PS1 odd causality

[Victini378]

I don't know why, but when I try to burn on a Metal AZO with Japanese Plextor the game “iS - Internal Section” patched in English it crashes on the Positron logo. I have burned it twice and it has the exact same problem.
I got the patched version from my copy of the original game, using the patches found on romhacking. It works on the emulator (Duckstation and ePSXe), but when I burn it, it no longer works from either the emulator (boot from the disc) or the original console.
Also when I try to copy the game from the burned disc all programs (Alcohol 120%, Imgburn) give me L-EC Uncorrectable Error:
####################### Dumping/Recording Progress Log #######################
********* Time stamp of this log file: 11/02/2025 05:37:01 *********
05:37:01 Processor info: AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 8-Core Processor x 16 (3600MHz)
05:37:01 Disc dumping: PLEXTOR CD-R PX-W2410A (USB:0)
05:37:04 Reading Mode: RAW + SUB-96
Selected reading speed: 1X (150 KB/Sec)
05:37:04 Source Info: Session: 1, Track: 1, Length: 206.0 MB / 23:26:38
05:37:10 Disc read error at: 71
05:37:10 Disc dumping failed!
05:37:10 Error message: [03/11/05] - L-EC Uncorrectable Error

Attached is the burning log.

 

[KleinesSinchen]

Your CD writer is extremely old. Despite Plextor having been very good drives when they were new, I have sadly come across many issues with those: I've ordered several of them for their unique special functions and almost all have trouble (some didn't work at all). Using them over some USB enclosure might also cause trouble.

Writing CDs at 1x often gives bad results. Yes, 1x is known to cause trouble compared to 2x or more.

Try a high quality, full-sized (internal, not laptop, not USB) new drive for writing discs. PS1 consoles may have trouble with AZO dye CD-R compared to PhthaloCyanine.

Also: No need to write RAW-DAO+SUB96 unless the game uses subchannel data for additional copy protection. Alcohol 120% defaults to this mode if selecting PlayStation(2) as profile.

 

[Victini378]

Your CD writer is extremely old. Despite Plextor having been very good drives when they were new, I have sadly come across many issues with those: I've ordered several of them for their unique special functions and almost all have trouble (some didn't work at all). Using them over some USB enclosure might also cause trouble.

Writing CDs at 1x often gives bad results. Yes, 1x is known to cause trouble compared to 2x or more.

Try a high quality, full-sized (internal, not laptop, not USB) new drive for writing discs. PS1 consoles may have trouble with AZO dye CD-R compared to PhthaloCyanine.

Also: No need to write RAW-DAO+SUB96 unless the game uses subchannel data for additional copy protection. Alcohol 120% defaults to this mode if selecting PlayStation(2) as profile.

I have already burned everything with the Plextor, it works great. Just today I burned to a CD-RW (to test it from computer of course and not from PS1) and if I burn the English Patched version it gives the error L-EC on block 71. If I burn the original unpatched version it gives no problems.

What you say, that it burns poorly at 1x, comes from the fact that today's optical media, which you find on Amazon type, are of medium-low quality and do not support a 1x burn well.
However, I have tried burning with another player as well and there is the exact same problem with the English Patched version.

Post automatically merged: Feb 11, 2025

I recommend alex-free's Github article on CD-Rs: The Ultimate Guide To PSX CD-Rs (google to find it)

 

[KleinesSinchen]

What you say, that it burns poorly at 1x, comes from the fact that today's optical media, which you find on Amazon type, are of medium-low quality and do not support a 1x burn well.

Just as an old example for lower quality by 1x speed:
https://www.cdrinfo.com/d7/content/yamaha-crw-f1e-cd-rw?page=10

Yes, this is also related to media. Still you'll generally get better result regarding C1/C2 error rate with modestly higher speed (and I failed finding substantial differences on current drives regardless of choosing 16x which is generally the lowest and only CLV mode compared to 48x CAV mode. Also no difference to using Plextor Premium with 4x CLV.

Only noticeable drop of quality due to high speed occurs when burning DVD media with 9.6x→24x CAV "overspeed mode" (makes a scary sound as well).
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But in this case, with your Plextor ruled out as source of error:

If I burn the original unpatched version it gives no problems.

Something seems to be problematic with the patched image. Since PS1 discs use "Mode 2 Form 1" as data format the EDC/ECC data is part of the user facing sector opposed to Mode1. A patch has to make sure to update these as well. If you just change data without updating corresponding EDC/ECC the result is a (logical, not physical) read error.

It is puzzling that Alcohol 120% fails reading because it uses RAW read mode which completely ignores this. IMGBURN would write the disc in non-RAW mode with the drive correcting the EDC/ECC field by itself which 100% results in the disc being different from the image.

recommend alex-free's Github article on CD-Rs: The Ultimate Guide To PSX CD-Rs (google to find it)

While a lot of work and thought went into this (I know this article very well), I don't agree with everything from the perspective of my own experience. There is no way around trial and error beyond any guide online.
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If I had to guess I'd say this is a logical error due to a bad patch which is irrelevant as long as you do not write to physical CD-R.

 

[Victini378]

However, I created a patch that solves the problem. I posted it on a rom patch site, I don't know if I can post the link or even just the file here. In case anyone knows, let me know so I can post it here.