/vr/ - Retro Games

>>5279985
Cartridge master race.

I had to replace my first PSX after a few years because it would only read games while upside-down anymore. The one I got after that and my Saturn still work fine.

>>5279985
I have picked up several PSX and PS2's at the goodwill. Disc drive is the most common problem. Anything that has moving parts will experience wear. Still, PSX and PS2 are a dime a dozen and with freemcboot you dont even need one with a working disc drive.

>>5279985
Bought an SCPH-7501 PS1 on eBay a few months back, works fine

I got my first Dreamcast from a local store and it only took two months for it to kick it. Tried to revive it with the laser pot trick but didn’t get much extra mileage out of it.
My new one is still doing okay but honestly it’s only a matter of time with these things. CD drives = moving parts = inevitable failure, someday.
I do think any console with a vibrant “backup” scene is potentially more failure-prone, since pressed discs are often (but not necessarily without exception) less work for the laser than burned ones. The good news is that there are mods out there these days that make the drives obsolete entirely, and sometimes replacement parts are cheap too. The Dreamcast in particular has several different mod options and most of them are pretty cheap, but actually replacing the laser is kind of a crapshoot.
In my opinion it’s worth it but you should always, always buy a CD based system with the expectation of doing drive repairs eventually.

>>5279985
As long as you don't literally live outside in a swamp and take care of your shit, you're good.

DC discs are more prone to problems though. Like, I had a copy of King of Fighters 98 that had one scratch in the wrong place, and it would no longer boot up. But that kind of shit is still rare. Out of 100 games I.owned, it happened once. It's just that the lazer lense is more sensitive than other consoles.

With PS1, a PS2 or PS3 will play the discs your actual PS1 no longer will. Like, I have games that the PS1 won't play at all, but the other play perfectly fine. And they're second hand, and scratched to shit.

Lastly, your PS1 can be turned upside down, and some nonfunctional games will work fine again.

>>5279985
None of my main discs systems I have had since day one have had issues related to the drive. The issues were overheating (360/ps3) or failed capacitor/psu elsewhere.

>>5280035
Burned discs require no extra power/effort to read. Stop saying this. It is some made up bullshit people that know nothing about how a laser works keep spouting.

>>5280053
Not extra power — extra movement. If the data is laid out such that the laser has to move farther/more frequently to access it then wouldn’t the wear be different?
I would expect this to affect the DC especially since CDRs do not hold as much data as its proprietary format.

>>5279985
I have a modchipped PS1 and played many Dreamcast games on burnt discs too. Both are pretty fun.

>>5280079
No. The DC is the only example where we don't burn discs 1 to 1. Early 360 games were similar but still 1 to 1. Even later 360 games that overburned were still 1 to 1 and you had to buy a drive that supported edge burning. Bjut 1 to 1 doesn't matter. The sectors are laid out and the drives job is to find them and read them. If the sectors were so bad the drive needs to work harder to find them, then the game wouldn't load in the first place. Track seek latency is the biggest reason a ps2 game fails to load.

The only comparative to a drive working harder related to a burnt game would be a burn that would NEVER work. To simplify, a burn so bad the drive needs to reseek would also be a burn that wouldn't work as it is too far gone. That, what I just said, is creating a non issue. See, the drives only case in that it is working harder is when it can't read something and it needs to go back and try again. A comparison could be a disc with scratches or fingerprints on it. So, if a burnt disc is actually all that bad because an incredibly bad burn requires constant reseeks, you should never play a game with a single scratch or smudge you can't remove.

I can't even understand how anyone ever thought burning was bad. Take a laser pointer and point it at shit, does the laser die faster from one material to another? No. Again, if reseek is an issue then never play scratched/damaged games.

Similarly I can't figure out why people thought slower burning fixed issues. It wasn't the slower burning, it was the cheap shit drive shaking too much at high speeds and tossing some ones and zeros in the wrong spot. People still think a slower burn is the fix, not just making sure your shitty drive isn't wobbling all over.

>>5280035
Dreamcast is honestly just built like shit. Great console but the hardware failure for it is high, gdi drives die quick, I've seen gpu failures and controller ports blown

Japan release saturn, still playing games fine after all those years. Got a second v-saturn last year. Its in even better condition. These are built like tanks.

Pal psx, stopped reading cd's in 1995. Cheap crap console.

Had a japanese release DC. It was SEGA's take on the playstation concept. Power supply broke after 3 years. It was easy enough to replace.
The controllers both broke after a while too.

>>5280274
I haven't heard of many hardware failures personally besides dry batteries. I've owned a Dreamcast for 17 years and it still works.

>>5279987
This.
But my early model "audiophole" PS1 that I got in 1996 stopped working around 1998 or 99.
My Sega Saturn bought around the same time is still going strong.

>>5280274
You have to be new if you think the DC is out of the norm. It was built fine. Compare to PS1 or other consoles released a little before or after. It only takes a few months of modding/repairing to see there isn't some clear winner to the most dead or repaired consoles.

Before anyone says 360, the ps3 YLOD killed more 2006-2009 phat ps3 consoles than 2005-2008 xbox 360s existed. Go research this a bit before you reply with some mouth breathing ignorant reply. Unlike the 360 that can survive cold solder joints and a warped motherboard from the abundance of anchor points, the ps3 went through 6+ psu revisions and still couldn't stop the system from warping from heat, partially due to the fan downgrade and partially because it wasn't built with airflow in mind.

>>5280347
A big difference was that the YLOD killed over time whereas the 360s that died tended to die sooner than later.

>>5279985
>Thinking about picking up a PS1 and Dreamcast but if it's going to be a headache I'd rather not.
Changing out the laser assembly is simple on a PSX. I still have my scph 1001 I bought new, and it is still on its 1st laser. I keep it powered off when not in use, because they are warm even when not in use.

>>5280347
>It was built fine
Not really. Its GPU gets ridiculously hot for the little space it has, causing excessive wear and tear on all of the other components.

>>5280053
>Burned discs require no extra power/effort to read.
yes, they aren't reflecting the laser as good and clear as factory-pressed discs

>>5280308
>But my early model "audiophole" PS1 that I got in 1996 stopped working around 1998 or 99.
"$299."
>My Sega Saturn bought around the same time is still going strong.
"$399."

>>5281278
not an argument

My PSone still runs strong despite going through a fuckton of abuse (I would dump it into the freezer as a kid during hot summers when it would overheat and stop loading properly when we played CTR, I was dumb I know). I only had to repair the plastic paddle thingy that keeps the lid closed but that broke 6 months after getting it like 18 years ago or something.

Reads original games flawlessly, burnt copies so-so. I still have it plugged in my living room and while I admit I will play stuff on popstarter on my ps2 for the sake of console noise I still play it now and then. GOAT console.

>>5282131
>I would dump it into the freezer as a kid during hot summers when it would overheat and stop loading properly
Nigger, i was a little bastard too but never i thought about something so stupid and twisted; to be fair, me too i would play the shit out of that console but it would never overheat and it's still highly functional after all those years, wtf are you talking about... did you play in Mozambique with the PS1 above a cooking stove or something

>>5282462
Think 45 degrees celsius, around 115F
I was a dipshit and me and my friends loved crash team racing and hated waiting for 20 minutes for it to cool off. It must've gone into the freezer at least a dozen times, thank fuck no capacitors blew up. PSone is a sturdy little machine for sure.

>>5282131
its more likely you scratched the disc

>>5279985
I have a PS2 slim I picked up back in 2011 and it still works fine. Soft modded it to play imports for both the PS1 and PS2. I just got DDR 2nd Mix Club Version 1 and 2, but when I go to do the disc swap in 2nd Mix the append disc spins for a second and stops. Any way for me to remedy this on the PS2 or would I have to get a Japanese PS1?

>>5279985
I've had a couple of issues with my slim PS2 being unable to read discs after some years. In 2017 I fixed this myself by opening the case, placing some tape on a few spots, and now it works just fine.

I didn't own disc based consoles before the PS2, all my non disk based ones such as my SNES and Gameboys (despite shell and screen damage from being dropped) work fine.

I've acquired used Sega CDs and a Saturn over the years though. Make this differentiation because I don't know how they were treated before I bought them. The Saturn works perfectly. My top loader Sega CD is currently dead, haven't checked out the problem yet. My CDX works, but not on all games.

>>5279985
None of my disc-based consoles died down except for the PSX i had since childhood (PSOne model, had it since 2004), but even then it was only because i've done a ton of disc swapping back in 2011.
The rest of the consoles i own are taken with care, and i always do some research regarding mods and burned discs before proceeding so that i don't shorten their lifespan.

Like some other guy said the other day, you're lucky to find a PS1 in good condition that's clean and wasn't beaten to shit by its trailer park owners.

>>5282775
PSones seem to usually be cleaner to me. And they're pretty much immune to yellowing.

>>5282674
Burned discs don't change disc drive lifespan. Disc swapping doesn't either.

>>5281283
can't use sturdy parts when you want to win the market with a lower price

>>5282643
>Any way for me to remedy this on the PS2
hardmod, of course.