Did "Good" media go bad -OR- DVD Recorder conundrum? Help!

[MrCreosote]

Firstly, I sincerely apologize for the length of this narrative, but it covers many wasted hours of testing. Again apologies.
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I have wasted so much time on this, I would have been better off throwing the DVD recorder (Toshiba RD-XS32) in the trash. But here is the conundrum:

Buy XS32 3 years ago.

Buy 360 yellow Maxel (either MXL RG02 or TYG01) in the 20 jewel pack case when closed out by OfficeMax (or Depot) about 3 years ago.

Make almost 300 burns and make only maybe 3 coasters.

Then all of a sudden, get ERR-14's which are "DVD disc access error detected."
Get this in 5 successive burns on the same content.
Error encountered anywhere from a few minutes into burn or all the way to finalization.

Assume DVD drive is going bad.

Get LG GSA-H42N which is a suggested replacement from AVS forums.

Open up XS32 and lay LG drive on top of oem drive with ribbon cables all in the air (they were originally carefully taped to ground planes.

Make 2 burns and get 2 ERR-14's Very quickly at the start of the burn.

Conclusion: DVD Recorder has gone bad.
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A few days pass, I'm looking for some cheap media that I don't mind wasting for troubles like these and get some 1-16x Playo MCC 03RG20's from Staples 60 spindle for maybe $8 w/rebate.

AVS forum post suggests there may be a connection problem where the DVD ribbon cable connects to the adapter at the DVD. So I move the ribbon in and out to reseat.

Just for heck of it, I throw a Playo in the LG drive and IT WORKS!

I try a Playo in the oem drive and IT WORKS!

I try another Maxell in the LG and get ERR-14.

I try another Maxell from another case and get ERr-14.
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Its like overnight, the XS32 Recorder will not burn Maxells.
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Then, I start NeroCDspeed and get results that are hideous.
(as follows in this format: Drive, Media, PI errors ave max tot PI failures ave max tot)

Burns made after ERR-14 occurances
LG: Playo: 153 2687 2292511 0.15 374 17554
OE: Playo: 800 8717 7517441 11 8688 823522

Burns made before ERR-14 occurances
07/2007: OE: MXL RG02: 1.79 36 21499 0.00 17 266
06/2007: OE: MXL RG02: 111 3110 1654198 3.58 2797 424941
01/2005: OE: MXL RG02: 127 7268 1599844 2.50 1585 249992
(early): OE: MXL RG02: 523 6822 8587286 5.15 2351 676113

I took one of the Maxells that bombed quickly with an ERR-14 and put some data on it from my PC. Obviously, the disc was damaged since the Manufacturer no longer shows up, but the data is readable and I got this:

14 203 246427 .16 44 21975

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So here is the conundrum:

1) All of a sudden, 2 of my remaing 5 of 18 cases of Maxell have mysteriously gone bad overnight, or
2) Although I can record Playo's, they don't look that good (especially on the OE drive) and the DVD Recorder is "going bad."
or
3) I got a bad LG drive.

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What to do?

Proposed Experiment:

Determine if LG drive is bad.

Since these Maxells burn just fine on my PC, hook the LG to a PC and try to burn some PC data on them.

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But seriously, folks, I'm pulling my hair out and I'm already bald.

Any insight into this would be wildly appreciated!

Thanks in advance,
Tom

[lordsmurf]

Discs will last decades at minimum.
Lasers on the other hand, go much faster, couple of years.

So the odds skew towards your drives having trouble.
Clean them.

I don't mean those stupid "cleaning discs" as those make matters worse. Dismantle the machine, swipe the laser lens with a q-tip lightly dipped in alcohol (70% isopropyl "rubbing" alcohol) swipe again with a dry q-tip. Should be fine again.

Firmware upgrades are another solution.

[MrCreosote]

Thanks Lordsmurf,

I may give that a try, however, the LG drive was supposed to be OEM new - I bot it just a couple weeks ago. To Toshiba was upgraded to the latest firmware. Of course, with the LG drive, I'm stuck with its firmware unless I put it in a PC and update (if it needs it). NOTE: I probably should put the LG in a PC and check it out to see it is working properly.

Tom

[terryj]

I would go ahead and do a half/half.
Put the LG in a PC, test it with Nero
and while it's testing, clean the Toshiba as Smurfy
suggested, and try again.

But I overall agree with Smurf...if you got anywhere near
500 or more burns with the Toshiba, chances are
the drive is going bad. Certain drives are less finicky
with cheap media, thus Playo could be getting a "free pass"
due to the firmware on the drive. My Pioneer gives a free pass
on ChumpUSA and Office Depot media, but when it started giving
"hardware sense errors" on TY and Verbatim, I knew it was time to replace.

Clean the Toshiba, try burning with Taiyo, Sony or Verbatim discs.
If these fail (esp. the Taiyo) then trash the drive.

The LG...OEM's still can arrive DOA from supplier. Test
with the PC, if it passes great. If not, send back
for replacement
(hope you kept the reciept).

[MrCreosote]

Well, my efforts were completely stymied when it became known to me that not all DVD drives can run PIE/PIF tests. In fact, both DVD drives of 2 PC's I have at my office could not perform those tests.

Including the suspect LG GSA-H42N!

So there is no way to burn the test disc and check it with the LG.

So I burned a 4x Maxell TYG01 at 4x and tested it on my I/O Magic 8x and got

PIE 1.68ave 64max 30111total, and
PIF 0.01ave 42max 1415total

I believe this is not good. But does it indicate there could be a problem with the LG drive? or media for that matter?

[OneSickPup]

Well, my efforts were completely stymied when it became known to me that not all DVD drives can run PIE/PIF tests. In fact, both DVD drives of 2 PC's I have at my office could not perform those tests.

Including the suspect LG GSA-H42N!

So there is no way to burn the test disc and check it with the LG.

So I burned a 4x Maxell TYG01 at 4x and tested it on my I/O Magic 8x and got

PIE 1.68ave 64max 30111total, and
PIF 0.01ave 42max 1415total

I believe this is not good. But does it indicate there could be a problem with the LG drive? or media for that matter?

Let me make a few suggestions:

• 1. Don't worry about pie/pif testing at this point. Use CD/DVDSpeed TRT (Transfer Rate Test) function and make sure you get a smooth reading curve. Any drive is capable of that test AFAIK unlike Quality Scan features that are restricted to certain drive types. If the dvd reads okay then it should be a keeper.

• 2. LG drives with Renesas chipsets (the H42N being one) are great drives but do tend to require more power than many other types of drives. If that drive works okay in a pc then I would speculate that you may have a weak power supply in that Toshiba RD-XS32. Let me add that I know nothing about that particular recorder.

• 3. Different media requires different write strategies to be used. Some strats require more laser power than others which could explain the Playo vs Maxell issue and points the finger back at power issues.

Not sure if this helps any but good luck.

[MrCreosote]

I measured the voltage at the DVD drive in the Toshiba and it was 4.97v (but not checked during burning.)

Also, I tried burning to the troublesome Maxell using the 1x rate conversion option. I then kept getting messages that the dvd might be dirty. (I did this only with the OE drive which could be dirty. Haven't had a chance to try with the LG drive.)

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How should I test the LG drive with the TRT?

Burn a test disc on the LG and then do a TRT on the LG?

[OneSickPup]

So I burned a 4x Maxell TYG01 at 4x and tested it on my I/O Magic 8x and got

PIE 1.68ave 64max 30111total, and
PIF 0.01ave 42max 1415total

I believe this is not good. But does it indicate there could be a problem with the LG drive? or media for that matter?

If you still have the disk referred to in your previous post (quoted above), then just run the TRT with that I/O Magic drive. I'm not certain you can trust quality scans performed on that drive. The TRT should prove or disprove its readability. I normally avoid using LG's for TRT's because they tend to be very good readers. It's best to pick drives that are somewhat picky in regards reading so that if it passes acceptably on a fussy reading drive it should be good on anything. Just my opinion of course. Good luck.

[Nelson37]

Diagnostic programs are nice. However, too often they do not test what we want tested.

Is the goal of the excercise to arrive at a media and burner combination that passes a diag test perfectly? Or is the goal to get a media and burner to which you can copy a series of bits, and be able to retrieve exactly the same series of bits off the disk?

If the disk burned and played back perfectly, but the diag says it is flawed, what do you do? What if the diag says the disk is fine, but playback shows errors?

Do a series of burns in the PC, using original PC burner and both DVD standalone drives. Copy the files back to the PC from the burned disk, and run a File Compare on these against the original files stored on the PC. If what is on the disk is identical to what you intended to burn to it, no problem.

[epiquestions]

I have a DVD-writer (Liteon SOHW3253s with firmware CS0T) and lately it has been creating bad burns. When I burn a dvd full of divx avi vids, it plays the movies fine until about the 3400Mb area of the dvd. My dvd writer and cdr/dvd combo can't seem to read it. Tested the meadia with NeroCD/DVD speed and like I said it can't read from the 3400point onwards.

I have burned BENQ 16x -burned at 16x (trouble with pc dvd drives, OK with nextbase dvdplayer)
BENQ 16x -buned at 12x (OK)
TDK 16x -burned at 8x (can't read 3400mb region onwards plus a black ring (burn maybe) is seen
around the 3400mb area of the dvd)
a couple of Kellpex 8x - burned at 4x/6x/8x ( can't read 3400mb region onwards

I have burned at least about 120 dvds with this one and the drive s about 2-3 years old

Is this a sign that the drive laser is going bad? Is there anyway to fix it?
Could resetting the learned media fix the problem? (using eeprom utility)