Updating default PS3 dumping method

[rhynec]

With the newer releases of ManaGunZ, disc dumping for the PS3 has become much easier. The 3Dump.bin file can be directly generated inside the PS3, only needing to be copied to your external USB drive (The option is found in System Settings, and the 3Dump.bin file will be generated in the tmp folder of hdd0; using ManaGunZ filemanager it should be easy to copy it to your usb of choice). Technically, it should also be possible to skip using the GetKeys package and get the decryption keys from ManaGunZ. Right now ManaGunz is able to generate what it calls a bluray disc key, which if I understand correctly can be also used for decrypting a PS3 bluray, though I have no idea how it relates to Redump's decyption keys.

ManaGunZ also supports dumping encrypted PS3 discs like MultiMan, and it doesn't require one to enable direct disc access every time a dump is attempted. ManaGunZ is also better at detecting when a BluRay is inside the console, whereas MultiMan (on some systems) require one to insert the disc only after launching the program.

Better yet, with ManaGunZ you can dump the encrypted ISO straight to NTFS without requiring to first generate it inside the console. This should avoid needing to split the ISO after generating it (btw, PrepISO isn't needed for ManaGunZ to detect the NTFS device, it is built into the program).

Using ManaGunZ should make it much easier for new dumpers to acquire the information they need to submit to Redump. We should consider updating the wiki to recommend using this new method, though I would prefer more people to try it out before submitting any changes. Your thoughts?

P.S. I think I should mention a few bugs I encountered using ManaGunZ:
a) The PS3 (sometimes?) freezes when a PS3ISO folder doesn't exist in your NTFS device and you try to dump an ISO.
b) Dumping the so-called bluray disc keys to NTFS appears to not work at all: it freezes when no PS3ISO folder exists, and it fails other times.
I have reported these bugs to the developer, and I'm still waiting to hear back from him; I'm hoping they are fixed soon.

Edit: Forgot to mention, ManaGunZ is also able to generate IRD files from bluray discs. They are generated automatically when dumping a decrypted ISO, and for now they can't be generated manually. Perhaps, if Redump begins to accept IRD files, the developer might add an option to do it manually, b/c as of now it isn't really a necessary feature.

Edit 2: The bugs I mentioned have been fixed in pre-release version 1.41. They should be included in the next official release of ManaGunZ.

[Burrrrrton]

Thanks for the detailed information. It is very helpful and educational. It's good when there is an opportunity to use additional utilities.

[user7]

I'll need a step by step bullet form if you want me to update the wiki. To someone who's never done this method, it just looks like gibberish.

[rhynec]

Rough Draft of a Step-by-Step Guide:

Dumping ISO using ManaGunZ

Note: You need to have up-to-date ManaGunZ installed on your PS3 (version 1.39 or higher strictly required).

• Connect an NTFS-formatted external device to your PS3, with a PS3ISO folder on the root of the device (a preexisting PS3ISO folder won't be needed in version 1.41 of ManaGunZ; it'll be created automatically and won't fail)
• Launch ManaGunZ with the your game disc already inserted into the console (as of version 1.40 of ManaGunZ, inserting disc while the program is open works, but is a bit buggy and requires extra steps).
• Hover over you game's icon on the PS3 section of the user interface. Make sure that there is a Blu-Ray tag on the lower right side of your screen while hovering over your game, to make sure it is an disc game and not a game dump.
• Press triangle while hovering over your game. On the menu that pops up, click on "Build Encrypted Blu-Ray Disc" and choose a destination for your dump (in this case, it should be /ntfs0:/PS3ISO if you already connected your NTFS device and it was detected correctly). Wait for it to finish dumping.
• After the dump is finished, an encrypted ISO (a .iso.enc file) should be present in the PS3ISO folder of your NTFS partition.

Dumping metadata using Getkey (updated for ManaGunZ)

Note: You need to have installed the GetKeys v2 package, and up-to-date ManaGunZ (version 1.39 or higher strictly required).

• Connect a FAT-32 formatted usb into your PS3
• Open ManaGunZ, press start to enter settings, and navigate to System Tools.
• Click on "Dump 3Dump.bin." (a 'Done' notification should appear once the process is finished).
• Exit ManaGunZ settings by pressing the back button (circle).
• Press select to enter ManaGunZ file manager.
• Navigate to /dev_hdd0/tmp/; a file named 3Dump.bin should be present in the directory. Select it by pressing square over it, press triangle to open options, and click on copy.
• Navigate to the root of your inserted usb device (should be named /dev_usbXXX/), open options and click on paste.
• Exit ManaGunZ, insert your game disc, and run GetKeys (with your USB still attached to the console).
• (The rest of the instructions should be the same).

Feel free to edit this post as you see fit in order to include it in the wiki (It may be overly descriptive).

Note: The developer of ManaGunZ may integrate the GetKeys package into ManaGunZ, so 3Dump.bin generation may not be necessary in the future: https://github.com/Zarh/ManaGunZ/issues/57

Edit: Inserting a disc into the PS3 while ManaGunZ is open only causes a bug when there are no other items/games to be scanned in your console/drive/etc. The bug in question is that the icon+UI won't be automatically refreshed when the disc is inserted, which can be fixed by changing UI styles to Coverflow and back to XMB. (or opening the program again). The issue has already been reported: https://github.com/Zarh/ManaGunZ/issues/59

[user7]

>(The rest of the instructions should be the same).
Can you tell me what exactly? I want to recopy / paste into the new wiki section.

https://wiki.redump.info/index.php?title= … S3_Console

[rhynec]

Sorry for that, what I meant was that the instructions should be the same as the ones in the metadata section about GetKey, Here they are (a bit modified):

• GetKeys should create two files on the root of the USB drive: disc.pic & getkey.log
• The getkey.log file will contain the disc_key, disc_id and PIC. If anything went wrong creating the 3Dump.bin or extracting the data, the "getkey.log" will contain a WARNING message saying the process failed.
• Make sure that you provide the complete and correct metadata for each dump.

Hopefully, with this added to the wiki, more people will try out dumping with MGZ and comment on it.

[user7]

https://wiki.redump.info/index.php?title= … unZ_Method

I broke it out into it's own section.

>Hopefully, with this added to the wiki, more people will try out dumping with MGZ and comment on it.
Any tools I can link for the downloads like Multiman "Tools" section has? That might help.

I see you're a newer member, you've tested this method and make sure it matches redump dumps? I guess we should have started there.

[Bigmanjapan]

I've tested 1.40 version of this program by dumping two discs:

1. After Hours Athletes BCES-01335 (perfect condition, dumps fine via multiMAN and matches existing redump entry);
2. LittleBigPlanet 3 BCES-01663/RSC (data side is heavily scratched, cannot be dumped via multiMAN due to read errors).

1. Dumping.

ManaGunZ 1.40 dumped After Hours Athletes game correctly. The hashes match redump entry.

Dumping LittleBigPlanet raised some questions. When multiMAN dumps a disc with read errors it does 30 retries on each error. If data cannot be read in 30 retries, then dumping process is terminated. This happens with my damaged LittleBigPlanet disc too. ManaGunZ on the other hand, continues to dump the disc without terminating dumping process. The read rate dips to 0 MiB/s in problematic areas as expected but dumping is not terminated. I transferred the output dump to my PC, calculated the hashes and they didn't match the redump entry. Now I'm not sure what ManaGunZ does exactly (forcefully fills error segments with zeros or something else) but it clearly is an issue when it comes to accurate dumping. I've had multiple PS3 discs which visually had perfect data surface but rendered read errors upon trying to dump them via multiMAN. With ManaGunZ there is simply no way to tell if such discs were dumped correctly. Moreover, as an additional indicator of dumping process status multiMAN features an active log which shows errors and retry attempts; ManaGunZ has no log and therefore no way to see if any errors were ever encountered during dumping.

Another thing I've noticed is that when multiMAN encounters read errors, discs would slow down and speed up again. In other words, one can hear how optical drive does something with the discs. In ManaGunZ nothing like this happens, just a steady humming of a dumping process despite the errors.

Dumping process of damaged LBP disc via ManaGunZ 1.40:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2Qr5mHiBwo

Dumping process of damaged LBP disc via multiMAN 04.85.01:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Df6uDcv8uqk

2. Transferring the dumps.

My Slim PS3 has only two USB ports. One is occupied with the controller since its battery is dead. Dumping keys via GetKey requires FAT32 formatted storage. Dumping discs via ManaGunZ requires NTSC formatted storage (as a proposed method in the guide posted above). You can see how this becomes an absolute circus of constantly inserting/removing devices to keep the dumping process going.

ManaGunZ can dump discs to internal HDD just like multiMAN does but at the same time there is no FTP connection support. Therefore even if I dump a disc to internal HDD via ManaGunZ, I would still need to use multiMAN to transfer the dump to my PC since I use cable connection which is the fastest method.

3. Images' filenames.

One interesting detail of ManaGunZ is how it forces its own filename format on the dumps.
For example, multiMAN would name the above-mentioned After Hours Athletes like this:

After Hours Athletes.ISO

While ManaGunZ would render this filename:

BCES01335_20210710_063641.iso

This could actually be a solution for those users who encounter an outright termination of dumping process in multiMAN when certain Japanese discs are attempted to be dumped. They have either Japanese characters or nothing at all in their file/volume names and that, I guess, confuses multiMAN. ManaGunZ might be able to bypass this.

My resume would be that using ManaGunZ for dumping in its current state is not warranted. The way it handles read errors alone is reason enough. At the same time it might help dumpers who have issues with Japanese discs but imagine that those Japanese discs would have read errors as well, then it's a guessing game of was such disc dumped correctly or not all over again.

[user7]

Good research. Well for now, I've moved the tutorial to the "Discussion" tab of the PS3 dumping page wiki if anyone wants to do more testing.

[rhynec]

1. Huh, I didn't know MGZ had trouble handling read errors. All my discs are in very good condition, so that's probably why I never experienced anything like it. Unfortunately I haven't had the time to contribute any dumps to Redump, so I don't have dumper status and thus can't access the PS3 section to compare hashes with my own dumps (I have seen some PS3 Redump hashes posted elsewhere online, and my dumps hashes do match those, but since they are not exactly official I can't use them for testing). I'll report the problems to the developer on GitHub (or perhaps it would be better if Bigmanjapan did so since he was the one who initially encountered the problem). Thankfully, MGZ is open source and the developer is fairly active (unlike MultiMAN), so any problems we encounter can be fixed.

2. Technically speaking, MGZ already dumps the disc keys to NTFS. BUT, they are embedded in an IRD file or a .disc.key file: https://github.com/Zarh/ManaGunZ/issues/57. Though, since you need the logs from GetKeys to submit your dump to Redump, you can't really stop using GetKeys until it is integrated into MGZ. For FTP, it might be better to use webMAN-MOD since it is being actively developed and can be used even while on XMB (it might be worth adding a section about that for those with damaged USB ports).

3. Pretty cool that MGZ may be able to bypass certain problems with Japanese titles. Let's see if someone is willing to test one of those problematic discs.

4. Tools:

• ManaGunZ Latest: https://github.com/Zarh/ManaGunZ/releases
• GetKeys V2: https://archive.org/download/GetKeyR2Ga … -GameOS.7z