CloneCD, an Elaborate Hoax ?
Posted on 16/09/01 22:22 by Dennis                             
CloneCD, an Elaborate Hoax ?

Here's some interesting information regarding the method that CloneCD uses to back-up CD's. It seems CloneCD doesn't really do what it says it does... Here are some interesting parts of the article:


It all starts with the elaborate claims. The author of CloneCD, who goes by the nick Olli, claims that his program is "The perfect CD Replicator" and that it makes "real 1:1 copies of your CDs". In what follows I am going to prove to you that it is completely false. I am going to give you my personal, biased opinion on CloneCD and why I consider it to be an elaborate hoax. Furthermore, I am going to reveal its secrets

"..One strategy that can be used to "copy protect" a program is to make a a CD that contains a bunch of bad sectors at known locations. The programmer codes a few "bad sector checks" into the executable. When a user runs the EXE file, the program tries to read the places where the bad sectors are supposed to be. If the drive does not return errors at the places it should, the program knows that something is wrong, assumes that the user is using an illegal copy and then refuses to run. The reason why the "bad sector" method of copy protection works is because most CD-R devices will not allow the user to write bad sectors.."

"..Below is a snapshot of CloneCD in action. Each line represents a READ CD command. This is the command that is used to return data from the CD. The programmer tells the CD reading device which sector to begin at (LBA), how many sectors of data to return (xl) and then finally what parts of the sector to return.

For all you techies who are interested, S stands for SYNC, UD stands for USER DATA, EE stands for EDC & ECC, EF stands for ERROR FIELDS while SCSB stands for SUBCHANNEL SELECTION BITS. Note how CloneCD does NOT return any subchannel information from each sector.

Look below and let me explain to you what is going on. CloneCD starts at sector 705 and reads 16 sectors at a time asking the drive to return all parts of the sector except for the subchannel. Notice that the reading operation at sector 801 returns an error.

CloneCD then starts back at sector 801 and starts reading a single sector at a time. See how it goes from 801, 802 all the way up to 814 and then it hits an error. What does CloneCD do this time? Nothing. CloneCD just ignores the error and proceeds with the next sector. I don't know about you but would you call ignoring errors a perfect copy? Where is that "special operation" that allows CloneCD to read what no other program can read?


Read the full article including the mentioned snapshots here. Please note that we asked Olli for his comments on this article but he hasn't responded... And please also note that this article wasn't written by me but by the author of FireBurner. The original article was located at www.fireburner.com/editorials/elaboratehoax.htm but the link is now dead... Luckily I saved the file I asked permission if I could upload the article to a different location but I got no response...

Personally I don't really care how CloneCD does it. As long as it gets the job done I'm happy

Source: IgD's CD-R Portal

Reactions
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By Guest, Sun 16 Sep 2001 22:36
Who the hell cares what CloneCD does in the background? The copies made with CloneCD work great and that's what we want. It even can creat a blank CD as long as I put it in the drive and it works. :4
By Zyron, Sun 16 Sep 2001 22:37
Tell me something i don't know. I wandered about the same subject for a long time.
By Guest, Sun 16 Sep 2001 22:40
It would be nice if Olli were to comment on this matter... In the meantime I've set up a little poll in the CloneCD forum. Could be interesting.
By rexroach, Sun 16 Sep 2001 22:44
This article must be at least 18 month old or there was something very similar, I recall
By Guest, Sun 16 Sep 2001 22:47
@rexroach Yes the article is a little old (don't know when it was written, but the file is dated from 28-8-01) but we were waiting on a comment from Olli... We contacted him some weeks ago.
By Ian, Sun 16 Sep 2001 22:59
IgD wrote something very similar awhile back.. this looks just like his rant.. someone probably cut and pasted it up here.
By Dood, Sun 16 Sep 2001 23:05
the only reason i can think of for it being a hoax is if clone was working wit safedisc creators os something similar. in whish case they would time the arrival of new protections very specifially with clones capabilities to always have something missing. anyone any other suggestions?
By Guest, Sun 16 Sep 2001 23:16
I don't really understand the point you're trying to make. When all the information a CD-ROM-drive can get from a sector is "error", than writing a CD that also returns "error" from the same sector is as perfect as I can imagine.
By DoMiN8ToR, Sun 16 Sep 2001 23:30
DoMiN8ToRPlease read the text of this newsposting very good before posting a reaction. This is NOT the opinion of CD Freaks, but the opinion of the author of Fireburner, we could say; "a competitor of CloneCD"
By the111, Sun 16 Sep 2001 23:52
ehem... by the AUTHOR OF FIREBURNER! anyone sense some sort of alterior motive here...
By PerfectPrintout, Mon 17 Sep 2001 00:39
So thiss IS the reason why Clonecd can't create perfect copy's of SD2.
By Domino, Mon 17 Sep 2001 00:42
First of all, this entire thread is a complete waste of time. Why would the creators of CD-Freaks participate in a "He say - She say" high scool rant is beyond me. Bringing this matter to Olli's attention is about as childish as it gets. I mean who gives a damn if it doesn't copy a certain way? CloneCD makes great working copies of all known protected CDs. In fact, no other application comes close to competing with it. Bottom line: If it works and works well, everything else is irrelevant. Secondly, Fireburner is one of the worse burning applications available. Hell, you can use NERO and CloneCD and all your copy needs are met. If you want to make a few coasters, then download a copy of FireBurner. It will make a coaster even if you have Burn-Proof Technology on your drive. The author should be paying us money to use that piece of crap. Lastly, Is it just me or has the quality of news on this site gone down hill?
By Guest, Mon 17 Sep 2001 00:46
Please tell me, in what PRACTICAL sense are the copies made by Clone CD not perfect? Name one instance where you can do something with the original that you can't with the copy. Bottom line, who cares how Clone CD works, it gets the job done better than any other duplicator. Ally
By Guest, Mon 17 Sep 2001 00:54
No, the reason CloneCD doesn't make perfect copies of SD2 is because you are using a drive that can't write bad sectors. CloneCD is the software that arranges the data. If your burner doesn't support the info being sent to it in the proper fashion, then of course it's not going to work. CloneCD is a great peice of software.
By Guest, Mon 17 Sep 2001 05:33
Who cares about how CloneCD works in the background?! As long as my copies work, I am fine with that. Just because the FireBurner sucks ass...
By errorken, Mon 17 Sep 2001 07:41
btw, isnt this hoax being mentioned some time ago allready ? I remember the same hoax posted on cdfreaks... on wich olli posted some replies a couple of days later to explain it so I think its quite normal he doesnt react on it againSmilie
By WeezeR, Mon 17 Sep 2001 07:53
Ya know, every once in a while the freaks come up with some shit. This is another example of it. CloneCD works for me and I will not be swayed easily. Other apps will have to beat CloneCD not just talk shit.
By Guest, Mon 17 Sep 2001 08:04
as the article snip at top says it is a "biased opinion" on clonecd. so obviously things being said will be against clonecd, whether or not clonecd works well. and the fact that the fireburner creator wrote it doesn't help much either. it's like asking a bmw engineer why mercedes sucks and vice versa. i agree with a lot of you, clonecd works, and it works for me. so i have nothing bad to say about it.
By NightHawk, Mon 17 Sep 2001 12:50
This a REALLY OLD article, which is written by the author of the FireBurner program. It seems he wants people to use FireBurner and not Clone puke Anyway this is Oli's reply, taken from CD Media World: I've seen, that you opened a discussion about "CloneCD - An Elaborate Hoax". Just my comments: Of course - CloneCD can't make a "perfect" copy of data it cannot read. That should be obvious. I think it wasn't necessary to prove this :-) In case CloneCD detects a bad sector, it will display an error in the logfile. Well, displaying an error should give the user a hint, that the copy can't be "perfect". If the data can't be read, dummy data is created that can't be read either. If the Original can't be read, and the Copy can't be read - isn't that as a close as "perfect copy" can be? The author talks a lot about read errors. Come on, do SecuROM CDs have read errors? AFAIK CloneCD is the only CD-Duplicating program in the world, that can make a working safety backup of e.g., Revolt (SecuROM) *without* bypassing the copy protection. What has this to do with read errors? Why can CloneCD overburn with Sony and HP Burners, but other programs can't? Does this have anything to do with read errors? The author talks about bypassing copy protections. I want to make it perfectly clear, that CloneCD does not and never has bypassed any copy protection. It does not decrypt, descramble or modify the data it reads in any way. Important: The data it "reads". Read errors are - Errors. The data can't be read. In conclusion, calling CloneCD a hoax and calling me a liar is very bad attitude (and wrong, too), and leaves a foul taste in the mouth, especially from an author of a competing product. I asked the author of the article for a public apology, but he didn't reply. Regards, Oliver Kastl
By Nila, Mon 17 Sep 2001 12:58
Fireburner used to be great because it was a stand alone app that required no installation and was tiny. You just downloaded it and used it instantly to burn any cd image files you wanted. These days however I haven't tried it but it seems to have gotten bigger and now has an installation program, defeating both of it's major strong points.
By Guest, Mon 17 Sep 2001 13:03
This was written by Bob Marietta, Fireburner developer some two years ago! Regardless of how CCD does the trick mr. Marietta's total inability to make a reliable (or at least acceptable) version of his program so far speaks volumes itself...
By NightHawk, Mon 17 Sep 2001 14:52
With old versions of FireBurner you could extract discs to a cue/bin file, ready to be burned. Unfortuantely the author removed this from later releases, meaning that you have to use CDRWin or Blind Read to create the image file. This does not make sense - we are expected to pay for a program which can not even copy discs on its own puke
By Guest, Mon 17 Sep 2001 15:35
I see some people are wondering why this article was posted on CD Freaks: Well the 'hoax' is that CloneCD cliams that it uses special operations to copy a game. This article states it doesn't do anything special. In fact it just replaces error sectors with crappy data. This is no special operation and Olli should make a note of this on his website and shouldn't promote CloneCD as a magical software that can do things no other software can do. Don't get me wrong here: I love CloneCD. Like I said I don't care how it does it, as long as it does it I'm happy. But I do feel, if this article is correct, that claiming things that aren't true should be mentioned. I also see this was an old article: I didn't know this... I get it a few weeks ago and mailed the author of FireBurner about it but got no reply. If this is indeed a really old article there was no need to post it. If Olli just had replied or IgD it wouldn't have been posted.
By defiz, Mon 17 Sep 2001 18:19
hi! CloneCD is best burn soft ever made? I like to know "how many programs and electronics work" so I want to know but I don't care if this is true. this soft works greatly and you can make backup of most copyprotection in cd these days! CLONECD IS BEST! USE IT! Wink
By Guest, Tue 18 Sep 2001 01:23
if it is c--p why does it copy safe disc
By Guest, Tue 18 Sep 2001 03:23
CloneCD does an excellent job at copying disc protection schemes, but as far as I'm concerned, It still doesn't do what it claims. I have yet to see any software create a digitally identical cd copy. Using ECI Disc inspector Pro i can examine the data content and TOC in hex format sector by sector. Not one program I have used that is on the market can copy a disc 100% exact. The last data sector on 90% of the OEM/Manufactured cd's have a disc id written in Mode 0 (packet writing) CloneCD, Fireburner, Adaptec Cd Copier, etc. can't copy the Mode 0 data for some reason, so when I run a disc compare using ECI, the copy always comes out 1-2 sectors short o finformation. I'm not sure if any programs reference that portion of the cd for copy protection,but i have no doubt that some will soon enough.
By InterCepTor, Tue 18 Sep 2001 04:12
I am sorry to say that the so called genious behind the so called ingenious program is complete B.S. No programmer in the world could write a program, which would allow u to make 1:1 copies. We are struggling with Safedisc 2, what next, we r slowly loosing the battle now, nothing good lasts for ever. WE have to rely on unwrappers, and the program that patches the weak sectors. So that is my opinion CLONECD is shite, as why cant it also patch the weak sectors so the game will burn perfectly with every drive. THE TROUBLE IS YOU HAVE ALL YER HEADS STUCK UP OLLIES FAT ASS, AND HE IS CRAPPING ON YOU BIG SYYLE. so if u recon u r the solution ollie, u r a sob ripping honest peeps who have paid for a license. Clone v3.0 looks no different from its early incarnations. You are prob still using the same old copy routines that are out of date, your days are numbered, and unless someone can deliver a kick ass 1:1 working duplicator. ITS THE END FOR US ALL. R.I.P CLONECD AND ITS AUTHOR OLLIE? How do we know this man is the person he claims to be. Game over Ol? your days are over, there are far more talented coders out there that could get a similar program 2 clonecd to actually do 1:1. Look @ the shite vob software bought us, it was suppose to scan the protection and then set the copy mode automatically. Utter B.S it never worked, another claim to ripping peeps off. SO MR OLLIE Y CAN'T YOUR CCD AUTODETECT, AND SET THE COPY MODE AUTOMATTICALLY EH! WHY DO U HAVE 2 REPLY ON 3RD PARTY PROGRAMS TO DO YOUR WORK. THE TRUTH IS U DON'T HAVE A CLUE. :4
By Domino, Tue 18 Sep 2001 05:13
Interceptor, You have to be one of the dumbest people on the internet. CLONECD copies everything (including SafeDisc 2) if you have the right CDRW Drive. How could you talk smack about someone and you don't even have all your facts together? This makes you look like a total jackass and I doubt anyone will take you serious from this point forward. By the way, CDRW drives that can copy EVERYTHING cost $100 or less now. Go pick one up and shut your mouth because it wreaks of horse sh1t.