forums.ps2dev.org

Why is it that there are utils that allow you to transfer whole game discs from PS->PS2 (fap_link,winhiip,hdl_dump),
for which there is very limited legitimate use (legit use is copying ISOs of homebrew apps... if you own the game, why not let the ps2 rip it for you),
but the other file transfer methods (ftp & netfs implementations) cannot handle more than a few megabytes at a time?

I want my PS2 to play MP3s. I want to help improve the existing players, maybe even have a stab at creating a visualizer/screensaver-type addon. But I'm frustrated by my inability to resolve the combination of unreliable HD access and unreliable transfers, so I just play GTA:SA instead.

P.S. Just because I get the impression that forum participants are treated as "guilty until proven innocent", let me make clear that all my games and all my music are legal and legit, all my music is legal and legit.

Well, if you're truly concerned with the performance of the software you have a few choices. You could just drop it and play a game, sure... but you really should offer to help fix the problem. You don't need to be a super coder to test and report bugs, and you'll probably find that you learn something in the process.

So, can you give a better description of what's happening? How far along do transfers get before they die? What kind of speeds are you getting?

I'm quite willing to help, debug, and even submit patches and fixes! I don't consider myself a programmer, but have no problem reading, understanding, and modifying code -- working as an ISP sysadmin for 10 years, you almost don't have a choice!

I've been talking to myself over here about my biggest problem so far: getting current CVS of ps2link+(ps2atad+ps2hdd) to cooperate.

My mc backup script has problems getting files and dir listings if run more than once, hence the message about running 'ps2client reset'. (I haven't even checked to see if the problem lies in ps2client or ps2link yet...)

I haven't been concerned with transfer speeds yet... ftp transfers would fail after 5 or 6 MB, but I haven't tried again recently. When it wasn't working properly, I decided to compile my own versions to better be able to debug... but I got stuck with HD problems.

ftp is unstable it's a know thing (sometimes limiting it to 20KB/S works) but if you use ps2link network w/ps2os ps2menu you can trasfer what you want at about 650KB/S without problem.
for faplink a nd hdldump i don't think that if i buy an original disc i want to use the ps2 drive because all knows it's very delicate and i'm dumping now all my original by pc cd reader to ps2 via ethernet. another thing if you have a legally owned inport what do you do to read it on a ps2 ?

huh I had no problem uploading/downloading ~5MB files to mc with either ps2netfs or ps2ftpd, and im quite sure ps2ftpd to hdd is used heavily by the swedes who worked on ps2ftpd. personally I dont have a hdd fitted so cant test ps2link + ps2atad.

Toker wrote:Why is it that there are utils that allow you to transfer whole game discs from PS->PS2 (fap_link,winhiip,hdl_dump),
for which there is very limited legitimate use (legit use is copying ISOs of homebrew apps... if you own the game, why not let the ps2 rip it for you),
but the other file transfer methods (ftp & netfs implementations) cannot handle more than a few megabytes at a time?

Most homebrew developers aren't in the habit needing to transfer such large amounts of data. They don't scratch their disks, so they don't need to rip them. Who writes homebrew stuff of more than a few megs ? Most homebrew developers have ways to play MP3s without doing it through the PS2.

Most homebrew developers probably concentrate on PS2 toolchains, device driver, and graphics development. These don't tend to create
large files. Thus, they probably rarely run into the problems you see.

On the other hand, people who "use" homebrew, as opposed to develop it, think up many ways to cram tons of data for whatever reasons.

I am not saying that anything you are trying to do is wrong, just that, you seem to be using the PS2 for a different purpose than most developers. Thats fine, but if stuff isn't to your liking, like someone else said, you can step up to make it be more useful.

Toker wrote:P.S. Just because I get the impression that forum participants are treated as "guilty until proven innocent", let me make clear that all my games and all my music are legal and legit, all my music is legal and legit.

Well, as I mentioned in another thread, if you want non-judgemental homebrew support, you came to the wrong place. People will question about your goals and motives, especially when there is a common denominator of the following kinds of people showing up:
1. People who warez ps2 games, or who scratch any game disc they own by walking within 5 feet of it, thus wanting to play backups.
2. People who are doing something maybe dev related, ask for help, but don't provide hardly any information that might let people help, thus provoking blunt questions.
3. People who aren't willing to invest time.

I would say that most people who are treated as guilty until proven innocent bring it on themselves. Unfortunately, there are people who get jumped unnecessarily in the process, but rarely does it get to the level of rude. As they say in hockey, "No blood, no foul." If you can't take the chill, get off the ice. :)

thats quite alot of bs gorim. there are alot of ppl who code demos out there, and the content surpasses a few MB's worth of data, be it mp3/ogg, textures, meshdata.

And still my point remains, that using ps2netfs or ps2ftp for a few MB's do work fine ( up to the xfer limit that we atm have with ps2ip ). Ive yet to transfer hundreds of MB's over to a hdd though.

only problem(ps2ftpd) I am aware of is if you have hdloader installed, and if so you will be killed with death.

blackdroid wrote:thats quite alot of bs gorim. there are alot of ppl who code demos out there, and the content surpasses a few MB's worth of data, be it mp3/ogg, textures, meshdata.

Ok, I admit I talked out my arse on that one. :) But if you didn:t call me on it, he might never have known. ;)

While developing ps2ftpd I transferred several files of > 600MB in size to the HDD to test it, and I had no issues with degrading transfer-rates or interruptions , although I used a slightly older version of ps2link so I reached a maximum of 150kB/s, but I've heard of speeds over 250kB/s downstream. The server in itself is very I/O-limited, when running it in Linux it hit the limit that my disks could write while doing local transfers. (well above 40MB/s).

One thing that could PERHAPS improve performance would be if the I/O was made completely asynchronous, but I have not attempted this so far, as I've been happy with the speeds I've seen.

Only instability-issue I've seen (that happened very rarely) was that the server would stop to respond when sitting idle for a while, but as all it does then is sit in a select() when idling, it feels like something else was locking up, and I didn't look further into it as it was very hard to reproduce.

I would recommend that you make sure you use a proper version of ps2link, and build ps2ftpd.irx from cvs. If you use versions compiled by other people who have modified the source and don't really know what they have been doing (like ExecFTPS), you're on your own, I will not help you.

And as a final note; I transferred 100MB of data (split in 10 files) to the HDD as a test just now by FTP, and it worked flawlessely with ~150kB/s.

gorim wrote:

blackdroid wrote:thats quite alot of bs gorim. there are alot of ppl who code demos out there, and the content surpasses a few MB's worth of data, be it mp3/ogg, textures, meshdata.

Ok, I admit I talked out my arse on that one. :) But if you didn:t call me on it, he might never have known. ;)

true that :)

That's all fine.... So it's hot in this kitchen -- I can take the heat, the flames, and a few insults.

All the talk of ftp is nice, but as I said, I haven't concerned myself too much with that yet because I am still unable to get cvs-compiled ps2sdk+ps2link to load ps2hdd without freezing, and no one has given me a clue to where the problem might be.

And as for what people do with homebrew apps... some apps are more 'proof of concept' than anything else, others have the goal of becoming end-user software.
If it weren't for developpers who want to make end-user software, the OS, webserver, and scripting language that run the forums wouldn't exist.
I've nothing against the first type of development -- I do it all the time, just to prove to myself I can do something, or to learn from it.
For example, I'm thinking of figuring out how the non-sony mc's work with their own drivers as a crash-course in dissasembly and reverse-engineering. I may not succeed, but I'm sure I'll learn something useful in the process.

Toker wrote:All the talk of ftp is nice, but as I said, I haven't concerned myself too much with that yet because I am still unable to get cvs-compiled ps2sdk+ps2link to load ps2hdd without freezing, and no one has given me a clue to where the problem might be.

Well the first question in this thread was "cannot handle more than a few megabytes at a time?", and you have been given doubtful statements to that question.

As for your problem you seem to be the first that has encountered it wich makes it abit hard to answer "give me a clue as why it doesnt work".

just a thing for me 600mb is a mirage, i switched to ps2link w/ps2os and recursive copy.
i tried also the compiled irx.
i load up from memory card ps2link 1.23 (from this site) then i load ps2atad.irx, ps2hdd.irx, ps2fs.irx iomanx.irx, and finally ps2ftpd.irx all by ps2client and the first are from ps2sdk 1.1 and ps2ftpd compiled by me. i get worst results. to be precise at first point i can trasfer up to 100mb a time, (but it don't save what it transfer when i complete a trasfer and so if it crash i loss also what i uploaded with succes), but when i expanded the partition (the ps2mp3 partition) now i have like 5 segment it pratically inutilizzable i can't trasfer even 150KB.