Bizarre behaviour
 

While I'm waiting for some new lexan to come in at my nearby Home Depot I put my PS2 back together and played some games this weekend because I had some friends staying over from Seattle.

Anyway, I discovered a couple quirks with my PS2 that I'm not sure if they're normal behaviour.

Backups, for the most part play fine. Except load times are twice as long and games like MGS2 where they have long FMV sequences get choppy after a minute. Do Backups normally read slower than originals?

Also, Originals will now only play if I put the chip in Sleep mode.

I'm running a v4 no gap with a DMS3 and 2.2 bios.

Also, I still can't get a backup of Amplitude to run. I tried the trial of Alchohol and it says it burned just fine but I've tried it on Ridata's Verbatims, and some cheap **** I bought just to try it out. None work.

Use DVD Decrypter for making backups, it works great and is free.

It sounds like you either need to run a lens cleaner through your ps2, or the laser is weak and needs a POTS adjustment...

Netmech just replaced the laser a couple weeks ago and it ran everything fine when I first got it. now it's doing the wierd stuff.

May have had a manufacturing defect??? Check all the data cables are the laser ribbons are all correctly positioned.

I'm thinking it's a chip defect more than anything since Originals play fine when in sleep mode. Otherwise it says "Please insert a valid Playstation or playstation2 disc..."

I'm gonna have to gamble and say the chip is defective. Dammit, i ordered it from Divineo. I wonder if they'll help. Cause otherwise I'm up **** creek :(

It’s not the chip that’s for sure! It’s your laser. Even though netmeck put a new one in there as it wears in a new laser will still need adjusting from time to time. It the laser takes too long to read the disc it will through off the timing of the chip, thus you will end up with the RSOD (please insert Playstation, blah blah) screen. Plus I don’t think it helped the drive assembly the way you have it all hacked open....might have put something out of alignment.
Any way a simple pot adjustment might fix this.

Alrighty, Adjustment time I guess.

And just for arguments sake. I never touched anything but they top cover. While I've been working on the PS2 the drive itself has been in a dust-free room.

Yergle... Okay, I no longer have access to an oscilliscope. Anyone have a general resistance measurement that's safe? I don't like the idea of going in blind.

Well that’s exactly what I'm talking about. The lid to the drive is all cut open, reducing the rigidity of the cover that hoses the mechanism that supports the disc. There could be some flexing or vibration going on now that the structural integrity of the drive lid is reduced.

Take a measurement of both and reduce that measurement by no more then 10%. But DO NOT go below 700 ohms and that’s going low. Just make sure you have your original settings wrought down in case you need to set them back.

Good luck.

That'd be a tough call to make as I really only cut holes in it as opposed to complete cuts through sections. It appears that nothing really depends on the top of the of the drive, with the exception of the holdermagnet, no components/parts or otherwise touch the top while it is in use. Everything seems to be mounted or based off the sides and bottom which are secured firmly to the rest of the system.

In my opinion the top is nothing more than a dust cover and something to hold the magnet while the drive is empty. Of course, that's just an opinion, and I could be very very wrong.

Anyway, thanks for the help. I'll try and adjustment later this week and let you guys know how it went.