.CHD

📌 A .CHD format entry includes in-game data compressed by lossless CHD (abbreviated from “Compressed Hunks of Data”) method. At the same time, the .CHD extension is tightly supported and opened up by multiple console and arcade emulators. Specifically, it mainly holds a compressed version of the complete contents of a hard disk built-in into an arcade machine or internally compressed gaming data dumped from an ordinary CD-ROM. This category of .CHD compression algorithm serves as one of the essential principles exploited within a retro gaming community. The following mechanics decrease the resulting size of game data dumped from physical storage devices, such as CD-ROMs, cartridges, and arcade game machines.

How to open an .CHD file?

📌 The .CHD file category is splendidly recognized and opened by console and arcade machine emulators, such as RetroArch, MAME, OpenEmu, and others. Although you are given a chance to burn a complete copy of CD for its further usage on the original console, the software emulator provides an opportunity to run the desired game directly on your PC with visually stunning graphics and audio layer playback. It should be strictly noted that .CHD resources are not suggested to be opened at all. All major emulators which are compliant with .CHD-oriented file schema consider you to put the outcome .CHD-based object into a folder which can later be accessed by the emulator to load internal game contents into a .CHD sample, correspondingly.