Sony Drive Check - Does It Work?

[Curt Lindner]

OK, I've been having mysterious problems with my Sony DRU-500A drive, and I can't get any help from Sony.

I run Drive Check, it says that it passes, but the resulting disk is not readable. Since the drive check just wrote, and read back information, shouldn't I be able to see what it wrote?

This is the same problem I am having with the drive, which I have had for almost a year, but only recently had problems.

I do a disk to disk copy using RecordNow, RecordNow DX, ECDC 5, or Nero 5.5.10, and it always reports success, but the disk is often unreadable, but sometimes it works fine.

What can I do to figure this out? I can't afford the cost or the time to write a bunch of bad disks....

Any advice would be appreciated!

-Curt

[69Dartman]

Just something to try, have you installed a aspi layer? sometimes my disks could't be read by some programs before I installed the 4.60 layer, after I did everything works and it cuases no problems with other programs that don't need it either.

[valeyard1492]

I run Drive Check, it says that it passes, but the resulting disk is not readable. Since the drive check just wrote, and read back information, shouldn't I be able to see what it wrote?

I ran it on my DW-U14A/DRU510A and no problems were reported; however, I determined it was the verbatim (unmarked speed) 1x media causing the coaster problem.

So have you tried different media?

[vtecwil]

The information that is written on the disc when using drive check is just for checking the drive . The format of this data can not be read by windows .

[valeyard1492]

The information that is written on the disc when using drive check is just for checking the drive . The format of this data can not be read by windows .

Actually, in the test you use a CD and I could read the disc, which follows because there would be no way to verify the write if it could not read what it wrote.

[vtecwil]

Check the Sony website for the latest version of drivecheck . This version of drivecheck allows you to use DVD media . I tested my drive ( 500 AX ) using a +RW and everything tested fine but the media could not be read back in windows . I have burned media ( +R ) since this test and they work fine . Maybe the original poster of this question should take your advice and try a different brand of media .

[valeyard1492]

http://sony.storagesupport.com/cdrw/diagnostics.htm

Yes, they have recently updated it (10/22/03).