Trouble Burning Sega Saturn Games

So I recently acquired a modchip for my Saturn (thanks Bad_Ad84, Zer0-2k11, and APE) and had my first experience trying to burn games for it. I lucked out and my first attempt worked perfectly but every game I've tried after that hasn't worked.

I managed to burn DOA at 24x using IMGburn on a Verbatim CD-R after using Saturn Region Patcher and Sega Cue Maker. I've tried burning other games at either 16x or 24x on multiple computers with no luck. The closest I've gotten are games that will load the developer logos but after that come to a black screen and won't load any further. Any ideas of what else I should try?

Here's some additional info:
All games are BIN/CUE
All games have been burned with IMGburn
All games I've tried are Darkwater releases
Regular Games work fine
Burned at either 16x or 24x none of the burners I've tried so far can go lower than that
I've only used Verbatim CD-R's so far (Taiyo Yuden's are on the way)
I've tried with/without Sega Region Patching and Saturn Cue Maker
Games I've gotten to load developer logos are: Nights and Rayman
While loading the Developer Logos the CD access LED will flash but once it goes to the black screen it stops but the disc will still be spinning
Yes I have used Google and searched the forums for answers already

 

What happens when it doesn't reach the developer logos? Does it go into the bios or does it hang on the Saturn boot logo?

 

Use a different burning app. Imgburn is known to produce the most C2 errors. In 10 years the only time I burned coasters was when I was testing Imgburn.

A few games don't like it when you try to run PAL games in 60hz or NTSC games in 50hz. So if you tried running a PAL game region modded to run on a USA/JPN console, they might act up.

Also, for some odd reason there are some drives that can't burn Mode2 tracks (which would account for Nights not working, but not Rayman).

 

just curious, what other burning programs would you recommend? I've personally never had any coasters using imgburn and taiyo yuden cd-rs when burning psx, duo, saturn, and sega cd games.

 

Sometimes it'll hang on the boot logo for a bit before going to the BIOS, other times it'll load the BIOS right after loading the Saturn logo. Sometimes in the BIOS it'll check the disc and then say that the "disc is unsuitable for this system".

I'm pretty sure all the games I've tried so far have been USA or JPN. It's interesting how different programs are regarded in certain circumstances, like in this case how IMGburn can cause problems for Saturn games but it's pretty much the only accepted program for burning 360 games. And like Gunderson said what would you recommend instead? I could try Nero, I'm sure it's on one of these computers, but is there a better option?

 

All the big name apps produce better results than Imgburn. CloneCD, Nero, even Alcohol, etc. I use a very old version of Nero (7.8.5.0, lite pack) and never ever got a bad burn. Imgburn however produced bad burns half the time I used it, and even the built-in verification did not catch the error. It was bloody ridiculous.

That sounds like it is trying to read the disc but can't read it properly. Could be a weak laser - could be that the laser just can't wade through the sea of errors Imgburn put on the disc (which can also be due to a weak laser, since good lasers can read discs which are cracked in half).

 

I recommend CloneCD as well. I never used Nero for a very long time so i can't recommend it personally but if Druid says its good then i would give it a shot too. Alcohol is great, used it for a good while too.

Try out some other software. It sounds possible from what Druid is saying.

Verbatim from what i hear nowadays is their media quality has gone down hill, it could be possible that it is the Verbatim's your using could be from a bad batch.

What i would do is try out is Nero first as CloneCD doesn't support bin/cue and you would need to mount the image file to a virtual drive to burn it (Daemon Tools). Use the Taiyo Yudens when using Nero and set it to 16x writing speed. Hopefully that should fix it but if it doesn't work then it might be the laser is too weak to read cd-r's properly.

 

I've personally never had problems using whatever media I could find but I burn Taiyo Yudens with an older Plextor drive for picky systems.

At the very least it sounds like you've got the modchip installed correctly.

 

Saturn drives are super strong; if they already can't read a freshly burned lower quality CDR, then they'll have plenty of problems even with the highest quality CDRs.
I'd adjust the laser and check if the tray is right. The only times I had problems with my Saturns not reading CDRs, they either needed their lasers adjusted, or the tray was either too low or bent to shit.

As for Nero I'm using a very, very old version, so I can't comment on how new versions work. But I imagine they only mutated the user interface, since the underlying burning program was already good.

 

Good news everyone! I've gotten it to work with 100% of the new batch of burned games using Nero 12 at 24x speed with Taiyo Yuden CD-R's and not altering or creating a new .cue file.

So it looks like there were a few things going against me here the possibility that IMGburn was not creating as good of a burn, some of my Verbatims might have been bad (same batch I was having problems burning DC games with), and Sega Cue Maker does not seem to work for me.

I ran out of Verbatims so I can't test that, and I haven't gone back to try IMGburn yet with the Taiyo Yuden's but out of curiosity I did try using Sega Cue Maker on a game that had already been successfully burned. And it seems to me that it isn't generating a correct .cue file since any game that I burned using it on either Verbatims or Taiyo Yuden's are the ones that only make it to the developer logos. Not really sure what's going on there.

I've also been able to burn games after using Saturn Region Patcher, haven't tried any PAL games though. But it looks like I've finally got the correct method nailed down so I can start enjoying some games

Out of curiosity is there a special CD to use when adjusting a Saturn laser like there is for the Dreamcast?

Thanks for the help everyone!

 

That is incorrect. It's more about hardware and burn speeds than an issue with the software. Like I said on a previous post, some software and burners can handle Saturn isos, some can't, but Imgburn definitely can. You need to be burning the discs on good media at the slowest speeds possible. Also, I solved the issue with the 2 data track discs last night (like NiGHTS). While you can't load the cue sheet in Imgburn because of the 2 data tracks, you can mount the image in DaemonTools and rerip it with Imgburn creating an ISO image with the 2 data tracks. Once this image is properly created you can load it in Imgburn and blamo, game burns and works perfectly. Nero can't handle these discs and CloneCD doesn't even support bin-cue.

 

I use IMGBurn and JVC Taiyo Yudens CD-Rs. Any failures are my fault.

 

Why would you use the cue maker when 99% of all Saturn game images come with the proper cue file?

 

No, you are wrong. Imgburn makes more C errors and sometimes flat-out makes bad burns, and doesn't even realize it did so (the verification finds no errors).

I don't know why you keep bringing up games with 2 data tracks, if you have a proper bin/cue of it, just about every app can burn it as long as your drive supports burning MODE2 tracks (some crap ones don't). I've burned so many copies of Nights and many other 2-track titles, and never got a single problem.

Good media and slower burn speeds can help you get a better burn (as in, you have less C errors), but that matters little because a Saturn with a properly calibrated laser can read just about anything.

 

Negative. Not all software handles the dual mode discs, Nero won't touch them, forget CloneCD altogether for Saturn isos and Imgburn won't touch the cuesheets with dual mode tracks. As for all the morons out there ripping their Saturn games with Alcohol, do the rest of us who have spent the past 10 years + cleaning up the Sega Saturn scene and delete all those crappy rips. The only thing worse than CloneCD are all the retards ripping their Saturn stuff in iso-mp3 format. Thanks for all the desynched garbage!

Imgburn Lite has been tried and tested thoroughly and will handle any Saturn isos you can throw at it AS LONG AS YOUR HARDWARE AND MEDIA DOESN'T SUCK. Everyone knows to use good media and slow burns. Remember CDRW drives? Those are the best. You can forget all the modern day garbage that rips and burns at 500x because you are going to be making coasters. The 2 best pieces of software which only work on older operating systems are CDRWin and Fireburner.

We all know you've ripped dual mode discs 549823740928742 times and you've been through 23984720391743942 Sega Saturns. That never gets old does it?

But I digress. No, the Saturn won't read just about any garbage you throw it either. Why do you think this thread is even here?

For anyone out there willing to listen to someone who has been doing this for almost 2 decades, do yourself a favor and buy good media, burn your bin-cues at the slowest speeds possible, 8x max (2x and 4x are the best), and do the rest of us a favor who have been working hard to clean up the Sega Saturn garbage floating around the internet by deleting any iso-mp3s you come across. Imgburn Lite will do the job right at slow speeds on good hardware with good media. Ignore all the other disinformation out there. If by chance you have an older PC running Windows 98se or 2000, get CDRWin (version 3.9) or Fireburner. They are easily the two best pieces of software ever created for ripping and burning Sega Saturn isos.

CRC errors are usually a hardware fault or the result of cheap media or both. In nearly 20 years of ripping and burning Sega Saturn isos I've never once had a CRC related error. Again, see the aforementioned paragraphs. Burn your stuff correctly and you'll be gaming to your heart's content.

 

Pretty much useless talking to Boriz about literally anything Saturn related. He knows it all, nobody can have a different opinion or better information, even with 20 years of testing. It's his opinion and assumptions only, everyone else needs to keep quiet. As for the "I've burned NiGHTS 500 times and been through 20 Saturns this year alone", you sound like some teenager talking about his Call of Duty scores online. Give it a rest already. You've provided 0 help by the way. "Just trace the jumpers..." Um, okay. Why don't you show me? Did you go through all your Saturns and don't have one to provide a screenshot of what you are talking about? Super helpful. Provide some screenshots of an actual Saturn motherboard instead of just posting random, vague comments on the threads. Can you guess why you aren't getting that coveted screenshot of my motherboard you basically begged me to take?

No, Sega did not make an optical laser unit in the mid 1980's designed to last 500 years reading every POS disc you throw at. That assumption is absolutely ridiculous on every level. Just no. Why do you think they came out with 2 different models of Sega CD units? For fun? Oh gee, I wonder if it's because the optical unit in the Sega CD v1 was defective and tended to ride lower over time thus causing it to not read cds anymore? HMMM. Oh wait, yes, that's it. If you mod the unit properly so the optical unit sits at the same level, it'll work properly without you having to go out and buy a Sega CD v2. Gee, I wonder why there are so many Sega Saturn models? I guess Sega just created those for fun out of boredom. Um, no. They are all one hardware improvement after another. Optical laser units were not designed nor built to last 20, 30, 50 years, sorry.

Have you noticed you are literally the only person here complaining about Imgburn? I wonder why that is.

As far as you providing whatever BS information about Sega Saturn isos, thanks man. You've done an awesome service to the Saturn community. Here's the result of that kind of logic:

Pretty Fighter X (jap). There are literally 20 different garbage rips of this floating around thanks to the "rip it and burn it with whatever you want logic". Well done. The CDI someone created? Sweet. That's DiscJuggler format which was created specifically for the Dreamcast scene. Well done. The image is absolute garbage. The Alcohol image floating around? Missing bytes of data, again, well done. The iso-ogg rip floating around? Very well done. OGG? Garbage. There are also numerous iso-mp3 rips floating around with no cue sheet from the original disc. Sweet. I love my Sega Saturn games desynched and choppy. What a huge service these complete morons have done for the Sega Saturn. Kudos.

Again, thanks to this attitude that the Saturn "will read anything" and "any software will work", there's complete garbage everywhere online. Thankfully some of us still have the right connections to the right groups providing the right, proper rips of Sega Saturn isos.

For anyone reading this, do the rest of us a favor who actually like the Sega Saturn and have been doing this for decades and delete everything that isn't in bin-cue format from the original discs. Most of these rips were provided by Darkwater and TOSEC. If you can't verify the origin of the rip, delete it.

 

With all due respect, you two getting into a flame war isn't helping the OP any, and he seems to be having some luck with the system he's using now (although it does have some strange options, the 24x burn speed for one).

A thread like this pops up once a month, and like so many "how do I" threads, it illustrates the strange dichotomy of a person tech-savvy enough to be backing up CD based games, but lacking the initiative to use site-based search functions or Google.

Perhaps Assembler need some FAQ stickies for this kind of thing. In my mind the formula for burning good backup copies of disc based games is: Good Image + Good Media + Good Burner x Low Burn Speed = Good backup.

I don't think the software you use is so important, it's worth remembering that format specific code in several of the popular burning utilities is often open-source and differs not from utility to utility.

FWIW, I do use ImgBurn, and have zero-coaster success across PS1/Saturn/Dreamcast/Gamecube and XBOX formats. For media I use Maxell CD-R or Verbatim AZO DVD-R, always at lowest available speed (usually 8X). My burner is nothing special - I use the Superdrive in an 8 year old iMac.

I am in the process of building a tower PC that will operate solely as an image despositry and disc burner, I'll probably use Windows XP as the OS to allow the best range of burning options.

 

True enough. I've deleted my post above, it was really going too far. jrio should do the same.
I'm also putting him on ignore just in case.

But I still say that a properly calibrated Saturn can read damn near everything. Even if you burn crap media at 48x speeds, as long as it was a proper backup, it will read fine. Perhaps I should take a video of that cracked disc that still plays fine.

It seems that ImgBurn is very flaky - some people have 100% success, while for others it fails more often than not.
OP seems to get things working by switching to Nero instead, and this is far from the first such case I've seen.

 

I will say that I know the history of all my disc based systems, and with the exception of my XBOX, they all have "low-miles" lasers in them, my Gamecube, in particular, reads backups flawlessly with no pot-adjustment. This may explain my success with ImgBurn to some extent. I'll agree the Saturn doesn't give a damn what media you use, even the no-name dollar store blanks work fine as long as the image is good.

I used to use Nero for all my PS1 and Saturn stuff, but having set up ImgBurn on my Mac's Bootcamp partition to burn DC games, I just sort of fell into using it for everything else.

Years ago I did devise a method for burning Dreamcast images using Toast, I just can't remember how I used to do it! Of course Toast will also burn BIN/CUE just fine, if you are stuck with no windows option.

 

That's not how I mean it - Imgburn just flat out burns things wrong. Not as if it had high error rates, but as if one or two bytes of the CD Image got altered before going from the hdd to the burner. I really need to dedicate a spindle of blanks to check what causes this, does it actually alter data, or does it just push ridiculous amount of CU errors, or what. Having some real statistics out there would be good - all the people I know, who work on cd backup tech, agree on Imgburn being the worst burner but no one produced any real data so far.