Was there ever a saturn cart that let cdr play?

Some do check multiple times. And frankly, if you don't know how to swap by now, you never will.

 

There is no such thing as bootable Saturn (HK) silvers.

 

The "Strong Card" is actually called Super Strong Card, by the way. Noone ever seems to have one, by the way. And yes, it's pretty amazing that noone has found a way to bypass the Saturn protection, isn't there something like industrial CD readers that can seek to that area? PC drives won't go there as its after the Lead Out.

 

Yes, because if the copy protection mechanisms weren't patented anyone would be free to reimplement them. Besides, what would be the point of adding more methods? The optical verification is perfect for preventing CD-R copies, and there's not much you can do to stop people with pressing plants anyway. Furthermore, having lots of sophisticated protection methods while leaving a single, extremely vulnerable point of failure is a waste of time. Now, do you have any real info on any additional protection methods, or..?

 

If so then how come all saturn back ups work fine once they are booted?

Yakumo

 

It's only some games that check more than once.

 

Do you know which games these may be? I'd love to try one out. I remember that Batman forever was a pain in the arse to boot. I have the original PAL disc here so I may make an ISO of it then try the disc swap.

Yakumo

 

Nope, but printf over at SX said he had removed extra protection checks from some games. (Well, I do know that the unreleased Saturn version of Return Fire had them, but you won't be able to try it for yourself.)

 

WHY ON EARTH would you want to play Batman Forever? :smt043
I think Thunderforce V does multiple checks.

 

I remember reading about how someone hacked the BIOS on the Saturn to play any type of disc. I think it was from a really well written FAQ, but the guy said "The website I found said something along the lines of 'If you don't know how to do this, you don't deserve to know'". I think it's just someone who wants some attention. I'll try to find that FAQ tonight.

Frankly, it doesn't make much sense to me. I always found this type of stuff interesting, but I don't pretend to know anything about it. How would you extract the BIOS from the Saturn anyway?

 

probably by dumping EEPROM content...
Dev Saturn has these on the socket so it's easy to pull out...

Dumping ROM has been fascinated me for some time ever since tat controversial NeoGeo ROM dumping fiasco...

cheers

 

Everyone says EEPROM It's not an EEPROM, it's a Mask ROM. It's not programmable, eraseable or electronically-eraseable. Sophias and prerelease Saturns may have EPROMs.

What would be gained by dumping a few BIOS? All regions are already dumped and floating around the 'net. If you do wanna dump a BIOS (why?) you can use a Comms Link card and ARP/PAR or a device programmer. (Some BIOS may be in a SOP/TSOP or some other bitchy package)

It seems logical to me that the media test would be carried out in hardware and that disassembling the BIOS would lead to nothing. Probably someone has commented it for the non-SH peeps too.

 

Hrmm..seems like an interesting project.. (namely i do have a external chip reader, cost a few hundred..but worth it)

And i do want a saturn (again)...sold it like a fool years ago!

I got an idea on how to write the data on the lead out (or after anywho)..just gotsa grab that data to write...

And edit..most "modchips" do just that , patch the bios in realtime.. so a replacement bios would probably be feasiable

 

:smt043 I just wanted to see how shit it was, and yes it was SHIT. Thunder Force works from CDR though so maybe that doesn't do multiple checks. Do you think that the protection code could be stored in the saturn's memory and that's how they do multiple checks? Seems a bit poinless that way though.

Ykumo

 

The protection on Destruction Derby is checked twice. The first time is on the same time it's checked on all games, and the second time is a little bit later than that, on some company logo or just before the start screen, don't remember exactly.

 

That's because it's bollocks. Removing the copy protection check from the BIOS doesn't help, because the CD block refuses to read game CDs unless they've been validated. Altering the CD block firmware would help, but to the best of our knowledge its stored in ROM embedded in the SH1 controller.

 

[quote="YcemanThe protection on Destruction Derby is checked twice. The first time is on the same time it's checked on all games, and the second time is a little bit later than that, on some company logo or just before the start screen, don't remember exactly.[/quote]Nice, I have the original of that too. I'll make an ISO and see if it will boot.

Yakumo

 

We should concentrate on cloneing the mod-chip and making it 20pin compatible, what if further supplies in the future dissappear?

Can someone make a close-up of the modchip in good resolution so I may see what is contained on that PCB?