Cd Burner burns SOMEtimes, never at max Speed

problem came basically out of nowhere. 1 day everything was fine, and then it started messing up.

I have an ATAPI 52x Cd-RW and it refuses to burn at Max Speed. 48x capable Sony cdrs it only burns at 32x and 40x AT&T cdrs at 24x. basically 16x slower then it should be!?

But thats not even half of my troubles. The Burner doesn't actually burn! it does, sometimes, but not everytime. according to the software the burn is sucessful, but when i try to run the CD (data, audio, doesn't matter) it just freezes or for example if its data with 100 miles, the 1st 25 might work, if i try to access the next 20 it'll freeze, but the last 55 also work. If i ran it from the Burner it works, but not on the regular CD-Rom. its as if the CD wasn't Finalized.

I've tried basically every option in the software, and its still beyond any explanations. sometimes the CD will burn fine, and then next time it wont. i had a 50 pack of Sony cdrs and about 30 of them are in the trash, 10 still in the box. the wierd thing is i managed to sucessfully burn a cd with the "finalize cd" option UN-ticked! but the next one messed up again. The software even says the CD is fine when i do the data verification for it, but it is still messed up!

i can't think of any significant changes i've made around the time this problem started happening. I did upgrade the a new Version of Nero, and i did physically unplug the Burner around that time. but it still doesn't make any sense of why i'm having these problems. I tried different software, i tried going back to the old version of Nero, same exact result, 1 cd might burn fine, you think you solved the problem, then the next 3 will all mess up.

i also disconnected it and connected it again a bunch of times to make sure its connected the right way still the same problem.

i think i managed to narrow the problem down and i think it must be the Burner itself because i hooked it up to a different PC (XP on both) and it still wouldn't Burn at Max speed, burned 1 cd and messed up the 2nd one. also tried different software on the 2nd PC as well. This is a ridicolous problem because if something was messed up software, hardware some driver whatever, it just shouldn't work ALL THE TIME then, not work now and not work 10 minutes later.

 

could be bad DRM go to your device drivers and go to view>show hidden devices or something like that, then click on "non plug and play drivers" and see if you have starforce.but it sounds like you already figured it out, maybe the burner is just messed up.

 

You might try upgrading the firmware, if it is not at the latest level.

 

....thanks for the quick replies.

I looked in the non plug and play section and Starforce is there, Starforce protection, theres like 8 of them...is that good or bad?

As far as the firmware, i dont even know how to do it. I'm not even sure what brand it is. it just says "ATAPI CD-RW 52x" on it. Everest Home edition has no info on it, don't get all that many result when searching for it either.

 

thats bad, starforce is very buggy protection software that can slow down, even disable a cd burner. the only problem is you can't play a starforce game without starforce, here is a link about it and a list of games and removal tool.
http://www.glop.org/starforce/

 

that problem described on the website sounded very simular, but unfortunately when i uninstalled all that starforce crap, checked in the device manager to be sure its gone, the problem is still there.

 

unfortunately it sounds like your drive is dead. NEC, Sony and Liteon are good, i have an Lg and it is fast but loud as hell, I wouldn't reccomend it.

 

thanks for the help. i'm gonna try updating the firmware and if that doesn't work, i'll probably just get a new one.

only problem with that is that i dont know what brand it is. how would i go about finding that? on the label it just says a bunch of #'s. found a model no. MS-8352A and found a site that was firmware but i'm still not sure if its exactly the one that i need...

 

I googled the # and it appears to be an MSI
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=9471&vpn=MS-8352A&manufacture=MicroStar

 

are you sure its safe to mess with the firmware?

i found 2 sites with firmware for it:
http://forum.rpc1.org/dl_firmware.php?category=6&manufactor=21
http://www.msi.com.tw/program/suppo...e_list.php?part=5&kind=11&CHIP=1&Page=3&num=0

but the reason i'm not sure is on these links and the one you posted, just looking at the picture, the burner clearly says MSI on the front AND on the label. mine doesn't say MSI anywhere.

 

if that is your model than it is an MSI, it is safe, just download from the MSI site that you linked to.

 

It's safe to upgrade the firmware as long it is the right firmware. so make sure you know the model number of your burner.

 

After reading your post and other's replys, it might be simpler to just delete the StarForce app. and reinstall an earlier version of Nero. I've read where a lot of people had problems with the initial release of Nero 7. I'm still running the last version of Nero 6 and will wait until a few revisions before making the plunge to version 7.

 

I actually have Nero 6.6. the old one i had was 5.something, and i have tried different software besides Nero. also i delete all the starforce stuff already.

i'm gonna hold-off on the firmware upgrade until i get a reply from the tech people at MSI. wrote them an email today, so i'll wait. dont know if i update the firmware maybe it'll be void the warranty (if i even have one that is).

 

well, i didn't have the patience to wait so i updated the firmware....


a few changes happened. not enough to conclude anything but i'll try to explaine what exactly is happening now..

when i 1st started having this problem my i though it was just bad CDRs (sony). the reason i was thinking this is because of the speed (48x capable) only had an option for 32x. i seem to remember using different CDRs, ATT which are only 40x capable and the option was there. now i'm not too sure about that, it could be my miind playing tricks on me, because recently both Sony and ATT disks only had the option to burn 16x slower then they're capable of.

After the firmware upgrade i get an option to burn at 40x for the Sony disk. still not what its capable of, but better then 32x. i'm happy, burn the disk, its messed up again, not happy.

the ATT disk now has an option to burn at 48x, which is wierd cause it says on the disk its only capable of burning at 40x. burned this one and it worked, unfortunately i dont have anymore to test how consitent it is, but this made me think back to the time i thought the problem was with the actuall cds.

some more info.

before the update i ran Nero infotool, got these results for Write Speed:
Write Speed : 52 , 32 , 24 , 20 , 16 , 12 , 8 X

(again this was strage. what happened to 48x, 40x?)

after the update i get this:
Write Speed : 40 , 32 , 24 , 20 , 16 , 12 , 8 X

(now what happened to 52x and 48x?)

i burn that sony disk which failed then ran the Infotool again:
Write Speed : 52 , 48 , 40 , 32 , 24 , 20 , 16 , 12 , 8 , 4 X

(thats more like it)

as far as burning the 2 disk. i'm not sure at what speed it acutually burned them.

Sony disk at 40x took 2:56
ATT disk at 48x took 3:14

I know can tell whether a disk will be bad or good before it even finishes. just listening to the Burner spin and how much sound it makes. if its consistant from start to end i would think the cd will be fine. but other time its spins and then you can hear it just slow down right in the middle of it, no info, buffer stays the same, no other programs running, it just slows down, i look at the file it was burning at the time (data cd) and bingo. around that file the cd is not readable.

 

I burn alot of CD's and DVD's. I have used many brands of disc's. The one I use now that gives me the best results is Taiyo Yuden. So maybe a differnet disc might work better for you and your burner.