PS2 OPL from USB Drives to HDD Network Adapter

[Lerain]

Greetings,

I'm running FreeMcBoot 1.966 with OPL v1.2.0-Beta (Official) and several USB flash drives filled with games.

Everything works perfectly fine, and I even added exFAT support (BDM Assault) to FMCB and OPL, so I can store games larger than 4 GB on those USB drives.

However, the old USB 1.1 bottleneck is still present and becomes really noticeable during certain startup cutscenes.

To improve performance, I've prepared a couple of 1 TB compatible 3.5" HDDs and I'm waiting for my GameStar SATA Network Adapter.

So far, so good.
But the process of writing games to HDDs seems a bit strange to me.

With my USB flash drives, I simply format them as exFAT, use OPL Manager v24 to create the folder structure, transfer the ISO files into the DVD folder, and then run OPL Manager again to make the filenames compatible with OPL.

I was hoping to use the same workflow for the 3.5" HDDs.

However, it seems that for HDDs I must use Windows HDL Image Install (WinHIIP) to format the drive with 48-bit HDLoader support and create a valid PS2 Master Boot Record.
And instead of copying ISO files directly, I'm supposed to import them through WinHIIP or use the newer HDL Batch Installer.

Why is the USB workflow never mentioned as an option for HDDs?
I already have exFAT support installed, and OPL can read external storage like that just fine.

Thank you.

@Shinra54 You have two roads ahead you to choose: RAW on APA or exFAT on MBR/GPT.

APA is native HDD environment, with some design problems and because none of OS on PC supporting it, you need dedicated apps to install games on it (like eg. WinHIIP which you should never use it... for various of reasons. Instead, the HDL Batch Installer or PFS Batch Kit: two toolkits based on hdldump). PS2 can boot from APA, so you don't need eg. FMCB.

exFAT is filesystem placed on MBR or GPT partition table. It is supported by every OS out of the box, so you don't need any dedicated PC apps for putting games. PS2 cannot boot from it and you need keep your disc images and/or VMCs defragmented. Nearly none of PS2 apps supporting it (because BDM drivers are quite new thing, so so far only OPL and NTR can read PS2 games from it).

Well, there is 3rd road: APA-Jail. It is mix of two above to get advantages from each.

On a different thread Most Up To Date OPL Guide For Using HDD? I found a really helpful post about possible HDD workflows.

If I understood it correctly, you can just format a HDD as ExFAT, copy your ISO files into the DVD folder, organize them with OPL Manager, and that's it.

 

[Berion]

Yes, you can. Keep in mind that you need OPL with supporting BDM for internal drive (OPL GD or latest OPL 1.2.0 beta builds).

Why is the USB workflow never mentioned as an option for HDDs?
I already have exFAT support installed, and OPL can read external storage like that just fine.

BDM HDD is around 1 year old fresh, 2 if we will count in OPL GD.

Newer generations seeking knowledge on Reddit, YT, Facebook etc. where rarely valid info can be found, not to mention up to date; or they are in Discord channels which often aren't public. And we have no time for creating videos, nor watching endless tutorials. That's disturbing phenomena why ppl prefer that instead searchable database and non demanding media like discussion forums are. Just my 3 cents. ;p

 

[Lerain]

Yes, you can. Keep in mind that you need OPL with supporting BDM for internal drive (OPL GD or latest OPL 1.2.0 beta builds).


BDM HDD is around 1 year old fresh, 2 if we will count in OPL GD.

Newer generations seeking knowledge on Reddit, YT, Facebook etc. where rarely valid info can be found, not to mention up to date; or they are in Discord channels which often aren't public. And we have no time for creating videos, nor watching endless tutorials. That's disturbing phenomena why ppl prefer that instead searchable database and non demanding media like discussion forums are. Just my 3 cents. ;p

Thank you, kind sir.
Such awesome news. I'm so glad I don't have to mess around with this whole "HDD APA" thing.

I think "OPL GD" is the GrimDoomer fork with ExFAT support.
For some reason, that build (v1.2.0.6-1996-Beta) kept crashing on me, so I ditched it.

But the official ps2homebrew build (OPNPS2LD-v1.2.0-Beta-2221-81acdf8) also seems to work fine with ExFAT, so I guess they added support for it as well.

I also tried the Jay-Jay OPL Daily Builds since they look cooler, but I couldn't get any games to show up.
Either no ExFAT support or something else was off.

I'll create another thread for the different OPL versions to discuss that separately.
Thanks again.