Help with unreadable DVDs

[diggrd]

Originally Posted by RainDawg

Well...the problem has been solved.

I took the disc into Best Buy and put it into one of their computers...it worked fine. I bought the drive, installed it, and all is well. I guess the old drive was just starting to go...

So, now that I am the proud new owner of a dual-layer drive, let's get some DVD-9 torrents going! .

I'm all for that but the blanks are still too much $$$, can you find them for less than $10. I paid $35 for 3 just to test them but still haven't bothered.

[RainDawg]

I paid $120 for the drive. Didn't buy any DVD-9 blanks though, cause they were $34 for three. I know they are down to $5 or so online, but it's still not practical to use it yet. But, in a year or so when it starts becoming the norm, I'm ready .

[wazoo2u]

Originally Posted by RainDawg

I paid $120 for the drive. Didn't buy any DVD-9 blanks though, cause they were $34 for three. I know they are down to $5 or so online, but it's still not practical to use it yet. But, in a year or so when it starts becoming the norm, I'm ready .

Which drive did you buy ?

[RainDawg]

Sony DRU-710A

[wazoo2u]

Think that was on sale at CompUsa this weekend too. I'd be interested to know how you like it after a while. I'll try to remember to ask you about it..

[RainDawg]

Yeah, it's a Lite-On, which I've always had good experiences with, though never used it for DVDR yet. It seems to be a pretty new model, as there are only a few reviews to be found on the 'net. It read the disc I wanted it to read, perfectly, which was worth about the cost of the things right there....

[tritonman]

Raindawg-

Out of curiousity, how old was your defective drive? I've had a couple problems like the one you spoke of. Usually it works fine, but it acts up every once in a while.

[RainDawg]

The drive is only a year old, but I've burned around 400 DVDs on it. I know that shouldn't kill it....

[tritonman]

The problem is that they don't really give you a life expectancy for them. 400 DVD's is def a lot, but we have nothing to base that number on. I wonder if there's a site that tests the durability and longevity of dvdr's, dvd burners, etc? If not, I'll check that out later tonight.

[fatoldpig]

Haven't had a problem with DVDs yet But sometimes my old (probably about 5 year) Plextor CD writer does not recognize some cd-r's but Pioneer DVD-rw does.

Make sure you make a copy of that DVD.

These days hard drives are getting so cheap I have one copy on hard drive and another copy on DVD. Last Friday Best Buy but had 120 gig HD for $30 after rebate and OfficeMax had 200 gig for $50.

[aaadbell]

Originally Posted by RainDawg

Well...the problem has been solved.

I took the disc into Best Buy and put it into one of their computers...it worked fine. I bought the drive, installed it, and all is well. I guess the old drive was just starting to go...

I just skimmed this thread, so maybe somebody said this, but I would bet neither the disc nor the drive were defective. With both CDs & DVDs you will find certain combinations of (1) make of disc, (2) type of drive it was burned on, and (3) type of drive you try to read it on that cause problems. (Probably should add (4) condition of the disc at the time you put it in the drive. I even wonder if it makes a difference whether it's still cold from the mailbox when you put it in a drive.)

On my previous computer, I usually had trouble extracting Mitsui CDRs, even though they worked fine in other CD drives. I have 2 DVD drives in my current computer and 1 more at work (only one is a writer), and I've had to use all 3 to extract the information off of some data DVDs. I've had DVDs that I couldn't extract and I'd send them on to somebody who said there was no problem, and vice versa. I have also had Rain Dawg's experience of the computer not even recognizing that there's a disc in the drive, where another drive will recognize it.

It's very sad that the companies who make the media and the drives cannot make them completely interoperable. It's just like Windows - things almost work most of the time. The poster above who mentioned voodoo is right on. From what I've seen, this isn't like science - you can't repeat someone else's experiment and get the same result. On the other hand, it's not totally random. There are discs that are problematic on most or all drives.

[RainDawg]

Originally Posted by aaadbell

I just skimmed this thread, so maybe somebody said this, but I would bet neither the disc nor the drive were defective. With both CDs & DVDs you will find certain combinations of (1) make of disc, (2) type of drive it was burned on, and (3) type of drive you try to read it on that cause problems. (Probably should add (4) condition of the disc at the time you put it in the drive. I even wonder if it makes a difference whether it's still cold from the mailbox when you put it in a drive.)

Well, none of these were the case. I have about 250 Ritek discs, exactly the same. Most of them still work with the drive, and it's the same one they were all burned on. I just got one that refused to be read anymore. I've had the problem before, but a good lens-cleaning always solved it. This time, no dice. I think the laser is just wearing out....