PC Pals Forum
Technical Help & Discussion => Self Building, Upgrading & General Hardware Help => Topic started by: Lona on March 11, 2004, 00:39
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My cd-writer is acting up and I'm not sure what's wrong. It will burn a few discs then it just stops recognising that there is a disc in the drawer. The disc is always very hot when I remove it. If I shut down and wait half an hour, then reboot, writer works ok. What could be causing this?
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Sounds like overworked caused by excessive downloads since you got BB Lona ;)
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Sounds like overworked caused by excessive downloads since you got BB Lona ;)
:wahh: :wahh: :wahh: :wahh: :wahh: :wahh:
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Sounds like it could be overheating Lona :-\
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I found that when CDs start coming out extra warm (they are usually warmish after burning), the drive is usually on the way out. :(
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As Simon says Lona it sounds as though its on the way out I had one which did what yours is doing and it finally died. Now buried in the back garden next to the old monitor that succumbed as well. :-\
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Lona,
Does the drive also disappear in "My Computer"? That happened to me on a PC running ME, installed W2K, same thing. Also, when you put a CD in the drive, the PC locked up. It was only a bog standard CD-Rom, I then installed my CR-RW 32x12x24 in to that PC, problem solved.
So I sold that drive for a tenner, and bought a nice new shiny fast Samsung Drive 52x32x52, £26.95 with carrage includes Nero V5.5 software.
http://www.cclcomputers.biz/acatalog/ (http://www.cclcomputers.biz/acatalog/)
Go on treat yourself, as it sounds to me like your writer is on the way out.
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Tony
My drive doesn't disappear from my computer but when I click on the drive with a disc in drawer it says "insert disc" but not every time. As regards buying a new writer, would such a fast one be compatible with my P111, 1ghz speed PC?
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As regards buying a new writer, would such a fast one be compatible with my P111, 1ghz speed PC?
I don't think that would be a problem, Lona. :)
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Lona,
new writer will be OK on your system, is the writer as old as the PC ? have you tried reinstalling the writer software? I'm just of the opinon, when kit like that acts up, and taking into consideration it's age and it's speed. For ball park £26 you can save yourself alot of hassle, and have a fast writer to boot.
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Yes, writer came pre-installed with PC. I was just looking at that site, Tony and I think I should be going the full hog and buying the dvd writer and cd writer combined. Would I be asking to much of my machine or would I still be ok.?
I see they have a Sony,
Sony DW14A Silver (Dual Writer +/-) OEM Ref: CDR4027
Silver OEM Drive - (4x DVD+R / 4x DVD+RW / 4x DVD-R / 2x DVD-RW / 24x CD-R / 16X CD-RW), (OEM DVD Drives require DVD playback software)
In Stock(As Of 17:30 On 11/03/2004)
Online Price £61.60£72.38 Including VAT
What do you think?
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Its always handy I suppose, but will you really be burning DVD's??
£40 could buy you something else ;D
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Lona, you could try >>> http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?
action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=57305&_LOC=UK (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?<br />action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=57305&_LOC=UK)
/me tidied link. ;)
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Lona, you could try >>> http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?
action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=57305&_LOC=UK (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?<br />action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=57305&_LOC=UK)
That one only does dvd-. I want one that does both. :)
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Its always handy I suppose, but will you really be burning DVD's??
£40 could buy you something else ;D
DVD's hold lots more data, Ketamininja. If I have to replace might as well buy dvd writer as I would probably want one at a later date anyway.
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Lona, you could try >>> http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?
action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=57305&_LOC=UK (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?<br />action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=57305&_LOC=UK)
That one only does dvd-. I want one that does both. :)
Product Information
Providing both
DVD/CD playback and recording capabilities in a single unit, ;) Toshiba's SD-R5112 drive enables users to store and share home movies, music and photo files with greater efficiency and performance. With DVD recording speeds of 4x, the SD-R5112 makes it virtually effortless to transfer home videos, photos and other digital files from the computer to the living room DVD player.
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http://www.blankdiscshop.co.uk/acatalog/Hardware_Section__.html (http://www.blankdiscshop.co.uk/acatalog/Hardware_Section__.html)
Worth a look :)
Liteon 8x (+R) and 4x(-R) for £59.98 plus postage
or
NEC2500 8x(+R and -R) for £69.98 plus postage
BTW the Sony drives are very picky about which media they use
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Thanks Hookstar and Dack for your imput.
Hookstar, the toshiba one as I said only does dvd-and not dvd+
Dack, The Leoton, although it does + and - dvd, it doesn't do cd writing. I will take your point on board regarding the sony. I am still looking around for the best buy but one that does everything would be ideal.
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You've got mail :-*
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BTW the Sony drives are very picky about which media they use
Bloody right, they are! >:( I bought a pack of 25 Datawrite DVD-Rs, for burning with my Sony DW14A, and the success rate is 1 in 4, if I'm lucky! Mind you, I needed some new beer mats! ;D
Oh, and Lona, I think if it writes DVDs, it will write CDs, although not as fast as a dedicated CD Writer. :)
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I take it Simon, you don't recomment the sony DW14A then. ???
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Well.... as a writer, when it works, it's fine, but obviously you have to stick to blank discs it likes. I haven't actually got round to trying any others yet, but I have some 'Zero Defex' on order from CD-R Media (http://www.cd-rmedia.co.uk/index.mhtml), so I'll let you know what they're like when I get them. Given the choice again, I think I would have opted for something less tempromental - perhaps a Pioneer? Having said that, I've never had a problem with LiteOn products either.
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Just thinking of what you have said Simon. My writer was working fine with imation discs and I bought maxell ones last week. Could it be that my writer doesn't like maxell and there is nothing wrong with the actual writer.?
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Well, I would have thought that Maxell were better quality than Imation. :-\ Have you not got any Imations left you can try it with?
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No, unfortunately all my imation ones are finished. Scrumpyjack was saying that some discs which are thicker than others can give problems with some burners. I notice these maxell discs are thicker than the imation ones. I have just given away 50 Ridata discs because I thought they were incompatible with my burner. At the rate I am buying discs that don't work, I could have paid for a new burner. :(
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The only thing I could suggest is contact the manufacturer of the drive you are considering, and ask them which discs they recommend. If you have something in writing, at least you may have some comeback if the drive doesn't work with the recommended discs.
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Bloody right, they are! >:( I bought a pack of 25 Datawrite DVD-Rs, for burning with my Sony DW14A, and the success rate is 1 in 4, if I'm lucky! Mind you, I needed some new beer mats! ;D
Funny that :-\ I bought a pack of really cheap white-faced DVD-R from Ebuyer when I bought my DW-14A and I haven't had one failure that wasn't my fault out of about 17 discs burnt so far.
I must have been lucky ::)
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I have narrowed it down to two writers.
http://www.microdirect.co.uk/ProductInfo.aspx?ProductID=2763&GroupID=170
http://www.microdirect.co.uk/ProductInfo.aspx?ProductID=5070&GroupID=177
What do you think??
???
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If i was getting one it would have to be this (http://www.microdirect.co.uk/ProductInfo.aspx?ProductID=5492&GroupID=42#reviews) one as it gets highly recommended from a board i go to on times where all they seem to do is back ups all the time.. ;)
This is the 8x version of the one Sandra has and i'm sure she is up on the ins and outs of what works with it best :thumb:
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The first link ain't a writer Lona, it's a DVD player. You sureyou got the right link ? ::) ;)
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Sorry Tony, my mistake. ;D
http://www.microdirect.co.uk/ProductInfo.aspx?ProductID=5489&GroupID=170
I also found this interesting review.
http://www.pyroport.com/reviews/2.shtml
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I think I would also go for the Pioneer Cammy linked to. :)
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I think I would also go for the Pioneer Cammy linked to. :)
I will second that Simon, I have been using the Pioneer 106 for a while now and its working ok for me 8)
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It would appear that this new model by Pioneer isn't as good as the previous one.
http://www.cdfreaks.com/article/137/9
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Lona, I would either go for that one, despite the review in the hope that a firmware upgrade will resolve the problems at a later date :
To sum it all up, this is the best we could say: ?A fast DVD-Writer that needs a lot of firmware improvements?. And we do not feel that this drive deserves any awards, due to the problems it has.
Or, get the 4x 106, which will possibly have dropped in price now due to it being an older model.
You will be pleasantly surprised at the difference in speed of CD writing compared to your current CD writer and at the moment 8x DVD blanks are a bit like rocking horse sh*t and are likely to be expensive compared to 2x and 4 x DVDs.
Seeing that your main use for having a DVD writer will be to presumably put a few DivX/Xvid films on a single DVD, now that you have bought a proper DVD player, then you will probably be writing at 2x anyway to make sure that you get the best burn to be able to playback on your DVD player :)
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Sandra, will you stop giving away my secrets. ;)
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Looking at the comments of the review here (http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=89556) i would still go with the 107 as it is only about £2 more than the 106 now :horror: and the newest ones have the revised firmware with them :thumb: