Okay, today I've got mine first DVD+RW discs for my Sony Handycam. I have never used them before, I used DVD-R discs. I bought DVD+RW discs not DVD-RW because I read that I can watch the recordings without finalizing. So after I put the disc in the camera, it said if I wanted to format it so I did. To try the disc out I recorded like a minute, and wanted to check if I could watch it on my computer. The recording was there I opened it with Nero, and everything was fine. Then I saw the option: Erase this CD-RW. I clicked on that, I click on next, and then this happens: Why can't it just erase? I try to delete it manualy by selecting all .ifo, .buf and .vob files, right click and delete. Then there is another error. Here's a screen: The only thing I can do with these files is to copy them. I put the disc back into the camera and format it again, it says everything will be deleted so I continue. Now the weird thing happens. The recordings I made at first are no longer to be found on the camera, but when I open the disc on my computer they are there. I decided to finalize the disc knowing that I can unfinalize it later. I didn't want to create a menu, so I put the disc in the DVD-Drive. Now I try to erase the disc and delete. Same errors. I put the disc back into the camera for some reason I can't unfinalize it so I format. After that I can record again so I recorded for about 10 minutes and I put the disc into the DVD-Drive. For some reason the 10 minute recording is on the camera and I can watch it, but on my PC there is the old recording I made the first time. Another weird thing is that even now there is an option of finalizing, on the camera's screen on the top right corner, where it shows what kind of disc there is, it shows: DVD+RW and it is underlined which means that it is finalized right? Please help, what can I do? I am a noob with these kinds of things, I trust you people you helped me a lot in the past. I use Nero 7, not 8, can Nero help me? I used Nero Express to erase the disc, I set it for full, the bar doesn't go all the way and then when it appears to be done because there is a "ding", the DVD-Drive won't open, I click the button and nothing happens.
Windows, under XP, has no support for DVD's - that's why you can't erase the disk. That to one side, I find that RW DVD's should be separated into disks that are recorded and erased on a PC and disks that are recorded and erased on an external device. Don't mix them up, because in a short time the disks fail - of course it doesn't matter where they are played.
You are having multiple problems because you are doing things multiple ways and running into conflicts. I'll try to explain what's happening in order: 1) Your erasure option came from Windows using a Roxio engine (see the bottom of your screenshot). This engine for packet-writing/formatting/erasing is different from and ha conflicts with Nero. Stick with Nero, or even better, erase your discs in the camcorder using its formatting process because the laser tracking in the camcorder will be consistent. One reason rewritable media "fail" is that tracking differences from multiple laser sleds in different drives end up creating tracks that cannot be followed. Those "failed" discs can be revived, but only using an initializer used in the factories. Sticking to one tracking version in a single drive or camcorder--and only one erasing/formatting software--solves lots of problems. 2) The "weird" thing is due to the fact that a quick erasure on DVD+RW merely wipes out the table of contents, not the data. Your camcorder no longer sees the old video because it looks for the table it wrote. Your PC sees all the data, even the "erased" data that has merely lost its addresses in the table of contents. Full erasure and formatting wipe out the old data as well as the TOC (table of contents). 3) When you do a full erasure in Nero 7 (Nero 8 will do the same thing), your drive door may be locked because of the conflicts with Roxio's erasing methods. "Full" erasure actually wipes out the TOC as well as addresses and header information. It does not actually restore the disc to its original state as an initializer does by reheating and crystallizing the recording layer for its shiniest state. (The "pits" on rewritable media are simply dull spots where the semi-metal alloy that is the recording layer was melted and suddenly cooled again. Reheating, not melting, turns the crystals back to their shiny state.) Stick to formatting and erasing your camcorder discs on the camcorder instead of the computer, and you'll find fewer problems. It's the conflicts between camcorder/PC/PC drive/Nero/Roxio that is throwing you for a loop.
