A CAPS question

[barkingboy]

Hi,

I have quite a few (original) disks that I have been unable to successfully "rip" using the many ADF tools on the Amiga or disk2fdi on PC.

Anyway, I just wondered if the CAPS dumping tool is going to be made public at all?

Cheers

[derSammler]

No one except the CAPS team can do anything useful with the images created by the dumping tool. Making it public doesn't make any sense therefore.

Anyway, if you want to dump your originals for CAPS, you'll get the dumping tool. I'm sure.

[barkingboy]

Originally posted by WindowsKiller
No one except the CAPS team can do anything useful with the images created by the dumping tool.

Oh I see - I didn't realise that Hehe.

[whiteb]

Originally posted by barkingboy
Oh I see - I didn't realise that Hehe.

Well, what happens is you speak to Caps-Project and tell them what you have...., they send you the software to run (which requires a REAL A500), it checks out your system to see if its got the correct hardware for dumping... you send the disks off to Caps where they get converted into a format WinUAE understands. (In the future they might work out a way to recreate the disks onto real floppies).

Caps Only sends processed images back to contributors, that way you can have an electronic version to play once disks reach unreadable levels.

Have a look at www.caps-project.org

[andreas]

Originally posted by whiteb
Well, what happens is you speak to Caps-Project and tell them what you have...., they send you the software to run (which requires a REAL A500)

LOL?

I'd always thought it requires an Amiga with at least a 68020 CPU. A500s usually don't have that one inside.

[Enverex]

Yeah, 020 min, and at least 2-4MB RAM and a Hard-Drive if you aren't dumping directly over a Laplink/Null modem cable.

[whiteb]

Originally posted by andreas
LOL?

I'd always thought it requires an Amiga with at least a 68020 CPU. A500s usually don't have that one inside.

A500, A530 (030 @ 40mhz, 8MB ram, 1GIG SCSI)

[fiath]

Originally posted by whiteb
(In the future they might work out a way to recreate the disks onto real floppies).

We already know how to do it. In fact IPF files are specifically designed for mastering to disk. It is just a huge amount of work to make it happen time + money wise.

It will happen, just not right now.

Anyway barkingboy, if you want to dump your stuff just email us and we will send you the dumping tool. The reason it is not on the site is because (apart from only us being able to use the image as already pointed out) we need to check your system is healthy before you start dumping.

[barkingboy]

I'd forgotten about this thread.

Faith, I have a large amount of complete games / coverdisks / applications as well as 100s of loose original game disks (from eBay!).

However, I need to make an inventory of them all (which I plan to do very soon). When that is done, I will let you guys know what I have and you can decide if there is anything you want.

Incidentally I just got budget versions of Rainbow Islands, Rick Dangerous 2, Go For Gold & Pro-Tennis Tour in the post today.

[fiath]

Great thanks.

You can match them against the games database http://www.caps-project.org/games.php - we only really want the ones not on it For more details on exactly what we want, you can see the wanted page: http://www.caps-project.org/wanted.shtml

But it is best to make a list of all of them anyway - so we can see for sure

[barkingboy]

Hi,

Well I have already sent emails about this to the CAPS team, but I thought other people might be interested. Anyway, after a busy weekend I managed to get this lot uploaded:

1. APB & Xybots - On same disk from TNT compilation.
2. Championship Cricket
3. Blastar
4. Civilization - v855e.01 (Enhanced AGA)
5. Dawn Patrol
6. Football Manager
7. Go For Gold - (Kixx)
8. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade Graphic Adventure
9. Kingmaker: The Quest For The Crown
10. Netherworld
11. Power Monger And WW1 add on (The Hit Squad)
12. Pro Tennis Tour - (The Hit Squad)
13. Rick Dangerous 2 - (Kixx) - works on an A1200
14. Rocket Ranger
15. Shadowlands - (The Hit Squad)
16. Silent Service II - v1.01
17. Space Station
18. Speedball2 (Kixx) A600/A1200 compatible!
19. Starlord (needs manual though for protection which I don't have)
20. The Immortal (The Hit Squad)
21. The Ryder Cup: Johnnie Walker (A1200 version - doesn't look AGA though!)
22. Wembley Rugby League
23. Wing Commander
24. Worlds At War - v1.42 (needs manual though for protection which I don't have)

Obviously I only uploaded those that I couldn't find in the CAPs database or that I had budget versions of that might be more compatible versions with A600/A1200 support.

Hopefully at least one of these disks will be useful! I still have more to sort through at some stage as well.

Regards

[fiath]

Cool.

Yes, emails are being caught up on now, but we still have a fair few to go to get current.

[whiteb]

You can match them against the games database http://www.caps-project.org/games.php - we only really want the ones not on it

Fiath....

The games database has "Armour-Geddon II" but not "Armour-Geddon"

I have my eye on the latter and should know in a few days if I get it.

[fiath]

The reason Armour-Geddon is not released is because it has some parts currently unsupported. This does not mean what we have is good or bad, we just don't know at the moment.

So, atm that purchase is not worth it until we know more. There are plenty of other games that need buying if you want to do that.

As our recent shopping shows (http://www.caps-project.org/accounts.php) there really is no problem finding games that are currently unsupported. If anybody wants to buy games for the purpose of dumping, then just let us know because we usually have our eye on something somewhere.

[Enverex]

I'm always interested in picking up obscure games, so if you need anything in the UK just shout (as long as it isnt too expensive).

[whiteb]

Originally posted by fiath
The reason Armour-Geddon is not released is because it has some parts currently unsupported. This does not mean what we have is good or bad, we just don't know at the moment.

So, atm that purchase is not worth it until we know more. There are plenty of other games that need buying if you want to do that.

As our recent shopping shows (http://www.caps-project.org) there really is no problem finding games that are currently unsupported. If anybody wants to buy games for the purpose of dumping, then just let us know because we usually have our eye on something somewhere.

/me waves fist..... when I say I have my eye on it.... I have bid

well currently at 95 cents (AU), i wont cry if someone out bids me then

The box contains:
Armour-Geddon manual
Armour-Geddon Diary
Multi-language keyboard control sheet
Megazone subscription flyer
3 3.5" Disks

[edit] see, this is where you need to have a section on the website for "Submitted and being worked on".

You tell people "Go check the website, and if its not listed... then go ahead".

So, that then makes.... "Games released" and "Games already submitted and is being worked on".

[derSammler]

I have already scanned everything from Armour-Geddon, so don't care about it. Unless fiath doesn't like my scans.

[whiteb]

Originally posted by WindowsKiller
I have already scanned everything from Armour-Geddon, so don't care about it. Unless fiath don't like my scans.

This is exactly my point, The CAPS website said NOTHING about Armour-geddon (or any other game for that fact, except games already released.), what parts have been scanned, and what havent, what disks are corrupt and need more dumps of.

Caps website needs to have THIS information too.

Also, with games dumped already...., on the database, it *NEEDS* segments to display which games have had scans of manuals, boxes etc already submitted, and which HASNT.

Until we see this, my ebay buying will stop, and such as it is, so will my dumping and scanning.

[CodyJarrett]

To echo whiteb's comments and be more explicit, it would be useful for contributors to know the fate of each their submitted raw CAPS images - whether they have been successfully turned into an IPF image, contained errors, were modified in some way, were in an unknown/unresearched format or are awaiting a second raw image for comparison etc.

[IFW]

Unfortunately which games have been dumped normally means nothing... and even less and less these days.
Originally we posted those, but it turned out to be a very bad idea, as people thought whatever is submitted is good, while in reality about 30% or less of anything submitted is suitable for preservation normally, that is not modified, not copy, authentic etc - and even a less percentage is not a game that is already out. Now take that 30% of say 20% of "new" submitted games and you will have a right estimate of possible new releases.
It is not a coincidence that release batches are shrunk to as little as 25 games a batch.
Many of the submitted games are the same with already existing releases, or modified or copies or simply bad.
What is in the release database reflects 99%+ what useful dumps we have, the rest 1% is due to me having a real job as well - so far, but I am working on it
So what I can say is that if a game is not in our release database there is normally a very good reason for that.
There are two kind of exceptions to this rule:
a, a few dozen games that are partially or whole in generic hw mfm format (read: atari, pc, sam etc), that will be added whenever atari gets properly supported, I won't go for amiga specific hacked formats - that's why we ask for atari dumps. I want a proper solution, not just a few hack scripts that work with the amiga games in atari format.
b, the 1.5bit mfm format used by 4 Psygnosis games, Obitus, The Killing Game Show, Armour-Geddon and Nitro. Please note all 4 are dumped, but given Psygnosis track record of insanely high bad duplication rate, I wouldn't be much surprised to find most of the disks are bad...
In case of any doubt about a game just drop me a line, it is obviously me who knows the most about game dump/release status.
On the scans front the right person to ask is Fiath.
Please note, that I am very short on time so whenever - if ever, very rarely these days -. I post something it means the time spent on a release is spent on posting the message.

Thank you for your cooperation