[Answered] Preferred executable cruncher in 2021?

[Antiriad_UK]

For exes in "new world" there is no question. Best overall/super fast exe launch: bifat's Cranker. (also great data depack)

For best exe size\too long depack times: shrinkler ( also my last intro)

For best in-demo data depack....Serious shit....best time leonards lz4...then ross's nrv\oxygene\cranker.
So many people sharing code, love it... (pick your size/speed pref and go!!)

[Radertified]

Originally Posted by Antiriad_UK

For exes in "new world" there is no question. Best overall/super fast exe launch: bifat's Crankler. (also great data depack)

For best exe size\too long depack times: shinkler ( also my last intro)

For best in-demo data depack....Serious shit....best time leonards lz4...then ross's nrv\oxygene\crankler.
So many people sharing code, love it... (pick your size/speed pref and go!!)

Cranker, not Crankler
http://aminet.net/package/util/pack/cranker

[Photon]

My next cruncher will definitely be named Shcrainkler... "Oh, yeah! I've heard of that one."

LZ4 is pretty fast depack, but seems not as good ratio as many suggestions here? It's always a balance, of course. Using the right tool for the need. Here, the need is for something easy to use, and specifically for exes. Later, there's time for showing how to depack while loading tracks and similar.

[ross]

My preference, from faster/less_packing to slower/more_packing:
doynamite->nrv2x->arjm7

lz4 is out because too less packing, shrinkler for be to slow.
This does not mean that they are not excellent! but they are not for general use.

Oh.. none of the ones I have listed are hunk/exe compressors.
But for that I am waiting for Mr. Spiv

[a/b]

Originally Posted by Photon

LZ4 is pretty fast depack, but seems not as good ratio as many suggestions here?

LZ4 is entirely byte based, not dealing with Huffman and all the bit stuff. That's how it achieves super speed on expense of compression ratio.

[Galahad/FLT]

Shrinkler is great, but in large files, its just too damned slow on 68000 to depack.

Propack for me for decent packing, quick decompression, and working properly on all hunk types except overlays, but people rarely use those in any case.

[andy2004]

just did a test with cranker..

I took the old powerpacker 3.0a.. and crunch it with cranker no special settings.
cranker -f ram:9 -o pp3 where -f from and -o output.. filesize 37536

then i took powerpacker 3 and compressed itself.. 37604 bytes.
as a comparison.. then i tried running the files..
powerpacker packed file ran perfectly..
cranker packed told me it wasnt executable.

I unpacked the powerpacked powerpacker 3 and crunched using execruncher by blueberry
no fancy settings..
similiar to those of cranker.
execruncher2 from 9 to pp3 filesize 32500bytes and again runs perfectly..
^produced the smallest.

[Photon]

There will always be cases where one cruncher performs better than the other - the use case is in topic, and a few bytes don't matter as much as ease of use and reliability.

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

overlays

As per topic, overlay support is not needed. ProPack seems good. Last updated Feb 1992. Were hunk types introduced after that that is in common use, so that I couldn't recommend it for e.g. WB3.1?

Originally Posted by andy2004

execruncher2 from 9 to pp3 filesize 32500bytes and again runs perfectly..
^produced the smallest.

Didn't Shrinkler replace it? And other crunchers may have the edge for graphics or music which is part of a demo, but not a utility. Ratio doesn't have to best, but should be good.

And Shrinkler is good, but depack speed prohibitive @ 7MHz as has been mentioned.

Cranker seems good as well, its best feature loading while decrunching.

Any more crunchers that should be mentioned specifically for "good behavior when depacking", can depack a pushing-the-RAM-limits OCS 1MB demo on OCS 1MB without using much overhead/stack?

[andy2004]

Titanics loading while decrunching version 1.2 i think was the latest..

[andy2004]

Did I kill this thread?..

[Photon]

andy2004: The question is answered, I'll put that in title.

I knew (and had) most execrunchers mentioned here, it was just a re-check to make sure I didn't miss a recently released/updated one.

mcgeezer/Antiriad answered first (Propack / Cranker) and I mentioned Shrinkler and maybe one or two more while using those two in the video.

Results: (kinda anticipated)

• Shrinkler: Smallest, ~2K/s decrunch speed
• Propack: Medium-good compression, ~18K/s speed
• Cranker: Medium compression, ~60K/s speed

[Motion]

Originally Posted by andy2004

just did a test with cranker..

then i took powerpacker 3 and compressed itself.. 37604 bytes.
as a comparison.. then i tried running the files..
powerpacker packed file ran perfectly..
cranker packed told me it wasnt executable.

Cranker seems to remove the executable bit 'RW-D' on the resultant file (at least it did on version 0.64, not tried 0.66).

[shades_aus]

Has anyone done any testing on executable files with all these crunchers?
I am interested in the smallest file size on files although, some of the options just confuse the bajesus out of me being a non-programmer.

How do you even tell what options to use on a file?
Even library and devices are executable, right?

Also, has there been any news on the new stonecracker from Mr.Spiv?

[shades_aus]

Well I guess I can make some tests as I'm trying to get a utility disk made for an A500.
Updated with PowerPacker 5.0b. I couldn't get Shrinkler to work and still execute compressed files in Amiga OS 3.x so, here's what I have so far.

149628 - SFC - Original
66628 - SFC - Imploder 4 (Level 8, 8192 merge, Library)
65224 - SFC - PowerPacker 5.0b (Best,Library header)
64536 - SFC - StoneCracker v4.10.3 (Best,Professional,Library)
61060 - SFC - Crunch-Mania v1.91 (LZ-H 64k Huff, Library)

52596 - siegfreid.library - Original
29108 - siegfreid.library - PowerPacker 5.0b (Best,Library header)
29028 - siegfreid.library - Imploder 4 (Level 8, 8192 merge, Library)
28640 - siegfreid.library - StoneCracker v4.10.3 (Best,Professional,Library)
27160 - siegfreid.library - Crunch-Mania v1.91 (LZ-H 64k Huff, Library)

[andy2004]

powerpacker 4.0 is available on the FTP.
uploaded to the ZONE for you..
powerpacker 2.1, 2.2, 2.3 3.0 4.0 4.3 and 5. not sure about 5 though could be a modified 4.3

[Crashdisk]

Just for information :
PowerPacker_Pro_v4.2-2.04_.exe = PowerPacker v4.0a for Kick 2.0
Power Packer Professional v4.3 = PowerPacker v4.0a for Kick 2.0
Power Packer Professional v5.0b = PowerPacker v4.0a for Kick 1.3

[Adrian Cummings]

I've tried quite a few of those crunchers listed above now, but still yet to find something better than RNC ProPack which for me is still king of the Amiga crunchers 30 years on it seems.

I'll give Shrinkler a go today tho as not tried that one.

[jotd]

RNC is one of the best compromises, yes:

- unpacks on itself
- depacking source available on amiga and C
- packing executable available on amiga, and pretty good reverse from lab313.ru (?) to recreate propack on windows. Works much better than other attempts.

Cranker and all are very cool but it's not possible to unpack cranked executables with, say, xfddecrunch, and the embedded unpacking uses the OS heavily and even dos packet interface to be able to use async IO (floppy load+decrunch at the same time) so it's complex, so it almost forces to use kickemu in whdload slaves, where it could be avoided.

[Adrian Cummings]

@jotd OK cool regards Cranker and understood

I just tested Shrinkler and compressed my Amiga code on PC using it for speed, which was very fast compression time as expected. It actually produced the best compression size I've seen to date so all good.
Sadly tho it took about 30seconds to unpack and boot on stock 020 AGA Amiga, which in my opinion is just too long to expect people to wait as compared to RNC ProPack.

Overall RNC ProPack is still the best compromise for larger games use but perhaps Shrinkler is better suited to demos or smaller games.

Personal verdict on Shrinkler: Very nice tho as it just works

[Adrian Cummings]

...Actually I also tested Shrinkler on my new Amiga game .exe with the poke colour option set and although took about 25-30secs to unpack on A1200, it looked kinda pretty at least.
I may use it as really don't want to take anything out of my game code further to cram it onto disk 1 at least.
Will continue testing anyway.