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In optical drives (CD, DVD, BluRay etc), the laser automatically follows the groove by moving the lens sideways (tracking). This is necessary, since tracks on optical discs are neither perfectly centered nor perfectly circular.
In optical drives (CD, DVD, BluRay etc), the laser automatically follows the groove by moving the lens sideways (tracking). This is necessary, since tracks on optical discs are neither perfectly centered nor perfectly circular.


The PlayStation exploits this inherent feature of the CD format by having a specially crafted wobbly groove at the beginning of each original disc. The console now monitors the tracking movements the laser has to do to follow this groove and extracts a signal out of this. After this, a string can be extracted from that signal. This string is either SCEI (for Japan and Asia discs), SCEA (for North America discs) or SCEE (for all PAL region discs). The console then compares this to a string it expects, which differs depending on the region of the console. Hence, this method combines both, copy protection and region locking.
The PlayStation exploits this inherent feature of the CD format by having a specially crafted wobbly groove at the beginning of each original disc. The console now monitors the tracking movements the laser has to do to follow this groove and extracts a signal out of this. After this, a string can be extracted from that signal. This string is either SCEI (for Japan and Asia discs), SCEA (for North America discs) or SCEE (for all PAL region discs). The console then compares this to a string it expects, which differes depending on the region of the console. Hence, this method combines both, copy protection and region locking.


The exact way this signal is being extracted by the drive electronics and how it's compared differs between [[Motherboards|motherboard revisions]]. E.g. PU-7, PU-8 and PU-16 have the circuit built from discrete op-amps and passive components, PU-18 and PU-20 use a semi-custom analog IC, and PU-22 and all later boards do all of this inside the DSP/CD-ROM decoder/SPU combo IC.
The exact way this signal is being extracted by the drive electronics and how it's compared differs between [[Motherboards|motherboard revisions]]. E.g. PU-7, PU-8 and PU-16 have the circuit built from discrete op-amps and passive components, PU-18 and PU-20 use a semi-custom analog IC, and PU-22 and all later boards do all of this inside the DSP/CD-ROM decoder/SPU combo IC.
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