Braintrash

I don't believe I have been demeaning and insulting and I can say for sure it wasn't my attention. I don't mean to insult anyone, although I don't mind pushing the arguments and I also don't mind someone pushing his arguments against me. Then, the frontier between push someone and hurting someone vary from one individual to another and if there is one thing that causes democracy to die is to care about people feeling hurt when pushed, because then, everybody says he was hurt and we can't argue anymore; that results in a dead end. If someone think I treated him an idiot, he's welcome to prove me wrong. When I am proven wrong, I don't feel like I lost, but like I learned something, which is always a win. As such, rather than trying to attack me on my way to say things, prove that my arguments are wrong and admit they are right (either is good ), that will be a better subject than comparing opinions about what can considered harsh talk or not.

Opinions are to be belittled while arguments aren't; he used opinions while I used arguments.

Simply because being not (rather than "NOT"; caps are for yelling) involved with both parties, I can add a neutral point of view, something which was missing from the debate. The world is not binary, only digital —and thus, limited— systems are.

I am not Deunan, nor am I a friend of him of whatever. I bought one unit from him and that's mostly all the talk I had with him. My aim here is to understand your complaints, because I don't really think you got the point but that may be a misunderstanding. As such, I will go one point at a time. 1. Lack of professionalism. So far, for his first public project, I think he did very well. He was clear about things, have been very transparent and has always explained why he did the things the way he did them. The few e-mails I exchanged with him were polite and nice. Overall, I have the image of a serious guy and he has been professional so far. Anyway, I don't think that's an important point; he did something that nobody else did so far and that alone is more pro than all other DC modders. 2. Lack of teamwork. We live in a free world. At least, I live in a free one, but your mileage may vary according to your geographic location and beliefs and kinks. Being free means that I can do my stuff alone or in a team; my choice. Forcing someone to be part of a team when he doesn't want to is not freedom, it's socialism at best, communism at worst. It's a spoiled child attitude: "I want the thing he doesn't have and I want it on my terms and I will cry and curse if I don't get it." That's currently what you seem to be doing there. As for the improvement and help, there is clearly a lack of information on your side. First, following the project for years, GD-EMU has came through many iterations before being publicly sold. It's not anymore a beta, it's a fully working product that does exactly what the advert say it does. No more but no less, which is way more than many commercial products sold by Fortune 500 companies that you buy without complaining. But, as usual, David is less impressive than Goliath... Second, how could you help him? This offer for help appear more as a rip off — let me use your project and I will make money of your work — than real help. Because, let's be serious: Deunan has made a working Dreamcast emu and a working GD-ROM emu. He is so far the only one known person in the world to have successfully done both of that. There are other attempts, but nothing fully working so far. Meanwhile, many people come bullshitting him about technical aspects they don't have a clue about. That doesn't help at all and is, indeed, a reason to remain alone on the project, because releasing GD-EMU instantly turns you as a honeypot for trouble. If I was Deunan, I would see any help offer as a Chinese attempt to rip off, like you can see everyday on the modding market. Especially when you don't have credentials and still you tell him that things are wrong with his work. Sorry, that's not professional, that's childish. 3. Lack of proper channels of communication. Replacing a DC's controller port. Wow! I'm impressed. Not. Everyone can do that. That's fucking simple. A child can do it. A blind child could do it. Sorry, but that's just a joke to brag about being able to do that. Man, come again bragging when you will be able to design your own GD-EMU based on your sole knowledge. Then, you will be a "HUGE Dreamcast nut". Anyway, Deunan can be easily reached, especially since you found his e-mail, which is publicly disclose very easily, especially since all preorders are made through his e-mail... 4. Lack of region support. Here comes why you are not a "HUGE Dremacast nut" and why you can't help him. I don't mean to be rude, but you totally show a lack of understanding. First, GD-EMU is a GD-ROM emulator, which means it is meant to replace the original GD-ROM unit with a SD unit that will work exactly like the GD-ROM unit (excepted from faster boot times, but we won't complain, will we?). Second, the original GD-ROM unit doesn't interfere on the disc region. In fact, it has nothing to do with the disc region and it doesn't care about it, it just passes the information contained in the disc to the Dreamcast internal chips which then decide what to do with it. So basically, we have to way to bypass region: either though hardware (using a BIOS mod) or software (using a disc, like Utopia or Dreamshell, that will patch on the fly the region information that is given to the Dreamcast internal chips). What does it tell us? It tells us that the GD-ROM is never and has never had an actual role to region by-passing. And since GD-EMU is only a GD-ROM replacement, it is not mandatory for it to have it and it shouldn't be automatic. Why? Because, first, many people already have modded DC, using various methods (mine is a Sakura Taisen unit, with region free BIOS, debug BIOS intro, scanlines 3-way switch and VGA + audio through USB), and having two region bypass together could be a source of problems, depending on how the modding is done. Then, GD-EMU can boot Dreamshell and do the region bypass if your Dreamcast is not modded. You can even try with Utopia. It works, because GD-EMU works like a real GD-ROM unit. And Deunan is still the only who publicly achieved it so far. Also, as a matter of fact, Deunan is working on a menu and even publicly said that a region bypass option in the menu was an easy thing and that he might do it. And guess what? Because of an actual feedback made to him, using polite words; talk about not supporting the product! You want to be heard? First, do your math and come with an actual and serious demand and, most of all, don't be agressive like you are. But still, the region bypass wouldn't be a magic trick. Some games don't work correctly when region patched, and it's not a region bypassing method problem, and a problem about how the game was programmed, just like the VGA mode; not all games respond correctly to it, just look at Bangaio. For these problematic games to work, it would need a complete reprogramming of them; meanwhile, many clueless people would complain about the patch not working for all games and anyone having experience with dealing with customers knows that explaining why over and over will never satisfy the said customers. So, by leaving it alone, Deunan avoid a lot of unnecessary problems and I think it is a smart move from him. BTW, he already has issued a firmware update, so you can't really say he's not working seriously on GD-EMU. Then, if you were here for the hobby, you would grow quickly bored working on the thing you master and that is basically done. A real hacker like new challenges and that basically is what Saturn and PC Engine offers. Do you always play the same level of the same game? I highly doubt it. In the end, what's happening is that: 1. You are useless to the community (many enough people can do more than you in a way that you can die right now, things will still be done). 2. Deunan has wrote a working DC emulator and gave it to people for free and he has also made a GD-ROM replacement unit that he decided to sell so that others can enjoy it. And he's the only one having a working publicly available product. I guess the point is made. The one with the stuffed ass is you, because all you have are your complain while Deunan and it's happy customers have a future-proof Dreamcast. Still, I wish you good luck.