I have a LG GSA-4120B burner running Firmware version 115. I use Nero to burn. My problem is that when I burn a disc, it says it's going at 8x, but it takes FOREVER to burn (49:20 for 2.85gb, to a dvd-r). It used to burn a full 4.38gb dvd-r in 20 min, and now will burn as much on a dvd+r at 4x in 5 min less time. I have re updated firmware, un/reinstalled the drive in windows & tried other brands of media, even though I was in the middle of a pack of dvd-r when this all started. It also doesnt burn cd's at the right speeds either. Is it just that my burner is about to bite it? I've only had it since Janurary of this year, so hopefully that isn't it. Thanks in advance for your help.
in the device manager look at the properties of the drive(s) to see if the dma is enabled not disabled
I'm not sure what I'm looking for but I didn't see a dma option. CD recording is enabled, however. If that isn't what I need enabled, let me know. I really don't (obviously) know what I'm doing here. Sorry & Thanks.
Under the properties for my drive I got the following tabs: General, properties, DVD region, volumes, & driver. Under That properties tab, there is a enable digital cd playback for this drive, which is ticked to yes. I saw nothing about dma, however.
You should check it from device manager, then something like IDE ATA / ATAPI controllers (don't know if it's correct because I'm not using english windows). There you should have primary and secondary controller, usually dvd-r drives are connected to the second ide port so check properties under secondary controller. You should find DMA/PIO information there.
Thank You eduard0.... I found it! It saysevice Type: auto detection, Transfer ModeMA if available, Current transfer mode: PIO Mode I have no clue what this means, but hopefully someone will. Thank you for all the help guys, keep it coming!
Whatever primary or secondary IDE/atapi controller that was in Pio mode, Just uninstall that controller and reboot. You may want to check the other controller out as well. Start Control panel System check hardware Device manager IDI ATA/ATAPI controllers open up the tree Highlite that controller in pio mode right click- uninstall Re-boot the pc. Windows will automatically hook it back up and it should go back to dma or udma mode. Double check the other controller and make sure it is dma or udma if available.Uninstall and reboot if you have to. Reason why your controllers revert from dma to pio: If you get around 5 or 6 burn errors in a row,windows will revert this mode to pio mode for safety reasons. Usually crappy media,burning too fast,or a combination of both is the culprit.
Well, I uninstalled it & rebooted... and not only did it not fix the problem, it caused my cdrw drive to go into PIO mode as well lol. I believe I will be requiring more assistance.
Go to device manager again and try to update ATA driver. (BTW it's quite interesting thing that Windows won't let users choose tranfer mode directly, instead of that itself configurates system to work slowly or something...) Did you update your DVD-drives firmware before this problem occured? I'm using exactly same drive with firmware A111 and it works fine in DMA2 mode.
I tried to update the driver, but windows told me it was the best match. As for the firmware, I am running a115, but it worked fine for 3-4 weeks after I updated it from a111. I have previously rolled back to a111 & un/reinstalled the drive to no avail, so I went back to a115.
So far I've tried all the advice given plus changing the IDE cable. Got anything else? I really want to get my burner fixed, so please help me out guys. Thanks again.
I have two drives, a Lite On SOHC 5236K(DVDRom/CD burner), set as a master drive. My LG GSA 4120B, the problem drive is set as slave. Both are on the secondary IDE cable.
try changing the drives around so that the dvd drive is master & the cd rom drive is slave. also try slaving 1 of those drives 1 at a time to the hd to see what happens.
Changing the slave/master settings fixed it. Thank you everyone, especially ddp. You will all probably hear from me again on some other forum soon, as I will probably screw something else up in the near future.
I also have the LG GSA 4120B drive (firmware A102). I use NERO Reloaded and also get many 'Sector 'xxxxxxx' has different contents to source' messages when NERO verifies the DVD. I have tried various DVD's (Philips DVD +RW, Datasafe DVD +RW and RiVision DVD +R). With the RW's I have erased them and then written the same data again only to get the same message on verify except on different sectors. My drive is set as 'master' and DMA is enabled. I have also used 'Beyond Compare' to compare the DVD backup to the original data and there are definitely errors. The only media on which I do not get errors is DVD RAM. Any suggestions please, would a firmware update help?
