I have an old duplicator using A05 burners. I regularly use 8 x blanks without any problems. I must admit, I had to change my brand. I had problems with Verbvatim. I now use Taio-Yuden. No failures. Hope that helps.

Thanks guys! - Makes my decision transparently simple . . . g

Although I'd like to read some definitive material on the subject, my recent experience supports Bob's suggestion that newer, high speed media can be troublesome in older, slower burners.

I've just run into this situation with two burners. One's a Pioneer DVR 106D and the other is the same device, branded with the Memorex name. I've used both very successfully since late 2003, and most of my burns have been with lower speed DVD-R or DVD-+RW media. I recently used my last of a couple of batches of Ritek & Imation disks, and purchased some Maxells (made by ProDisc) to use with my DVD recorder. They work great on the that, but I've had mixed results in my computer burners.

Sometimes, there'll be a power calibration error. Other times, the disc will seemingly burn ok, but then can't be read afterward, even though (in the case of a data disc) it sails through the post-burn verification. I've tossed a handful of discs and finally concluded that it's media incompatibility, with the newer, faster discs being at fault. The burner manufacturers eventually stop upgrading the firmware to recognize new media types, and at some point you're probably better off replacing your burner.

That's what I did. Got a couple of OEM LiteOns for $36 each, and installed them just yesterday, No more problems.

Have you checked to see if there is a firmware update for your drive? Sometimes that makes it compatible.

Dave T2

I don't think there is a general compatibility issue with buring 16x -R discs in a 4x burner. I do that all the time and it works fine (I'm using TY discs).

Sometimes when supporting a faster speed the actual spec changes... e.g I think between 2x -RW and 4x-RW there is a change, such that a 4x -RW disc won't work on a 2x burner.

And there was such a change with -R I believe early on (1x to 2x I think). But from 4x to 8x to 16x I believe the spec is the same, they just have rated the discs to handle higher speeds.

Mark

While you may be able to set the burn speed in some burners, if you hear the unit
constantly changing "gears" it usually ends up not being able to complete.
I ended up purchasing a HP light scribe and very happy (was on sale).

Since it is getting harder to find 4x not a big deal. However, I wonder how long
the discs will keep the information on 16x.

Grazie, there's no technical reason why media can't be burnt at slower speeds, it's all supposed to be backward compatible.

However, if you've got a fast burner, the general consensus is that it's at its most accurate burning at its maximum speed. It's not important to burn at the maximum speed of the disc, just the maximum speed of the drive.

Personally I've never burnt anything out of DVDA, I use CopyToDVD instead which has a more extensive library of burners and discs, plus it's updated often. Give the trial a stab and see what you think:

http://www.vso-software.fr/products/copytodvd/copytodvd.php

It's also 64-bit compatible with those on x64 systems and is largely bloat-free.

. . ugh . . ..

Well, Stuart, followed your advice and d/l demo of the s/w.

#1 - Start up PC from fresh.

#2 - Fired-up CopyToDVD at which point it asked if I wanted to use my previous DVDShrink. I couldn't NOT select it and it proceeded to use DVDShrink.

.. ok I thought let's see . ..

#3 - DVDShrink asks for folders, files and stuff and I follow my normal routine.

#4 - I pop in my Verb16x DVD-R and off goes DVDShrink and starts the burn in process.

AND EUREKA! Success!! I play it back and it looks good.

However . . . flushed with this triumph I try another burn. Nope. Same error. Same unsuccessful burn. And yet another coaster.

Now this leaves me with a few unanswered questions.

Q1 - Did I get lucky using this from a "cold" start?

Q2 - Will a NEW faster DVD burner make any difference?

Q3 - Am I looking at a purely s/w issue that EVEN a new faster replacement burner would not remedy?

Exasperating.

Let's not forget that I CAN successfully burn 4x platters on this burner.

Where do I go from here? I've got a quote for a Pioneer DVR-112 should I go ahead and purchase and install this? Is there any insurance that this would work?

If this hasn't bored you already, what other advice is on offer?

Is there such a thing as a standalone Firewire DVD burner?

Desperate of London!

Best regards,

Grazie

Grazie, I really believe that updating you drive's firmware will fix your problem. Why buy a faster drive when it's best to burn discs at 4x anyway?

Thanks Laurence.

Eh? Why buy a faster drive when it's best to burn discs at 4x anyway? - well . . I can't get 4x DVD-R Verbatims and have purchased 16x. Why do you say "better"? I WANT and really don't mind/care burning at 4x. My burner does 4x easily. It is only that I can not locate 4x verbs - yeah? Now if I want many dupes, then it is off to a replicating house! No, this is solely for my own straight-from-the-easel to client/s work. A simple, working DVD burner that will take the latest DVD media. And this I had with 4x.

OK, just how do I go about updating my burner's firmware? This IS "Grazie" you are talking to? Yeah?

Thanks Laurence . .

- g

Sounds like a hardware error. After a power off, dicey components frequently "reset" to a working state until they flip to failed. That explains your one good burn.

In answer to the "all media should be backward compatible," I think "should" is the operative word. As someone above noted, the media code is different on high speed media, and if the older drive cannot understand that code, unpredictable results.

Bob.

http://www.dvdhs.com/usa.html

or

http://www.dvdhs.com/euro/index.html

One could update the firmware in the older drives. I took the simpler approach as it was so cheap and bought a new Sony cooker. Never looked back. And I wish this 4x burning is better than 8x burning myth would go away.

Bob.

Just the other day I was getting errors with DVD playback on some discs I had made. I looked and sure enough, I had accidentally burned those discs at a faster rate. I don't care what the general wisdom is. When I burn discs fast, they don't play back well in DVD players.

I have done a bunch of tests with different discs and DVD players, and some time later, I thought things might have changed and ran the tests again. The conclusion I came to is simple:

Use only the best quality discs and burn them at 4x. For a while I was burning at 8x, but I noticed that these discs weren't as reliable accross all DVD players. I have one DVD player in particular that seems to hang up on fast burned discs.

At this point, I refuse to go faster than 4x. Not because of what I've read or what I've been told, but because my own experience tells me that 4x is better.

"Grazie, there's no technical reason why media can't be burnt at slower speeds, it's all supposed to be backward compatible."

Wrong.

When your DVD blank is loaded the writing software reads the media ID from the DVD. It then looks up the write parameters for that media in the DVD drive firmware. If you have an old DVD drive it may not know what to do with your blank media and drops back to a default set of burn parameters.

If you load a blank DVD in your drive and go to "file" "properties" in DVDA, you can find a DVD Info tab somewhere that will tell you what media the drive thinks it found.

Steve Mann

STEVE! - Now THAT is gold info. I shall see IF I can get DVDA4 to FORCE the lower speeds WITHIN setup? Yes? But will this make a JOT of difference if the FIRMWARE, in the Burner, then doesn't know about the platter being 16x, senses a 16x or worse, gets completely confused by have some info it can't read?

Steve, what do you know?

Should I buy a newer up-to-date burner? I reeeeally don't need to if I can get over this "blip".

Thanks again guys.

G

"Should I buy a newer up-to-date burner? I reeeeally don't need to if I can get over this "blip"."

If you can't upgrade your burner firmware, I would recommend buying a new burner. (They aren't that expensive) The DVDA properties window will also tell you the real make and model number of the DVD drive, so check the real manufacturer's web site for firmware upgrades. Not the PC makers web site.

Your problem may be that the default burn parameters for the DVD drive may be overburning the media. One way thet the media manufacturers get the higher speeds is to make the dye layer more sensitive and your DVD drive may be so old that 4X was the top speed and the laser is running at max power.


Steve Mann

Thanks Steve.

The burner is a SONY DVD RW DW-U14A

Driver Provider - MS

Driver Date 1-7-01

Driver Version 5.1.2535.0

How do I get at the FIRMWARE info for this thing?

Cheers - g

This might help:

http://www.samtack.com/TechSupportFAQ/techfaqfirmwareCDRW.pdf

While upgraded firmware is a good thing to try on the cheap, drives are eventually orphaned by the manufacturers. In my earlier post, I mentioned updating the firmware to the latest for my Pioneer drive. It's the latest, alright, but it's still about 2 years old. If you consider how quickly things change in 2 computer-hardware-years, there's plenty of potential for new media that the burner doesn't know about.

Bob? I'm on Windoze XP? Not 2000. Can't locate the folder reccomended.

G

"If you have an old DVD drive it may not know what to do with your blank media and drops back to a default set of burn parameters."

Exactly, which is why what I wrote previously wasn't incorrect. All media is backward compatible to a degree, the burn quality however, still depends on the drive and the media, as it does in all cases. In this case it would actually make only marginal difference if the burn speed was lowered.

Grazie, look up your drive on a site such as Video Help or CD Freaks:

http://www.videohelp.com/dvdwriters?DVDname=DW-U14A

...then use the compatibility info there to choose your media.

The DW-U14A is an OEM DRU-510, so you can update the ID of the drive then update the firmware with the versions directly from Sony. Here's a link to a list of Sony firmware downloads:

http://forum.rpc1.org/dl_firmware.php?category=4&manufactor=30

Odd though that you can burn one good disc, that points to an OS issue. Can you try disabling anything that might be running in the background, things that have a mind of their own like DVD playback software, virus scanners, the screen saver etc.

I still think you should try CopyToDVD too. If you find your default burning software pops up when you load a disc, just cancel it and start CopyToDVD manually instead.

OK ..

Tried CopyToDVD again. This time my other s/w DIDN'T appear - hmmm?

However, I did get a report of the actions happening. Each line IS a separate report. I've left out the majority that aren't WARNINGS but just clear info sends:

OK - Writing speed requested x4.0, effective x4.0 ( YEAH!!! )
. ..

. ..

. ..

OK Start writing . .

OK Start write Buffer

! - AUTOUPDATE: The update site is not reachable [ I'm NOT connected to the INTERNET on that PC]

X ( bad message here Stuart ] "Write error at 2256(16) - Code 03 73 03 [Medium error, Power calibration fail (CD-burner is dirty)]

OK Finalizing . . .

OK Sending anonymous statistics

. .

And there it stops. Another 2 coasters.

As I say, I CAN burn 4x media, no problem. So why should I get this "dirty" message?

BTW, I am now considering an EXTERNAL USB Freecom 18x burner. It does everything plus LiteScribe. What do you think? This ways I can lop it onto my OTHER pc and have it burn from there OR from my NLE PC - yeah?

TIA

G