CD/DVD Burner Not Working--Very Odd Behavior

[Josh Stegmaier]

Hello all,

I've recently been experiencing some very strange behavior from my CD/DVD
burner. I believe it all started when I attempted to use NeroLinux (based on
fairly good experience with my Windows version of Nero.) I tried to burn a
.nrg image to a CD and then have it do a write check. During the write
check, it found several read-errors, and this caused my system to all but
freeze completely. I attempted to cancel the check, and I'm not even sure
anymore whether I actually got in cancelled or if it just finished.

After that, I attempted to burn the .nrg image again, but this time at the
slowest speed I could, hoping to avoid the errors on the disc. I left my
computer for about 30 minutes or so, and when I came back, the write was
stuck at 4 or 5 percent, and going no where--it wasn't reporting any errors,
either. So, again, I attempted to cancel the burn, and I believe I suceeded
that time. Just after this, my real problems started.

I thought I'd give Nero one last try, this time burning a bin/cue image that
K3b hadn't burned successfully. I put another blank disc in the my CD drive,
and this time, Nero wouldn't recognize there was a disc in the drive at all.
Finally fed up, I gave up on Nero, and decided to look for another burning
program.

I read around a bit, and decided to get Gnomebaker. I downloaded it, and
tried to get it to burn something, but it wouldn't recognize the blank disc
either. Thinking maybe it was a problem with the disc, I switched to another
one, then a third, finally realizing that, in fact, it wasn't just the
programs that weren't recognizing the blank discs, but my computer wasn't
seeing them at all.

I got a little worried at this point, but thinking maybe it was something
with GNOME, I restarted the GUI, but still the problem persisted. I
restarted my computer, but there was no change. I test several other discs,
and even borrowed a different brand of CD-R from a friend to try, but
nothing worked. Finally, I tried a blank DVD-R, which was recognized.
However, when I tried to burn about 3.8 GB worth of stuff on to the 4.7 GB
disc, I was told to insert a disc with at least 3.8 GB free.

All this had me a little worried. Then, I tried putting in a burned CD I had
been able to read earlier. Nothing--it didn't even register. Non-burned CDs
worked fine. Then, I tried a burned DVD of mine. It recongized it, but it
told me it was a blank DVD-R. Considering all this stuff had just worked the
day before, I was really getting worried my CD-R/DVD-R drive was ruined.

However, I decided, I'd try to reinstall Ubuntu--with the final release of
Dapper coming out soon, I thought I'd give it a try. Unfortunately, being
unable to burn discs meant I'd have to just reinstall from my Breezy disc,
then do a distro-upgrade to Dapper. I figured out how to get my /home
directory onto a seperate partition, then I reinstalled Breezy. After, I
tried to distro-upgrade to Dapper, and ran in to trouble, but that isn't
really imporant here--basically, I just had to install Breezy yet again.

Now, there I was on a new install of Breezy, hoping that my drive is
working--a hope that was soon dashed. The first CD-R I put in was recognized
right away, but when I tried to burn an iso to it (the Dapper installation
iso, by the way), I was told to insert a disc that had enough free space for
the image. Hoping that maybe this time it WAS just a problem with the dics,
I tried another one--that one and all subsequent CD-Rs I've tried haven't
been recognized, just like before my reinstallation.

I tried my DVD-R next. Recognized immediately, I moved about a GB worth of
stuff on it to be burned, and it burned successfully. That was some good
news--at least until I reinserted the disc, when the computer told me it as
a blank DVD-R again.

So, that's where I'm at right now. I don't understand why the problem
carried over from one installation of the OS to the next--unless there's
something in my /home that's causing the problem, but I have no idea what it
is--there's not even a .nero folder or anything similar there. And, I don't
understand how a program can actually permanently ruin a hardware device on
your computer, which is what appears to have happened.

I'm sorry for the extremely long mail, but this is worrying me a lot, and I
hoped by going into detail it would help others see what I did wrong.
Hopefully with your help I'll be ablt to resolve this problem soon.

Thank you,
Josh Stegmaier
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