My DVD drive has a problem. Lately, it has been refusing to acknowledge many home-burned CD-ROMs that I place into it. It’s consistently fine with commercially produced audio CDs, CD-ROMs, and DVDs. But for most home-burned CD-ROMs, it seems to think there’s nothing in the drive.
Now, other than the fact that I need a new drive…heaven only knows just what’s wrong here…is this a logical distinction for a (however faulty) drive to obey? Is there some genuine difference between the way a home user’s CD-RW drive burns a CD and the way a mass producer’s machine would burn one that might make the drive not “see” the former but act totally fine with the latter? Track location, perhaps?
Commercial CD-ROMs are “pressed” much like records. The pressing puts a series of pits on the disc, much like the grooves in a record too. CD burners use a laser to burn a similar pattern onto a layer of dye on the disc.
If the CD-R discs you’re trying to read are old, it could be a case of “disc rot”. Many of my older CD-R discs from 1997 won’t read at all anymore, even though they’ve been carefully kept in a binder in a climate-controlled house.
If the CD-R discs you’re read are new, I find this is a sign of either a failing or dirty drive. You can shell out $10-$15 for a drive cleaning kit, but if the drive is older than a year or so, just replace it. A new CD-ROM drive doesn’t cost more than $30 these days - heck, I just bought a 52x black CD-RW drive for $48.
Oooooops! Forgot that you had a DVD drive. I also just bought a black Sony 16x DVD drive for $33 from Newegg - regular beige ones are a couple of dollars less. Why spend $10 on a possible fix when you can get a sure fix for only $20 more?
I have the same problem with some 3 month old home burned CD’s on a 6 month old DVD player. The CD rom drive reads them just fine. I’d say that your cheaper DVD players have trouble reading the discs. Just my opinion though.
Also, note that a CD-RW, works differently from a CD-R. The RW uses a laser to melt a Phase Change Compound. Depending on how long you leave the compound above its crystallization temperature, it will cool to either an amorphous or a crystalline state. The crystalline state reflects the read laser, while the amorphous state absorbs it.
You’ve neglected to mention if these are only discs you’ve produced yourself, or include ones from other CD burners. (Thought I admit it’s probably your DVD ROM, as you’re probably not leaving the disk open, using a double density burner, etc.)
From what your OP has described I think the culprit is “not finalizing the disc”.
When you burn a disc at home using your software (I use Nero) most of the time the disc is not finalized.When you finalize the disc,further writing on the disc is not possible.
When you purchase commercial discs they are always finalized but as mentioned above this might not be a case with your domestically burned disc.
Try to burn a disc by finalizing it and then try to use it.Theres a good possibilty that this may work.
The OP says that this is a recent problem, implying (to me at least) that some home-burnt CDs that used to work don’t any more. This seems to me to be more symptomatic of a DVD drive that is slowly going out of alignment, but is still capable of reading commercially-produced discs with their higher pit/land contrast. If the problem were with finalization, the drive would never have been able to read these discs.
OOPPSIES!! I guess you are right Antonius Block.
sorry cmkeller I guess this means you will have to shell out a few doubloons for the new drive or a cleaning kit.
In order to find out what plays on your machine, I would have to know the make of the dvd or cd writer, the firmware you are using for it, the writing software, the type of computer & the media type. It’s almost a media issue…get the right media for your machine.
Many earlier model DVD players have a tough time reading home-burned CDs. There may be nothing at all wrong, just that your player (like my 2 year old Denon) is one of those that has problems with burned CDs.
I do not have a CD-RW drive. The disks I refer to are exclusively by other people.
The disks I’m referring to definitely used to work. More importantly, they still work…on other people’s drives.
The DVD drive is definitely a cheap one. It’s made by some company based in Taiwan that I don’t even remember the name of (it came as part of my computer, two years ago). I suspect that the problem is this “mis-alignment”, and the only solution will be to buy a new one.
I had the same thing happen to me with my DVD drive. And a while after that, it stopped reading pressed cds, and then DVDs. Get a new drive. As many have pointed out, they’re pretty cheap now.
OK, so the consensus here is that I should buy a new DVD drive. Anyone have any specific brand or store recommendations? Any good “price-watch” type of sites for such things? (I checked on MySimon,com,. but the prices they list are a bit steep for my taste.) I wouldn’t mind getting a combo DVD/CD-RW drive, but that much is definitely not a necessity.