6-28-2020 - DCDIB 1.0.2 - Burn Bootable Dreamcast CD-ROMs On Mac OS X 10.3.9 G3/G4/G5, All CDI File Formats Supported

[alex_free]

https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/dreamcast-cdi-burner-mac-os-x

If anyone tries this out feedback is greatly appreciated. Dead simple usage.

Double click the app.

Select your CDI file in the file chooser.

Enter password if necessary for burning privileges.

Wait until Terminal says burning is complete and the CD-ROM ejects.

 

[alex_free]

Found out there are 4 total types for Dreamcast CDI’s. WAV+ISO, WAV in an ISO+ISO, WAVs+ISO (CDDA), and WAVs in an ISO+ISO(CDDA). The WAVs in an ISO+ISO CDDA file format is now supported in version 1.0.2. This version is also compiled for Mac OS X 10.3.9, G3/G4/G5.

 

[TheShortTimer]

Alex, once again you are a godsend!

Earlier today, during a jogging session I came across the following:

A Dreamcast and an obscured Mega Drive II! (known Stateside as the Genesis)

There's also a few games including Crazy Taxi. I set up the Dreamcast to see whether it even works.

Looking promising but can it load game discs?

Seems to be fully functional! Going exercising can be unexpectedly rewarding.

To confirm what you've detailed on Mac Garden, I can use your app to download and burn Dreamcast titles to CD-Rs, including homebrew releases? How's that for luck?

I'll need to check the revision number to see if it's 0 or 1 model.

 

[alex_free]

Alex, once again you are a godsend!

Earlier today, during a jogging session I came across the following:

A Dreamcast and an obscured Mega Drive II! (known Stateside as the Genesis)

There's also a few games including Crazy Taxi. I set up the Dreamcast to see whether it even works.

Looking promising but can it load game discs?

Seems to be fully functional! Going exercising can be unexpectedly rewarding.

To confirm what you've detailed on Mac Garden, I can use your app to download and burn Dreamcast titles to CD-Rs, including homebrew releases? How's that for luck?

I'll need to check the revision number to see if it's 0 or 1 model.

Sure can! Any and every .CDI file I've come across works with it, and literally any CD-R brand works in my experience, the Dreamcast is not picky at all unlike the PS1. An Intel Mac version is coming soon as well, will probably be the first thing I put out on Intel as soo many people asked for that on reddit and the dreamcast-talk forums. I recommend googling cdromance <game title name>.

 

[TheShortTimer]

Sure can! Any and every .CDI file I've come across works with it, and literally any CD-R brand works in my experience, the Dreamcast is not picky at all unlike the PS1.

Fantastic! I've checked the revision number and the machine is a "1 model" which means I'll have no problems with running the MIL-CD exploit.

Whoever dumped the Sega machines very thoughtfully included scores of CD/DVD jewel cases and sleeves which are going to come in handy when I'm creating my own discs.

An Intel Mac version is coming soon as well, will probably be the first thing I put out on Intel as soo many people asked for that on reddit and the dreamcast-talk forums.

Marvellous! From my brief look around, Dreamcast-talk is a very interesting forum and I've already found what will be the material for my first burned disc. It'll effectively negate the need to use the Mega Drive because anything I'd want to play would be available to me on the DC and with greater flexibility.

I recommend googling cdromance <game title name>.

Thanks for that recommendation - its been extremely fruitful.

 

[alex_free]

Fantastic! I've checked the revision number and the machine is a "1 model" which means I'll have no problems with running the MIL-CD exploit.

Whoever dumped the Sega machines very thoughtfully included scores of CD/DVD jewel cases and sleeves which are going to come in handy when I'm creating my own discs.

Marvellous! From my brief look around, Dreamcast-talk is a very interesting forum and I've already found what will be the material for my first burned disc. It'll effectively negate the need to use the Mega Drive because anything I'd want to play would be available to me on the DC and with greater flexibility.



Thanks for that recommendation - its been extremely fruitful.

I’ve been following that site since before they even had Dreamcast CDIs. There was a site called replayers that had the best selection of CDIs, and they merged with cdromance a few years back. Excellent resource and great use of my backup HDD.

I find it interesting that the PAL consoles do not have a manufacture date on the sticker. Mine is September 99 (the USA launch month), and since August 99 consoles are all rev 0 this is one of the first rev 1 consoles which I like a lot. I am a collector of launch consoles or near launch consoles, like my October 1995 PlayStation.

Bad picture, but this is the serial to SD card adapter I bought off eBay years ago for like $10. There are also directions on how to make your own online. While some games can be loaded off of a SD card, the load times are not great and I just use CD-Rs. The best use of the SD card by far IMO is the use of it with DCMC (Dreamcast media center). You can browse and load 320KB/s MP3s off of a FAT32 SD card and play them no problem on a Sega Dreamcast console, which was released in Japan in 1998! I never ever had luck with playing any kind of acceptable video on the Dreamcast until I discovered SFD player. Which is basically exploiting the FMV technology used by Dreamcast games (it’s just slightly modified MPEG-1 at an even higher bitrate then VCD, SFD: up to 3600KB/s V.S. VCD: 1150KB/s, literally more then triple). I wrote an entire tutorial at Dreamcast-Talk and on Reddit as well as even mentioned it a few times on these forums

I’ve tried a few Genesis emulators on the console, and they are definitely usable for many games (I can’t remember for example if something like Phantasy Star II or Sonic 3 could save games but I doubt it).

I started Half-Life on quite a few different computers and platforms, but never finished it until I burned the leaked Half-Life Sega Dreamcast CDI which I played through to the end with zero problems using the controller (although it does support the official Dreamcast keyboard and mouse which would of course be a way better experience if you get those).

Soul Reaver: Legacy Of Kain is also excellent, have not finished it yet though.

Also, believe it or not, you can get that thing online if you want to. There are various RPI/PC setups with modems that allows you to play things like the Quake 3 Dreamcast port with other Dreamcasts and even PC players. The first online console remains online to this day!

 

[alex_free]

Intel version dropping tomorrow

 

[AdamJD]

This doesn't seem to work in Big Sur. The current version shows app with slash through it - needs to be updated.

 

[swamprock]

I’ve been following that site since before they even had Dreamcast CDIs. There was a site called replayers that had the best selection of CDIs, and they merged with cdromance a few years back. Excellent resource and great use of my backup HDD.

View attachment 1818459

I find it interesting that the PAL consoles do not have a manufacture date on the sticker. Mine is September 99 (the USA launch month), and since August 99 consoles are all rev 0 this is one of the first rev 1 consoles which I like a lot. I am a collector of launch consoles or near launch consoles, like my October 1995 PlayStation.

View attachment 1818460
Bad picture, but this is the serial to SD card adapter I bought off eBay years ago for like $10. There are also directions on how to make your own online. While some games can be loaded off of a SD card, the load times are not great and I just use CD-Rs. The best use of the SD card by far IMO is the use of it with DCMC (Dreamcast media center). You can browse and load 320KB/s MP3s off of a FAT32 SD card and play them no problem on a Sega Dreamcast console, which was released in Japan in 1998! I never ever had luck with playing any kind of acceptable video on the Dreamcast until I discovered SFD player. Which is basically exploiting the FMV technology used by Dreamcast games (it’s just slightly modified MPEG-1 at an even higher bitrate then VCD, SFD: up to 3600KB/s V.S. VCD: 1150KB/s, literally more then triple). I wrote an entire tutorial at Dreamcast-Talk and on Reddit as well as even mentioned it a few times on these forums

I’ve tried a few Genesis emulators on the console, and they are definitely usable for many games (I can’t remember for example if something like Phantasy Star II or Sonic 3 could save games but I doubt it).

I started Half-Life on quite a few different computers and platforms, but never finished it until I burned the leaked Half-Life Sega Dreamcast CDI which I played through to the end with zero problems using the controller (although it does support the official Dreamcast keyboard and mouse which would of course be a way better experience if you get those).

Soul Reaver: Legacy Of Kain is also excellent, have not finished it yet though.

Also, believe it or not, you can get that thing online if you want to. There are various RPI/PC setups with modems that allows you to play things like the Quake 3 Dreamcast port with other Dreamcasts and even PC players. The first online console remains online to this day!

I‘ve ported a few old DOS Fenix games, and have written two of my own, for the Dreamcast.
Fuseki Games downloads for Dreamcast

 

[TheShortTimer]

Following on from the difficulties that I mentioned in the DCDIB thread for Intel Macs where attempts to run the program under High Sierra and even Snow Leopard on a couple of MacBook Air's using an external USB optical drive, I had a hunch that there might be an issue surrounding how external drives are accessed via USB, so I set up an iBook G4 with DCDIB 1.0.6 and my suspicions were confirmed by the success shown below:

Hurrah, I got there in the end!

Interesting that OS X identifies the burned disc as an audio CD. Of course, I now have to test it on the Dreamcast.

A few spins later...

Yes, I'm in business! SMS Plus is an awesome emulator that runs Master System and Game Gear titles. I've mislaid the disc that I'd burned previously and Dreamshell doesn't boot .CDI files via the serial port so I needed to create a new one and I'm now a very happy retro gamer.

From now on, I'll crack out the iBook G4 whenever I need to burn stuff for the Dreamcast.

 

[alex_free]

Following on from the difficulties that I mentioned in the DCDIB thread for Intel Macs where attempts to run the program under High Sierra and even Snow Leopard on a couple of MacBook Air's using an external USB optical drive, I had a hunch that there might be an issue surrounding how external drives are accessed via USB, so I set up an iBook G4 with DCDIB 1.0.6 and my suspicions were confirmed by the success shown below:

Hurrah, I got there in the end!

Interesting that OS X identifies the burned disc as an audio CD. Of course, I now have to test it on the Dreamcast.

A few spins later...

Yes, I'm in business! SMS Plus is an awesome emulator than runs Master System and Game Gear titles. I've mislaid the disc that I'd burned previously and Dreamshell doesn't boot .CDI files via the serial port so I needed to create a new one and I'm now a very happy retro gamer.

From now on, I'll crack out the iBook G4 whenever I need to burn stuff for the Dreamcast.

Sorry I’m making you use ppc 🤣 really it was always made for that back in the day, not saying it can’t be improved for intel in the future tho!

I think the actual issue you were encountering is it can’t find external usb burners (yet, support really needs to be added for that because internal Mac burners are not amazing for old consoles, funny enough the iBook G4 burner is probably pretty good for them (older burners are more high quality with better tolerances for old readers found on old consoles)).

Not surprising at all it’s considered an audio CD, that’s how the exploit works sometimes (there’s 4 different exploit methods and this supports them all).

 

[TheShortTimer]

Sorry I’m making you use ppc 🤣 really it was always made for that back in the day, not saying it can’t be improved for intel in the future tho!

Don't be sorry. Its been a joy returning to using a PPC Mac and I've successfully burned half a dozen discs so far and they all work without any issues.

I think the actual issue you were encountering is it can’t find external usb burners (yet, support really needs to be added for that because internal Mac burners are not amazing for old consoles, funny enough the iBook G4 burner is probably pretty good for them (older burners are more high quality with better tolerances for old readers found on old consoles)).

You've validated my need to hoard hardware - thanks!

 

[alex_free]

Don't be sorry. Its been a joy returning to using a PPC Mac and I've successfully burned half a dozen discs so far and they all work without any issues.

You've validated my need to hoard hardware - thanks!

I think you would enjoy the worlds first scientific study on burning psx (ps1) CD-Rs https://alex-free.github.io/psx-cdr/

TLDR: I use a plextor px-708A IDE burner from 2003, connected to my late 2012 Mac mini with an IDE to usb adapter, and use cmc pro CD-Rs to burn discs that work like pressed cdroms performance wise on my 30 year old ps1.

 

[TheShortTimer]

I think you would enjoy the worlds first scientific study on burning psx (ps1) CD-Rs https://alex-free.github.io/psx-cdr/

You are correct - it's a fascinating read!

TLDR: I use a plextor px-708A IDE burner from 2003, connected to my late 2012 Mac mini with an IDE to usb adapter, and use cmc pro CD-Rs to burn discs that work like pressed cdroms performance wise on my 30 year old ps1.

Would these PSX CD-R's also work on a PS3, given that it's backwards compatible with the PSX?

 

[alex_free]

You are correct - it's a fascinating read!



Would these PSX CD-R's also work on a PS3, given that it's backwards compatible with the PSX?

Yes, if it’s soft-modded! Same with PS2… I actually am the developer of the most advanced, compatible, and open source soft-mod for ps1, “Tonyhax International”. I love the old ps1 games with pre-rendered cgi backgrounds and the 3d enemies/player characters. Big fan of old resident evil, parasite eve, 90s square Enix. To use the remasters is a sin!

I fell in love with the ps1 and it’s flawed security. I have done so much to bring that community to the modern age, solving anti-piracy protections, figuring out how to burn CD-Rs in the modern age that actually work, fixing ps2 hardware bugs with patcher programs and completely software solutions…

There was no real open source soft mod that worked on all ps1 and early ps2 consoles before me… I sought out to change that and am very happy to have solved many issues people had a few years ago…