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[SaitoH]

Years ago -back in the Dreamcast days- an RPG named Skies of Arcadia was released upon an unsuspecting public. Though the reviews were stellar, all was not well. Many customers had problems with brand new copies of the game not working in their system. Some exchanged the game, yet still the problem would persist, while others had no issues. Perplexed, I perused messageboards hoping for a solution and came across an interesting tidbit ... apparently boiling the disc would fix the problem. Odd as it was, I decided to give it a shot. Low and behold it worked! I'd say I boiled a good dozen copies of the game, with a 100% success rate, yet to this day I have no idea what the boiling did.

Someone please explain.

 

[FallenOne666]

IIRC, it removed a thin layer on the bottom of the disk that resulted from the pressing/packaging. This layer gave the lens trouble reading the disk.

 

[Teddman]

Hmm, maybe I should have boiled that copy of Shenmue that never worked... I bought a new DC just to play disc 2 (it worked).

 

[Wario64]

the boiling trick was the strangest thing ever during the DC era. the demo discs had problems too (though i never encountered a faulty disc ever)

 

[SaitoH]

IIRC, it removed a thin layer on the bottom of the disk that resulted from the pressing/packaging. This layer gave the lens trouble reading the disk.

Sounds plausible.

Mayhaps the winner?

 

[pj]

People used to do this all the time with OXM discs, but they have gotten better about sending discs that work sans cooking.

 

[Juice]

Pathetic of Sega and Microsoft to have such low quality control on discs.

[flamebait]
Reminds me of Sony and their low standards for PSP screen defects like dead pixels. Oh!
[/flamebait]

*waits for a bunch of people to run in and pointlessly argue that you can't prevent dead pixels, even though I'm talking about screening already produced units and removing the bad ones.*

 

[Timo]

you can't prevent dead pixels.

 

[zackattack]

I heard boiling your psp removes dead pixels

 

[hooo]

you can't prevent dead pixels.

No, but you don't have to use the ones with them either.

 

[GDGF]

I heard boiling your psp removes dead pixels

That actually works. Thanks!

 

[CurseoftheGods]

I heard boiling your psp removes dead pixels

Holy shit. I just tried it. It works!

 

[GDGF]

Ironicly, though, it has a side effect of adding a thin layer of film to any UMD disc you may have inserted into your PSP at the time.

 

[gohepcat]

IIRC, it removed a thin layer on the bottom of the disk that resulted from the pressing/packaging. This layer gave the lens trouble reading the disk.

That can't be it. I had a disk that I used a disk doctor on (removed a lyaer of plastic) and that didn't fix it, but boiling it did.

The only thing I can think of is that it sets the aluminium foil into the pits in the plasitc.

when CDs/DVDs are created they stamp pits into the top layer of plasitc, then place a sheet of super thin aluminium on top and suck the aluminium into the pits through the back. Perhaps sometimes it does not work and when you super heat the disk the foil falls into the disk....that's the only thing I can think of.

Maybe

 

[RunWhiteBoyRun]

I was reading this earlier, fits in perfectly with the dead pixel discussion:
http://www.psphacker.com/2005/06/dead-pixel-cleaner.html#comments

Some people are saying it does fix it.. but I have no dead pixels, or thread starting abilities.. have fun

 

[Myoclonic Jerk]

well.. I've heard about boiling Bass strings, but this ?? :lol :lol :lol

 

[Black Widow]

I dip mine in my moms tomato sauce after boiling it as the oil from the sauce coats the cd and enhances data transfer.