
It would require another method to list games. (load the cache first and compare the gamelist to add only new games instead of creating it based on the list only)

I'm not the one who wrote that part (I'm only the last dev on the project, most work has been done by previous developers)
I don't know if I will change it, it's not planed for the moment.

I will experiment with turning the cache on and off and see how load times are. Since I will be using different config files, one will only be pull gc games and the other only pulling wii games.

 

[Makarew]

In your apps folder, try copying the GX folder so that there's two. Have each load a different port. In the meta.xml, edit it so that the titles are different in the Homebrew channel so you know which one is which.

 

[citrus3000psi]

So I messed with this a little last night.

I'm able to get the usb loader to read the config file off the gamecube drive. But once I turn this drive off and turn the other drive on, it doesn't read the config. Instead it builds a new config in the sd:/config. And then if I switch the drives back the usb loader for game cube pulls the newly created sd:/config.

I'm not sure why I can't get the loader to read the config off the 2tb drive.

My only thoughts are it only reads config from usb drives in port0 (I didn't think about testing it at the time so I'm not sure if this is true; hope its not)
Or
the config cannot be found on an ntfs partition. I'm currently in the process of copying all my games off the 2tb drive, formating a 10gig fat32 primary partition in front of the ntfs partition and see if it can read the config then.


I'll know more tonight.

 

[citrus3000psi]

So I got the drive formatted with a 10gig fat32 primary and dropped the config file in; and no dice. This only happens when the only drive is plugged into port1. If I move the drive to port0 it picks up the config file just fine.

Cyan, would it be possible to make a special build for me? One that checks the config file in this order:

1. usb1:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
2. usb1:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg
3. usb2:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
4. usb1:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg
5. rest of the usb slots....
6. sd:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
7. sd:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg

Pretty much just want it to check for the config file in the sd last.

So I keep my gamecube drive in port0 and keep the config for it on that drive. It will read this first before the sd card.
My wii drive will be plugged into port1 and the usb loader will not find it on the drive; so it will default all the way to the sd card where I can tell the config to point to usb port1.

Let me know if this is possible. If I not, I may look into a mechanical usb switch solution so both drive would essentially be plugged into port0. Both then would have separate configs on their corresponding harddrive.

 

[Cyan]

it's possible, but I can't maintain a special/different build for everyone, so it will be a one time build.
On next update, it will not work again.


Like I said, you have to eject the SD card to use a second config file.

SD inserted = config 1
SD ejected = Config 2 from first USB encountered.

It's not a feature, it's only the way it's coded, it was a workaround.

I'll see if I can change the way the settings are read (use the current folder instead of fixed paths)
maybe with a xml argument to prevent users depending on fixed path to loose their settings.

 

[citrus3000psi]

I understand what you are saying.

When I wrote make a special build for me I wasn't thinking about future updates. I wouldn't expect you to maintain something special for me. However this change wouldn't effect any current users. People that use the default settings would still get their config file picked up on the sd. However I'm not sure if this would increase loading time for users. And if so then it wouldn't be a good idea. But if not then it would be a way to run two config files for two separate hard drives.

Just throwing out ideas but would this be possible. Keep the current loading of how things are now but just check for one more place if the file isn't found.

1. sd:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
2. sd:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg
3. usb1:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
4. usb1:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg
5. usb2:/config/GXGlobal.cfg

6. sd:/config2/GXGlobal.cfg

Like I said I can run the config file off usb0 with the sd-inserted (no config file found on sd). My only issue is when the I'm trying to exclusively use usb1 with the sd-inserted.

This wouldn't change any current users and to me would be added benefit to the program.

If this is possible to change that then I would be golden.

Thanks for taking the time to help me with the issue!


Edit-----

I got this working. In the meta.xml there is a field for which usb port to default to. This fixed my issue. I've got two usb loaders installed

sd:/usbloader_gx2
sd:/usbloader_gx3

The meta.xml files have different app names so I can tell them apart. The config file is now loading off each hard drive. There is no config files found on the sd card anywhere.

Things are working GREAT!

 

[DEFIANT]

I'll see if I can change the way the settings are read (use the current folder instead of fixed paths)
maybe with a xml argument to prevent users depending on fixed path to loose their settings.

i would be interested in this as an added feature or setting. I was looking for a way to run multiple usblgx configs, ie; one for wii, one for gamecube, one for nand on emunand, and one for emunand. but i'm not using 2 hdd just one. settings in folder would solve that. i would just make multiple folders.

 

[StickyBandit]

I tried this same concept in 2018 and usb loader gx keeps creating a config file on the SD? Does it not search the usb drives anymore in the order mentioned above...
RE:
GXGlobal can be in different places, it's checked in this order and stops on the first found.

1. sd:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
2. sd:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg
3. usb1:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
4. usb1:/apps/usbloader_gx/GXGlobal.cfg
5. usb2:/config/GXGlobal.cfg
etc.

AND...
"
I got this working. In the meta.xml there is a field for which usb port to default to. This fixed my issue. I've got two usb loaders installed

sd:/usbloader_gx2
sd:/usbloader_gx3

The meta.xml files have different app names so I can tell them apart. The config file is now loading off each hard drive. There is no config files found on the sd card anywhere.

Things are working GREAT![/QUOTE]
"

 

[Cyan]

what's your question, or problem ?

USBLoaderGX uses SD in priority if there's one inserted. having a setting file already created or not is irrelevant. If it's not present, it will create it on the first compatible device/partition found in this order :
SD, USB partition1, USB Partition 2, ..., USB Partition 8

If you want 2 separate instances of the loader, you need to eject your SD Card completely to force the loader to look on USB.

With SD inserted : it loads on SD.
Without SD inserted : it loads on USB.


The thing you quoted first was a request, not how it works.
the second thing you quoted is not how it works, I don't know how he managed to "not get a config file on SD" even if SD is inserted. That's not how the loader is working.