May 26, 2026
Disc drama: ripped and furious
Modern Blu-ray drives can now rip GameCube, Wii, and Xbox 360 games to PC
Old game discs just got a surprise comeback — and the comments went feral
TLDR: Some modern Blu-ray drives can now back up old console game discs to a PC, which could make saving aging game collections much easier. Commenters were split between excitement, legal panic over copy protection, and the kind of tiny design complaints only the internet could turn into a subplot.
Retro gamers just got a new party trick: some modern Blu-ray drives can now copy old game discs from systems like the GameCube, Wii, original Xbox, Xbox 360, and even Dreamcast onto a PC. The big deal here is simple: what used to require messing with the console itself can now, for some people, be done with a compatible disc drive and special firmware from OmniDrive. In plain English, it means backing up aging game collections may suddenly be much easier — if your drive is supported and if you don’t accidentally turn it into an expensive paperweight.
But the real show is in the comments, where the crowd instantly split into the usual internet factions: the helpful link droppers, the legality alarm bells, and the been-there-since-the-Wii-era veterans. One user basically kicked the door open with a bare-bones “tl;dr” and a GitHub link, which is peak internet efficiency. Another went straight into nitpick mode, asking why the project used a green X to mean “not supported,” a tiny detail that somehow became comedy all by itself. And then came the serious fight: one commenter flatly declared that bypassing copy protection is illegal, preservation talk or not, tossing cold water on the celebratory mood.
Meanwhile, an old-school user rolled in with a personal story about buying two Wiis decades ago and backing up pricey games before scratched discs could destroy family peace. That memory-lane flex gave the whole thing a weirdly wholesome edge: part tech breakthrough, part preservation mission, part comment-section cage match.
Key Points
- •OmniDrive has released firmware that allows certain modern Blu-ray drives to read proprietary game discs from older consoles on a PC.
- •The firmware only works with select internal and external Blu-ray drives using the MediaTek MT1959 chipset and listed as supported by OmniDrive.
- •Supported console formats named in the article include the original Xbox, Xbox 360, GameCube, Wii, and Dreamcast.
- •In the demonstration, a compatible drive running OmniDrive firmware and Media Preservation Frontend successfully ripped an Xbox 360 disc to an ISO file.
- •The article says this approach is simpler than older backup methods that often required modifying the original console, but warns incompatible firmware flashing can brick a drive.