Crystal Team is getting behind...

[alexo]

Hey, indoweed.

Nice to see that you edited out some of your original post. Restraint is good.

There's three consecutives posts whining about CC not releasing updates. I feel the need to step in.

There is a difference between "whining" and asking politely, you'll see when you have kids of your own :-)

The Agent posted the last entry in roadmap back on 3-22. That's less than 3 months.

Three months is a long time in software development but actually your metric is wrong. Version 19 was released six months ago touting a "full psone fix!". That claim was retracted a month ago and another month later we were told that it is fixed again.

Now, I understand that it is fun to work on skinning an app but consider this: how much time do you spend in BM on your PS2? Most people that I know treat their modchips (and associated software) as something that enables them to play the games that they want in the way that they want to play them. They don't care if it's butt ugly as log as it works -- and the less obtrusively it works, the better.

If I told you that you have an hour a day just to play with your PS2, would you spend it admiring the BM skins or actually playing your favourite games?

Looks to me that the skins are more of an advertisement of the CC team's "1337 ski11z" than a useful feature. Normally, I would not mind; go ahead and have your fun. However, the same roadmap shows that they had a fix for an issue that bothers quite a number of people back in February. Then why not release an interim "1.91" and make a bunch of people happy?

The Agent wrote that fixing bugs is the CC Team's priority. Why not make available incremental big-fix releases with those fixes? At the least, it will have more people testing them.

In case you haven't noticed, modchip business isn't like an ordinary business.

In what ways?

I remember when nobody thought CC team was gonna release new firmware...and everybody thought they were dead...then they proved alot of ppl wrong. Then they released CC 1.1 a few months later.

Kudos for them, but that's hardware, not software, and it does not help the people that already have a 1.0 CC installed. Remember how much flak DMS got when they stopped releasing updates for their DMS3 chips?

In my original post I wasn't trying to say what I know about C programming...I was trying to explain why maybe it's taking them so long. Okay, I also know about programming in assembly and C. I was just informing the newbs that don't know about programming, why it's so hard.

And I was trying to say why I disagree. C, and even assembly, are not hard when you know what you're doing (and I assume the CC team does).

Sure they'll release it in a hurry ,but it's buggy as hell and crashes all the time. Is that what you want?

Why should it be "buggy as hell and crashes all the time"? Lots of people write low-level code all the time. I can assure you that Linux, Tomcat, etc. are not written in Java.

I don't agree with you about it not being exceptional....when it comes to ps2 programming I see it as yes it is.... and will definitely stand by my statement 100%. Dude, considering ps2 is not like an xbox, in respect to it being not as pc-friendly as an xbox is. I believe that coding for ps2 is hard, therefore people who write software for ps2 do get my sincere recognition.

True, the PS2 is not a friendly environment to program for. However: First, it is not as bad as you make it to be (2nd-hand information: I never programmed for the PS2 but my friend and coworker did). Second, and most important, BM does not have to use the FPU or the vector units. So basically you have to contend with the MIPS-based processor and a shitty OS (and, of course, your own ASIC). Not a piece of cake but not rocket science either.

As, per your statement "Delivering quality software on time is something that a lot of people do all the time. I appreciate those who do it but I don't see it as something exceptional".
also, quoting you, "All it takes is knowledge, dedication and discipline."
So youre saying CC is lacking one of those or all of those?

Perhaps they lack motivation?

Because if that's true then I guess CC team isn't one of the top modchip makers, right? Certainly took over dms lately. That only leaves them with Matrix.

Interesting question.
First, define "top". What is your metric?
Second, with only 3 contenders, being "one of the top makers" is not that hard.

Advice: continue to support your family and stop worrying about when somebody's going to release a new firmware.

Sound advice! However, asking a question once in a couple of months is not exactly "worrying", is it?

edit: Actually there are 4 posts in a row whining about a release

People want their bugs fixed

One of the things you find out when you are a "business" is that if you don't cater to your customers - you lose them. Unless you're a monopoly, but the last time I looked, the CC team wasn't.

If you look up my posting history, you'll find out that I used to advocate the CC. The reason was their responsiveness at the time: frequent releases containing bug-fixes and requested features, a message board where they actively answered questions, etc.

Did it help? Not a lot probably, I figure about 4-5 got the CC on my recommendation. But I am just one person, get a 100 satisfied customers (at the time) like me and you have additional 400-500 sales from free marketing. Keep the new customers happy and the figure grows exponentially.

Fast forward to today. I can no longer actively advocate the CC as the responsiveness is not there anymore. Translation: 2 lost sales as a couple of people decided to get the Infinity after asking for my opinion. I don't think the CC team would even notice it but then again, I'm just a regular guy, not even in the modding business. However, vendors are starting to prefer other brands and that will make a difference.

What will happen tomorrow? I have no idea. I may as well go back advocating the CC if I'm happy with the "support".

[alexo]

Oh, by the way, speaking of responsiveness.

My expectation from the CC team would be something like this.
Instead, the closest thing we had, TheAgent, is MIA.

Pity really.


Now broodje says that the Infinity is about to get DNAS auto patching soon.
When it does, what will the CC offer to stay competitive?

[cherrypie]

Personally I think I have a right to be annoyed.

Mid December 05 I buy a v14 PS2 and start looking for a chip. I see Crystal gives me the features I want so I investigate their chip.

Dec 19, Software Release 19 is released, it supposedly fixes my only concern with the CC1.1, PSOne support on V14, so I order one. Two days later I install the chip, flash hacked firmware 19 and try to load a couple of PSOne backups (the only backups I have at the time). They don't work, so I try and try again, resolder the sx point several times, check everything with a multimeter, the job is neat, the wires are short, all connections check out, try without BM, still no luck. I make a backup of one of my PS2 discs, it works fine, notice other people on V14's are having problems with PSOne, some can get the discs to run without BM, others have no luck, like myself. So from day one, I don't get what Crystal have told me I would get. Patiently I wait for the update, and am still happy with all my chip can do, just annoyed that I can't load the PSOne software I've been eager to try "no problem" I think, "the Crystal team will get a fix out soon enough".

13th Jan, Crystal advertise a new revision of CC1.1 (damn, I just bought one, that's irritating, gee thanks for the warning). They also mention a new revision of BM is coming up. "YAY"

Only word on updates from now, comes from TheAgent, he's not part of the CC team, I don't know how close he is to them, but hey it gives me hope. I see TheAgent has a CC roadmap, says they've got a new fix for PSOne. "Awesome!!! looks like my biggest gripe has been fixed" patiently I continue to wait and am otherwise happy with my Crystal Chip.

Now it's been six months since the last official word from the Crystal Team and no fix has been offered, I didn't get what I paid for and it's starting to look like I never will.

I'd be happy with an official "Hey, we're alive, the next release is proving to be a lot of work, but we're making progress." but all they offer is silence.

[anarchy2007]

I have been doing mod-chips for many years and can tell you that every mod-chip manufacturer that I have TRIED to deal with have been the same. They do not answer e-mails and hardly ever admit to any problems.

*edit*
There are 2 exceptions, Origa and Matrix teams. Luke form Matrix has answered every single e-mail I have sent him regarding an issue with the Matrix infinity mod-chip. The reason why I was forced to stop using the MI is because of all the ModBo, Myth, infinity, etc.. mod-chips that are floating around in S.A. They gave the infinity a bad name not to mention price wise they are much cheaper. The Origa bros reply to all posts on their forums personaly. *edit*


The CC team on the otherhand has never, no not even once answered an e-mail (maybe because it's allways "Full") regarding BM scripting. I asked the same questions meny times on their old formus, but never got a reply. Even the Agent (no offense to you Agent) wich is their "spokes person" doesn't answer most questions. 1 eg. is the USB support which is suppossed to be 1 of the best features of this chip IT DOES NOT WORK, and that answer is allways the same, "I'll have to make up a BM software pack with USB support" that has been the answer since the first release of USB support.

I think what they do not realise is that 95% of all people that use BM have very little or no coding experience and rely on the CC team to help create scripts. The problem is that the only person that seems to know anything about most of the scripts is the Agent.

On the other hand I have done many CC mod-chips, more than I care to remember and can tell you that it is without a doubt 1 of the best, most stable mod-chips around. I supply all my customers with a v1.4 BM CD and my own software pack for them to play with, this way I have no problems with most features that do not work.

[mr.vince]

Sorry if this sounds rude, but: I bought this chip to play imports, not even backups. But all it does is run some stuff, but definitely not my PS1 games in NTSC on my PAL machine. This bug has been confirmed and I wonder if there will ever be a version that does what has been promised.

Why don´t we get, what we simply paid for? A working chip. I do not want any fancy new features, a working chip is all that matters. I am currently thinking about just buying another product because I want to play those games now, not in 3, 6, 9, 12 or whatever months.

Vince

[anarchy2007]

I do many, many Crystal chips and have only had 1 person complain about PSOne titles on v14 (screen lift issue). The problem was the v1.4 BootManager that I include with all the modfications that I do. I gave him the 1.8 BootManager and it worked fine.
I am not saying that there is no such problem, but find it strange that I have only once had this problem. Asfar as PS2 titles, imports or back-ups, every thing runs perfectly.

[cherrypie]

I do many, many Crystal chips and have only had 1 person complain about PSOne titles on v14 (screen lift issue). The problem was the v1.4 BootManager that I include with all the modfications that I do. I gave him the 1.8 BootManager and it worked fine.
I am not saying that there is no such problem, but find it strange that I have only once had this problem. Asfar as PS2 titles, imports or back-ups, every thing runs perfectly.

Problem might be specific to particular motherboard revisions seeing there's an absolute ton of V14 boards. Seems that most people can't get them to load via BM but many can without BM. For me they just sit at a black screen while the disc whirs for 10mins then stops.