Working Around Faulty Discs

[dwighthouse]

I've used CleanRip to rip my entire GameCube and Wii collection over the last few years. Thanks so much for that software btw, @emu_kidid. I really appreciate the ability to rip my own games (and stay above board), yet also gain the advantages of emulation features.

As I seek to fill out my collection, I've handled many used discs in recent years. For Gamecube games in particular, they are apparently very easy to scratch or damage. Running them through CleanRip either yields "No Seek complete" or "Unrecovered read error" errors, which fail the process.

Often a large percentage of the disc apparently rips successfully, only for it to fail towards the end and output nothing. I can sometimes clean the disc and have it go through, but other times not.

My questions are:

• Is it possible for CleanRip to output the data it did get before failure?

• Is it possible for CleanRip to "rip backwards", starting at the end and seeking in reverse. Combined with the above feature, it would theoretically get all the data on the disc save the small corrupted portion. It seems most of the time that failures are due to one area being damaged.

• Is there a way to try and continue ripping in spite of corrupted data, perhaps marking which regions are flawed?

• If these things are possible, how feasible to implement? I'm a programmer myself, though I have no experience dealing with hardware so directly. Or, would someone be willing to work on this on commission so that the developer would be funded for his/her time?

Thanks for your time!

[Papy.G]

I'd like to add: Would ripping with a Wii lead to less reading errors/fails?

I experienced unsuccessful dumps just after disc cleaning, cleaning once more with attention did the job.

[dwighthouse]

I am already ripping with a Wii, using CleanRip. I don't have any computer drives that can read GC discs.

I tried the disc stock, then cleaned it and tried again. Then tried again. Then cleaned it more aggressively and tried again. Then tried again. Then tried USBLoaderGX's load game feature twice. Then cleaned the disc even more aggressively and tried it a few more times with CleanRip. They all errored out.

Also tried just playing the game, which crashed immediately during the intro movie.

I'm open to game disc cleaning tips. Most of what I do is water and a lint-free cloth. More aggressively, I will rub the disc surface with water using my fingertips, then clean with lint-free cloth. Should I be using a chemical beyond water?

[Papy.G]

Ok, so you got far in the process.

I personally add a little soap in the cleaning process, bad finger grease can sometimes resist to water only.

Did you check your discs for surfaces separation?

If it's really only scratched surfaces, maybe you can try a polishing "disc restoring" machine.

[dwighthouse]

I'll try some soap.

The surface looks fine except for a few scratches. Most seem superficial, but one or two seem a little deeper.

I hesitate to use one of those disc polishing machines as they often destroy gamecube discs.

Any comment on the software side? Is it a limitation of the drives themselves that prevents continuing to rip after an error occurs, or reading the disc backwards? Or can these things be achieved in software?

[emu_kidid]

I'd implemented what you're describing here in an attempt to dump a specific disc that no one else seemed to have at the time, the scratch on that disc was from about half way and went straight to the edge so ripping from the end backwards didn't really help in my case but retrying did get a few extra bytes from the disc each time.

It was hell on the drive/laser and I wouldn't really recommend it unless if you're attempting to dump something there's only one of etc. I can add some options though when a read error occurs to attempt to jump a certain amount forward from the problematic area and zero pad that spot, but again you're going to end up with a bad dump so it's not really worth it.

[dwighthouse]

Dang. No, it's just a shame that something like half of the gamecube discs I try to rip are not ripable, and then I have to handle trying to return things that others "test" by turning it on and seeing it shows the menu. It's a big mess.

[dwighthouse]

Oh, I just thought of something. What if you have two discs that both have scratches? If you could get as much data as you could from both discs, you could combine the data to get the full image, assuming the scratches weren't all in exactly the same places.