DVD WRITER

TUSHU · July 5th, 2009, 07:39 AM

DEAR SIR,
I HAVE A SONY DVD WRITER INSTALLED IN MY PC(INTEL CORE 2 DUO 1.8 GHZ), OS XP2. FROM LAST 2 MONTHS IT FAILS TO RECOGNISE A BLANK DVD. AS I INSERT A BLANK DVD, THE ICON OF THE DRIVE IN 'MY COMPUTER' CHANGES TO CD ROM, AND IT SHOWS THAT FREE SPACE 0 BYTES AND USED SPACE0 BYTES. IT CAN RECOGNISE AND BURN CDS VERY EASILY.
AFTER 3 FORMATS OF C DRIVE, I PURCHASED A NEW LG DVD WRITER. SAME PROBLEM. IT ALSO DOES NOT RECOGNISE BLANK DVD. WHEN I USE LIVE CD LINUX, I CAN BURN DVDS VERY EASILY, BUT XP2 HAS SOME PROBLEM.
THERE IS SO MUCH DATA STORED IN THE OTHERS PARTITIONS THAT I CANNOT FORMAT ENTIRE HARD DISK TO ELIMINATE THE BUG. PLEASE ADVICE.
EARLIER I HAD VERY EASILY BURNED DVDS. THIS IS ONLY A RECENT PHENOMENON.

Aaron_8015 · July 5th, 2009, 07:53 AM

What software are you usin to burn the disks? Have you switched to a different manufacture of DVD-R?

Also Using CAPS in forums is seen as shouting, we are capable of reading lower case.

TUSHU · July 5th, 2009, 08:03 AM

Dear Sir,
The softwares that I have used are magic iso, infra recorder, and ofcourse Nero 7. Actually,I don't even have to use a burning software. Just inserting a blank dvd into the writer and right clicking and seeing properties, shows that there is no free space. I have tried 4 different brands of blank dvds available (Sony, Samsung, Writex, Moserbaer). Same result everytime.
But same rejected dvds are recording fine when I use them in linux(since I have two writers now) I can use live linux in one and another writer to burn.

glendalf81 · July 5th, 2009, 09:03 AM

i had a similar problem which was fixed by updating the drives firmware, you could give that a go

osprey4 · July 5th, 2009, 10:00 AM

Tushu:

Windows XP cannot write to DVD media, nor are the context menus capable of seeing disc space, for the same reason. So when you insert a blank disc, the OS cannot recognize the disc and it shows up as a CD.

Please use Nero to write to blank DVDs. If you employ the multi-session technique, you will be able to write multiple times, and Nero will be able to show you the available space.

TUSHU · July 5th, 2009, 10:31 AM

Dear Sirs, Osprey4 and Glendalf81,
As I have said, I had purchased a new LG Drive to overcome this problem as I had feared that My Sony drive was damaged. But the problem persisted. Again, this problem has surfaced only 2 months ago. Earlier I had burned many dvds with my sony drive without any problem. It was usually multisession and the Nero 7 disc info gave true disc usage information always. In fact even now once in a while( once in 4 to 5 tries) Magic iso still recognses the dvd with true space information and even writes to it. But most of the time there is an error while verifying the written data, so I have almost abandoned the idea of using XP2 for the time being and burn dvds to store extra data through KB3 burner of Linux. I have almost copied most of the data stored in dozens of dvds and now in a few days I am thinking of wiping off/formating total machine and then try once again and see what happens.
I have even updated and installed intel's latest BIOS just in case it might help. But ofcourse no help.
Thanks for repllies and I am hoping to find a bulls eye answer through all of yours guidance and help.

osprey4 · July 5th, 2009, 03:42 PM

Your strategy of reinstalling the operating system is probably your best bet. The chances of this being a hardware issue are remote.

TUSHU · July 6th, 2009, 08:00 AM

Thanks Osprey4,
your confirmation/affirmation to my idea has given me more courage. By the way, I have decided to upgrade from XP2 to XP3. I am also thinking of downloading latest BIOS version from intel site and install it too. Perhaps all these in conjuction might solve the problem.

TUSHU · July 23rd, 2009, 11:47 AM

Dear Sirs,
At last I have been able to solve the problem of dvd writers not recognising blank dvds.
I formatted my computer ,loaded XP3 and even upgraded BIOS but it did not solve the problem. Then I came to know about Windows XP Ultimate (by Johnny). I downloaded the dvd iso image from their site and installed it. This solved the problem in one go. Both my dvds now recognise blank dvds with correct info about blank/usable space etc. I have even burned couple of dvds today and it works perfectly. Though the software is very big it has got several brilliant features added to it.
Thanks to all who tried to help me out. I will certainly inform about any future development.