Gamecube Laser Tweak

[butch]

Hello everybody!

I just decided to adjust my gc laser to try playing backups from dvd! I have a xeno-chip, but my cube isn´t playing any backup, no small DVD´s and no big also!
So i read a lot tutorials, opend my cube and meter the poti! It is at 80ohm!!!
Every tutorial tells me something around 180 to 400ohm! What is wrong?? The cube was never been opened before!

Can i go a little bit lower?

Thanks in advance for your help and apologise my bad english...

[s8n187]

hiya butch , ok the sweet spot for POT Tweaking is roughly between 300ohms and 180ohms if you go below 100ohms it will kill your Laser at a quick rate.

btw your English is very good so dont worry about it

[doktor_krotch]

It's more a matter of working out which value will work well for the media you're using on your particular Gamecube. Some of the most compatible media is RITEKF1 and RITEKG04/G05 (many different brands). These work with a large range of pot values. I'm using MCC 03RG20 (16x Verbatim branded -R) at the moment. Pot is set to 175Ω and 100% stable. I've also used MCC 004-00 (16x Verbatim +R, must be bitset to work) at 175Ω. See if you can get some of the media I've mentioned and start experimenting to find a stable value.

I used to run 75Ω to use some TDK G02 mini dvds. Two of my mates did the same. Afaik, all our cubes are still working. Just depends on the amount of wear on your DVD drive I guess.

[butch]

Thanks for your answers!

Btw my Cube is a DOL-001 (EUR)!

I tried it with Verbatim Mini -R 4x (mediacode ??) the last time!
I also tried Sony Mini -R 4x and Platinum -R 4x!
Big ones i tried: TDK -R 16x and Sony -R 16x!
I can´t find a store selling ritek G04/05 in germany!

Today i first download a proggie to check the mediacode of my DVD´s!

Is it possible that a DVD isn´t working on 80ohm but will work when i turn the poti higher? I thought that a lower "resistance" is always better to get backups working...

[gtmtnbiker]

It doesn't hurt to try different values to see what works for you. Just note the original value and then try higher/lower to see what happens.

One nice thing about having a ViperGC or Qoob chip is that you can easily swap out the DVD drive from another unit. With a Xeno, you need to unsolder the chip.

[butch]

Okay, setting it higher will only cause that the dvd won´t start to spin. That happen at about 250ohm!

But...

Setting it to 75ohm will bring the Platinum Mini and the TDK Big to work! YEAH!!!!
That´s only 5ohm lesser than the original setting...

I don´t no how stable it works because i only tried metroid prime for about 10min, but for this 10min it works perfectly!!

Thanks for your help guys!

edit:
Okay, not so stable as i wish...
After 20min an error is displayed: "Please turn off your gamecube and read the manual bla bla bla!"

Is that normal because the drive can´t read the DVD as good as an original or is it a first sign for a laser damage?

[butch]

i think i give sdboot another try because i don´t want to kill my laser!

Metroid Prime isn´t working very well for me...
I use sdboot 0.4 final and gcmutility 0.5 to shrink the gcm-file! The sound is really wired on startup (´cause it´s streaming audio, right?) and when i go through a door in the game it slows down/hangs up for 1 or 2 seconds!

Can someone give me some tips? Is it possible to play this game good with sdboot?
And one more question: will sdboot 1.0 will be released in near future??

[doktor_krotch]

I don't shrink my Gamecube games because I don't think you gain anything in terms of compatibility but I may be wrong. The really weird sound you mention on startup might be because gcmutility is applying a streaming audio fix (?) but the xenogc already has a streaming audio fix. This happened to me once. Try it without shrinking the game.

Metroid Prime works with sd-boot. Slowdowns will be unavoidable with the current version though. emu_kidid's working hard on the next version. I believe we'll see it sometime soon.

[butch]

thx to you! I will give it a try!