All that soldering for this?...

So here's the deal: I have a v4 ps2 that I have installed a Crystal Chip 2.0 in (my first mod). I flashed the chip with the cracked firmware and installed the boot manager and everything seemed to be going great, except that the ps2 doesn't seem to want to run backups, which was the reason I bought the chip in the first place. It reads commercial DVDs fine, but upon putting in a backup the drive spins up and down several times accompanied by a lot of clicking, similar to the sound you'd here in any pc cd/dvd drive when it can't read the disk inside. These are TDK blanks that I'm using, and I burned them at both fast and slow speeds, but it doesn't seem to matter. I've also tried CD-Rs, in the case of Rez, which is small enough to fit on one, still with no result. Am I correct in believing that the CC2.0 doesn't require patched backups? Could it be one of the CD/DVD wires? It read the CD of the firmware that I burned without a problem, so I don't think it could be the blanks. It may also be important to note that in the Boot Manager under "Console Version" there are only three question marks. I don't know whether that has any bearing on this problem, but it struck me as strange. Anyhow, any help you guys have to offer would be much appreciated, as I might go unconscious if I inhale more burning rosin.

Sounds like a laser issue to me. V4 and earlier lasers are notoriously poor quality, not to mention the age of the console the laser is most likely simply worn out at this point. But I would still recommend checking your CDVD points again to make sure they are soldered well and correctly.

Its not a total loss even if the laser is shot. You can install HDL to your MC or HDD and boot HDL from within the CC's Boot Manger and play your back-ups this way, avoiding the use of the laser all together. You can even use WinHiip to install your back-ups to your PS2's HDD right on your PC also avoiding the PS2's laser.

You might be ale to clean and adjust the laser to work better and get a little more life out of it if this truly is the issue.

Good luck!

Thank you for the quick response. If I were to re-check my CDVD solder points, which ones would those be? I've pretty much been soldering "by the numbers" over here, not having had any previous experience with modding. I, too, was thinking that it might be a laser issue, except that it read the firmware CD that I burned perfectly, and that was on the same type of blank, burned at the same speed. That's my ray of hope, anyhow...

The CDVD points on your V4 would be A, B, H, I and HA. The laser might be just good enough to read the upgrade disc from CD-R but not good enough to read back-up DVD-R's. Just so you know recordable media is harder for any laser to read then originals. Also I do believe the CC2.0 will boot the upgrade disc even if the CDVD points are wrong or not soldered well.

Thank you very much for the help, I'll get on checking those points.

It's working! Turned out that the "I" point wasn't fully connected, and that made all the difference. Thank you for your help.