a couple of questions

[thx4allthefish]

Hello,I have a couple questions,I'm not sure if they
belong here.sorry if it's the wrong place.

question 1) is there a ps2 memory card reader for pc?
I'm thinking about an usb device like the ones that
read camera's memory cards. is there such a thing?.
(the idea is to store the contents in a regular pc file
in order to backup it. like the ps1 memory card files
from the emulators).

question 2) I've noticed almost all of the dvds I've burned
have dark little spots that are the same color than the not-recorded
area. I panicked "AAAAAAAHHH!,NOW I'LL HAVE TO DOWNLOAD AND BURN
EVERYTHING AGAAAAIN!!" and "AAAAAAAGH!!,THE BURNER IS FAILING ALREADY?!",
but,I found out that the stuff is readable,the data is not corrupted,so...
what are those dark spots?. I never got a buffer underrun error,
and I did several obsessive tests to the discs and everything was ok.
should I worry and get a)another brand of media b)another burner?.
by the way,after the first "spotted disc" I check every disc for spots,
it seems the "magic spot fairy" came when I was sleeping,opened the cases,
used his/her magic spot wand,and created the dark spots in the discs.
I'm sure most of the discs had nothing unusual,they were just stored in
their cases and the next time I checked,they had the spots,
so,I'm really confused about this. I guess it's not the "dvd rot" problem
because the media has less than a year,and the data is readable,but
I really don't know if I should worry or if it's "normal".
oh,I use tdk or sony media,(hp sometimes),and before I forget,
my tests on the affected discs were:

i)basic copy/paste test: I copied the files to the hard disk and they
were readable.

ii)sfv test: I compared the files both with the original ones in the
hard disk and with copies on cd,and they were ok.

iii)cdmage test: in discs where the contents were cd isos,I searched for
errors with cdmage and the isos were fine.

iv)decompress test: in discs where the contents were zip or rar files,
I decompressed them and they were ok. (I never use recovery record in
my rar files,so a bad sector would screw it,right?,that's why I'm sure
the file is ok if it decompresses).

v)iso test: if it was a ps2 game,I made an iso with imgburn. none of
the discs had bad sectors.

vi)watching the whole thing: yep,I watched a couple of series all over
again just to make sure all of the avi files were fine and the disc
had no errors. (of course I had already tested the discs with the
other methods,but this was "just to be sure" in a "supersticious" way).

anyway,my question would be,what are the dark spots in the dvds?,
and,should I worry?. considering the data is readable and the stuff
is usable,I don't think it's "dvd rot",at least not the worst case
scenario,should I backup everything before it becomes worse?.

thanks in advance.

ps: yes,I have a lot of free time...

ps2: the burner is a samsung one,I got it this year,and I've used just dvds
with it,(I handle cds with the cd burner),and my motivation is that "fact"
that cds wear out/damage the ps2 lens,so,a corolary would be "cds damge dvd units.period". yes,call me supersticious or ignorant,but I don't want to take any chances.

[The Joker]

1> action replay max i think.

2> can you take a pic of these spots i've never seen any on my CD's

and i don't get the last bullet.

[Dinosaurman]

1> action replay max i think.

2> can you take a pic of these spots i've never seen any on my CD's

and i don't get the last bullet.

1
No.
its a usb flashcard.

2
?

[Panda Man]

I, uh.... can you post an image of said spots like vlame said?

I wouldn't worry too much about it if the disks have no errors

[thx4allthefish]

from what I've found,I guess action replay max allows you to save the memory card contents to an usb drive and then save it to the pc by means of a software it includes,but there's a risk of corrupting the memory card or something like that. I was looking for something more simple,like a reader like the ones avaiable to read a camera's card.

the bullets were descriptions of all the tests I run on the discs,and the last test was just watching entire series (stored in avi files on dvd discs) just to be sure the discs are ok and there are no errors in the files (image or audio corrupted or something like that).

sorry,I can't post a pic because I don't have

a)a camera
b)a cell phone with picture-taking capabilites
c)a web cam
(I never cared about either of those things)

but imagine a tiny little almost microscopic dot colored darker than the rest of the disc. at least different from the recorded area's color,it's the same or almost the same color than the not recorded area.
anyway,I've been doing more tests and everything is fine,the discs are usable and the data is not corrupted,so I'll try to be less picky/paranoid and not worry about it,at least for now,but if I find something,I'll update this just for the sake of the information. (as far as I've "investigated",all I found was about "dvd rot",but it's not the case because in "rotten dvds" the discs become unusable and the data corrupted).

[The Joker]

well if he gets the ar max he'll be able to send his saves to the flash stick via the program on the ar disc.

[Haldrie]

AR MAX only works with PS2 memcards though and uses it's own special format. If he can get uLaunchELF to run with AR MAX (which I've heard you can do but have never tried it) then he can do RAW dumps of both PSX and PS2 memcards. It's a bit more tricky getting them from a emu memcard onto the actual memcard though.