CD drive no longer acccepts newly burned CDs

[luisr]

I got a regular CD drive in my system along with a CD-RW burner. I used to burn CDs in there using Nero Burning ROM (under Windows XP Home) with no problems and was able to read them in my regular CD drive or anywhere else without problems.

Now, the last few disks I have burned work properly in the CD burner but won't be recognized by my regular CD drive. I took one of those disks to the computer I use at work and it doesn't work either. I have opened known-good CDs I have burned in that computer too without problems.

As far as I know I have not changed any settings in Nero Burning ROM and I am the only person who burns CDs in this computer. I found a nice little utility called "Nero InfoTool" that gives me information about the disk drives, and the CD disks inserted. I put a known-good disk in the regular CD drive and a "bad" disk in the CD-RW drive (both work properly in their respective drives) and both show the same format: "ISO 9660, Joliet", both show just one session (I didn't make multi-session disks in both cases).

However, the "bad" disk won't work in my regular CD drive even though it has the same format as the good one. Both disks have pictures in them and were recorded as data CDs.

What can cause this? I did find one seemingly little detail that might be the reason. Please anyone tell me if this is so.

I noticed that all "good" disks were Imation CD-R disks that show a logo with "16X 80min" and say "1x-16x Compatible". The "bad" disks are also Imation CD-R disks of the same capacity but do not show either logo. The "bad" disks all come from the same package.

My CD-RW drive records at 32x according to its specifications. Could it be possible that those disks that do not say "1x-16x Compatible" are not compatible at all with my CD-RW drive even though it can read the disks properly?

One additional detail I found with the Nero InfoTool. The "good" disks show "CMC Magnetics, CD-R, 79:59.74" in the media info field whereas the "bad" disks show "CMC Magnetics, CD-R, 79:59.73".

Please advice.

[luisr]

Ok, so I decided to do an experiment and the results seem to confirm my suspicion. I made another CD but set the write speed to the lowest possible (4X) and lo and behold, the newly burned CD worked in the regular CD drive.

I never paid attention to this speed thing before. Now I am stuck with a pack of 50 CDs that are not adequate for my hardware. I can use them, but still....

Any feedback?

[glc]

Kick the speed up and find the fastest they will burn properly, or contact Imation about a possible replacement.

[drewK7VT2]

for a while i couldn't find cd-r discs that were rated at 52x. i was kinda mad about it since i spent the extra money to get the fastest possible burner on the market at the time. i ended up using some 48x discs and they all burned fine at 52x. i even had some old 32x discs that worked at 52x also. i guess it just depends on how well they are made. these days, i just grab a stack that say "All Speed Recordable" (Harmony Multimedia).

[gunrunnerjohn]

If you download the Nero CD-Info tool, it'll tell you the speeds that any blank media are capable of. Just stick them into the CD-RW drive and fire it up. I find it very handy to categorize unmarked bargain CD-R media.

[luisr]

Anyone care to provide a URL for downloading this CD-Info tool? I have searched various places, even Ahead's web site and they don't appear to have it available for download.

[Panama Red]

I did a search on the Ahead site and came up with this:
http://www.nero.com/en/index.html#c1023694368810
Looks like several utility offerings, including the info tool. I use Nero too, and also find the info tool quite useful. good luck

[luisr]

I came up with that page too but the "CD-Info" tool is not there, not to be confused with the "InfoTool" which IS there.

[mike breck]

luisr

Have you tried reinstalling the Nero software to see if that helps.

[luisr]

Why? The problem is not with Nero. It's the blank CDs as far as I can tell.

[mike breck]

Sorry. Misread your post. I see the media appears to be the problem.

[Panama Red]

I think my link is correct. reread gunrunnerjohn's post and I think you will see that he means NERO CD - Info Tool. The linked info tool will provide the disc speed info he refers to. You may already have this software as a part of Nero tool kit. My came on the software CD with my burner. Hope this helps

[luisr]

I tried burning another CD with the speed up one notch to 8x. Nice coaster. I am stuck at 4x with these disks, unfortunately.