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celticdesign
Registered: Oct 2005
Posts: 149 |
packer/cruncher reviews
hi,
are there any crack/cruncher reviews or comparings around?
i meanm what was the best packer around?
i often use the 1001 cardcruncher v4 for fast and good results. what do YOU think was or is the best on the 64?
cheers
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Mason
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 461 |
heh this is like religion... some like one packer or cruncher for some reasons and the rest got other reasons why they like a specific packer or cruncher most. |
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chatGPZ
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 11386 |
some of the matcham and the oneway crunchers contain test results.... the notes on the original release discs that is :)
besides that, pucrunch and exomizer are pretty much the way to go these days :=P
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Tch
Account closed
Registered: Sep 2004
Posts: 512 |
I mostly used Cruel,it always had the shortest results.
But it could fuck up and then I used Time-cruncher.
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QuasaR
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 145 |
This is the way to go with a REU: Byte Boiler 256k V1.0 (hmm... somebody should upload the Ninja version with Flash8&SuperCPU support...) Before that I used AB-cruncher together with Beastlinker. |
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tlr
Registered: Sep 2003
Posts: 1790 |
Quote: heh this is like religion... some like one packer or cruncher for some reasons and the rest got other reasons why they like a specific packer or cruncher most.
Absolutely! :)
Compactor/Linker V4/H was a popular choice by many people for a long time!
I used that one a lot, followed by Equal sequence packing with Maxshort V5.2, and the finally bit-packed with Bittos V4.0.
The Final Super-Compressor got a fair amount of use aswell, all in one program, how convenient! :)
Later I coded my own equal-char-packer Packer I, which isn't all that good, but atleast it handles $0800-$ffff. Everybody's got to have their own equal-char-packer. ;)
This was usually finished off with Matcham Time Cruncher V3.1. This cruncher was amazing at the time because it only took a couple of hours to crunch your program, and it resulted in very short files.
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HCL
Registered: Feb 2003
Posts: 728 |
Ok, i'm in. I'm always using my own ByteBoozer, because it's my own, good enough, fast decrunch and yumyum :). |
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hollowman
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 474 |
when i'm in doubt, i read this article http://sidchip.ath.cx/~hollowman/packers.txt |
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HCL
Registered: Feb 2003
Posts: 728 |
@Hman: Excellent ;D. |
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Mason
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 461 |
Quote: when i'm in doubt, i read this article http://sidchip.ath.cx/~hollowman/packers.txt
heh thats funny... even more fun that when he mentions the tape loader in Puffys Saga |
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Wanderer
Account closed
Registered: Apr 2003
Posts: 478 |
Actual 64 linking... ECA Linker. For a linker written back in the early 1980's it works splendidly. I have never been able to find another linker that works properly.
For emulator linking, Exomizer of course.
For crunching, I was always in favour of the one that said "EXPLODING #" as it decrunched. If I had something that was crucial to crunch (eg. crunch a demo to allow just one more page to fit onto it) I might use Time Cruncher and let it work overnight.
For emulator use, PUCRUNCH for sure!!!
Again, as previously posted, it's like religion.
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Oswald
Registered: Apr 2002
Posts: 5094 |
just a little sidenote, pucrunch is quite slow at decrunching. |
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iopop
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 317 |
pucrunch is quite fast, atleast faster than Cruncher AB/Byteboiler, when using the ffast flag. You'll loose some 100 bytes but you earn 20 sec in decrunch time.. |
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WVL
Registered: Mar 2002
Posts: 902 |
Quote: Actual 64 linking... ECA Linker. For a linker written back in the early 1980's it works splendidly. I have never been able to find another linker that works properly.
For emulator linking, Exomizer of course.
For crunching, I was always in favour of the one that said "EXPLODING #" as it decrunched. If I had something that was crucial to crunch (eg. crunch a demo to allow just one more page to fit onto it) I might use Time Cruncher and let it work overnight.
For emulator use, PUCRUNCH for sure!!!
Again, as previously posted, it's like religion.
the one with 'exploding' is the cruncher by Faces, which i used a lot..
Exploding Faces Cruncher
While coding, i try to use PuCrunch now, as crunching with PuCrunch just takes a couple of milliseconds on my pc.. The new Exomizer2 also looks nice, compression is better, but compression time is a lot longer. |
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Mason
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 461 |
I reckon the faces one came out in the 90s - there was another using exploding.... in the 80s. |
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Burglar
Registered: Dec 2004
Posts: 1101 |
things progressed over the years, but...
first compactor 4h
cardcruncher (I actually placed an ad in a mag to get it)
afl packer (dont remember the exact name, it was slow, but easily beat cardcruncher)
cruelcruncher
time cruncher (for good speed)
crosslinker (by xakk)
and then oneway came.
beastlinker
The AB Cruncher (I actually made a levelpacker out of that, used in quite a few games)
Level AB 2.0 (I always wondered if they named it 2.0 because I made a level ab first;)
Byteboiler
basicly oneway ruled with their REU enhanced packers, amazing speed. I would still use it if I did anything :P
I actually used a lot more (everyone used levelsqueezer at some point in time, so did I) but too many to remember.
Burglar |
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Rough
Account closed
Registered: Feb 2002
Posts: 1829 |
does anyone have experience using exomizer as levelpacker (excludes decruncher)? and which fast load routine works fine with it? |
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Krill
Registered: Apr 2002
Posts: 2980 |
I'll add exomizer support to my irq demo loader as soon as 2.0 final is out, because i need forward depacking.. I'll also officially release it online some day, but for now, anybody interested can get it by mail. :D |
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shazz
Account closed
Registered: May 2007
Posts: 9 |
hello,
I've got a PRG which is packed by a cruncher which writes on screen "Exploding #210" then # decreases, is it a known packer (Exploding Faces Cruncher ?) and how can I depack it ?
thx
------------------------------
Shazz/TRSI^MJJ Prod
http://www.trsi.de/users/shazz |
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tlr
Registered: Sep 2003
Posts: 1790 |
Quote: hello,
I've got a PRG which is packed by a cruncher which writes on screen "Exploding #210" then # decreases, is it a known packer (Exploding Faces Cruncher ?) and how can I depack it ?
thx
------------------------------
Shazz/TRSI^MJJ Prod
http://www.trsi.de/users/shazz
The classic "Exploding #xxx" cruncher is Bitimploder V2.0.
Depacking is as always done by patching the final jump in the decruncher using a monitor. Replacing the jump with clv; bvc <self> is my favorite.
Finding the end address can be a bit tricky for some decrunchers. |
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Richard
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 621 |
There's also this: Exploding Cruel Cruncher V2.6
It uses yellow Exploding #xxx text :) |
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shazz
Account closed
Registered: May 2007
Posts: 9 |
Quote: The classic "Exploding #xxx" cruncher is Bitimploder V2.0.
Depacking is as always done by patching the final jump in the decruncher using a monitor. Replacing the jump with clv; bvc <self> is my favorite.
Finding the end address can be a bit tricky for some decrunchers.
Thanks TLR, that's to patch Speedball/Cosmos for the DTV...
I'll send you an email about the decrunch method ;-)
Richard, looks that Bit Imploder used for Speedball... |
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tlr
Registered: Sep 2003
Posts: 1790 |
Actually the bit imploder decruncher is different from most other decrunchers in that it is fairly obfuscated.
A quite fun exersize actually. :)
Which PET coded it? |
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Richard
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 621 |
I used to have various tool collections bought from PD libraries. One of which was the Cabana User Tool Disk. This collection had the Bit Imploder included in the Crunchers category. I even used it in the past on some of my old stuff, before I even go into coding games. Well, I did not know much about m/c, except for the $080D jump address (I always frozen my work with Action Replay cartridge). Unfortunately for me, the filesize of my old SEUCK/enhanced BASIC/Demo demon stuff were the main problem :(
Anyway it was handy for me at the time. :)
One cruncher I had always used during the late nineties was the Fast Cruel V2.5 and the Matcham Time Cruncher V3.1 (Noisy version)
;) |
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Rough
Account closed
Registered: Feb 2002
Posts: 1829 |
Zizyphus was THE MAN whose stuff was most useful (AB Crunch, Zipper etc.), the best pre-packer was XTC by Rockstar thou.
Nowadays it' simply Exomizer I use, better than PUCrunch in result. |
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Richard
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 621 |
If intro-linking or linking other files to your progs. It is usually best to use Lightimizer/Visiomizer to pack the game/demo or whatever. Then pack the program to link the game with the same packer (As it is very reliable compared to other packers, that make things more unstable) then crunch with a cruncher like Exomizer (If this prog is the last one). That is how to get a brilliant result packing stuff :) I done exactly that with Racked Off (With my new TND intro, linked to the game). :D
Method:
Racked Off game packed (Lightimizer V6.3).
Racked Off game intro with game linked together (Lightimizer V6.3 then Exomizer)
I will do exactly the same with any other game I write, which I want to link my new TND intro to :) |
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MorGorr
Account closed
Registered: May 2002
Posts: 47 |
Is there any decent article about how exactly crunchers work? I mean apart from Richard's? ;-) |
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Rough
Account closed
Registered: Feb 2002
Posts: 1829 |
there are plenty online e.g.
ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/compression-faq/
or mess with google... |
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MorGorr
Account closed
Registered: May 2002
Posts: 47 |
http://www.codebase64.com/doku.php?id=magazines:chacking16
This one is nice. |
