XBOX Samsung Drive will read backups but not genuine games

I picked up two XBOX systems today, and one has a corrupt BIOS. So I took it apart and took the DVD Drive out to see if the drive is ok. It can read backups but not pressed discs, so I cleaned the laser and removed any dust from the draw and still the same thing. The tray also doesn't close easily. I'm guessing the laser is on it's way out or something but no sure why it can't read original games.

I've also tweaked the pot and the same issue.

Anyone ever experienced this?

 

Yup, replace the laser. However, if the BIOS needs sorting too, you need to weigh up whether it's worth spending time on that machine.

 

Believe it or not retro, it needed tray alignment again, works wonders now. Thanks for your input too by the way

 

Ahh, interesting! Was the tray off the runner, or was it a height issue?

 

There's a white part that hooks into under the tray, I guess that was knocked out of place. I just made sure the laser mech was 50% up and slide the tray back in. Usually that white part under the tray needs to be aligned otherwise the tray won't work correctly, so I guess the mech wasn't moving to the security part of the DVD, hence why the laser would only read back ups. I think I explained this correctly

 

The security stuff is all over the disc. There would be one or two games that would boot without need the laser go to the end of the disc.

The method MS uses for security on legit discs rely on the random placement of intentional bad sectors on certain areas of the disc.

But it was very interesting the way you fixed it. Sadly the samsung drive has the horrible problem with the tray not ejecting sometimes ...

 

i had a brand new xbox console sealed once had samsung would not read some games but work with others weird drive it was.