04 user guide

4. User Guide

The main window has three tabs: Convert to CHD, Verify CHD Files, and Extract CHD Files. A terminal-style log view sits on the right, stat cards and the progress bar at the bottom, and a status bar with the CHDMAN dependency indicator at the very bottom.

Title-bar buttons: About (info dialog), AppData (opens %LocalAppData%\BatchConvertToCHD), Exit.

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4.1 Convert to CHD

Workflow

1. Source Files — select the folder containing images/archives (or pass it as a command-line argument).
2. Output CHD — select the destination folder.
3. Adjust options (below).
4. Review the file list, uncheck anything you don't want, then click Start Conversion.

Options

Option	Effect
Search subfolders (recursive search)	Recursively scans the source folder; the output mirrors the directory hierarchy (relative paths are preserved).
Delete originals after a successful conversion	Removes the source file — and its dependencies (.bin, .sub, etc. for cue sets; .img/.sub for CCD sets) — only after the CHD was produced successfully.
Process smaller files first	Sorts the batch by ascending file size so quick conversions finish first.
Time limit per file (minutes, default 15)	Aborts a single conversion that exceeds the limit; the file is marked failed and the batch continues. The app enforces a hard cap of 4 hours (AppConfig.MaxConversionTimeoutHours).
Force CD / Force DVD	Overrides automatic command detection (createcd / createdvd). The two checkboxes are mutually exclusive.

File list

• Every file matching the supported extensions (see Overview → Supported Formats) is listed pre-selected.
• Select All / Deselect All toggle the whole list.
• The list is loaded in chunks (100 items at background priority) to stay responsive on huge folders.
• When recursive search is on, the File Name column shows the path relative to the source folder.

What happens during conversion

1. Archives (.zip/.7z/.rar) are extracted to a temp directory first (SharpCompress, with a 7za.exe fallback for zip/7z), then each supported file inside is converted. Cue/GDI/TOC entries whose referenced data files are missing are skipped with a warning.
2. .cso is decompressed to a temp ISO (CSOSharp), then converted.
3. .pbp is extracted to CUE/BIN (PBPSharp), then converted. Files without a PlayStation disc image (PSP homebrew, corrupt variants) are skipped with an informational message.
4. .ccd is converted to CUE/BIN (CCDSharp), then converted.
5. Everything else (.cue, .gdi, .toc, .iso, .img, .raw) is handed directly to chdman — after cue normalization when applicable and a dependent-file check.

Each file's chdman command is chosen automatically (see Technical Logic) unless Force CD/DVD is set.

Advanced behaviors you may observe in the log

• "Retrying with createdvd (unrecognized track type)" — a createcd attempt failed because chdman did not recognize the track type; the app automatically retries with createdvd.
• "chdman exited with code N but produced a valid output file" — a non-zero exit that still produced a non-empty output CHD is treated as success.
• "Prepared self-contained cue set ..." — the cue was normalized (BOM, encoding, zero-padding, MP3 tracks) into a work directory before conversion.
• "Falling back to system temp" — the preferred temp drive was not writable; the system temp is used instead.
• "TIMEOUT: Conversion ... exceeded N minute(s). Marking as failed." — the per-file timeout fired.

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4.2 Verify CHD Files

Workflow

1. CHD Files — select the folder containing .chd files.
2. Enable Search subfolders if needed.
3. Optionally enable Move successful to 'Success' folder and/or Move failed to 'Failed' folder.
4. Click Start Verification.

Details

• Verification is fully local: it uses the CHDSharp library (Chd.CheckFile) to check structural integrity and checksums — no chdman process is launched.
• Success lines show the CHD version and SHA-1, e.g. V5 — SHA1: 1f2e3d....
• Moved files land in inputFolder\Success and inputFolder\Failed (created automatically). These folders are excluded from subsequent recursive scans.
• With subfolder search, the relative directory structure is preserved under Success/Failed.
• Moving uses retry-with-backoff so transient locks (antivirus/indexer) don't fail the move; a persistent failure is logged and reported but does not abort the batch.

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4.3 Extract CHD Files

Workflow

1. CHD Files — select the folder containing .chd files.
2. Output Folder — where the extracted files go (structure is preserved when searching subfolders).
3. Choose the output format.
4. Click Start Extraction.

Output format

Choice	Command	Output
Auto (default)	Detected from CHD metadata	.cue, .iso, .gdi, or .img
CD (.cue)	extractcd	.cue + track .bin files
DVD (.iso)	extractdvd	single .iso
GDI (.gdi)	extractcd	.gdi + track .bin files
HDD (.img)	extracthd	single .img

Auto-detection scans the CHD metadata (via CHDSharp): dvd → DVD, gd-rom → CD/GDI, hard disk/hdd → HDD. When the result is a CD and the metadata contains gd-rom, the output extension becomes .gdi instead of .cue.

Notes

• Multi-track (CD/GDI) extraction writes into a _extract_temp_<guid> directory inside the target folder, then moves the files out; on success the temp dir is removed, on failure it is kept and a warning tells you how many files remain.
• Corrupt CHD files fail fast with the CHDSharp error message ("Not a valid CHD file", "Invalid or corrupt data", "Cannot open file", …) and the batch continues.
• Delete original CHD after a successful extraction removes the source CHD only on success.
• Cancellation deletes partially extracted single-file (DVD/HDD) outputs.

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4.4 Global Hotkey — Screenshot (F8)

Pressing F8 anywhere (the hotkey is registered globally via RegisterHotKey) captures the current foreground window and saves it as

%LocalAppData%\BatchConvertToCHD\screenshots\screenshot_yyyy-MM-dd_HH-mm-ss-fff.png

The path is shown in the log ("Screenshot saved: ..."). Capture uses GDI BitBlt; if no foreground window exists, a message is logged instead.

4.5 Status Bar & Stats

• Status bar: current operation message + the CHDMAN dependency indicator (green = available, red = missing).
• Stat cards: TOTAL FILES, SUCCESS, FAILED, ELAPSED, SPEED (disk write/read MB/s, sampled via performance counters while an operation runs).
• Progress bar: per-batch progress with a Cancel button that stops the current operation (cancelling chdman kills the process and cleans up temp files).