Most Unreliable Console?

General and high profile video game topics.
Sut
Posts: 845
Joined: April 8th, 2015, 4:23 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby Sut » December 19th, 2016, 9:47 am

Well after having a tinker and replacing the fuse in the PSU (built into the ST unfortunately) it did the same thing again. So looks like a new PSU is needed fortunately some guy from the ST forums has refurbished ones at a fair price.

So will look to get it back up and running in the new year.

VideoGameCritic wrote:I'm also a former Atari ST owner - I had the 1040 model back in the day. Sometimes I think about picking up another one. I remember some excellent games like Time Bandits, Starglider, Winter Games, Double Dragon, and some motorcycle game. But hearing about their lack of durability makes me think twice.


Never realised the ST was much of a thing stateside. If you do take the plunge make sure you check out the European game library think the total stands at a couple of thousand. Like most home computers the ST didn't have any quality controls like consoles do but there are definitely some gaming gems in there.

Alucard1191
Posts: 476
Joined: November 16th, 2016, 12:55 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby Alucard1191 » December 19th, 2016, 5:18 pm

Add me to those on here that have said NES and Dreamcast.

My NES was removed from my possession in the mid 90's, but it had all sorts of issues. I would have to stack a 2nd cartridge into it to hold the one I was trying to play in place, the connectors were going, etc. I have no doubt that the NES would not have survived my various moves I've had over my life.

My Dreamcast also is in bad shape. It won't read the vast majority of my games, MvC2 is the only game I have that consistently reads, and it has issues, skips, etc.

On the flip side, my SNES and Saturn are tough as nails. The controllers have held up extremely well over the years, and they all have gotten a lot of play. My N64 and Dreamcast controllers have not aged well at all, and replacing them is actually pretty high on my priorities list.

While many people have said they've had bad luck with PS2s, I'm on my original and it doesn't have any problems at all. The controllers are for the most part durable, but one of my 4 controllers has a bad analog stick.

I think that the SNES is the toughest system I have overall, with the PS2 or the Saturn for CD based systems.

I have actually been really disappointed with my DC overall. When I was reading the Critic's system reviews, he really speaks highly of the system, but I find it to be my least played, most difficult system. Now, my game selection isn't fantastic, but I have a ton of "the hits." Virtua Tennis, Crazy Taxi, Power Stone 2, Soul Caliber, MvC2, etc... and I still play it the absolute least of all my systems. I probably haven't found the right game yet to get me hooked... but with its reliability issues I view the system overall poorly.

I really like my Saturn though, which the Critic grades much more harshly overall than the Dreamcast. It's really interesting to see the differences in opinions brought on by this site. So many different types of gamers.

CharlieR
Posts: 429
Joined: April 23rd, 2016, 8:04 am

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby CharlieR » December 28th, 2016, 6:37 pm

Anyone else have problems with gamecube? Mine doesn't really load melee (of all games,) but it works fine on my wii. Other games don't load that great, but on my wii, they play fine.

User avatar
Rev
Posts: 1487
Joined: April 7th, 2015, 7:31 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby Rev » December 29th, 2016, 12:09 pm

It's possible that the Wii reads scratched discs better than the gamecube which could be the reason for the problem. I've had a gamecube since it was launched in the U.S. And mine still works fine... My Wii is actually in worse shape lol.

User avatar
Retro STrife
Posts: 2531
Joined: August 3rd, 2015, 7:40 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby Retro STrife » December 29th, 2016, 1:10 pm

Rev wrote:It's possible that the Wii reads scratched discs better than the gamecube which could be the reason for the problem. I've had a gamecube since it was launched in the U.S. And mine still works fine... My Wii is actually in worse shape lol.


I'd agree with Rev. I remember that, back in the day, my copy of Final Fantasy 9 on PS1 had a glitch that froze my PS1 every time. Finally, I was able to get past it by taking it to my friend's house who had a PS2. The PS2 skipped when it got to the glitch, but then got past it. I've also noticed that heavily-scratched PS1 games usually work better in a PS2. Same concept with GC and Wii. The Wii's disc-reading technology is likely better than what's in the GC.

Alucard1191
Posts: 476
Joined: November 16th, 2016, 12:55 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby Alucard1191 » December 29th, 2016, 8:38 pm

Retro STrife wrote:
Rev wrote:It's possible that the Wii reads scratched discs better than the gamecube which could be the reason for the problem. I've had a gamecube since it was launched in the U.S. And mine still works fine... My Wii is actually in worse shape lol.


I'd agree with Rev. I remember that, back in the day, my copy of Final Fantasy 9 on PS1 had a glitch that froze my PS1 every time. Finally, I was able to get past it by taking it to my friend's house who had a PS2. The PS2 skipped when it got to the glitch, but then got past it. I've also noticed that heavily-scratched PS1 games usually work better in a PS2. Same concept with GC and Wii. The Wii's disc-reading technology is likely better than what's in the GC.


I can second this for the PS2. My monster rancher 2 and Castlevania SOTN barely function on my PS1, but they both work more or less fine in my PS2. MR2 can have some long loads, and Castlevania's music skips sometimes, but they've worked for nearly 2 decades now and have hundreds of gameplay hours on both.

I love backwards compatibility, but that seems to be going away. The Wii U plays Wii games...? Do the other systems do that? Can an Xbox One play 360 or original Xbox games? Does the PS4 play PS3 games?

User avatar
Rev
Posts: 1487
Joined: April 7th, 2015, 7:31 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby Rev » December 29th, 2016, 10:02 pm

Alucard1191 wrote:
Retro STrife wrote:
Rev wrote:It's possible that the Wii reads scratched discs better than the gamecube which could be the reason for the problem. I've had a gamecube since it was launched in the U.S. And mine still works fine... My Wii is actually in worse shape lol.


I'd agree with Rev. I remember that, back in the day, my copy of Final Fantasy 9 on PS1 had a glitch that froze my PS1 every time. Finally, I was able to get past it by taking it to my friend's house who had a PS2. The PS2 skipped when it got to the glitch, but then got past it. I've also noticed that heavily-scratched PS1 games usually work better in a PS2. Same concept with GC and Wii. The Wii's disc-reading technology is likely better than what's in the GC.


I can second this for the PS2. My monster rancher 2 and Castlevania SOTN barely function on my PS1, but they both work more or less fine in my PS2. MR2 can have some long loads, and Castlevania's music skips sometimes, but they've worked for nearly 2 decades now and have hundreds of gameplay hours on both.

I love backwards compatibility, but that seems to be going away. The Wii U plays Wii games...? Do the other systems do that? Can an Xbox One play 360 or original Xbox games? Does the PS4 play PS3 games?


Since the Xbox 360, Microsoft has stuck with emulating their consoles for backwards compatibility- meaning you can download an official emulator from Microsoft which will play "some" of the previous generations games on the console. The Xbox One cannot play original Xbox titles though. Through patches and updates you can play more and more releases but since the backwards compatibility isn't built into the hardware itself the games may not play as well on the Xbox One as they would on the original hardware (graphical and musical glitches, games freezing, etc).

The PS4 is not backwards compatible at all. The original fat PS3 was backwards compatible with the PS2 and PS1 however the slim PS3 and future models were only backwards compatible with PS1 games (all PS3s can play PS1 games). The fat PS3s are coveted due to the full backwards compatibility however they are well known for dying due to the Yellow Ring of Death. Even if they get fixed it is a temporary fix at best, thus they are getting quite rare.

The Wii U is backwards compatible with Wii, and the Wii is backwards compatible with the NGC. I believe this is built into the hardware for both consoles meaning they should run fine. The Wii U might actually emulate instead of it being built into the console as I've noticed that the console pulls up the old Wii channel and menus when I've used it... Not sure on this one although it seems to have full (or nearly full) backwards compatibility with Wii games.

User avatar
LS650
Posts: 71
Joined: April 8th, 2015, 11:03 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby LS650 » December 30th, 2016, 12:38 am

I've found consoles to be generally pretty reliable. I'm trying to think of one that failed. Except for a 1977 6-switch Atari that needed a regulator replaced, I've never had a console break down.

Now _controllers_... there's a different story.

Alucard1191
Posts: 476
Joined: November 16th, 2016, 12:55 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby Alucard1191 » December 31st, 2016, 2:24 pm

Thanks for answering my backwards compatibility question so thoroughly. The is unfortunate that practically none of the new systems have that. Wii U having Wii compatibility is nice, if I get that I could feasibly sell my old Wii system, (My GC still works perfectly fine, that machine is really tough.) but if I wanted to play fairly modern games I'm looking at a PS3, PS4, 3 X-Box systems, and a Wii U. That is a lot of machinery. I hope some comes through my wife's thrift shop. So far I've gotten an NES (With ducktales!) and a copy of Mortal Kombat II on my SNES.

I'm going to need a heck of a set up to play such a myriad of systems.

I'm curious if anyone out there has a Turbografix 16 and how that holds up? What is the difference with the CD vs cartridge format?

I'm just going to keep on asking questions in this massive thread apparently, lol.

/Current system wishlist:
1) Genesis
2) old 8-bit computer, Apple II, C64, etc.
3) Turbographix 16

None of the new systems have really interested me so far. I guess I'm just a retro kind of guy.

Alucard1191
Posts: 476
Joined: November 16th, 2016, 12:55 pm

Re: Most Unreliable Console?

Postby Alucard1191 » December 31st, 2016, 2:40 pm

Having now officially read the thread, I'm amazed how many people have had PS2 issues. My PS2 was either a launch model or an early revision, (It is the normal big type, and I bought it when the system was new, not at launch, but within the first year or 2 of release) and it is an absolute beast. I said earlier that it reads games that my PS1 has a hard time with. I've dropped it, moved in and out of 2 apartments and 3 houses, and I used to lug it to friends houses that didn't have the system. (My friends all jumped on the X-box wagon and got sucked into the Halo era pretty hard... I was playing mainly RPGs and adventure games, just like today.)

Anyway, it is one of my most stable systems. It is absolutely in my top 3 played systems, having received easily hundreds to thousands of hours of gameplay. It reads fine, it isn't super loud, controllers are good, etc. (I just loaded up Final Fantasy Tactics yesterday, and I had three save files, with combined time at almost 200 hours... and that of course doesn't count the many deaths and retries...)

Almost all my other cd based systems have some sort of issue though, from minor (GC button sticking, controllers not in best shape) to major. (Dreamcast barely reads games... in fact, only MvC2 reads consistently.)

Did I get the toyota of PS2's? If so, I count myself blessed.


Return to “Video Games General”