Need to know if my DC is compatible

[naplex]

I've tried everything, from Selfboot to Dreamboot, from Alcohol 120% to Nero. I follow every tutorial on the site and it just comes up with the DC menu, and I'm beggining to think that my DC isn't compatible. I've looked on my DC but I can't find the date when it was made (mine is a PAL-E console).

Any help on this, or where to find the date would be great!

[DCDayDreamer]

I've yet to find a PAL DC that didn't work with CDR's (you are using CDR? don't use CDRW because they won't work), it might be a burner/software problem. Someone had a similar problem and posted at DCEmu here:

http://www.dcemu.co.uk/cgi-bin/yabb/YaB ... 1090882502

There's lots of help topics on this board too but you might have to wade through a lot of posts, be patient and I'm sure you'll find a solution to your problem.

Good luck.

[Omegasis]

I hear time ago in the EGM Magazine that the last Dreamcasts produced by Sega don't have support for play CDR dics. They made this for stop the piracy of his games. I don't know if this is true.

See ya.

[burnerO]

I've tried everything, from Selfboot to Dreamboot, from Alcohol 120% to Nero. I follow every tutorial on the site and it just comes up with the DC menu, and I'm beggining to think that my DC isn't compatible. I've looked on my DC but I can't find the date when it was made (mine is a PAL-E console).

Afaik there aren't any incompatible PAL systems.

[Quzar]

It could simply be broken. Can it play music CDs?

[naplex]

Thanks, I'm searching through that topic now.
Oh, I was asking how you check if a Europe Dreamcast is compatible with a CD-R.

[burnerO]

Thanks, I'm searching through that topic now.
Oh, I was asking how you check if a Europe Dreamcast is compatible with a CD-R.

I haven't heard of any accounts of PAL Dreamcasts not.

Are retail games working?

[Omegasis]

If you want to know if your Dreamcast can read CDR Discs, make a CD music with Nero or Ease CD Creator. Don't use original music CDs because those have a different structure that the CDRs. If your dreamcast play the CD music in the CDR then the problem is another thing.

When you put the games that you created in your dreamcast you get a black screen or your dreamcast show the music menu?

[Rand Linden]

All DCs can play Music CDRs without problem -- they have the SAME "structure" as a pressed Music CD.

Homebrew and other SOFTWARE doesn't, however.

Rand.

[curt_grymala]

All DCs can play Music CDRs without problem -- they have the SAME "structure" as a pressed Music CD.

Rand - it may very well be that a DC will boot music CD-R's in the same way that it would boot a pressed disc (I have no way of testing this, but I know you're an expert on these things, so I'll go with it), but I disagree when you say that they are the same.
If that were the case, then my DVD player would play music CD-R's. It plays pressed music discs without any trouble at all, but always tells me that there's no disc in the player when I throw a burned disc in there.

[BlackAura]

I think that's more to do with the physical properties of the disc than the logical structure of the disc.

[farrell2k]

Your dvd player can have he ability to check to see if a disc is a cdr.

[Omegasis]

All DCs can play Music CDRs without problem -- they have the SAME "structure" as a pressed Music CD.

Then Why my Xbox can play pressed music discs and not CDR music discs?
The burn in both cases are different. I say "structure" because is the same thing. And you are the bleemcast creator? o_O

[Quzar]

All DCs can play Music CDRs without problem -- they have the SAME "structure" as a pressed Music CD.

Homebrew and other SOFTWARE doesn't, however.

Rand.

when i asked him if it could play them, it was because after time and wear, a lot of DC's lasers' frequencies shift and they are only capable of Playing GD-roms or only capable of playing CDs. I know that all DCs are SUPPOSED to play music CDRs, it is just common for them to get to a state where they cant anymore.

[Rand Linden]

...but I disagree when you say that they are the same.

I never said they were the same -- I said that the "structure" is the same -- which it is.

There's many differences between a CDR and a pressed disc, obviously -- but the organizational data formats are the same... or at least they're supposed to be!

Blackaura understood what I was saying, but that's probably because he has more technical background.

The short summary is this: It *should* work.

A properly burned CDR that meets all the specs is hard to generate -- and most CD burning software packages do NOT conform to the required specs -- for a recent example, look no further than issues that arose with the goatstore's discs.

As for your DVD, it *should* work if the disc is recorded properly -- unless the DVD player is specifically designed to NOT allow CDRs.

Make sure you close the session and burn in the correct mode, and at a low speed -- it's been a while since I've had to muck around with the lowlevel disc stuff, but I really can't see a good reason that it wouldn't work.

As for the DC not working with any particular flavour of media, chances are good that it simply needs to be serviced -- as mentioned a few times here (and a while back), the physical CD unit gets out of alignment and can cause all sorts of problems reading discs.

I've never heard it having to do with the "frequency", but rather the sled and assembly becoming slightly out of spec, which prevents accurate positioning of the drive head.

Rand.

[Quzar]

I've never heard it having to do with the "frequency", but rather the sled and assembly becoming slightly out of spec, which prevents accurate positioning of the drive head.

well the fix i have seen for this problem (that i have used successfully) involves adjusint the laser's pot, so i assumed it had something to do with the laser not having enough or having too much power. Its possible that frequency isnt the proper term for it though.

[WRAGGSTER]

better just to buy a new freakin laser than fuck it up entirely

[Rand Linden]

quzar,

Typically that pot requires very precise equipment to measure levels and then exceedingly tiny adjustments to adjust the power level correctly.

It's just as likely that in the process of opening the DC and dismantling it, you bumped and/or cleaned whatever was dirty or misaligned without even knowing it -- usually a slight nudge to the sled will fix most problems, and for many others, just cleaning the lens does it... which is exactly what worked perfectly on *many* DCs here over a long period of time.

I won't say it's not possible that whatever you think you did by adjusting that pot ended up fixing things -- it just doesn't seem very likely... and is certainly not recommended, especially because it depends on the model, build and all sorts of other factors...

... which is why pretty much everyone that I've ever known and/or heard about who has tried to adjust that pot, usually ends up posting on some MsgBoard asking how they can repair their DC afterwards.

In the end, whatever works for you, that's all that really matters.

Rand.

[hrb2k3]

i adjust the pot from time to time to read cdrw's and one time my DC just didn't read any discs. turns out the little ribbon that connects the GD to its control board was loose. so i pushed it back in and it was fine for a while.

then my DC had probs again. turns out the ribbon had a little tear. good thing i had a broken DC to get another ribbon.

so all in all, if you open your DC, be very... very careful.

[crazyrom]

All DCs can play Music CDRs without problem -- they have the SAME "structure" as a pressed Music CD.

Then Why my Xbox can play pressed music discs and not CDR music discs?
The burn in both cases are different. I say "structure" because is the same thing. And you are the bleemcast creator? o_O

My xbox can read cdr's