Problem with USB advance running off HDD

[Undertow79]

ive been trying to get USB advance to load on my slimline v12 using swapmagic. I renamed the swapmagic.elf file & copied to the swapmagic directory on the HDD Here is the strange thing. When i start up my ps2 with the swapmagic cd loaded, usb advance starts up (running off my maxtor hdd), but then usb advance tells me there is no HDD connected. How can this be running off the HDD and be telling me that there is not one connected? any suggestions?

also i formatted the HDD using USBextreme and installed and copied some games. MOH frontline & MOH 2, Tony Hawk 4... but they dont show up.
also It wont boot using the USB advance cd either.
Anyone know what im doing wrong here?

[dlanor]

ive been trying to get USB advance to load on my slimline v12 using swapmagic. I renamed the swapmagic.elf file & copied to the swapmagic directory on the HDD Here is the strange thing. When i start up my ps2 with the swapmagic cd loaded, usb advance starts up (running off my maxtor hdd), but then usb advance tells me there is no HDD connected. How can this be running off the HDD and be telling me that there is not one connected? any suggestions?

There are a couple of different possible reasons for that.
1: Swapmagic and USBAdvance probably use different USB drivers, so they may have different compatibility characteristics. So a USB drive may work with one of them and still fail with the other.

2: There may be a problem with the USB driver of Swapmagic, so that it prevents the one of USBAdvance from initializing properly. Such driver conflicts have caused problems with other software, though I'm not aware of any specific problem with Swapmagic. (but I don't even have it...)

Best regards: dlanor

[Undertow79]

Yeah Ive practially given up trying to get it to work that way. I may just buy the actual usb advance with the disk instead of the various downloaded versions ive tried., or just get a modchip... its about time!

[dlanor]

Yeah Ive practially given up trying to get it to work that way.

Before giving up entirely, you could try letting Swapmagic start LaunchELF instead. With LaunchELF configured for 'IOP reset' it doesn't matter what drivers Swapmagic used, as they should get thrown out of the system. And I know for a fact that LaunchELF can start USBAdvance error-free, because that's how I use it myself.

I may just buy the actual usb advance with the disk instead of the various downloaded versions ive tried., or just get a modchip... its about time!

A modchip definitely makes life easier in using homebrew software of all kinds. It's what I'd get if I was in your position.

Best regards: dlanor

[Undertow79]

ok finally ive had some time to mess around with launchelf. i got the latest version 3.41t and put it on my HDD and booted it with the swapmagic cd. Now i copied a few .elf files onto my HDD as well but im having the same problem. I boot the USB extreem elf and it tells me no HDD is connected. (with the IOP reset on yes) Yet when i boot the reality player or SNES emu elf files they load up fine. just cant seem to figure out how to get them to read files off my HDD either, they just look right to the cd for folders. I also tried running usbextreem of the MC after i copied it on with launchelf, that didnt work either, I tried two different HDDS too! Hope im just one small step closer to getting this! Any more ideas?

[dlanor]

ok finally ive had some time to mess around with launchelf. i got the latest version 3.41t and put it on my HDD and booted it with the swapmagic cd. Now i copied a few .elf files onto my HDD as well but im having the same problem. I boot the USB extreem elf and it tells me no HDD is connected. (with the IOP reset on yes)

Hmmm, so it works with LaunchELF but not with USBExtreme. Right ?
I mean that the file browser in LaunchELF v3.41t does show the contents of your USB HDD.
Is that correct ?

Yet when i boot the reality player or SNES emu elf files they load up fine. just cant seem to figure out how to get them to read files off my HDD either, they just look right to the cd for folders.

That's perfectly natural, as those programs don't support USB.

A PS2 does not have a centralized OS with all the drivers each program needs. The closest thing it has is a collection of drivers in the firmware ROM, but those only cover the basics, not such things as USB storage devices.

For a PS2 program to work with such a device it must load a device driver for it, and the programs you mention don't have it.

I also tried running usbextreem of the MC after i copied it on with launchelf, that didnt work either, I tried two different HDDS too! Hope im just one small step closer to getting this! Any more ideas?

Well, are you 100% sure that you have formatted the drives correctly ?

To work with USBExtreme the drive must have only one single partition, and that partition must use a FAT32 filesystem. FAT16, which Windows often simply calls FAT, will not do the job. FAT16 works with LaunchELF, but never with USBExtreme. And NTFS partitions are also useless for PS2 purposes.

The best way to ensure having the right filesystem is to use ul_format.exe to create it. But some have reported problems using that on already formatted drives with more than one partition (and in some other cases).

To eliminate those problems, first use Windows to format the drive to a single NTFS partition. Then use the ul_format.exe program to make it into a single FAT32 partition (the only type that program can make).

I'm not sure if the format is your problem, but it's worth testing.

Best regards: dlanor

[Undertow79]

im going to try and reformatt the partition in dos this time. That makes alot of sense what your saying. Hope it works out, ill let you know how i make out, Lauch elf is working fine and reading everything off the HDD. Its a really cool program.

on a side note. you seem to really know your stuff so ill ask you about a seperate post i have in a different area. I have a new 50" samsung DLP HDTV. Now when i have my ps2 hooked up to it, it does not fill the entire screen. It had two one inch thick black bars on each side of the screen. I know my ps2 is set to 16:9 mode. and it is not displaying the typical 4:3 black bars that are much thicker on the sides. The TV also has stretch and zoom options which none of them fill the entire screen. My dvd player does not do this, but even when i play movies in the ps2 as a test it has the one inch annoying bars on the sides. Ever come across anything like this??

[dlanor]

im going to try and reformatt the partition in dos this time. That makes alot of sense what your saying. Hope it works out,

I hope so too. Good luck with it.

ill let you know how i make out, Lauch elf is working fine and reading everything off the HDD. Its a really cool program.

I'm glad you like it. It was one of my own favourites long before I joined in its development. (Which was the main reason I wanted to do so.)

on a side note. you seem to really know your stuff so ill ask you about a seperate post i have in a different area.

Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I'm afraid I can't quite live up to it this time...

----- snip ----- re: problem specific to Widescreen HDTV set
Sorry, but I don't have access to any such equipment for testing.
All my TV sets and monitors have the 'old-fashioned' 4:3 proportions.

Best regards: dlanor

[Undertow79]

Well i reformatted my HDD in windows then used ul_format to reformat it again for the PS2, used ul_install and put on a game, and set up the HDD to boot launchelf with swapmagic. Still no luck detecting the HDD with USB advance. But with Launchelf everything is reading ok as before. I did notice an error message at the top of launchelf when it started up, "unable to load launchelf.cnf" Not sure what this means. Think its affecting me at all?

[dlanor]

Well i reformatted my HDD in windows then used ul_format to reformat it again for the PS2, used ul_install and put on a game, and set up the HDD to boot launchelf with swapmagic. Still no luck detecting the HDD with USB advance.

Well, then I'm all out of ideas. Sorry, but that's the way it is.

But with Launchelf everything is reading ok as before. I did notice an error message at the top of launchelf when it started up, "unable to load launchelf.cnf" Not sure what this means. Think its affecting me at all?

I don't think so. All it means is that it has failed to load LAUNCHELF.CNF from one of the expected paths. Once you do save a CNF file (Done automatically when you exit the CONFIG screens of LaunchELF) that message should stop appearing.

With some versions of LaunchELF it could be a problem, as missing CNF file means that defaults will be used for everything, and the old defaults did NOT include IOP reset. (Which kills old driver remnants in IOP memory.) But with the new defaults introduced with the new CNF format of v3.41t, that is no longer the case. Now IOP reset will be used even without any CNF.

Best regards: dlanor