Dreamcast Is my Dreamcast laser dying?

[KenaiPhoenix]

Hello! Im once again with some issues.

I was playing Half-Life on the dreamcast and realized that I was running into some errors that stopped the game from running. After that, if I restarted the console, it would just never boot. I tried another burned game, Unreal Tournament, it booted perfectly like always but after a while it would just start to get more "stuck" when loading zones, and even breeze the game.

I thought my DC was done for, but if I put my "legit" games one, it loads and works perfect. I let them run for a while and no problem, so I dont really know what to think. At the time of writting this I played Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 and Dead or Alive 2 after HL failed, for more time than the later, and they always booted and worked like always, no error or slow downs.

I was planning on just burning a test game on another CD brand, but my burner decided to die today (not my day regarding optical stuff), so until I find a new one I can just use what I have at hand.

I have seen videos of people opening the DC and gently pressing some part of the reader, but I dont know if it worth the risk. On one side I have the suspicion it can be something with the calibration of the laser, If I put a legit game after it fails to read, and then try to boot the burned one, it help it to boot, tho it fails later.

what do you guys think? should I start searching for a place to let my DC rest forever?

 

[NotReallyHere]

If your Dreamcast still reads your legit, retail games properly, then it is certainly not dying! Please don't feel the need to "repair" it - unless it starts having problems with your legitimate games.

My best advice? Don't tinker with it too much. Yes, you can buy a replacement laser mechanism or watch repair videos online, but... well, as they say, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

There are other factors at play here, too. Certain Dreamcast models (particularly those made in late 2000) have a harder time reading burned games. Burned discs can also fail over time - they do not have the lifespan of legitimate factory-produced game discs. And there's always burner issues to consider, too. If your burner has recently died, it's possible it was starting to fail when it was burning your problematic discs, giving you write-errors along the way.

What software do you use to burn? The old stand-by for Dreamcast games was DiscJuggler, though I prefer - and have success with - IMGburn.

The quality of the disc matters, as well. I use specific discs for certain consoles, and my Dreamcast prefers a thicker, heavier disc made by Maxell, called "MaxData." They have an opaque silver layer, which you can not "see through" like most "budget" discs made by other companies, such as Verbatim. Sony used to put out a quality, thicker disc made for music, but I'm not sure if they're still in production.

TL;DR - Start with a new burner, and the best-quality discs you can afford. Best of luck to you

 

[Boog111]

Have you cleaned the lens. Mine wasn't working and found out the lens was incredibly dirty. Cleaned it and problem solved.
Also, I've noticed with my DC games I've burned that the burning hardware you use can affect how well it plays. I have an old Windows XP laptop that I use and get the best results with. Same .cdi files and same burning software but it does better than any other computer I have. It's the only reason I still have it.

 

[Nebulon_Galaxy]

Personally i would have bought a MODE and forget the disc drive, its a ticking timebomb at this point.

 

[JellyjamLu]

hm, for a while before i was on PC i would burn DC games also, I found in most cases the burn was successful but yes rarely every now and then I would get a dud fail to boot disc despite a successful imgburn.

There's talk of using burned discs on real hardware degrading the laser but there is no real proof of this, more of a myth or scare tactic to pirates.

if your legit dreamcast discs are starting to not boot, its probably the laser through natural expiration but if they are 100% booting every time, yeah its the CDI's.

If your not using them already I recommend Verbatim brand.

 

[Mr. SyS]

ODE. You can play GDI rips with these and I heard they're "pure" dumps of much higher quality than the CDIs which are cut and compressed to fit on CDs.

 

[KenaiPhoenix]

I dont want to ditch the reader, I mean at that point I can just emulate the whole thing and call it a day.

What software do you use to burn? The old stand-by for Dreamcast games was DiscJuggler, though I prefer - and have success with - IMGburn.

I was using ImgBurn

The weird thing is that until like a couple of days ago it was running perfectly, I really dont know what happened.

Have you cleaned the lens. Mine wasn't working and found out the lens was incredibly dirty. Cleaned it and problem solved.

I clean it an it is still having issues. Is like it lost force or something... \

But on retail games it works like new, no issues at all. So I really dont understand this DC, it has give me just a lot of problems lately.

 

[Goshikk]

Nowadays if your DC fails (or any console really) you can just replace the optical drive with flash storage and forget about it

So even if your laser dies, don't worry too much

 

[Bootyfan]

I agree with just going ode but in the meantime, turn your console upside-down when you encounter problems reading discs.

The Dreamcast laser is at least 3x weaker than that of a psx.

 

[Goshikk]

The Dreamcast laser is at least 3x weaker than that of a psx.

Source?
This seems made up

Maybe the later VA1 and VA2 consoles have weak lasers but VA0 consoles will probably outlive us all

 

[Ezri_Muldoon]

All Dreamcast struggle to read CD-R's, however Half-Life Beta has several issues, from the memory leak VMU Save file to the atrocious loading times.
Knowing the Goldscr engine, odds are the disc drive faltered, skipped a line of data and that caused the game to crash

I would highly encourage you to replace the GD-Rom reader with a GD-EMU SD Card reader.
You can get a knock odd from Ali-Express for $30 and that will work (Mine is a knock off, going 5 years strong now) the only limitation that disc swap intensive games don't work, so D-2 is a no-go.

It has a button for disc swapping between the iso files but for the live of me I've never got it to work. You hold it for too long it goes back to the GD Menu where you select roms/ISO's.

It seriously improves loading times for Half-Life, and the various mods that received Dreamcast ports:
Half Life Blue Shift Expansion
Half-Life - DCRES
Half-Life - MUDS
Half-Life - Xanadu
Half-Life 007 Golden Eye Demo
Half-Life Black OPS - Black Operations R1
Half-Life Grunt Final
Half-Life Counter Strike Condition Zero Beta v.0.1
Half-Life Opposing Force (comes with extra games as well noted below but keyboard is needed to access them)
Half-Life ParanoiaDC B2
Half-Life U.S.S. Darkstar
HaloDC Revamped v1.1 (This is actually a quake mod running through Gold scr)
They Hunger Trilogy

The following require a keyboard to access:
Assault on Roswell
Project Xeno 1 e 2
Mission Failed
Mission no Mercy
Peace Like Us,
Adam
Etc 1 e 2
The Challenger Deep
Chaos Theory
Timeline
Gut Reaction
Opposing Force

If you want to jump more into Half-Life Dreamcast a GD-EMU is lowkey essential

 

[KenaiPhoenix]

The Dreamcast laser is at least 3x weaker than that of a psx.

Yeah, I think I can confirm.. my PSX is still reading games like it was brand new, and probably all of them are burned ones (I lost the few legit games I owned)

So even if your laser dies, don't worry too much

I would highly encourage you to replace the GD-Rom reader with a GD-EMU SD Card reader.

Yeah, well like before, if Im just going to just put some files in the SD card, I might as well just load an emulator with en USB adapter.

It might be unpopular opinion but I just prefer to keep the original as I can... even tho it might not be for long

All Dreamcast struggle to read CD-R's, however Half-Life Beta has several issues, from the memory leak VMU Save file to the atrocious loading times.

Im suspecting that it is actually the whole loading of the files of HL the issue, I havent tested yet, but it might tbe the constant loading stuff that warms the laser too much. Next weekend I will give other burned games a try and see if they have some better luck.

I agree with just going ode but in the meantime, turn your console upside-down when you encounter problems reading discs.

Wait... really? Wow... I dont know if it worth the risk (i give it a 80% of chances of falling to the ground)

 

[Goshikk]

It might be unpopular opinion but I just prefer to keep the original as I can... even tho it might not be for long

All that is conditioned decays
It is the nature of reality
But many find enjoyment in trying to prolong the inevitable. Can be a hobby

 

[Blamhammer]

What brand of discs are you using? I’ve always been a fan of Taiyo Yuden discs, not had much problems with them.

 

[KenaiPhoenix]

What brand of discs are you using? I’ve always been a fan of Taiyo Yuden discs, not had much problems with them.

Im using Sony CD-R because it was the one that actually worked better... I think.

Long story short: I got some Verbatim but the games I burned there didnt work, while my old Sony ones did worked. I later find out that those images where bad.

Now I have many Verbatim but my burner decided to died so until I get a new one I can get a DC game on another brand of CD, and my PC burner was the only one on my house.