dvd burner writes cd's, but not dvd's

[tarheelsnipe]

First let me give you some background. My PC recently rejected Windows SP2. I messed around with pretty much all the services in Administrative tools and msconfig. I set them back to what I think they used to be. Then I finally figured out how to uninstall SP2. Ever since that uninstall, I've been unable to burn dvdr discs.

drive: HP DVD200i, disc types: Kodak dvd+r, imation dvd+r

I have Nero 6.xx, Sonic MyDVD, and CopyToDVD. All are rejecting dvd writing. It WILL read DVD's though. I haven't touched the drivers. They're all fine. I've wasted 4 or 5 discs trying out different programs.

thanks as always for looking

[RJ]

By saying that you wasted some DVDs it means that the burner does write to DVD, just not the way it should be. Do you get some kind of error ?

Well, what I'd do is to slipstream SP2 into your WinXP CD and then do a clean install. It looks to me that your system is messed up, and the best is a clean install.

RJ

[tarheelsnipe]

well, when I try to burn images (bin's and iso's) it writes a thin line onto the disc. I can see it when i take the disc out. when I simply try to make a data cd, it writes a much thicker line.

I have a windows xp home w/ sp1a cd, but i don't have the key for it (doh). i found it buried in some cd's in my closet. I also have a copy of winxp pro w/ sp1 that i installed on another partition. I tried to burn a dvd from that XP version as well with the same result.

should i remove the dvd drive and delete the drivers and reinstall it?

[RJ]

So, if I got you right, it's like this:

You have two Windows XP installed, one on each partition. You installed SP2 on one of them and messed it up. And now you also can't burn a DVD from the other Windows XP, that wasn't affected at all by the faulty SP2 installation ?

I suspect the burner may have gone south . . it's an older model anyway.
But yes, I would try to remove the drivers (delete the burner in device manager), and let Windows re-install it. You don't need to physically remove the burner, just delete the entry in device manager and reboot.

If that doesn't work, I'd try the burner in another PC. If it still doesn't work, then I guess it's gone for good.
I have the HP dvd200i, too, bought it in June, 2002. It still writes DVDs fine, but not CDs. I don't know since when because when I got it I still had my Plextor CD burner so I didn't care about the CD burning ability of the DVD200i. Only this January, when I decided to remove the Plextor from my PC, because I barely burn CDs and I thought for the few CDs I burn the dvd200i would be good enough, then I discovered that it doesn't burn to CD-R. It burns CD-RW fine, though. But I always get an error message when trying to burn CD-R and it won't be burned at all.
Might be just vice versa in your case.

RJ

[tarheelsnipe]

deleted the drivers and reinstalled. same result. Here's the error report generated in CopyToDVD....

Burning process started at 1.5x
Start Write
Start Write buffer
Warning: (OPC) Failed. Code 00 00 00 (No Error Reported By Device.
Error: Unable to finalize the write process.
Error: (Write Sector Failed): Code 02 04 07 (Not ready, operation in progress

Is it time for a new burner?

[RJ]

I suspect so. I would still try it in another computer, but I believe it's dead.

RJ