Problems burning DVDs with LiteOn 811s

[tomstevens26]

Originally posted this in the DVD to DVDR forum, but since I'm a newbie at this I probably should have posted it here...

Hey everyone. Please bear with me...this is a bit long!

I sure hope someone here can help! I recently installed a LiteOn 811s and have yet to backup a DVD movie successfully. What I mean by successfully is a movie that doesn't skip, or garble, or freeze, or even jump back to the standalone DVD player menu of "Insert Disc". Let me explain what I've done so far...

I have tried the following programs to rip the source DVD:
DVD Shrink
DVD Decrypter

I have burned the DVDs (everything from 1x up to 8x) with:
Nero 6
CloneDVD
Alcohol 120%
DVD Decrypter
CopyToDVD

I have used 4 different forms of media:
Memorex 4x DVD+R
Memorex 4x DVD-R
DVD+R (unknown brand that came with the drive)
DVD+RW (unknown brand that came with the drive)

I've tried ripping with DVD Decrypter, then converting it to an ISO file, and buring it that way rather than burning the VIDEO_TS folder.

I have even went so far as to install this drive in another PC with the same outcome.

Also, the ripped movies play just fine on the hard drive when playing them through PowerDVD. So the ripping process seems to work.

DVDs that I backup are still acting unpredictable. For example, my most recent backup (House of 1000 Corpses) would play fine on my 16x DVD writer in another PC. On my Toshiba standalone player it would play fine until the next to last chapter. On my RCA standalone player it would mess up about halfway into the movie. I would think a bad burn would produce the same problems regardless of what unit it is playing in...correct? It would even mess up when trying to play it both on the LiteOn DVD burner and the LiteOn 16x DVDROM in another PC. In both cases, PowerDVD would pop up a message suggesting that I clean the DVD as "problems are preventing playback."

Also, the DVDs don't start messing up at the same point. For example, I tried backing up The Hulk. When I first put it in my Toshiba standalone player, the trailers played fine, then you get to the main menu. Everything appeared to work. Just to see if it worked again, I ejected the disc, reloaded it, and sure enough, it started skipping at the trailers, and jumped to main menu. When I tried to play the movie, and skip from chapter to chapter, it would skip to the chapter, but then start stuttering. The picture would then freeze but you could see the timer/counter jump 10, 15, 20, etc... seconds ahead, until it reached the end of the menu.

Given all of this, I'm really starting to suspect the drive is bad. Thursday, I built the PC that this drive was in. I used this drive to install the OS and all of my applications and did not have a problem. I've even burned a couple of data CDRs that verified the data after backup and performed correctly when I copied that data to another PC. So, can the drive read correctly, and burn CDs correctly, but have a hardware problem when burning DVDs?

So, what should I do? Does it sound like a bad drive to you guys? I just don't understand how it can be a bad drive when it comes to burning DVDs, yet every other function works. It also boggles my mind that if the discs were bad, then the point at which they start screwing up would be the same in all players. I've pulled it and have it sitting on my desk, ready to RMA. I'm at my wits end with thing and would really appreciate any help!!

Thanks for any advice!!
Tom

[Greykiller2004]

I had some of the same problems. After installing this drive, I found that the two dvd players I owned would read the dvd-r's with varied success, and that the first two burns both crapped out the same way you describe, about 2/3rds thru.

So....

What I did was, I did NO multitasking while the NERO burn was going, and NO multitasking while dvdshrink ripped the file. After doing that, I was able to get a dvd that would play in my old Toshiba SD-1600. That smells like success or close to it.

Try turning off all programs including NORTON or any other antivirus you may be using, and attempt the burn again.