Can't erase a DVD-RW

[DarrellS]

Can someone explain to me why I can't erase a DVD-RW disc?

Sonic MyDVD will erase 35% of the disk and then give me an era message than the media is scratched or something and none of the disk is erased (this is a disk that I bought and burned today and have been trying all day to erase).

I've tried a couple of programs that were suggested to me but they won't work either. They read my Liteon 812s but as soon as I stick the DVD-RW that I want to erase in the drive, the drive magically disappears and I have no DVD drive on my machine. The same thing happens with Nero which I downloaded a demo of. I have tried to burn over the data that is on the disk but get a burn rights violation and am told to download a burn rights from Nero which I did but I still get the burn rights error message.

Am I SOL? Is RW just a myth and the $14 that I spent on the 5 DVD-RW disks a waste of money that I could've spent on generic disks to make coasters with?

[DarrellS]

OK, looks like nobody has an answer for this problem so this is what I ended up doing.

First, I probably made a mistake by doing this since I had a few problems afterwards but I did a firmware upgrade.

That didn't help so I uninstalled every burning program that I had on my computer and shazaam, all of a sudden, I had an option in Windows Explorer to reformat the disk in the drive which I didn't have before.

I'll have to burn another DVD-RW to see if MyDVD will erase it or if I have to use the format option in Windows Explorer. I guess it doesn't matter as long as I can reuse the RW disks.

[DarrellS]

That didn't fricken work. It says it's not an empty disk and nothing will erase it.

How am I supposed to get adminastrative rights for this stupid Windows 2000 operating system when I own the fricking computer and it is my Windows 2000 disk that is installed on the computer.

I have absolutely no control over this computer. I have no msconfig to get rid of everything that runs in the background and keep it from running at start up and I can't erase my own CDs or DVDs because I can't give myself administrative rights that I should have in the first place since I am the owner of this single user computer.

[Capmaster]

I do it all the time in Nero. "Quick-Erase Rewritable Media" Maybe you have bad media?

[DarrellS]

I do it all the time in Nero. "Quick-Erase Rewritable Media" Maybe you have bad media?

I couldn't do anything with Nero installed. It kept telling me that I had Nero Burn Rights installed and told me to give myself server rights and everytime I tried, it kept telling me that I didn't have server rights to do anything with Nero, burn, erase etc...

Other programs either tell me that I don't have a recorder that is capable of erasing, that I don't have a drive installed at all, that the media might be scratched and the same you don't have administrative priviledges.

I've tried three different RW disks.

I can't keep a printer or scanner working on this operating system and now I find out that my DVD burner is worthless.

These so-called security features are driving me crazy. I can download and install anything I want. I can put a virus on the machine if I wish but I have to have administrative priviledges to erase a rewritable disk.

Is there a stripped down version of this operating system that is made for a single home user who doesn't give a crap about networking but only wants to use it as a video editing and graphics system and doesn't have to rely on a system administrater, whoever the hell he's supposed to be.

What good is it to burn a $3.00 RW disk if you can't erase it and reuse it. Might as well be using 60 cent ritek DVD-R. That's alot cheaper price for a coaster.

[DarrellS]

Well, it WILL erase a CD-RW but I guess DVD-RWs are out of the question.