Computer oppo help

[MybirdIStheword]

Making a long story short, I'm building a retro gaming/emulator console out of one of those new, tiny lenovo boxes. I have a few dvds full of old, cracked pc games I used to play. Some of compressed using a dead .ace format. Issue being: there is downloadable software called peazip that has an .ace plugin . the .ace plugin has very clear label that it is NOT RECCOMENDED as the software hasnt been updated since 2006 and is riddled with vulnerabilities. Given that these are ancient, pirated games.... Other than that, there are free online conversion tools that can convert .ace to a more familiar format like 7 zip. Are these trustworthy? What should I do here oppo?

Edit :Your payment will be a how to writeup

[trivet]

@mybirdistheword
Given that they are all old, the games themselves may be available free or very cheap.

I use Good Old Games and Steam for my fix of old PC games - I tried a few times to build an 'older' specs PC to play my old games but always had issues with drivers, and finding old drivers or files needed was impossible. Of course, this was several years ago so the situation may have improved.

Using Steam let me play Tie Fighter again with no issues - so I never looked back.

[MybirdIStheword]

@trivet said in Computer oppo help:

@mybirdistheword
Given that they are all old, the games themselves may be available free or very cheap.

I use Good Old Games and Steam for my fix of old PC games - I tried a few times to build an 'older' specs PC to play my old games but always had issues with drivers, and finding old drivers or files needed was impossible. Of course, this was several years ago so the situation may have improved.

Using Steam let me play Tie Fighter again with no issues - so I never looked back.

I'm trying to build this rather... Solid state. Don't want to be hooked in and updating or online required. I will turn to gog if necessary for some of these but i want the whole thing to be accessible with an xbox controller like a game console.

[RallyDarkstrike]

@MybirdIStheword Why not just download WinACE to extract them temporarily?

[facw]

@mybirdistheword

I haven't actually ever heard of PeaZip. WinRAR used to support ace files, but they removed it after a serious security flaw was found:
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/02/nasty-code-execution-bug-in-winrar-threatened-millions-of-users-for-14-years/
Other zip tools using the same DLL are also vulnerable, so be careful.

Also, I get why you'd want to be offline, but Steam's Big Picture mode does sound like the launcher interface you need (unless you have something else in mind?), even if you are only using it to launch third-party apps.

[trivet]

@mybirdistheword said in Computer oppo help:

@trivet said in Computer oppo help:

@mybirdistheword
Given that they are all old, the games themselves may be available free or very cheap.

I use Good Old Games and Steam for my fix of old PC games - I tried a few times to build an 'older' specs PC to play my old games but always had issues with drivers, and finding old drivers or files needed was impossible. Of course, this was several years ago so the situation may have improved.

Using Steam let me play Tie Fighter again with no issues - so I never looked back.

I'm trying to build this rather... Solid state. Don't want to be hooked in and updating or online required. I will turn to gog if necessary for some of these but i want the whole thing to be accessible with an xbox controller like a game console.

Ah, I see. I love that idea. Wish I could help more, but I caved and went with GOG and Steam.

[MybirdIStheword]

@rallydarkstrike said in Computer oppo help:

@MybirdIStheword Why not just download WinACE to extract them temporarily?

Idk, wouldnt that have the same vulnerability? The ace plugin is a windows file for some damn reason

[MybirdIStheword]

@facw said in Computer oppo help:

@mybirdistheword

I haven't actually ever heard of PeaZip. WinRAR used to support ace files, but they removed it after a serious security flaw was found:
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/02/nasty-code-execution-bug-in-winrar-threatened-millions-of-users-for-14-years/
Other zip tools using the same DLL are also vulnerable, so be careful.

Also, I get why you'd want to be offline, but Steam's Big Picture mode does sound like the launcher interface you need (unless you have something else in mind?), even if you are only using it to launch third-party apps.

I'm using a cool frontend called launchbox/bigbox that does everything and is totally worth the spend. I still wonder if those file convesion websites are legit or not as I wouldnt even need to install anything

[RallyDarkstrike]

@mybirdistheword ACE is just a format like 'zip' or 'rar'

If all you're doing is installing it to extract archives you'd used once in the past for these games and know those archives are likely safe, and then just uninstalling the program again, I don't see what trouble it would cause?