PS2: Reaction Time Issues while Recording "Burnout Revenge" footage

In the classic PS2 game Burnout Revenge reaction is quite crucial, be it to avoid other cars or making a proper start in the mode "Crash Party". However, when you record footage it may raises the difficulty level in an interesting way...

As a friend and me have our Crash Party battle from time to time, we decided to now finally record it. Also, he started doing "Let's Plays" on Twitch and YouTube, so it would be appropriate footage for his channel.

For doing that, I used my old Sony RDR HX 680 B DVD and HDD recorder. So I connected the PS2 with a SCART cable to the input slot of the recorder and another SCART cable for the output from the recorder to the TV.

YouTube: Tankh

After a recording test we started playing. A Crash Party with 9 rounds and two players. To quickly explain the starting procedure:
You hit the X button once to start the engine, and as the RPM go higher (seen through a line of fire) you have to press X again (to avoid explosion). Then the line goes down again and you have to press X a third time. Depending on how accurately you press X the second and third time determines how good you start is going to be.

However, as the recording device was between the PS2 and the TV, the screen was probably a few milliseconds behind, causing us players being unable to hit X an the right moment, making the cars either explode and stalling the engine.

As we were first surprised on what happened there, it took as a bit the figure out what's the issue. Ultimately we could adapt to the situation and I even got a score of around 10 million for like three times in a row (see video above).

Quite interesting situation, right? Someone seen that before? I guess the issue is either the SCART cable, the device, or both...

Unrelated, but worth to mention:  How about getting the footage to a PC? There's no other way than burning it on a DVD and then convert the files from the DVD on your PC. I usually use HandBrake for that. The audio was recorded separately and later merged together with the video file.

5 Reasons you shouldn't go back to Windows 7

Windows 7 is still enjoying a market share of almost 50 percent despite there was the opportunity to do a free upgrade to Windows 10. Here are a few features I miss when I'm using a Windows 7 computer again...

You get so used to the new Windows 10 features and when you start working elsewhere your operating system may still Windows 7. So you can't use certain features you were used to - not to mention that some were already introduced in Windows 8...

1: Screenshots by one key combination

In Windows 10 you can now make screenshots very easily just by using an easy key combination. You press Windows + Print and your screenshot will be saved in your user directory in the folder 'Pictures/Screenshots'. It's quite useful making several screenshots after another.

2: Virtual Drives included!

Remember software like Daemon Tools or Virtual Clone Drive? These were quite useful tools if you wanted to avoid burning an ISO image in order to use it on Windows 7 or earlier versions. In Windows 10 you don't need to install any extra tools. You just need to select on ISO file, right-click and select 'Mount'. That's it. A virtual drive will be added with your CD/DVD image. Way easier, all included. You'll noticed if you get back using Windows 7.


3: Control+V in CMD!
After so many years it's finally possible to use Ctrl+V in the command line. Pasting lines into the black box is now way easier. Going back to Windows 7 or other older Windows version you had to right-click, selecting 'Paste' to paste your clipboard. Now that's just better and faster.

4: Lots of language packs!
Changing the languages of your operating system had never been easier. You can change your Windows 10 easier to any language - even to small ones like Luxembourgish. Just go to Control Panel, 'Language', select the 'idiomas' you want, download them. After that you can easily switch to one of your downloaded languages. You only need to log off and log on again. Back in Windows 7 it was more difficult or even limited to certain version like Enterprise or Ultimate. And the amounts of possible languages are increasing. I remember working in certain companies a language change back in Windows 7 was applied by reinstalling the whole computer... But nowadays with Windows 10, no issue. Just switching to Japanese. As easy as with Android.

5: File Explorer Ribbon Bar

The Ribbon bar was first introduced as a the new view of Office 2007 applications. Some other applications within Windows 7 followed and since Windows 8 it´s also in the Windows Explorer - so jumping from 7 to 10, you will notice and you don´t wanna go back! Also having a graphical view on how fast a file transfer goes makes the new included file manager even better. Not only looks all better.


Anyway...
There are of course many more features in Windows 10 in comparison to Windows 7, but that´s just to name a few which I found were ones people would notice quite quickly. Also easy to get used to that. These examples show that you should not go back to Windows 7, although it´s still a great operating system.

Feel free to comment on if you agree or would have named other examples for reasons not to go back the OS from 2009.

MATSHITA BD-RE UJ-225S ATA DEVICE and Windows 10 - a bad combination!

You upgraded to Windows 10 and your DVD/Bluray drive is gone? It can become difficult or even impossible...

In my case it's about the Matshita Bluray drive called 'UJ 225S' in a Medion Akoya P8610. Initially sold with Windows Vista was the system later upgraded to Windows 7. So it's already a few years old. 

Last year there was the possibility to upgrade to Windows 10 for free. The owner of that laptop did it, but he later noticed that his Bluray drive wasn't available anymore. Interestingly in the BIOS it's still there and you can even boot from it. Using a current live Linux distribution to boot you can still see in the device overview.

So what can you do from here? 
A helpful solution which I've seen quite often and it apparently solved the issue in many cases is the following:
1) Go to regedit and select the following path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/CurrentControlSet/Services/atapi /

2) Create a new key named 'Controller0'

3) Create a new DWORD in Controller0 called EnumDevice1

4) Change the value of EnumDevice1 to 1

5) Restart your computer and your DVD/Bluray device should be back... 

BUT IT DIDN'T WORKED!

I found other suggestions to update the BIOS to version M1.04, but the BIOS was already running with the version M1.08. So that wouldn't make real sense...

ANOTHER IDEA: CHIPSET DRIVER

Maybe it's an idea to update the chipset driver? But there are no official Windows 10 chipset drivers available. You 'just' find the ones for Windows 7. And if you try them with your Windows 10 Medion Akoya laptop... you'll end up having a bluescreen.

Better use system recovery and go back to a date before you tried that. 

CONCLUSION

Basically it's something you end up nowhere. Either go back to Windows 7, use a Linux, use an external drive or maybe even change your optical drive completely. Too bad it's too old and not working with Windows 10, physically it's still very good.

Enabling DVD boot for Lenovo G70-35

No matter how often you try to press F2, F6, F8, F12 or anything: If you have a pre-installed Windows 10 you need to change some settings in the BIOS/UEFI in order to be able to boot from your DVD.

First, you need to get into the BIOS/UEFI menu to change the boot order by pressing Fn+F2. As you directly notice you can't even see the DVD drive.

In the following you should select 'Boot Mode' and chose 'Legacy Support' instead of 'UEFI'.

And in 'Boot Priority' you should also change from 'UEFI First' to 'Legacy First'.


Go to 'Exit Saving Changes' and open the BIOS again. Now you can see a bit more and also the DVD drive like you were used to in the older days.

Finally you should put the DVD in the first position ahead of the HDD. Save the changes and your inserted DVD will boot.

You'll be able now to install Windows 7, 8, 10 or anything from your DVD drive.