Can't copy files in *.dat form VCD

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> Curiously within Linux,these files cannot be copied off CD.But,once in
> Windows,you can copy them and store them.Both Xine and Mplayer play them
> now once they are stored like this. And that's how VCDs are kept on the
> harddisk by all my friends here.
>
> This is curious. Could anybody shed more light?

This discussion has been had before. A .DAT file on a VCD is not simply a renamed MPG file, but very similar.

The VCD format has less check summing bits on the CD than a standard data CD, as an error on the disk is less likely to cause serious problems, and you can actually fit more data on a VCD than a regular one. Not significant amounts, but a little more.

If you're going to store .DAT files on your hard drive like that to play them, you're wasting space. I suggest stripping the extra overhead of the DAT and leave yourself with an mpeg instead.

Search google on how to do it. I've done it before - there's not much to it.

Can't copy files in *.dat form VCD

> If you're going to store .DAT files on your hard drive like that to play
> them, you're wasting space. I suggest stripping the extra overhead of
> the DAT and leave yourself with an mpeg instead.

Well, I dont' know about stripping out the dat to get a mpg but I do know how to copy/rip out the DAT files.

You need the CDFS package. (google)

Mount a cdrom with something like

mount -t cdfs -o ro /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdfs

ISO images will show up as "sessions1_?.iso" or "session-?.iso", HFS images as "apple.hfs", boot images as "boot.image", VideoCD tracks as "videocd-?.mpeg" and audio tracks as "track-?.wav". ISO, HFS and boot images can be mounted loopback.

You can specify the uid, gid and mode that should be used for the files. E.g

mount -t cdfs -o ro,uid=0,mode=600 /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdfs