Backing up SACDs now possible..

What will be nice is when there are SACD blanks and EAC or someone else puts out a fix that burns them as easily as a 16 bit disc. It cant be too far off right?

 

I think it will never happen.

 

Why not? Should be easy as writing the other types of programs for the genius computer people. Or do you mean the hardware, like blank SACD's will never be available?r

 

It is just unbelievable what you have accomplished. Very cool.

 

pretty cool...I was pretty sure that this was never going to happen to SACD...clock ticking until burnable files start appearing on the internets

 

Physically burning a SACD is as easy as burning a CD-R. Extracting the data to a format that can be burned is a bear, and was always meant to be (practically) impossible. That's why it's taken 12 years since the format was introduced. And it really only became possible since the PS3 came out almost 5 years ago. So, it's taken 4.5+ years of diligent work to get to this point.

Having followed this "progress" for the past 4 years, I can safely say it will never be as easy as backing up your CDs, DVDs, or even Blu-rays. The hardware you need to to do it is unique (4 year old, discontinued PS3), the firmware for said hardware is "forced upgraded" by Sony to prevent this, and the custom coding is tricky.

You can't combine the above things into a simple one-step solution, ever.

Thank you.

 

I gave up "fighting" with SuperAuthor, it may be easy for you, it's a nightmare to me.

 

You don't have to use SuperAuthor at all. The PS3 can dump both 2.0 and 5.1 DSD programs to an .ISO file on a USB stick or external HDD. That ISO burns to disc via Imgburn. I can rip and burn a SACD with three button clicks and about 25 minutes of standing around waiting.

 

I see, then it's an easy process though executed in an unorthodox way with unorthodox hardware.

 

Not sure if you're being sarcastic, but your statement is true.

All the steps are described in the original post. If you don't have an original PS3 with firmware that you haven't updated in about 6 months, there's no point in even starting the endeavor.

Once you get it going, it's easy. But it was a painful process to get here

 

Of course, the PS3 hack wouldn't be possible if the Playstation group had not left the door open in the handling of the encryption systems within PS3!

Two questions for you, SamS:

1. I assume you are using DVD-R, but does DVD+R also work? (I mean player compatibility-wise.)

2. what happens with a dual-layer disc (e.g., Roger Waters)? Do you get one big ISO, or one ISO per layer?

 

I personally think it was buttoned-up rather tight. It's taken several years to get around it, and has since been patched via firmware.

DVD+R works as well. I set the bit-type to DVD-ROM. No problems with readability.

I haven't tried that yet, but will for sure later today. I have a handful of those dual-layer titles including Roger Waters and some Earth Wind and Fire. The biggest ISO dump can only be 4GB do to the FAT32 restriction. Most SACDs I've done have been between 3-3.6GB.

 

I just hope they are able to eventually find other SACD player solutions. I don’t have enough SACD’s to justify the purchase of a PS3 for this, but I’m glad that they are making headway.

Thanks for thread and the examples.

 

Unlikely. The PS3 is a unique machine whereby you can write code to tell it to do certain things outside of its original design, i.e. rip SACD to USB.

I actually just picked up a spare PS3 in case the one I have now has trouble down the road. Old PS3s are abundant now, but you have to make sure to get one with an older firmware, and people that have them know they're useful for more than just this, as such they are commanding a premium.

 

The real problem is that most of the early PS3 units have died prematurely or you need to send it to a service technician to get "reflowed". Quality control was not at the top of Sony's expensive list when creating it. Heavy use of it, particularly gaming, will lead to the laser going bad more often than not. But Sony sold several million of them, so there are working units out there. I have two as I stated earlier, but I stupidly updated the firmware.

 

I'm not suggesting the hack was trivial, but the Playstation group made a fundamental cryptographic error that allowed the master key to be determined in the first place.

That's good to hear, I was wondering whether we were going to have one of those situations where Sony's own format is NOT supported!

FAT32? Yikes! What is the online community thinking in order to get around that? Long (70 mins.) M-ch pop/rock albums will ALL be over 4 GB.

 

Well, I wouldn't say "most" died prematurely, but there is a fair amount out there. I actually bought a dead 60GB SACD unit as a spare, and will have Sony refurb it for $150. Then I'll have basically a new set of all the parts, i.e. drive, power supply, etc. to use with for my modified player. Of course if the main board fails on my modified unit, I'd have to sent it to a third party repair company so my modifications stay intact.

The PS3 does not support writing to NTFS, so FAT32 is what we're stuck with. I will try some long discs tonight to get a better idea about file sizes. Besides the obvious dual-layer discs, any others that you know are particularly large?

 

What about Ext2 or Ext3?

 

Nah. There might be some hack to read Ext2/3, but the PS3 won't write to it.

 

I'll have to pull out an old catalog and see if any titles leap out at me. Getting the DST to fit on long pop/rock material was always an issue. I even remember Telarc having problems with 1-2 titles that needed the DST encoder to be pushed off its default settings. Isn't Celine Dion also dual-layer? I know it's somebody like that. It has to be M-ch, and then think in terms of G. Hits, live albums or 2-on-1s which generally run over 70 minutes.

Let me go find an old catalog!

 

FAT32 is no problem!! There is a media server program called Tversity that runs on your PC and can stream video to the PS3. It is pretty easy to configure. It allows you to transfer files between the PC and PS3. Fat32 is not the supported format on the PS3 hard drive. It is the format that it reads from the USB ports. You can transfer files >4GB all you want over the network. I have done it many times in the past.

 

Great news. How about converting the DSD files to PCM for people with media servers? That would greatly increase the availability of high resolution titles for those without an SACD player.

 

I'm sure I'll see Thriller's SACD ISO rips on the net for download in no time.
I whished I would have bought the Top Gun soundtrack SACD, I may get a second chance now...

 

The SACD rips go out the USB ports (not to internal HDD), only FAT32 is supported.

Yep, the ripped DSDIFF files can be converted to PCM via the free Korg Audiogate software.

 

Delete.