LIGHTNING UK!

Alcohol probably have the file specs for CDI images, I do not. I guess the first question should have been to ask what sort of image you think it is? Is it a DVD, a CD, an Audio CD? ImgBurn would only work with DVD or basic CD Images. Search the forum for 'grab5m'. It's a little tool I wrote for this very purpose. Sorry but it need to be run via the command line - so I hope you are semi familiar with that!

I'd need the first 5mb of the file so I can see why it's not being accepted. If you can do that and email it to me, I'll either fix it or tell you why it can't be done.

Go here and get the firmware update http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwar...6&dlc=en&os=228 Then try again.

Yup, TAO is just dumb and can only burn a single track - of any size. It's not very flexible and forces certain things that you might not actually want. To use SAO you have to send a cuesheet, and it's the individual items (tracks) in the cuesheet that have to be over 2 seconds (150 sectors) in length.

By default, most programs that open and try to use DLL files will do so from their own folder before using the system one. So when you use Nero, it's using the WNASPI32.DLL in it's own folder. All other programs would use the system one - ImgBurn included. Yes you could put Nero's WNASPI32.DLL in the System32 folder but then again it would be better to just stick it in the applications folder - incase it screws up some application that relies on the real Adaptec one. In theory you could tell ImgBurn not to wait for background format, but that's only going to push the problem to one side, not fix it. You'd still be asked to format each time you try and burn because it'll never get to that 'Formatted' state. Hopefully the Ricoh +RW discs will work where the Verbatim ones obviously did not.

Pretty much, yeah! Communication with the drive is fine. ASPI just provides an alternative 'road' for the I/O stuff to drive down. If you like, try setting the I/O Interface to one of the other ones and see if it makes a difference.

Yup, that or switch to TAO (track at once) mode burning. I don't really do any CD burning, or if I do, it's never something so small! If I had, I'd have probably taken the time to implement the basic TAO recording method as a fallback if SAO can't be done.

Ok the 'Test unit ready' & 'Request sense' commands going into the log shows the drive is still accepting I/O request. That's a good sign in that the system hasn't actually frozen. You're getting the correct status returned from the drive too - 'logical unit not ready, format in progress'. That's what I'd expect it to say. The problem really is just that the drive won't write to those discs properly. When you eject a disc during a format, it will attempt to end the format before it ejects the tray. That is all controlled by the drive. That's probably why you experienced a delay after pressing the manual eject. The '80 02 7D' data in the sense area info is actually where the progress % comes from. The 80 means that progress values are available and the '02 7D' (637) is the amount complete - where 'FF FF' (65535) is maximum - making 0.9% complete (would show as 0% probably). If you're getting that same figure all the time, it means that's where the format is getting stuck - pretty much right at the start! You're going to have to find some other RW's to try. Maybe some Ricoh ones or something.

ok yeah I'd start by totally removing incd. You might need to uninstall nero and then reinstall doing a custom install with incd turned off. Otherwise, you'll have to strip it out via regedit. Not sure what mxlw2k is either. I don't recognise it as a typical filter driver. Seems to trace back to MusicMatch. See about removing it if you don't use it. Same goes for the Pfc one - normally part of 'Padus'. If you don't use it, remove it. This may help you: http://www.daemon-tools.cc/dtcc/t440-my-re...re-missing.html

You shouldn't ever compare scans between different drives. It just never works - as you've now seen! I believe the BenQ drives (philips chipset) are the only ones that support jitter measurements.

That could be because it's under 150 sectors. Some drives won't burn tracks under 2 seconds (150 sectors) in SAO mode.

Don't worry too much about ASPI. It's not really recommended for use on XP and only programs with lazy authors still need it! The programs that detect if it's ok or not do not take into account that not all files need to be present on XP. So even when it's fine, they'll still report files missing. Nero's ASPI is self contained and doesn't use the system one. Under XP, it's just an SPTI wrapper anyway. That's why you're seeing different file sizes. You can check your filter drivers by downloading the 'devfilter.exe' tool from here http://www.bustrace.com/downloads/free_utilities.htm You basically just highlight your drive and see what it lists for upper and lower filter drivers. Click the 'clipboard' button and paste back in here.

You can't actually change the erase speed within ImgBurn, it will always do it at max, regardless of the speed setting. If you insert a disc AND THEN load ImgBurn, ImgBurn is forced to wait until the OS thinks the drive is ready / not ready. To be taking that long, I would say the drive is having problems initialise the disc. That would go hand in hand with it not being able to format them. Please don't forget to get the 'debug' log before you terminate the program though. There is every chance it's still working perfectly fine - just that the drive isn't reporting any progress with the actual format.

Yes, tools -> drive -> unlock is the same thing. The 'E' button just does that and then ejects the disc too. Yes, you can use tools -> drive -> erase -> full to format the disc without having to burn anything. Like I said, you only have to format a disc once. At 4x, that should take 15 mins. Once formatted, it'll read 'Formatted: Yes' in the info window on the right. When that is visible, the program allows for direct overwrite with no need for additional erasing / formatting. So ok, lets get another format on the go (ensure your firmware it up-to-date first of course) and when it's been going a while and you consider it 'stuck', press the F8 key to enable I/O debug mode. If you see lots of I/O stuff going into the log, it means the program is still checking with the drive to see what it's doing. Let me know what's being said. If nothing is being put in the log it means your drive/drivers have stopped responding and you'll probably need to reboot. This probably means you have a driver problem and will need to check your filter drivers etc. btw, the 'WinXP SP2 Kills Everything' rumour is long gone now, you should probably upgrade!

I actually meant for you to convert it to what it really is.... a LiteOn drive.

The program locks the drive so you can't eject the disc. Unless it shuts down nicely, it won't unlock it. What you could do is terminate the program, then load it up again and hit the little 'E' button under where you select the drive. ImgBurn will not write to DVD+RW media until the drive actually sees it as having been formatted. Not all programs work that way, but mine does - and for people without hardware issues, that isn't normally a big problem. You format once so it's done properly, then it won't need doing again. As I said earlier, yours isn't formatting properly and so you'll never get to the stage where it actually works. Next time you've left it for an hour or so formatting, eject + reinsert the disc and then copy + paste the info from the window on the right within ImgBurn.

It all comes down to the firmware really, as to how the drive is identified. You're on the latest dell firmware but maybe a real liteon one would work better. You could try crossflashing as it certainly couldn't make things any worse! Assuming you've tried a range of QUALITY disc, it could also be that your drive has developed a fault.

Ah ok, yeah, I forgot about that deferred error memory problem. You're getting write errors during an erase... which is never good. So basically, your drive doesn't support those discs.

DVD+RW formatting is a 2 stage process. The first is done in what's known as the 'foreground' (where the user can see things happening), the rest is done in the background. The foreground part takes about 1 minute usually, the background bit would take 15 - 25 mins. During this time, the drive may or may not flash the led to show the user that it's doing something. So basically, if you've left it for hours and the media still reads 'Formatted: No' in the info panel on the right, your drive is having problems formatting the media.

already done it

There is never any dummy data, the drive does the padding.

Do you get that access violation error every time you try and erase a disc? What does the log window say? Try a full erase and copy + paste the full log please.

Sure thing, no problemo

Speaking from experience (programming wise).... making little (ISO9660) names from long ones is a pain in the arse, especially if you're doing a lot of them. It's slooooooooooooooow I'm finding these things out the hard way by attempting my own ISO creation util.

Billy, try actually burning at 8x. It's quite possible the write strategy for TYG02 @ 2.4x is worse than the 8x one. Hopefully they are real TY discs too