Tutorial: Compress Dreamcast GDI to CHD (also works with PSX, Saturn, Sega CD, etc...)

[@johnfite2567]

The robot voice made me think this was bogus. I checked the .bat file in notepad++ and it looked ok. Tried it and got great results. Thanks for the tutorial.

[@loueezyrap]

Wow finally I figured this out. Thanks I appreciate your video.

[@FranciscoSelma]

Thank you! Now I can have my Atomiswave to Dreamcast ports better organized in my DIY Arcade machine.

[@alistairstewart9975]

Great tutorial. Simple and to the point and also included the program I needed. Liked the video as you also made me laugh with the robot voice. Thank you.

[@xternal1]

Thank you my dude. This vid was Very helpful! I was looking for this type of info for a while.. Keep up the great vids.

[@Mick2K]

Thanks. I'm glad that it's useful to you.

[@lcb2884]

PLEASE HELP: the program I use to convert the games closes immediately and I can't find a solution

[@Mick2K]

Try this: github.com/umageddon/namDHC It way better than my batch file

[@a88pockets]

Im all of 15 seconds into the video and I want the creator to know that no one in the world cares as much about the sound of your voice or what you look like more than you do. I didn't learn that everybody is so preoccupied with their own insecurities that they have no time to consider what yours may be until i was in my 20s. Trust me when I say your voice is fine. Lean into who you are, what you sound like, look like and are into and own that shit.

[@Mick2K]

You're probably right but it wasn't meant to be taken serious. Even if I would sound like an idiot nobody would care as long as i am understandable and that's the problem. English isn't my native language and i'm a sloppy speaker. So i used text to speech instead of recording hundred takes.

[@der-Troet]

works for me, thx!! 👍👍

[@ruster666]

Thanks for this tutorial, was very helpfull!!! Congrats!

[@chrislaivier8459]

Ahhh... the Magician Lord music at the end ❤

[@Mick2K]

Ah, i see you're a man of culture as well.

[@chrislaivier8459]

@@Mick2K Still have the AES cartridge laying around here somewhere in my big pile of old games and dead systems. Never managed to play it through though with credits limited to only 4 lol

[@Mick2K]

@@chrislaivier8459 I sadly never had a Neo Geo myself. It was almost impossible to get where i live and the price was astronomical (at least for a Teenager in the 90s)

[@chrislaivier8459]

@@Mick2K Yea, I feel you. That's why I never made it past 6 games in total :D Spent my summer holidays working to be able to afford the few I have. Hard earned money to buy hardware I could not afford, that makes it hard for you to simply sell on. Viewpoint was so pricey back then with only 1000 copies for EU, 3000 for US and 4000 for JP, I never saw a NG AES cart climb that high again (around 1500€ with today's currency). Sadly, none of my games actually gained any value, they're all sitting between 35-100€. Guess if I had kept Snatcher I'd be filthy rich by now... :DDD

[@thispc721]

Very useful tool. Thanks for posting.

[@ethanwasme4307]

"i cannot directly tell you, but you should google the game" xD

[@10percent4DaBigGuy]

i got a big download of dreamcast zip files and anyways coinops in not launching zipped files i was looking for a way to convert these to GDI i spent a couple hours thanks for saving me allot of time!

[@cinetici]

should I do this proccess for each game individually or is there a way I can do a batch of them at the same time? Thanks for the tuto

[@Mick2K]

With this batch file you can only do one game but you could run multiple instances. I can run two or three at the same time without problems.

[@cinetici]

@@Mick2K thanks a lot buddy

[@juan643960]

thanks for the video man appreciate you

[@Mick2K]

And I appreciate your appreciation.

[@rocknflip66]

awesome tutorial, i was reading in a retropie forum about CHD. i was curious that its basically a compressed GDi, but whats the difference with CDi if we are talking about the compression? is the quality for CHD way better than CDi?

[@Mick2K]

Depending on the game and the quality of the rip the difference can be huge. CDI was made to fit on a 700 mb CD. Many rips lowered the audio and video quality greatly and some even deleted some videos or music to fit.

[@rocknflip66]

@@Mick2K dope, im going to test it now on my retropie pi4, thanks again!

[@vinayverma6064]

How to use low size San Francisco Rush 2049 cdi disc compress size Provide tutorial & Any cdr disc solution tutorial

[@pork6811]

Are the Bin and Raw files also combined into the CHD file? Or do I still need to keep them?

[@Mick2K]

No you don't have to keep them. All the files are in the CHD. You can delete everything but make sure to test the CHD before deleting the files.

[@pork6811]

@@Mick2K thank you! It works so far except for GDI file which comes along with 3 bin files, the program doesn’t works when I click on the Batch file. Any idea how to resolve this?

[@Mick2K]

If the batch file doesn't work for some reason you could try to drag and drop only the gdi file onto the chdman.exe

[@lolkalberer]

does it work with a original dreamcast?

[@Mick2K]

No only with emulators.

[@cinetici]

will it work with Retroarch on Switch?No problem with multiple disc games?

[@Mick2K]

It should work on switch as long as the core supports CHD. Multiple disc games are still multiple discs. It should behave exactly like any uncompressed game.

[@cinetici]

@@Mick2K awesome! appreciate it!

[@TinMan-ds8pc]

This worked really well thank you. It even works on PS1 games, DuckStation is a PS1 emulator that plays CHD files Is there any way to convert them back to their original format after using this?

[@Mick2K]

It works with almost any CD based system. I use CHD for my psx, sega cd, PC engine cd, Saturn and Dreamcast. Most emulators support it nowadays. And yes you can convert them back to bin/cue (except Dreamcast) but i am not on my PC and of the top of my head I don't know the exact command. If you can wait till tomorrow i will update the download link with a batch file to convert them back.

[@Mick2K]

I updated the download links with an archive that includes a batch file to convert the CHDs back to CUE/BIN.

[@TinMan-ds8pc]

@@Mick2K Thanks a bunch, bro. I really appreciate it. Unfortunately when converting it back it only ends up with a single BIN file when there should be multiple

[@Mick2K]

Usually with multi bin images the first is the data track and the rest are audio files. Open the cue with a text editor and all the data and audio tracks should be listed. So the disk image should still be usable as far as I know. Dreamcast is the exception. I haven't found a way to convert them back to the original GDI.

[@TinMan-ds8pc]

@@Mick2K I just tested it out on Crazy Taxi 2 and it worked fine. It was a Redump version and Redump uses CUE now instead of GDI. Although now that it has only 1 BIN file, it is no longer Redump verified This is what the CUE file looks like before and after FILE "Crazy Taxi (USA).bin" BINARY TRACK 01 MODE1/2352 INDEX 01 00:00:00 TRACK 02 AUDIO INDEX 00 00:06:00 INDEX 01 00:08:00 TRACK 03 MODE1/2352 INDEX 01 00:15:01 REM SINGLE-DENSITY AREA FILE "Crazy Taxi (USA) (Track 1).bin" BINARY TRACK 01 MODE1/2352 INDEX 01 00:00:00 FILE "Crazy Taxi (USA) (Track 2).bin" BINARY TRACK 02 AUDIO INDEX 00 00:00:00 INDEX 01 00:02:00 REM HIGH-DENSITY AREA FILE "Crazy Taxi (USA) (Track 3).bin" BINARY TRACK 03 MODE1/2352 INDEX 01 00:00:00

[@pbpraga3963]

doesnt work. Double click, something pop up, and nothing ever happens.

[@pbpraga3963]

And im using your files, and that same exact image of soul calibur

[@Mick2K]

Strange. Did you copy both files and click on the .bat and not the .exe

[@brianyounes9719]

great video, can you convert multiple games at once?

[@Mick2K]

Usually no, at least not with my batch file, because most GDI images follow the same naming convention and track1.bin etc... from one game would overwrite the files from another game.

[@followthewhiterabbit2549]

How can I play CHD format in Demul or nullDC ? In Demul I changed the GD-ROM plugin from gdrImage to gdrCHD but it doesn't work. Help !

[@Mick2K]

I don't know about nulldc but demul should work. Where did you get your GDI? Does the game work before conversion to CHD? Was it really a GDI or was it a cue? Redump changed Dreamcast format from gdi to cue and these rips are currently not working as CHD.

[@followthewhiterabbit2549]

@@Mick2K Really? "nullDC" is the best Dreamcast emulator by far. And "nullDC Naomi" is the best Naomi emulator out there. Both work smoothly and perfectly in my computer. Don't get me wrong, Demul is a very good emulator but it doesn't work as good as nullDC, at least in my computer. Demul has a lot of slowdowns while emulating. All my GDI run in nullDC and Demul. I got my GDI many years ago from many websites specially in Emuparadise websitte (Rest in Peace).

[@Mick2K]

@@followthewhiterabbit2549 I didn't mean i don't know what NullDC is. 😁 I meant that I don't know about NullDC's compatibility with CHDs. I mostly use redream and the retroarch flycast core and maybe demul. With these three there was never a reason for me to try another one. Emuparadise is still usable. Just Google for emuparadise workaround script. It's a little browser plugin.

[@followthewhiterabbit2549]

@@Mick2K Ah ok 😄 Returning to the subject i found a website called edgeemu.net where all the Dreamcast games came in CHD format. I downmoaded some and tried to run with Demul but I still can't. I as told you, i changed the Demul GD-ROM plugin from gdrImage to gdrCHD. 😥

[@Mick2K]

@@followthewhiterabbit2549 I may have found the answer here. segaretro.org/DEmul Demul only supports an older CHD version. And most people (me included) use a newer version. That could be the problem. It seems you have to stick with uncompressed games for now or change emulators.

[@someplumber]

Nice video. What if I have the bin and cue for a game and chdman crashes like there's nothing to work with? Just a flash of the black window and it's gone. This happens maybe 1 out of 15 times

[@Mick2K]

Could be a few reasons. If it's a Dreamcast game in cue+bin then it's probably a newer dump from redump.org. you can download the .gdi for that game from redump.org/downloads and try again. Maybe something is wrong with your cue. Open it with a text editor and look if the filename of the bin is the same as in the cue.

[@someplumber]

@@Mick2K You were exactly right. Something was wrong with the CUE. Thank you for the help and the video. The robotic voice is great. Reminds me of the movie Nerve. Stay awesome & have a great day 👍🏻👍🏻

[@Mick2K]

You're welcome. It seems the voice doesn't annoy people as much as i thought. I got mostly negative reactions on reddit but maybe i do more tutorials (if I have an idea about what) because on KZbin nobody seems to care about such things

[@cedrio1027]

man do you know how to change discs in redream dreamcast emulator? I'm playing d2 and I can't change the disk, I tried to run the second disk close to change and keep asking for the second disk

[@Mick2K]

Hi. At the moment I'm not at home to test it but I think when you're in a game there's a hotkey (I think escape) to show a menu to reboot, save and change disk.

[@barebarekun161]

Does this works on CD-R to play on Dreamcast?

[@Mick2K]

No. If you want to burn and play on real hardware you have to stick to .CDI rips.

[@barebarekun161]

@@Mick2K So will it work on GDEMU modded Dreamcast? I have a plan of buying one and I wanna keep my current NTSC-J Dreamcast stick to GD-rom and CDI discs.

[@Mick2K]

No. Maybe someday in the future gdemu or other ode's may support it but I wouldn't count on it.

[@chendogames181]

Thank you bro.

[@markcampbell2364]

Was helpful thanks

[@deniswilliam3938]

Amigo como transformo zip. Para chd Quero o chd do jogo mame the king of fighters 98 ultimate match hero arquivo kof98umh.zip mas não consigo fazer o chd dele pra jogar no emulador Retroarch?

[@Mick2K]

I absolutely understand every word you are writing and can say with a hundred percent certainty that...WHAT???

[@deniswilliam3938]

@@Mick2K cara roda cara eu tenho um samsung Galaxy s9 snapdragon também 845 e não consigo olha aí. www.bilibili.com/video/av29563223/

[@oiraferrer5610]

Is there a way to do it with iso files? Thanks

[@Mick2K]

In theory you could do it with that batch file if you alter it slightly. May I ask you why you want to convert ISO to CHD? As far as I know the only emulator that supports ISO as CHD is pcsx2 and in that case in my opinion CSO is the better choice.

[@iamgoodman1000]

THX I LOVE YOU

[@kurisu2916]

Thank you dude !!!

[@Reverse_Spider_Parker]

Does this image work on a real console if burned to a CD

[@Mick2K]

No. For burning and playing on a real console selfbooting CDI images is the only way to go. The information in this Video is only for emulation or lossless archival purposes.

[@Reverse_Spider_Parker]

@@Mick2K If only DC can read DVDs or there's blank GDs I wouldn't struggle looking for CDI builders and trying to add the lost data from the game to a cdi file I burned many broken CDIs

[@Mick2K]

I always had the best luck with CDIs from ReviveDC and DCRes. These are usually the highest quality rips you can get and often on 99min CDRs but i don't know how easy they are to find these days because both these projects are dead as far as i know.

[@Reverse_Spider_Parker]

@@Mick2K Thank you for your help wish me luck trying to rebuild lost files in the CDI image

[@fabienp836]

Hi ! is there a way to convert GDI to CDI ? Or CHD to CDI ?

[@Mick2K]

Yes but why? CDI was used back in the days because it was the only way to make the games burnable to a blank CD to play on your console. You could extract the raw game files from the GDI and convert them to a bootable CDI but it's time consuming and not that easy.

[@dallase1]

But Will it work with a GDEMU? I would think No.

[@Mick2K]

As far as i know it's not working with an ODE like gdemu but it would be great if it were possible.

[@MNNMMNNMMNNM]

Thanks, didn't worked for me to double click had to move gdi to chdman, but thanks

[@rocknflip66]

same, but when dragging the GDi files to chdman.exe worked! thanks for the tip!

[@艾麗莎莎]

Thank you

[@lucianohanzo]

obrigado ajudou muito

[@fabianernestopacheco]

I wanna convert CDI into GDI... Help!!!

[@Mick2K]

You can't convert CDI back to a GDI. CDI is designed to fit on a normal CD and often files are deleted, videos are recoded and audio is downsampled to fit. So imo it's best to discard CDI (unless you want to burn them) and look for true GDI images. They're smaller (if converted to CHD) and are without any quality loss.