5 replies to this topic

[Spector]

I have a Dreamcast that wont read the discs. Everything else is fine, the disc spins when you turn it on, you get the menus etc, but no loading up of the game. Is it worth trying to fix? My guess is probably not...

[holygrailvideogames.com]

I don't know how cheap Dreamcast are in the UK, but they are dirt cheap here in the U.S. You could probably just go buy one for a little money.

I have owned several Dreamcast over the years. I noticed that some of my systems have had trouble reading some disk, but can read other disk. You might want to try another game.

[kevincal]

YES! it is worth it. I bet that you have lint trapped in the gears driving the cd laser mechanism its really not that hard. Here's what you do, take off the cover of the dreamcast by unscrewing the 4 screws on the bottom and taking off the little modem thing..it comes right off with a gentle pull. Make sure your are carefull once all the screws are out and turn the system right side up. Then take off the top shell. Now..the black cd mechanism or drive just comes right up. It is still connected to some wires so you'll have to lay down and lift it up. Use a flashlight to look and see if a big ball of lint is trapped in the gears. I used some tweezers to get out the lint. I had the same thing as you disc spinning but that error message. Everyone think it's always a messed up laser eye but i doubt. Hopefully this will work.

[eldunko]

Dreamcasts are picky with scratched CD's too, often times if the disc is scratched mid game, the game will halt and take you back to the menu. I've never had a problem with any of my original store bought games, just the ex-rentals i picked up...

[Jasoco]

Yeah. They really are picky.

My Sonic Adventure has one teensy scratch on one of the levels (The one with the wind up in the hills) and any time I play that level, it's hit or miss if it'll freeze this time or not. Seeing as almost all the characters have to play that level at one point or another, I haven't beaten it yet. It's annoying, but if I keep trying and do things differently each time I'll eventually get past the level without triggering the scratch.

I dunno exactly what it's trying to load that causes it to die on me, but I'm still working on it.

[Atariman]

It's been my experience that the little lever that tells the DC that the lid is shut sometimes gets damaged (possibly by shutting the lid too hard?) and just needs something to push it back a little further (something you can glue on the front of the switch so that it is forced back a little further than before).
Whenever this was the problem, I could always get the console to power up, it would spin the CD around a coupla times, and then it would take me to the menus. I'm not sure if this is exactly what you described, but the DC would say that I need to put in a game disc or something like that.
So the price to fix these dreamcasts ends up being whatever you want to pay... I fixed mine with toothpicks and superglue.