Optiarc BC-5500S buffer problem

[Geryon]

I've got a Sony VAIO NS-11ZR (Intel PM45 Express chipset) laptop with Optiarc BC-5500S burner, running 32-bit Windows Vista Home Premium and I can't burn any DVD. To be precise, DVDs are burned but they're unreadable. (The CDs are burned without any troubles)

 

While burning a DVD, Optiarc's buffer level jumps wildly from 5% to 97%, but no errors are reported by ImgBurn during the very burning process. Still, testing fails; and burned DVDs can't be read anywhere.

 

I already installed the newest SONY flash for the drive (1.77), but nothing changed. Changed DAO/SAO mode to Incremental, and nothing changed. Changed SPTI interface to ElbyCDIO and nothing changed either. Bought DVD media of different vendors, but in vain.

 

I've read many tips about enabling DMA mode (symptoms of an IDE drive running in PIO mode are quite close to those of mine), but seems they're unappliable to a SATA drive like mine. I've also found no traces of any SATA-via-IDE in my BIOS, because the BIOS menu itself is very simple and only contains boot and password options.

 

Log:

 

------------

I 16:54:37 ImgBurn Version 2.4.4.0 started!

I 16:54:37 Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium Edition (6.0, Build 6001 : Service Pack 1)

I 16:54:37 Total Physical Memory: 2

Edited June 15, 2009 by Geryon

[mmalves]

Install this INF Update Utility, reboot if it asks you to, then install this Matrix Storage Manager and reboot. Also revert ImgBurn's settings to their default values (hint: the Defaults button in the Settings dialog )

[Geryon]

Just did that, but with no effect. The problem persists.

 

Writing on 1x speed works most of the time though (even before INF update and Matrix Manager installation).

[LIGHTNING UK!]

That log shows the disc couldn't be read during the Verify phase.

 

Windows should still be able to read the file system though and show you the 2 files you burnt to it, it would just eventually fail (or skip) during playback.

 

Try some Verbatim DVD+R media instead. For DVD-R, I'm more of a Taiyo Yuden (TYG02 / TYG03) dye fan than I am Verbatim (MCC 03RG20 / MCC 02RG20).

 

The graph data file would be useful for checking out the speeds. Open it in DVDInfoPro or the 'BurnPlot' tool you can find in the 'ImgBurn General' section of this forum.

[Geryon]

Right you are, files are displayed but playback fails sooner or later.

 

As of your media recommendation - here in Russia we haven't heard anything of Taiyo Yuden.

 

I have opened the last graph datafile (TDK DVD-R SL media, MBI 01RG40) with BurnPlot and attached the screenshot to this post.

[LIGHTNING UK!]

That's reaching 8x ok, it's just awful quality and the drive can't read back what it just wrote.

 

If the drive is clean and it still does it with the Verbatim DVD+R, send it back for replacement.