GDEMU (clone) - problems

pixeljunkie

Whilst Drunk., I Found God., Booze = Bad.,
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so, I def have a V1 dreamcast (2 of them actually) and I have now bought 2 of these clones. One is 5.15 and the other is 5.5 - I've read the numbers mean nothing, lolchina

Anyfarts...so, I'm using madsheep's GDMenu software AND a Sandisk Ultra card formatted FAT32 (tested others to no avail)....I'm literally checking all the boxes here.

No matter what I do or which DC I test these on I get "please insert game disc" on both GDEMU's and both DC's. It happened with the first one I bought and I thought I got a dud PCB, but 2 in a row? Makes me feel like I am missing something.

I've "bent the pins slightly" to get better SD card contact...I've cleaned all the ports, etc. I'm out of ideas and could use any help.
 

BanishingFlatsAC

formerly DZ
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so, I def have a V1 dreamcast (2 of them actually) and I have now bought 2 of these clones. One is 5.15 and the other is 5.5 - I've read the numbers mean nothing, lolchina

Anyfarts...so, I'm using madsheep's GDMenu software AND a Sandisk Ultra card formatted FAT32 (tested others to no avail)....I'm literally checking all the boxes here.

No matter what I do or which DC I test these on I get "please insert game disc" on both GDEMU's and both DC's. It happened with the first one I bought and I thought I got a dud PCB, but 2 in a row? Makes me feel like I am missing something.

I've "bent the pins slightly" to get better SD card contact...I've cleaned all the ports, etc. I'm out of ideas and could use any help.

I don’t think the card is configured right. What are you using to format the SD card? You wouldn’t be getting to the dashboard if the board was bad. Can you post a screenshot of your sad card?
 

pixeljunkie

Whilst Drunk., I Found God., Booze = Bad.,
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I don’t think the card is configured right. What are you using to format the SD card? You wouldn’t be getting to the dashboard if the board was bad. Can you post a screenshot of your sad card?

dc_folders.jpg
dc_folders2.jpgdc_card.jpg

using GDEMU SD for the card...also tried manually making the card

using guiformat to format
 
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BanishingFlatsAC

formerly DZ
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You’re missing the GDmenu folder.

Edit

I should clarify that folder 01 should be the gdmenu folder. I noticed that one has a different date and I just assumed it wasn’t the correct first folder.
 
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pixeljunkie

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You’re missing the GDmenu folder.

Edit

I should clarify that folder 01 should be the gdmenu folder. I noticed that one has a different date and I just assumed it wasn’t the correct first folder.

It does have the GDmenu in there...but I think you are onto something with the card being the problem. I just reformatted a card to exFAT, than back to FAT32 and it appears to be working...I think? I'll post up if this solves it...but thanks for the tips!
 

BanishingFlatsAC

formerly DZ
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Just brainstorming here, sorry if I’m rambling. Something just came to mind. When I first installed mine, it would boot but the Dreamcast animation would play, it would just show the logo completed and boot to the dash. What I had done was I added a game and didn’t rewrite the whole card and that was causing an error. If I rewrote the whole card, it worked fine.
 

pixeljunkie

Whilst Drunk., I Found God., Booze = Bad.,
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Just brainstorming here, sorry if I’m rambling. Something just came to mind. When I first installed mine, it would boot but the Dreamcast animation would play, it would just show the logo completed and boot to the dash. What I had done was I added a game and didn’t rewrite the whole card and that was causing an error. If I rewrote the whole card, it worked fine.

not a bad thought either - I've been running everything through GDmenu just to be safe though. But it looks like when it formatted my card fat32 it wasn't actually that...so I am using command line to slow format it fat32 and trying again. It worked on the smaller card. So, thanks you definitely helped me narrow it down.
 

BanishingFlatsAC

formerly DZ
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not a bad thought either - I've been running everything through GDmenu just to be safe though. But it looks like when it formatted my card fat32 it wasn't actually that...so I am using command line to slow format it fat32 and trying again. It worked on the smaller card. So, thanks you definitely helped me narrow it down.

Try AOMEI Partition Assistant. It’s all I use now for partitioning.
 

max 330 mega

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I hope your problem has been solved at this point. I had a bit of an issue myself finding a good program to format my sd into fat 32.
The only other thing i will add, is be prepared to really wrestle with mad sheep's gdmenu program. If you add a single game it does not like, boom your whole list is broken and its back to ultra slow loading the files one by one when you turn on the system. I eventually got my list just right for the main library of DC titles on my 400 gb card after tinkering for like a week, and then just use a second 32 gb sd card to play anything thats a translation or unreleased or homebrew title.
 

pixeljunkie

Whilst Drunk., I Found God., Booze = Bad.,
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I hope your problem has been solved at this point. I had a bit of an issue myself finding a good program to format my sd into fat 32.
The only other thing i will add, is be prepared to really wrestle with mad sheep's gdmenu program. If you add a single game it does not like, boom your whole list is broken and its back to ultra slow loading the files one by one when you turn on the system. I eventually got my list just right for the main library of DC titles on my 400 gb card after tinkering for like a week, and then just use a second 32 gb sd card to play anything thats a translation or unreleased or homebrew title.

I'm noticing - but sorted out the card - all seems to work huzzah!
 
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