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Make a CPK video disc
tzmwx - Mar 20, 2024

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  tzmwx Mar 20, 2024
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RUN VirtualDub64.exe (or VirtualDub.exe)


File > Open video file
Video > Filters > Add > resize > OK


Video > Frame Rate


Audio > Full processing mode
Audio > Conversion


file > Save file



RUN Avitosaturn.exe

Add files > Start


COPY *.CPK file to CPKCD folder
RENAME *.CPK to G00**.CPK
(** = 01 TO 99 )




RUN CPKCDtoISO.bat



Copy CPK.iso to saturn ODE or Burn to disc

Press START to NEXT CPK video

 TrekkiesUnite118 Mar 20, 2024
So not to be mean but this is kind of silly. AVItoSaturn is archaic and can only work with 8bit audio, 16bit doesn't work at all. It also doesn't control bitrate very well and will give poor results.

Secondly you don't have to be so strict with settings, you can play with frame rate, resolution, audio, etc. to get what works best for your video clip.

Finally it looks like you're just replacing files in an old demo disc. This again isn't really ideal as the old demo disc may not be that flexible to handle different resolutions, frame rates, and audio qualities.

I get that using an old Mac VM can be frustrating, but pointing people to old tools that don't really work well and just hacking a demo disc isn't really helpful for homebrew purposes. There's a tutorial stickied on this forum that shows how to encode properly and there's commented SBL demos... on here as well. I also included the source code in mysubmission to this years competition... that shows how to use gradation, handle different resolutions and aspect ratios, as well as how to implement player controls. I'd recommend people look into those for Cinepak Homebrew purposes instead.

 Danthrax Mar 20, 2024
Thanks for putting all of this together, TZMWX, but I tried this process with three different videos and none of them worked. They didn't run on my Saturn via Satiator, it just showed a black screen. And they didn't run in emulators like Mednafen and Yaba Sanshiro.

 tzmwx Mar 20, 2024

TrekkiesUnite118 said:

yesneed new software

 tzmwx Mar 20, 2024

Danthrax said:

Post your CD file structure diagram.Perhaps your CPK file has not been renamed?

 Danthrax Mar 20, 2024

tzmwx said:


When I open the CPK.ISO file in CDMage, this is what it looks like:


  TrekkiesUnite118 Mar 20, 2024

tzmwx said:

I agree which is why I'm looking into expanding the Muxer to do what MovieToSaturn does. In the meantime however I'd recommend people use the better Mac based tools rather than using junk like AviToSaturn.


tzmwx said:

This is why trying to inject new files into an old demo disc isn't the best approach for this. It's error prone and you're at the mercy of the limitations of the original player software. Building your own from source is a better approach.

 tzmwx Mar 20, 2024

Danthrax said:



Upload CPK.ISO file here


and
You can view the cpk file information and test whether it can be played normally

 Danthrax Mar 20, 2024

tzmwx said:


SegaXtreme doesn't allow ISO files to be uploaded to normal forum posts, but it does allow for RAR files, so I put CPK.ISO into a RAR and attached that to my post.

 tzmwx Mar 20, 2024

Danthrax said:

resize 320*224




  TrekkiesUnite118 Mar 20, 2024

tzmwx said:

If you write your own player you can do 320x240. The bigger issue I'm seeing is that the video itself is close to 400KB/s which is way out of spec. This is why AviToSaturn is really bad for this as you don't have good control over the bitrate.

 Danthrax Mar 20, 2024

tzmwx said:


I just realized that I'd forgotten to manually set the letterbox/crop size to 224. I thought it automatically changed that box when I set the absolute size to 224 up top ... Sorry about that! Thanks for your help. The Simpsons video now runs on my Saturn via Satiator. It even worked in Yaba Sanshiro.

 tzmwx Mar 20, 2024

Danthrax said:

Because SAROO blocks the communication with the VCD card slot, it cannot use VCD like your Satiator, so use this method to let Saturn play video files.
You can make a collection and press start to switch to the next episode

 tzmwx Mar 20, 2024

TrekkiesUnite118 said:



Currently, this is the only method that can complete the production of cpk files under Windows system. I look forward to your new software.Maybe you can contact VirtualDub2 / Wiki / Home... and directly use VirtualDub software to convert high-quality cpk files

In addition, SAROO can exceed the 300K speed of a 2-speed optical drive and can use ultra-high bit rate files. If the Saturn player software is upgraded simultaneously, you can try CPK files with higher bit rates.

 TrekkiesUnite118 Mar 20, 2024

tzmwx said:

Satiator doesn't provide any Video CD functionality either.

tzmwx said:

You can produce a Cinepak file on a Windows machine currently using a Mac VM. Is it ideal? No, but it will provide far better quality than using AviToSaturn. The Saturn player software shouldn't need to be upgraded if the drive can provide higher than 300KB/s. But I'm very skeptical that SAROO is actually able to do that if it's properly emulating a CD-ROM drive. Now if it's acting as a ROM cart that's a different story.

That said there are better ways to play Cinepak files on the Saturn than this method. At the very least you should try making your own program rather than trying to hack files into a Demo Disc.

 TrekkiesUnite118 Mar 21, 2024
If anyone wants a better CPK Player that's not based on hacking a demo disc here is a more generic version of the demo I submitted for this years competition. Simply place your CPK files into the cd directory, then run build.bat and it will generate an ISO in the out directory.

This has the following caveats:
  • The max number of files you can have is 50. Which really that should be more than enough.
  • Videos can be any resolution as long as they don't exceed 320x240
  • Videos can be any frame rate as long as they don't exceed 30fps.
  • Audio can be 8-bit or 16-bit PCM in both stereo and mono at any sample rate as long as they don't exceed 44100Hz.
    • ADX Audio is currently not supported.
  • File names can be anything as long as they do not exceed 11 characters and have a .CPK extension.
    • The character length includes the extension
  • The player supports limited anamorphic scaling. To use this do the following:
    • Encode your video at 320x240 resolution (320x224 will kind of work as well) without any cropping.
    • If the desired aspect ratio is 16:9 put _169 in the file name.
    • If the desired aspect ratio is 2.35:1 put _235 in the file name.
    • You can also use _LB, but this is more of a special case I used for the Star Wars clip. The original video was 2.35:1 but I cropped it slightly on the sides to get it to 320x160, but then it needed a tad more vertical squishing to look right. If the others don't look right give this one a try.
    • Any other file will assume you want it displayed in the aspect ratio of it's resolution.
  • R will skip to the Next video, L will skip to the previous video. X restarts the current video, Z pauses the current video.
If there's any issues let me know. This should work for any standard Cinepak file as long as you don't exceed the bitrate of the disc drive.

 tzmwx Mar 21, 2024

TrekkiesUnite118 said:

Can you make a 500K or greater code rate cpk for me to test saroo?

There is a file missing from the CPK_Player.zip provided by TrekkiesUnite118 which can be downloaded here.
A symbol "\" in build.bat is wrong, it should be"/"

 TrekkiesUnite118 Mar 21, 2024

tzmwx said:

You can make one yourself following the tutorial here:

  TrekkiesUnite118 Mar 21, 2024

tzmwx said:

The bat file should work just fine as it is. I tested it multiple times before I uploaded it. If you don't have cygwin installed however then that should be installed properly which you can get it here: Cygwin...

That said here's an updated version with the DLL included.

 tzmwx Mar 21, 2024

TrekkiesUnite118 said:


Thank you for your multi-function CPKplayer.

It would be better if you change the "\" in the build.bat file to "/".


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