Trouble with stray graphics & dots...

[admin]

If you read our warnings on our CDR page towards the bottom, we list "random dots" in the characters and background as the first sign of a CDR drive that is not certified for CDG. Looks like that may be your problem.

W return those Plextors that fail our testing, so a non-MTU Plextor may have problems that we would have caught.

My guess is that our Plextor drives would do a better job, but bad media will still cause a "mis-read". I talked to one user who said ONE TRACK on a SC disk took 25 minutes with our Plextor and Microstudio to read in. He let it run, and when it was done, the .cdg file was there and was good.

Microstudio will retry until it gets a good read on each sector from a bad Disc. Using any other CDR drive than Plextor is adding gasoline to the fire.

Getting a bad .kma file is the sum of all the things that can go wrong:

1. Bad media (scratched, dirty, fingerprints, poor reflectivity product,
   
   
2. Non-Certified CDG Drive, or one with a dirty laser (everyone should clean their's periodically), or one with a lower laser output, or poor lenses that don't focus as well.
   
   
3. Bad cables hey, it can happen!
   
   
4. Not using Hoster or Microstudio software. This doesn't apply to importing .kma files as only Hoster does that. However, it does apply to other files like BIN, MP3+G or ZIP that Hoster 3.100 will allow adding to Hoster's Songs Database. Whatever condition these are in, is what will get into Hoster. If they were imported with a bad drive, they will look worse than KMA files would from the same CDG Disc.