N9660 or M33 is causing heavy lagging in particular games in cso format.

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What steps will reproduce the problem?
1. install Pro B9/10 6.20 CFW;
2. start game with N9660 or m33 umd iso driver;
3. games like lumines in cso format will lag horribly when the game switches to 
other music and scenes/levels/stages when you score enough points; not all 
games will have this problem, but music(-based) games are more likely to have 
this kind of problem, probably due to the streaming nature of the game.

What is the expected output? What do you see instead?
Fluid/smooth gameplay when the game switches to other music, levels and/or 
scenes.

What version of the product are you using? On what operating system?
PSP 2000, 88v3 board; CFW 6.20 PRO B9 & B10 fix1. OS: Windows XP SP3 and 
Windows 7 x64.

Please provide any additional information below.
This issue is partially solved by using the "inferno" driver for loading the 
cso, which makes the game much more playable (almost no lags when switching 
music/levels/stages/scenes), though the game (in this case Lumines) is still 
lagging a little bit when the game changes in-game music or 
stages/levels/scenes etc.. 

Original issue reported on code.google.com by cmtan...@gmail.com on 18 Nov 2011 at 11:52

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Have you tried using an ISO instead of a CSO? AFAIK CSO's tend to have longer 
loading times / a little lag because they have to be decompressed on the fly 
compared to the uncompressed ISO files. Some games are more affected by this 
compression than other less demanding games.

I have no point of reference though, I never use CSOs; I always decompress them 
to ISOs before putting them in my PSP. Sure, it takes a little more space, but 
I'd rather have fluid gameplay than a laggy experience.

Original comment by zygi...@gmail.com on 18 Nov 2011 at 4:18

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@ zygi...

Well, I have re-ripped my own UMD lumines game to get an new iso (out-ruling 
that the cso has become corrupted or somthing like that). The new iso does not 
have the horrible lagging (it's really not alittle lag when I use the cso) 
issues I have mentioned earlier when using NP9660 or M33 UMD iso driver. 

But how do you explain that Lumines works so much better with the Inferno UMD 
iso driver, even when the game is in cso format? Although there some slight 
(almost negligible) lags between music/levels/scenes changes when you have 
scored certain score in the game if Inferno driver is enabled. So I think there 
are some issues with the NP9660 and M33 UMD drivers, although many people 
recommend to use the NP9660 umd iso driver since it's supposed to be more 
compatible, e.g. preventing freezes in certain games. I guess I will use the 
Inferno driver 'till I get freezes in certain games.

Original comment by cmtan...@gmail.com on 18 Nov 2011 at 6:38

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It all depends on the optimalisation fo the plugins. I'll make an example to 
compare:
WinZip creates *.zip archives with a moderate level of compression. 7zip does 
the same FASTER or with BETTER compression since it enables you to choose a 
bigger dictionary. Just like archivizers like WinZip, WinRar, 7zip, Uharc, etc. 
have diffirent compression and decompression times - the same goes for iso 
drivers on the PSP.
You could say that Inferno has better performance at the cost of compatibility.
Just like some games work better on SonyNP9660 other games work better on 
Inferno. So far I havent found a game that would require M-33 driver to work or 
perform better than on the other drivers.

Original comment by piotrekhenry on 18 Nov 2011 at 8:30

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CSO are always like that since it is compressed also Loading times are always 
longer since you need to decompress the data before loading it. The extra time 
might be or not humanly noticeable.

Original comment by chronosx...@gmail.com on 19 Nov 2011 at 7:10

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The two posts above explain a lot already, but to add:

As for explaining why Lumines work fast in CSO format using the Inferno driver, 
this is purely speculation on my part but go back to what I said: Some games 
are more affected by compression than other games. There has been issues with 
the GTA Series' Vice City and Liberty City Stories that they become almost 
unplayable when being in  CSO format. As of this time I don't know if they 
fixed that, but it gives an example of what I said.

Some games read data more from the disc (and in this case, the image file) and 
as been said, if it has to, it will, and if the data is compressed, the data 
has to be decompressed before it can be loaded. If the data is small enough the 
performance issues will be negligible, and will be a difference of only 
milliseconds to a couple, during loading screens. But if this data is large, 
and has to be loaded not during a loading screen, performance will take a hit. 
The data that had to be loaded at a specific speed at that time has been 
delayed because it was being decompressed first.

Original comment by zygi...@gmail.com on 20 Nov 2011 at 6:25

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@ Zygi @ examplex @ Piotrekh

Thanks for explaining why it's possible that there's horrible lagging in 
Lumines when using NP9660 or M33 umd iso driver. I have done some other tests 
such as tweaking the cache in the CFW, and the larger cache size doesn't effect 
or reduce the lagging at all. The only solution now to me is really using the 
Inferno umd iso driver, because the lagging in the game is really minimal, 
almost non-existant. I guess it's a decent solution for now, if it's not 
possible to make NP9660 or M33 driver load faster when it comes to cso images. 
I don't know who wrote the NP9660 or m33 drivers, or whether the developement 
of both drivers have been stopped then, but I guess, the only solution is the 
Inferno umd iso driver if the development has been stopped. 

Anyway, thanks!

Original comment by cmtan...@gmail.com on 20 Nov 2011 at 1:51

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Using Inferno is not asolution. Your best option is DEWCOMPRESSING the *.cso 
into a *.iso file. Then whatever ISO driver you will use wont lag at all.

Original comment by piotrekhenry on 20 Nov 2011 at 6:49

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If you insist on using .cso files, try using a higher clock speed when playing 
laggy games. But as ^ says your first and most practical solution is 
decompressing your .cso back to an .iso.

Original comment by zygi...@gmail.com on 21 Nov 2011 at 4:36

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Original comment by piotrekhenry on 23 Jan 2015 at 6:09

• Changed state: Fixed