I bought God Of War 2 yesterday, eager to maim and slaughter stuff. The copy I bought was brand new, platinum version. I put it into my old PS2, it struggles with the disc and to my horror, the words 'Disc read error' appeared. With my dad's advice, I inserted a special cleaning DVD into my PS2, and God Of War 2 had no problems loading. It was working well up until I got to the part after I killed the colossus and Zeus was killing me in a lengthy cutscene. It kept stuttering very badly, all the way through it. The cutscene passed (it was very depressing with the damn stuttering) and the gameplay was normal. So I continued, thinking it was a one off, when it once again stuttered like mad through the scene where you meet the guy who has his guts eaten everyday by a bird. I turned it off and went back to it half and hour later. It got through the cutscene without a problem this time around and I thought all was well. Then it did it again, 20 minutes into the game like last time.

I think it might be my PS2 at fault, coz it is 7 years old and it has on a rare occasion struggled with the games I've played, but its never done something like this before. Do I need a new one? Its not the disc coz its got no scratches on it, and apart from the cutscenes, it works fine. Is my PS2 on a slow death?

Trying manually cleaning the lazor, my ps2 used to get those errors all the time, but after I cleaned the lazor it was as good as new. Games load within 3 seconds, You can play DVDs on it and no more disk read errors. Heres a guide on how to do it:

http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/hardware/ps2.ars

Or you can just PM or something, I do it once every few months or so.

The whole process shouldn't take longer than 20 minutes.

I bought the Ps2 on launch and I never had a problem with it until just before I bought the ps3. I took it apart and cleaned the lazer myself. Note though, you might want to look online at ways to do it (cause I didn't) and I was sooo freaking close to riping the ribbon off. They put that thing so it comes off right when you open it, if you don't expect it to be there. Being a computer tech though, I was carefull enough.

i had the same problems just before the launch of the ps3 too funnily enough, it seems they timed it really well! haha, but i manually cleaned mine too, first time i did it i read online and it worked fine, second time i thought "i remember how to do it" ripped the casing off along with the ribbon! took me a good hour to get it all back together but i managed to eventually and now its never worked better! i just used disc cleaning cloths to clean the lazer, i duno if thats the right thing to do but it worked, but yeah read up online first

Yeah, since when you open the ps2 all warrents are void...I think they put that ribbon there on purpose...so if you open and rip it off, they don't have to fix it for free...then you've gotta fork out the cash if you don't know how to put it back on.

Smart job by sony...


*those sneaky basterds*

haha yeah, but the ribbon also actually connects the power buttons to the console its self, its just a matter of finding the right socket to put it back into. but yeah its also a warrenty thing, but i think also the casing its self has a warrenty sticker around it so as soon as u lift that off anyways ur void, i duno, up to u if u wanna risk it i guess, ur warrenty has probably run out anyways..

It probably has dust in it. I use a cotton swab to clean the dust out.

Yeah, its true that after I used the special cleaning DVD, it did actually read the disc. It prob does need a clean, but I'm getting a vibe in my bones that I may have to buy a new PS2.

Ya most likely your PS2 days are becoming numbered. I had some problems also with my PS2 like not being able to play DVD's anymore and losing the ability to play PS1 games.

Not much sense in buying a new ps2 until after you open the one you have and clean it manualy. I'd say that gives you like a 70% chance of making it work better again. And its quick, just a few minutes.

yeah like solidfox said u may as well give it a clean first, see if it works and if it does then great, put the money u had for a new ps2 to the side or towards a ps3 or sumthin, but if it still doesnt work then i guess a new ps2 is the way to go...

Er, I never said I wouldn't try to clean it. I'm gonna do it this weekend (well, actually my dad's gonna do it).