Computer Help Please

[Greg B]

I was burning an audio CD on my DVD/CD writer.

However, there was more material than the capacity of the disk - the light on the burner was flashing and the computer was unresponsive. I had to hit the reset button on the computer to regain control..

The burner is now not recognising blank disks to burn, and won't read data or audio disks.

Device manager tells me it is functioning properly, but device manager is lying.

I have done a soft uninstall and reinstall. Also a cold reboot. Nothing, nada

Any ideas?????????

[birddog114]

I was burning an audio CD on my DVD/CD writer.

However, there was more material than the capacity of the disk - the light on the burner was flashing and the computer was unresponsive. I had to hit the reset button on the computer to regain control..

The burner is now not recognising blank disks to burn, and won't read data or audio disks.

Device manager tells me it is functioning properly, but device manager is lying.

I have done a soft uninstall and reinstall. Also a cold reboot. Nothing, nada

Any ideas?????????

new pc perhaps:lol:

[Greg B]

Thanks Birdy, I might put that down the list of possible solutions at the moment.

[Onyx]

Greg, did you happen to let the machine idle in its supposed 'stalled' state for a few mins? Sometimes the burning software might be doing someting but not letting on, and the software usually locks the drive when in use (hence pushing the eject button will yield the virtual finger salute from your drive).

If there's a next time, before the hard reset press ctrl+alt+delete to bring up task manager (assuming you use Winblows) and shut down anything remotely related to the CD writing software. Give it a few mins to think itself out of its predicament...

At this stage, my suggestion is to update the firmware. If it's the Lite-On drive that you bought recently, there's a good chance there are 3rd party firmwares out there that increase ripping & burning speeds with compatible media and enable region free setting too. Heck, it's not reading inserted disks so might as well void that warranty to try fix it.

[Greg B]

Thanks Onyx, I tried the task manager option, all to no avail. The only response from the computer was that the cursor still moved, nothing else worked at all, no start menu, no reponse to keypresses.

I will try the firmware option, see what I can do.

cheers

[lukeo]

G'day mate,

Unlucky there, it does happen. It is unusual for burning software to let you "overburn" a CD. Nero Burning Rom has the capability but will not specifically let you do it unless you go into preferences, advanced and specify the option "enable overburn" and supply a maximum

number over 80 minutes (700MB) to burn. 705MB will usually fit on a 700MB CD (thats 733

000KB roughly), you can buy 90 and 99minute CD's .. though DVD-R's are much cheaper these days.

I have on ocassion had this experiance, it is rare. Usually the burner recovers fine but

sometimes a few things can occur which may need fixing, i.e this has happened to you.

1. Nero.exe or whatever your burning software is could also have been "shagged" by your hard reset of the computer, i think you mentioned you had reinstalled your burning software, if not do so.

2. The Imapi.exe service in windows XP is what does the "CD/DVD Burning" at a system level, it may have been damaged as well. locate your windows XP cd (if this is what you are running), Click Start -> Run and type this in exactly

sfc /scannow

it will check all system files for CRC integrity and changes, System file check also knows if a file has been updated via windows update or a service pack so dont worry about it replacing older versions your cd it does not do this.

3. The IDE drivers for your motherboard may have been corrupted (specifically the secondary

channel if thats what the burner is on). If you have a nvidia based "Nforce" board download

the latest "Forceware" drivers from http://www.nvidia.com if you have a Via based chipset

such as the K8T800 download the latest 4in1 Hyperion drivers for your motherboard, if it's and intel solution you will need you motherboard cd of a search of http://www.intel.com should provide what you need. This is not by any means what has happened but is probably a good idea anyway to use the latest drivers if you have a new pc.

4. The firmware as suggested is now "ka-put", download the appropriate firmware for your DVD burner, read all instructions and flash it.

5. The drive has done something "bad" to the computers BIOS, download the latest BIOS from your motherboard manufacturer and re-flsah (only recommended if you have exausted all other possibilities). Read all instructions carefully.

6. You could have physically damaged the burning laser of your drive, (there are warning about overburning for a reason), in which case if all the above fails (and you are willing to do all of the above at your own risk) then you may need a new DVD-RW drive.

[Greg B]

Thanks yraen69 for the time you have taken here, it is greatly appreciated.

I have tried several things you mentioned.

Two questions if I may...
Q1
I have located a firmware upgrade for the drive. I have the correct one. However, when executing the file it tells me

"No matched Drive detected
This utility is only for LITE-ON DVDRW SOHW-1653S

Detected Drives
0-0-0-0 O:
2-0-0-0 L:
2-0-1-0 M:
3-0-0-0 P:"

The lite-on drive is on L:
Does this indicate anything about where the problem is? Drive M still works OK.

Q2
I have gigabyte MB. There are several drivers available for download for my model. Nothing is specifically for IDE - would it be the chipset drivers (INF or IAA)?

thanks in advance if you can help

cheers

[lukeo]

Gigabyte makes many kinds of boards, for AMD/PIV even VIA.

The chipset drivers are the ones you want to try. Even if they don't fix your problem at

least you will have the latest drivers. These include drivers for everything the chipset

controls, ide, floppy, onboard items.

Lite On do not have the greatest instructions : (from there site)

Firmware Upgrade Program Run Under Windows
1. Make sure your drive's model name by inspecting the safety label on top of your drive.
2. Download the ZIP file with correct model name.
3. Please unzip the downloaded ZIP file.
4. Please close all applications under Windows.
5. Please make sure to keep power supplier without any interruption during upgrade.
6. Execute the firmware upgrade execution file.
7. Select the drive you want to upgrade ( if you have more than one LITE-ON drives ).
8. Upgrading ( No power interruption ).
9. Reboot your PC to see if the firmware has been changed.


I get the same error as you at work, I only have a generic Diamond Data cdrom in this

machine.


My guess is that the drive you have is a slightly different model, have a look here and see

if you can find an exact match. If you are 110% sure that this is the model and it still

won't flash it may be because the flash software cannot recognise the burner because it's

firmware is damaged.

http://www.liteonit.com.tw/ODD/English/ ... d%20rw.asp

If that is the case you will need some third party flasher which i wil try and locate.

Hmm try this at your own risk

Read here
http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php ... adid=83294
Download here
http://upload.cdfreaks.com/ftools/firmware.exe (I hate posting links to exe files)

The link at the bottom of this page points here

http://dhc014.rpc1.org/howto.htm#buildcommand

this gives you the option to download mktflash to flash your drive with various /f (force tages).

Whether or not you take this step is upto you, you have entered an area which is not to be treated lightly it can permenantly damage you drive, which at this point it seems is already the case. I suggest unplugging your other cd rom drive to avoid inadvertantly flashing it, reading everything twice before proceeding.

I sucessfully flashed my Pioneer 108 drive with a custom firmware to enable faster ripping speeds etc ... I used MKTFLASH and various switches which are all in the readme.txt file that comes with it.

personally i'd be trying motherboard drivers first, and even your Gigabyte motherboards official BIOS update via a floppy disk first.

definately do a sfc /scannow it may simply be corrupt software files that is easily automatically repaired by windows.

[PlatinumWeaver]

Before you try flashing the firmware...

Have you tried removing the device from the device manager and letting it re-install on the next boot-up?

[Greg B]

Dean, No I didn't. I tried a soft uninstall/reinstall without a reboot.

However, thanks Yraen for all you help, nothing worked, but I gave it a good crack. I needed to burn some CDs so I put the CD burner back in - everything works fine. So I guess the problem is in the device and not elsewhere in the computer.

I will stick the DVD burner back in for one last try later.

Thanks all

cheers

[lukeo]

That tells a story, no amount of cursing,reinstalling or flashing will fix a physically damaged drive. Unlucky you are, perhaps some of the above will help another user.

Is the drive still under warranty? If so can you or do you feel right returning it for anothor one?

Well good luck.