TOC Files Under PCSX, Are They Even Being Read By the Emulator?

**LillyDragon** · November 30th, 2012

Serious question over here, but I really don't know what the problem is over here!

Even after converting my CUEs to TOCs, the crashes in PCSX on certain games that rely on CD Audio, (Like Vib Ribbon and Tomb Raider.) have stopped, but I'm still getting no music, and the first Tomb Raider (Which I made a dump from my original disc using IMGBurn, into a single BIN file with a CUE sheet.) is still crashing, despite removing the CUE and replacing it with an equivalent TOC.

Granted, all my other games that don't really need the TOC file for tracking CD audio, like Tekken 2, Gran Turismo, Spyro, and Rayman 2 all work just fine under PCSX from start to finish with the "Simulate BIOS" option, so my emulation setup on Xubuntu is pretty legit without needing additional hardware to dump my own BIOS.

It's my other two favorites, Vib Ribbon and Tomb Raider, that don't seem to like PCSX. Tomb Raider's running flawlessly from the disc on the Windows version of ePSXe, and Vib Ribbon's okay on the same emulator from either the disc or a BIN dump and CUE sheet. I would use the Linux port of ePSXe, but all the dependencies are kinda hard to track down for the 64-bit edition.

tl;dr, is there something wrong with the syntax of my TOC files, or does PCSX Reloaded on Linux have a broken implementation for CUE's and TOC's? I'll post my CUE and TOC for Vib Ribbon if that helps. I'd love to be able to play these titles from Linux, it's annoying having to boot into Windows just for two games. (And possibly more if I track down the rest of the Tomb Raider trilogy.)

The TOCs were converted from CUEs using cue2toc installed from Synaptic, by the way.

Code:

//Vib Ribbon Cue Sheet
FILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" BINARY
  TRACK 01 MODE2/2352
    INDEX 01 00:00:00
  TRACK 02 AUDIO
    PREGAP 00:11:00
    INDEX 01 01:29:00
  TRACK 03 AUDIO
    INDEX 00 04:06:00
    INDEX 01 04:08:00
  TRACK 04 AUDIO
    INDEX 00 06:40:00
    INDEX 01 06:42:00
  TRACK 05 AUDIO
    INDEX 00 09:12:00
    INDEX 01 09:14:00
  TRACK 06 AUDIO
    INDEX 00 11:47:00
    INDEX 01 11:49:00
  TRACK 07 AUDIO
    INDEX 00 14:34:00
    INDEX 01 14:36:00
  TRACK 08 AUDIO
    INDEX 00 17:07:00
    INDEX 01 17:09:00

Code:

//TOC for Vib Ribbon
// Generated by cue2toc 0.4
// Report bugs to <dermatsch@gmx.de>
CD_ROM_XA

TRACK MODE2_RAW
    DATAFILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" 01:29:00

TRACK AUDIO
    PREGAP 00:11:00
    AUDIOFILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" 01:29:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" 04:06:00 04:08:00
    START 04:06:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" 06:40:00 06:42:00
    START 06:40:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" 09:12:00 09:14:00
    START 09:12:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" 11:47:00 11:49:00
    START 11:47:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" 14:34:00 14:36:00
    START 14:34:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "VIB_RIBBON.BIN" 17:07:00 17:09:00
    START 17:07:00

Also, don't even mention WINE, we all know the hilariously bad sound problems it's having with PulseAudio right now, and these two games I'm trying to play rely heavily on CD Audio in order to be playable.

**mister_playboy** · December 9th, 2012

Is your data file actually named VIB_RIBBON.BIN? One of the most common problem with CUE files is they are made on case-insensitive Windows and then don't work on Linux because the file name case doesn't match what the CUE sheet says. (VIB_RIBBON.bin for example).

**LillyDragon** · December 9th, 2012

I haven't even thought about case-sensitive strings! Figured PCSX wasn't case-sensitive and left the TOC file that way.

Just tried it, and still no audio on Vib Ribbon. On top of this, a TOC file with an all-caps TOC for the extension causes the game to freeze when loading CD Audio, but with a lowercase ".toc" extension, the game loads, but still no sound. Whether I provide the emulator with a BIOS or not, the results are the same, so it's not that.

I'm starting to wonder if this a flat-out compatibility issue with the emulator here. ;__; It works just fine on the Windows version of ePSXe in either WINE or Windows 7, although the former is still not an option because of PULSE and WINE not playing nicely with each other.

This is what my modified TOC looks like now.

Code:

// Generated by cue2toc 0.4
// Report bugs to <dermatsch@gmx.de>
CD_ROM_XA

TRACK MODE2_RAW
    DATAFILE "vib_ribbon.bin" 01:29:00

TRACK AUDIO
    PREGAP 00:11:00
    AUDIOFILE "vib_ribbon.bin" 01:29:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "vib_ribbon.bin" 04:06:00 04:08:00
    START 04:06:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "vib_ribbon.bin" 06:40:00 06:42:00
    START 06:40:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "vib_ribbon.bin" 09:12:00 09:14:00
    START 09:12:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "vib_ribbon.bin" 11:47:00 11:49:00
    START 11:47:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "vib_ribbon.bin" 14:34:00 14:36:00
    START 14:34:00

TRACK AUDIO
    AUDIOFILE "vib_ribbon.bin" 17:07:00 17:09:00
    START 17:07:00

Does it have to be all caps in both the TOC and BIN files for it work? I've tried lowercase and uppercase for either and still getting the same results as the above.

**mister_playboy** · December 10th, 2012

I don't see any other problem with your TOC, but I admit I've only used CUEs with PCSX-R.

**LillyDragon** · December 10th, 2012

Can you get any game dependent on the CUE sheet to run? (You don't even need it for games like Gran Turismo or Spyro the Dragon, since they have no CD Audio tracks that I can tell. Pretty sure it's all DATA/DATA there.) I've never had any luck with CUEs at all on PCSX-R, and after trying again I still get nothing.

I don't think the "silently load cue" feature is actually working; I'd rather execute the game from the CUE and be done with it. I have even removed the TOC from the game folder so PCSX-R will read the CUE, and visa-versa with the CUE so it would read the TOC without conflict. Vib Ribbon is still crashing on the Loading Screen to the Tutorial level, or giving me a barren field of no obstacles in-game. It's not a bad dump, and neither should my Tomb Raider dump either. ImgBurn shouldn't be failing me here.

This is so frustrating, I wish I had my phat Playstation with me, ugh. ;__; Is something derping up on the 64-bit edition of the emulator?