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Chankast is actually just a joke/parody program, right?

9K views 35 replies 12 participants last post by  laserjohn 
#1 ·
Chankast is just one of those programs that claims to be an emulator, but just displays the system's startup screen and doesn't actually do anything else, right?

It must be because I've tried every piece of advice on the net from making the BIOS images read only to using the Utopia Boot Disc, to using specific versions of virtual drive software and so far it has loaded exactly *0* games. It even ignores the boot disc and just goes to the CD player screen. That's all it ever does.

Yes, I know people recommend NullDC, and that works fine for me, but I've always been curious about Chankast. Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, it doesn't work at all. In fact, it's the only emulator that I've never been able to make do anything.
 
#6 ·
I understand that it's outdated, but what's the trick to making it work?

I have the emulator, I have a copy of the ROMs, I have game images in CDI format, I have a virtual drive through Alcohol 120%, but no matter what I do, all it ever does is show the Dreamcast logo and then go to the CD player screen.

The virtual drive is selected, the image is mounted (it can be accessed in other programs), but Chankast will not access the disc.

I read that some games aren't self-booting, so it was recommended to use the Utopia Boot Disc, but even that doesn't boot! I don't mean it won't boot the game, I mean the boot disc itself doesn't boot!

What else do you have to do to make it actually load something? You mount an image in the virtual drive, you point the emulator to that virtual drive, you start the emulator and... NOTHING!

Is there some particular type of animal you have to sacrifice? Do the planets have to line up in a specific pattern?

I don't care if it's not a very good emulator anymore, it bugs me that it just doesn't work, period. It's a mystery that I want to solve.
 
#10 ·
I don't recall but chankast was using the old dc bios and not the newer dump that has a lot more files
The BIOS files I've been using are as follows;

dc_bios.bin - MD5: e10c53c2f8b90bab96ead2d368858623
dc_flash.bin - MD5: 309b30a16c91186879f9a2e478993f3e

These are the exact BIOS files recommended by this YouTube video on setting up and using Chankast;



No matter what I do, it thinks there's no disc in the virtual drive. It simply doesn't work at all.

EDIT: Yes, I know the video talks about downloading pirated games, I'm simply using it as a reference for trying to get the stupid thing to work.
 
#12 ·
And if you don't use Utopia?
Nothing happens. Absolutely nothing I have ever tried has ever booted. I've also tried using the CD player interface, and selecting the game option, but that just asks me to insert a game disc.

E.g. Public Domain images tend to self-boot.
So we can rule out the disc image, can you point me to one that you know works on Chankast?
 
#16 ·
Have you tried your games with nullDC too?
Or reicast?
They work fine in NullDC. I can't run Reicast because I have an older system with XP on it and the author designed it to only run on Win7 or above.

From memory I remember Zero Gunner 2 ran good. There were more games that worked, I *think* Ikaruga and Border Down amongst them but it's just too long ago for me to remember all of it.
OK, but how would I know if I have images that are compatible with it? Just saying that X game works doesn't guarantee that my particular image of it will work in Chankast.

It works fine here, using daemon tools lite 10.4 as the virtual drive. On Chankast, use the xxx cd rom plugin and choose the daemon tools drive (options>configure drive).
I'm not using Daemon Tools because it says it comes with advertising, v10.4 says it only works on Win7 or above, and the "installer" is only slightly over half a meg, which says to me "web installer", something that I absolutely refuse to use out of principle.

I've used Alcohol 120% degrees, and I also tried another virtual drive program (I forget what it was now), and that didn't work either.

To be clear, I've done everything that I'm supposed to. I tell it to use the letter of the virtual drive. I make sure that the xxx plugin is selected. I have the BIOS images in the directory. I mount the disc image in the virtual drive. I can open it in any other program as if it was a real disc, but Chankast absolutely, positively refuses to acknowledge that there's a disc in the virtual drive. No matter what I do, it thinks the virtual drive is empty.
 
#23 ·
Aside from cdi, I used to work a lot with alcohol's format at the time, mdf/mds... did you try that?
Yup.

...fine. Do not use the suggested program that works. Use anything else... that doesn't work. :p
Well, if you can point me to a crapware-free version of Daemon Tools, I'll be happy to try it, but I'm not willing to install potential malware on my system. Blame the authors who have screwed up the reputations of their own programs by bundling them them with crap.

Besides, what exactly is Chankast doing that would cause it to only work with one specific virtual drive while thinking every other virtual drive is empty? Isn't the whole point of a virtual drive that it fools programs into thinking it's a real drive? Why is Chankast the only program that isn't fooled?

I guess you can also install the latest SPTD driver (http://www.duplexsecure.com/downloads/) and see if it fixes the problem.
I think I'll pass on installing random drivers.
 
#28 · (Edited)
I did that now, no dice (the images mount fine, chankast isn't booting them).
...well, I am trying to run an outdated emulator on a recent os here...

I found your FAQ, heh. Let's see if I'm doing something wrong.

ok, yup, I forgot the DC_Flash file. Don't know why I'm getting a black screen on a game I thought worked but it does boot now.

...and we are live!

Multimedia software Font Technology Display advertising Logo


thanks PsyMan, you saved me a cd-rom ;-)
 
#29 ·
It works fine here... Windows 10, Chankast v0.25 using the xxx cdrom plugin, latest daemon tools and sptd driver.

Maybe a reboot is required, or you selected the wrong drive letter from the emulator.

There is a definite way to fix the problem but I'd rather provide that only if everything else fails.
 
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