AIMS educational Alternate Versions

Among the latest batch Blazers has been kind enough to send my way for dumping, is a handful of the AIMS discs.

If you have a look below, you'll see the top disc is a little brighter yellow than the bottom one (more orange-ish). Additionally the top disc has a clear ring, whereas the bottom disc has a silver inner area:

 

These differentiations bring up some interesting questions. Blazers sent a single copy of each title, so I had to have a look in the redump database to compare an already existing dump of Animal Communities. My dump is here, a pre-existing dump is here. The dumps share the same PVD date and when using IsoBuster to browse the disc contents the dates on the root files look to be the same as well. Now notice the mastering codes of both entries - they're completely different. These clues point to the fact that at least Animal Communities received a second pressing - and possibly all the AIMS learning titles did. While in this instance the two different pressings have different hashes, this is likely due some mastering quirk - as may very well be the case with any other titles which were repressed.

On top - Blazers copy of Animal Communities with a "W.O." in the mastering code.

On bottom - Blazers copy of "The Civil War: Four Years..." with the serial number (as printed on the disc label) in the mastering code.

The good news about these Alternate versions is that you can identify which is undumped by the color of the disc label and the inner hole back area (clear vs silver) if you're browsing ebay for pictures.