Games which will really test my laser?

[roses]

Which games read close to the edge so I can test the quality of my burns/laser?

Thanks

[pr0ton]

Or make a backup from a backup and do a MD5 check?

[Aressi]

try eternal darkness

[megalomaniac]

transcode a movie...a long movie like Godfather or Casino...
use low settings like 640x330 and 2.0 stereo, and let it transcode to any quality to fit exact GC iso size...

you dont need to have great quality...your just testing...
use media player ce to go to the last chapter and see that it finishes correctly

[julius]

transcode a movie...a long movie like Godfather or Casino...
use low settings like 640x330 and 2.0 stereo, and let it transcode to any quality to fit exact GC iso size...

you dont need to have great quality...your just testing...
use media player ce to go to the last chapter and see that it finishes correctly

With media player ce do you refer to extrems mplayer? I thought it did not allow you to play media from dvd. Maybe you meant GC-Linux MFE player for gamecube.

[megalomaniac]

good point...


for mfe player make sure to use mpeg2 since it does not support avc

[roses]

Thanks, that whole transcoding thing sounds like a bit of hoo haa to go through as I don't have an SD setup.

I may burn a copy of Eternal Darkness and give it a try as I just want to satisfy my curiosity and see why I've got some games burnt 3 times on different media with cryptic symbols on the discs that I can't quite comprehend yet all seem to play fine. I distinctly remember there was an important reason for me doing this but it was many many moons ago now.

Cracked it open today to give it a once over with compressed air to clean out all of the fans and suchlike and checked the pot which came back at 193 Ohms which is none too shabby.

[emu_kidid]

If you really want to test the laser out for sync/focus/tracking, try out an Audio Streaming game which has the files positioned badly. PAL Star Fox Adventures comes to mind as it will cache/seek/thrash between streaming audio and cutscenes at times.

[roses]

If you really want to test the laser out for sync/focus/tracking, try out an Audio Streaming game which has the files positioned badly. PAL Star Fox Adventures comes to mind as it will cache/seek/thrash between streaming audio and cutscenes at times.

Perfect, that's exactly what I was looking for.

I want to find a troublesome game and burn it using both of my writers and see if there is a difference (or need) to keep my old NEC burner around these days.

[kel01]

It's the NEC chipset that makes the difference. I upgraded a bit too far on the pioneer drives to the point where they stopped using the NEC chipset and I noticed the difference. I ended up packing the new drive away and going back to my trusted pioneer 216 which was the last pioneer to use the NEC chipset If I remember correctly.

To be fair though I wasn't burning GameCube ISOs when I noticed the difference, I was burning dual layer discs. So your results may be different.

[roses]

@kel01 I think you may be right about the NEC chipset. I just burnt Starfox Adventures as @emu_kidid recommend and he's correct.

The burn that I did on my NEC plays perfectly with minimum noise from the drive whereas the other copy (burnt on a standard Matshita drive) seems to make the GC labour a heck of a lot more. It also turns out that the lightning track on Wipeout GX is stored near the edge as my NEC copy played through fine but the alternate one I tried DRE'd at exactly that point.

Interesting experiment, why would standard burns be fine all through the disk and only cause errors near the edge? Is there some kind of logic or reasoning behind this as I was playing the Cube with the top off and could see on my alt burns the laser would struggle on the outer edge (was perfectly fine with my NEC burns).

Looks like I'll be keeping my old burner around for archiving important stuff as there is a definite difference in burn quality even when using the same system (XP), software (ImgBurn) and media (mini G04). Who wouldve thunk it?

[emu_kidid]

I've come across what you're talking about too. Try different burn speeds and you'd be suprised.

Also, to test the media and not the burnt data necessarily, try Mario Tennis, start a match and leave it paused for a good 30 minutes. The laser won't try to read any data during that time, but you will hear it lose sync and on a subsequent read it might throw a disc read error. Use the NTSC Mario Tennis as that has positioned the files near the edge of the disc as I recall.

[MockyLock]

You sound for me as executioners...

[roses]

I've come across what you're talking about too. Try different burn speeds and you'd be suprised.

Also, to test the media and not the burnt data necessarily, try Mario Tennis, start a match and leave it paused for a good 30 minutes. The laser won't try to read any data during that time, but you will hear it lose sync and on a subsequent read it might throw a disc read error. Use the NTSC Mario Tennis as that has positioned the files near the edge of the disc as I recall.

It just so happens that I burnt a copy of that as well the other day as I'd never played it before (loved golf though). Will try the pause experiment and report back on how it goes.

Sometimes I wish the Cube didn't have such a small library of really good titles as now that I've dug it out of retirement it appears that I've completed every single game I could have wished to on the machine. All that's left is to replay old gems or step the quality down a notch and play stuff that isn't as good

[roses]

Tried your theory out with Mario Tennis and the game resumed fine. On a related note, what a boring game it is - personally I don't feel its a patch on Super Tennis on the old SNES and the difficulty level seems quite tame. Probably totally different if you were to play it with friends but as a solo sport it left much to be desired.

[BenoitRen]

Sometimes I wish the Cube didn't have such a small library of really good titles as now that I've dug it out of retirement it appears that I've completed every single game I could have wished to on the machine. All that's left is to replay old gems or step the quality down a notch and play stuff that isn't as good

15-20 games isn't enough for you? I realise everyone has different tastes and that 'really good' is subjective, but still...

[roses]

Sometimes I wish the Cube didn't have such a small library of really good titles as now that I've dug it out of retirement it appears that I've completed every single game I could have wished to on the machine. All that's left is to replay old gems or step the quality down a notch and play stuff that isn't as good

15-20 games isn't enough for you? I realise everyone has different tastes and that 'really good' is subjective, but still...

Indeed but playing a game for the 2nd or 3rd time just doesnt give you the same buzz as the first time round and its only upon breaking out the Cube again that I realized the reason why I put it away in the first place was exactly that reason. For example I breezed through every one of the Mario Sunshine secret stages last night and they were controller twistingly frustrating on the first play through.