I have an AMD 2500xp cpu,512 ddr400 ram, 80gb seagate 7200 hd, Optorite dd401 dvd burner, lg dvd rom. I have flashed my dvd burner with newest firmware update. I am having real difficulties coping dvds, none come out and any that do freeze after 10 mins. I have used dvd shrink/decrypter, 321 dvd xpress, nero 5.5, sonic 4.5 and allways the same result. I am using Princo bulkpaq dvd-r orange label and ritek dvd+r. Every time i burn the disc looks like saturn with loads of rings around it.My friend has used the princo discs for me on his machine and burns them without problems. Am i doing something wrong or is my dvd burner simply crap? Any comments appreciated.
Hi kit2000, Welcome to our little Club, What you're describing sounds like cheap media. Ritek makes more than 50% if all retail media and make all different grades from pure crap to very good grade stuff - Princo bulkpaq dvd-r orange label while fine for data isn't up to snuff for our purposes - in general, cheap media freezes, skips, stutters, pixelats, partially jams, may be rejected and lest we forget, our old standby, giving you the old just refuses to be recognized routine :-( Besides "Freezing", "skips" and pixelations, many times you’ll get a “Cyclic Redundancy error” or an "I/O error". This message can mean that your discs are scratched or dirty, it can also mean that your burner won’t accept your “cheap” media :-( Another problem which “pop’s up” is a “*Power Calibration Error”. This can stop you right in your tracks and most often is caused by, Yep, you guessed it, inexpensive media. *A “Power Calibration Error” can also be attributed to the Optical Components of a DVD Writer, though this isn’t usually the case. Trying to shut down your software and ejecting your DVD then restarting your program and re-inserting the same media recently cleaned has been known to help. Inexpensive media or even average media is great for text, Data, Spreadsheets, .Jpg and .Gif pictures and is good even for MP3 music BUT for DVD backups - BLAaaaaaT! It SUCKTH in an extremely Big-th way ! A good grade media is needed for DVD reproduction ! “Branded” Ritek G04's or Branded Verbatim are what we’re looking for OR any media boasting “Advanced AZO Metal Dye”, this indicates a superior dye application, while they are sometimes a bit “pricey” they are acceptable. Prices online from Meritline.com have gotten Ritek G04 down below a dollar a disc - Question - If you make coasters out of 3 cheap or even average discs and good copies from 3 Branded Verbatim discs or 3 “Branded” Ritek G04 discs - which ones then will you say are too expensive ? The 3 “Cheapo’s with no movie backup OR , the 3 recommended discs with a perfect backup on each disc ? Bear in mind, Memorex, Fuji, Sony, TDK, Orange Pack and others are quite good for your MP3 music, picture archives, Spread sheets, Data and your text backups and archives, they just don’t work well for DVD backups. Even DataSafe G04’s made by Ritek have been reported as inferior quality. Remember, for DVD backups, purchasing inexpensive media or even average media is a gamble, some people win, the majority of people lose, varying amounts but, they still lose :-( Let's try the right media for the job - just buy a 5 pack of what we recommend that will settle it once and for all - Don’t cheat though, buy the EXACT media we recommended - Using good grade media can guarantee you one thing to an absolute certainty, it surely cannot hurt. cheers, Pete
