HOW-TO – Sort your MSX files the TOSEC way

This document aims to serve as a guide to help sort all the different MSX files by having them renamed to TOSEC-compliant filenaming standard and sorted according to system-category-filetype. In short, no more…

LODERUNN.ROM

but…

Lode Runner (1984)(Sony)(JP).rom

in the MSX MSX – Games – [ROM] folder.

When filenames get too cryptic and you hardly know what’s the program inside, TOSEC-filenaming will come in handy to rename files in a more meaningful way plus adding useful info such as publisher, year, country and many different flags available. For further TOSEC naming convention, please visit the TOSEC website.

There’s a number a programs to manage dat files. For ease of use, I’ll stick to easy-peasy RomVault by GordonJ.

It’s self-explaining, but I’ll go into detail:

Steps:

• Needless to say, back up your files before proceeding.
• Go download RomVault. Unzip it. The following folder structure will be created:
  • DATRoot
  • ROMRoot
  • ToSort
• Go download the TOSEC dat (latest release as of now is 2012-02-29. Unzip it.
• Move the MSX dat files into RomVault DATRoot folder. It’s 18 files altogether. Current TOSEC-MSX WIP amounts to 40 dat filesm, though.
• Get every single MSX file you have and place them under RomVault ToSort folder. Mind files must be zipped (.zip) so be prepared to individually zip every .cas .dsk or .rom .cas file into a single .zip
• Run RomVault
• Click on Update DATs –> the .dat file structure will be shown in the left pane.
• Scan ROMs –> zipped files in ToSort will be scanned.
• Click on Find Fixes –> RomVault will check every zipped file in ToSort against the .dat files for a match.
• Click on Fix ROMs –> the magic!

Once Fix ROMs is finished go check the ROMRoot folder for your brand new MSX software collection sorted and renamed in a fully-meaningful way according to the TOSEC naming convention!