Pioneer 109 Problem vs Lite-On SHM-165P6S

[TBoneit]

Well I'm back with more questions

Pioneer I've been having probelms with my cheapo discs. Verbatim 16X +R & -R, Sony MIT and Sony MIJ, Fuji MIJ... Well true they should be good media and coming from a B&M , Best Buy/Staples should be the real deal.

The big problem is I can get about 1 burn at 12X or 16X before it starts making coasters. Burning at 6X it will burn a quantity and then start making coasters. However If I change brands/Type every few discs all is well at 6X. It seems like the drive learns a bad write strategy by repeition and changinbg discs clears it, Can this be?

By Coasters I mean some just will not burn and look untouched, others get about a 1/4 to 1/3 inch of burn and then error out.

Should I just presume not real compatable with XP/Intelchipset/Intel P4 or just bad drive.

As a test I swapped in a Lite-On SHM-165P6S that has been burning flawlessly in another computer of mine. It always seems to burn +R DL ok, same spindle never burned reliable in the Pioneer, that may have been a sign I shouldn't have ignored. The DLs burned in the Lite-On I use to test Personal DVD players drives to make sure they work out to the edge of the disc and the DLs always work when burned in the Lite-on.

I'm on a second Verbatim media burn with the Lite-On as a relacement for the Pioneer and so far 12X flawless burn. I always prefer to burn under rated Max speed.

I don't want to clunk anybody but I'd like to get a few dollars out of the Pioneer drive Any suggestions? At this point I'm thinking call up the Vendor and get another Lite-On AllWrite for the computer I pulled this one out of.

Any thouights/comments?

Cheers

Edit I've now done three and no problems. I'm testing this way to be sure is isn't some weird software problem. Not that I expected the software to be the problem as I had the same problem with Nero, DVD Decrypter and its replacement Imgburn 2

[lordsmurf]

Cables, jumpers, source drives, source discs, dirty drive, firmware... for starters.

[TBoneit]

Same cable, same jumpering.

Source drives, source discs, I'm not quite sure what you mean by that. Source drive would be the hard drive and source disc in my case would be what I've authored. I save the authored files for a while so I'm reburning them right now as a test on Verbatim -R 16X in the Lite-On and so far no problems.

Firmware? I though it was the latest. I can take it into work and check there. We are a little bit slow right now, sigh... makes it boring to tell the truth.

I can open thedrive and give it a good cleaning but I don't expect to find much not being a smoker and given that the computer does not seem to be in a dusty environment. IOW once a year whether or not it needs (pretty much not) I clean it anyway. Temperature could be a issue as when I go to burn I do several at a time as I save them and then do one after another. Hmm... Room Temperature is always cool (Basement) but it could still be temerature related, I hadn't thought of that until LS's checklist tweaked my thought processes into action.

Drive must be past warranty as it was made May 2005.

Thanks

[OneSickPup]

If you're certain it's clean and not a cable issue then flashing firmware is worth a shot - definitely can't hurt. If it's a DVR-109 then go here:
http://forum.rpc1.org/dl_firmware.php?download_id=2017
and get the newest 1.58 version.

If it's a DVR-A09XL then it's version 1.58 again but a different link:
http://forum.rpc1.org/dl_firmware.php?download_id=2016

Good luck. BTW - those links are to certified Pioneer firmwares.

[lordsmurf]

Damaged pins on IDE interface on drive?

[TBoneit]

What I was afraid of, I already have 1.58. No damaged pins. It burns semi reliable. I'm afraid that maybe I wore out the laser.

Oh well as cheap as a replacement is an having checked the obvious. It seems to burn reliable at 4X, more or less reliable at 6X. Unfortunately 4X on 16X media is not the best quality burn. 6X is OK not great.

Sad to say I can't even point to media as the problem as I use the good stuff, MIJ or Verbatim mostly, and some Sony MIT when I can't find the others reasonable price.

Did some test burns last night with teh Lite-On in the Pioneers place and 5 really nice burns at 12X.

[SCDVD]

Make sure you are using 80-wire IDE cables.

[TBoneit]

I only use 80 wire cables in my own PCs. Probable bad DVD burner I'm now thinking. It was never all that I hoped for to be honest but was OK. Maybe I just got a lemon that was on the edge of tolerances from Pioneer.

[lordsmurf]

If lasers run too long non-stop, they can wear out faster. That might be all it is. Avoid that on future drives, give a breather after an hour or so.

[TBoneit]

That could be as I build up things and then burn them off and test on a weekend day.

Not much I can do about that OTOH with the drive in my DVD Recorder as It gets used to burn in real time. IOWs a 2 hour movie takes 2 hours + Finalizing.

Not to confuse things as I started this thread about the one in my PC. I suspect from what I've seen here that the drive in my Pioneer 531h is also a variant of the 109 drive from my computer.