Hi there, I've been reading thru the forum threads hoping to find some help with issues re my burner. The drive is a Plextor PX-716A, bought it a few months ago, installed and ran no probs, including discs I had written with the previous writer (HP 200i). Upgraded for the extra speed and media types. Over the last month or so the plextor has stopped reading cd's and dvd's. This week I started to get serious and trawled the web for clues/help. Thru this forum the drive will now read commercial dvd-rom's and cd's (previously corrupt ASPI layer - used force ASPI 1.8 to correct this). It will now also recognise blank dvd+/-r and dvd+rw (I haven't any dvd-rw media to try). BUT, it refuses to recognise cd-rw media, and still doesn't "see" the ghost backup dvd+r disc I wrote with the drive a few months ago, either in windows or on reboot to use the disc for a restore. Also doesn't see any disc I wrote with the old writer. I have tried cleaning the drive with compressed-air-in-a-can and a commercial dvd-rom cleaning disc. No change. Also, it doesn't see the cleaning disc, but if I put it into the dvd player - no probs, runs fine, but not on the PC. I have tried the winxp registry hacks mentioned on the forums, also uninstalling nero, incd, plextools, via drivers and accelerators, and reinstalled them one by one from the ide controller up. Also tried the dma switch to PIO then OK then DMA and reboot. DMA mode without the accelerator is MultiWord DMA 2, with accelerator, DMA 4. System is a little stretched, but was working in this config for a while. Windows XP SP2 (slipstreamed install disk) Thermaltake silent X purepower PSU (560W) AMD barton 3200+ processor 1GB crucial ram in dual channel config (2 x 512MB) 2 x 80GB seagate HDD's - both as master disc 1 x 160GB Maxtor HDD - slave disk 1 x Plextor PX-716A dvd writer - slave drive 1 x floppy drive (for ghost, don't laugh!) radeon 9800 pro ultimate edition (silent heatsink) I can burn a cd-r with nero 6 (also tried earlier versions, no change), but not a dvd - I get power calibration errors. Any help/ideas greatly appreciated.
Contact Plextor. They will have you run a test on your drive. It may be going belly up. If it is, they will replace it.
Thanks for the reply GrandpaBW, I'll get onto them later today, I was hoping it wouldn't come to having to find the packaging in the loft (too full to think about). Anyone have any other thoughts as to why the drive is behaving oddly? All (polite) suggestions considered!
Have you checked to see if your DMA settings have changed back to PIO I think that is the alternate setting. If it is not DMA it will burn slowly. Look in device manager and check your settings.
Hi framit, yes thanks, I've checked. Since doing the repair of the ASPI layer and the software reinstalls it has stayed as a MultiWord DMA 2 drive. I am quite confused and frustrated by the things the drive does, ie, it will recognise and read a DVD-ROM and a DVD data disc (such as the cover disc on PC Gamer) but won't read the cleaning disc (DVD-ROM). I thought that if the laser was going blind it wouldn't read OR write, anyone have any insight? Cheers.
d4z3d You stated that "Also tried the dma switch to PIO then OK then DMA and reboot. DMA mode without the accelerator is MultiWord DMA 2, with accelerator, DMA 4." and that "it has stayed as a MultiWord DMA 2 drive." I would recommend that you use the accelerator to UDMA 4, here is some info I found about Ultra DMA 2 and MultiWord DMA 2: "Double transition clocking is what allows Ultra DMA mode 2 to have a maximum transfer rate of 33.3 MB/s despite having a clock cycle time identical to "regular DMA" multiword mode 2, which has half that maximum." In other words your MultiWord DMA 2 cuts the data transfer to only 16.66 MB/s instead of the 33.3 MB/s your Plex 716A needs.
RMeister, thanks for the info, tried the suggestion - sadly it makes no difference. With the accelerator applied it actually took longer to read the info on a disk, and it didn't allow me to view any of the disc types I was not able to view before. Purposely setting the mode to PIO slows things down even further. After resetting the system to the default winxp drivers and installing the latest VIA 4in1 driver, I ran a backup of a DVD to test the system. As you guessed, no joy! Final part of the Nero error log is given below: [18:46:01] NeroVision Burn process started at 2.4x (3,324 KB/s) [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:22:27 #22 Text 0 File ThreadedTransferInterface.cpp, Line 2643 [18:46:01] NeroVision Verifying disc position of item 0 (relocatable, disc pos, no patch infos, orig at #0): write at #0 [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:22:27 #23 SCSI -1066 File Cdrdrv.cpp, Line 1182 [18:46:01] NeroVision SCSI Exec, HA 2, TA 1, LUN 0, buffer 0x048A3C00 [18:46:01] NeroVision Status: 0x04 (0x01, SCSI_ERR) [18:46:01] NeroVision HA-Status 0x00 (0x00, OK) [18:46:01] NeroVision TA-Status 0x02 (0x01, SCSI_TASTATUS_CHKCOND) [18:46:01] NeroVision Sense Key: 0x05 (KEY_ILLEGAL_REQUEST) [18:46:01] NeroVision Sense Code: 0x24 [18:46:01] NeroVision Sense Qual: 0x00 [18:46:01] NeroVision CDB Data: 0xAD 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x08 0x04 0x00 0x00 [18:46:01] NeroVision Sense Data: 0x70 0x00 0x05 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x0A [18:46:01] NeroVision 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x24 0x00 [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:22:27 #24 Text 0 File DVDR.cpp, Line 5341 [18:46:01] NeroVision Drive: PLEXTOR DVDR PX-716A [18:46:01] NeroVision Book Type request [PX]: DVD-ROM [18:46:01] NeroVision Book Type setting not supported for the loaded disc type [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:22:27 #25 Phase 98 File APIProgress.cpp, Line 276 [18:46:01] NeroVision Start formatting disc before burning [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:22:53 #26 Phase 100 File APIProgress.cpp, Line 276 [18:46:01] NeroVision Formatting disc was successful [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:22:53 #27 Text 0 File DVDPlusRW.cpp, Line 663 [18:46:01] NeroVision Start write address at LBA 0 [18:46:01] NeroVision DVD high compatibility mode: Yes [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:43:32 #28 SCSI -1093 File Cdrdrv.cpp, Line 1436 [18:46:01] NeroVision SCSI Exec, HA 2, TA 1, LUN 0, buffer 0x02A10000 [18:46:01] NeroVision Status: 0x04 (0x01, SCSI_ERR) [18:46:01] NeroVision HA-Status 0x00 (0x00, OK) [18:46:01] NeroVision TA-Status 0x02 (0x01, SCSI_TASTATUS_CHKCOND) [18:46:01] NeroVision Sense Key: 0x03 (KEY_MEDIUM_ERROR) [18:46:01] NeroVision Sense Code: 0x02 [18:46:01] NeroVision Sense Qual: 0x00 [18:46:01] NeroVision CDB Data: 0x2A 0x00 0x00 0x1A 0xB6 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x20 0x00 0x00 0x00 [18:46:01] NeroVision Sense Data: 0xF0 0x00 0x03 0x00 0x1A 0xAA 0x30 0x0A [18:46:01] NeroVision 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x02 0x00 [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:43:32 #29 CDR -1093 File Writer.cpp, Line 311 [18:46:01] NeroVision No seek complete [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:43:32 #30 Text 0 File ThreadedTransfer.cpp, Line 228 [18:46:01] NeroVision all writers idle, stopping conversion [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:43:32 #31 Text 0 File ThreadedTransfer.cpp, Line 222 [18:46:01] NeroVision conversion idle, stopping reader [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:43:32 #32 Text 0 File DVDPlusRW.cpp, Line 881 [18:46:01] NeroVision Media-Format will be stopped after burning [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:43:32 #33 Phase 127 File APIProgress.cpp, Line 276 [18:46:01] NeroVision Generating DVD high compatibility borders [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:45:55 #34 Text 0 File DVDR.cpp, Line 5341 [18:46:01] NeroVision Drive: PLEXTOR DVDR PX-716A [18:46:01] NeroVision Book Type request [PX]: DVD-ROM [18:46:01] NeroVision Book Type setting not supported for the loaded disc type [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision 18:45:55 #35 Phase 38 File APIProgress.cpp, Line 276 [18:46:01] NeroVision Burn process failed at 2.4x (3,324 KB/s) [18:46:01] NeroVision [18:46:01] NeroVision Existing drivers: [18:46:01] NeroVision File 'Drivers\ASPI32.SYS': Ver=4.71 (0002), size=16877 bytes, created 17/07/2002 08:53:02 [18:46:01] NeroVision File 'Drivers\PXHELP20.SYS': Ver=2.02.40a, size=16416 bytes, created 26/06/2004 20:53:51 (Prassi/Veritas driver for win 2K) [18:46:01] NeroVision File 'Drivers\InCDfs.SYS': Ver=4, 3, 11, 1, size=99456 bytes, created 03/01/2005 11:33:44 (InCD4 driver for win NT/2K/XP) [18:46:01] NeroVision File 'Drivers\InCDpass.SYS': Ver=4, 3, 11, 1, size=28928 bytes, created 03/01/2005 11:33:24 (InCD4 driver for win NT/2K/XP) [18:46:01] NeroVision File 'Drivers\InCDrec.SYS': Ver=4, 3, 11, 1, size=8704 bytes, created 03/01/2005 11:33:46 (InCD4 driver for win NT/2K/XP) [18:46:01] NeroVision Registry Keys: [18:46:01] NeroVision HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\WinLogon\AllocateCDROMs : 0 (Security Option) If anyone out there can spot why it is failing, I'd love to know. Cheers.
Ok, been on to plextor support, have filled in the forms on the website and am now awaiting a reply. I must say I am shocked that a piece of hardware can go faulty in less than 6 months with so little usage, and it doesn't seem to be confined to just one make or model. If my bike or power tools were to do the same the companies involved would be in for some serious hassle, but because it is PC related, we all figure it must be our fault first. Sadly this seems to be the attitude of certain manufacturers as seen in other pages of theis forum (eg. Dell). Will post back once I know anything more. Thanks to all who've replied, and also those whose woes I've already looked at to try resolving my own.
OK, now I know the plextor is broke. I got my hands on an LG triple format burner (+/-, dual layer, and RAM) and straight off I burned the discs I had been trying to do for weeks. Used DVDShrink & Nero to do a backup, tried all the discs I was having problems with - no errors! Looks like plex will be getting a drive back for replacement under warranty. Thanks to all the forum users their help, without it I wouldn't have even known there was such a thing as an ASPI layer, let alone that it was corrupted. And I just Looove DVDShrink! Cheers, last night was the first time I had had a grin on my face in weeks!
Plextor came through on the support/customer service front! Brand new replacement drive arrived 2 days after sending them the error report. Can't beat that really, all the way from belgium to the IOM, I've had letters/postcards to family take longer.
Works a treat, even better the manufacture date on the drive is Sept 2005!! Don't know why I didn't set up with 2 burners before, what one doesn't read/write the other does! Even discs that have been created on other systems written with the WinXP CD writing software (Urrgghh). Have Fun.
