ImgBurn extensive testing

[Mare911]

Hi guys, i decided to post again with my impressions and questions

 

In last few weeks me and my friends tried ImgBurn as everyday burn tool

note: All computers used was strong enough, core2duo/2gb ram minimum

 

During this time we burnt 140-150 DVD discs (with warious content/disc formats). All went OK except in few cases:

 

1.Most severe error 1st

My NOD32 antivirus updated his database while disc was in burn process (this is nothing strange, as you probably know he updates virus database every 3-4hrs). [this can be just a coincidence tho]

Suddenly buffer levels in ImgBurn reached zero and i got "Waiting for buffers to recover... " and "Waiting for hard disk activity to reach threshold level..." message in log.

 

After this imgburn finished disc, but just before very end, when in status bar appeared "Synchronizing cache" ImgBurn freeze for more then 15min.

After click on "Abort" button i got "Close Request Acknowledged" in log but dvd burner remained locked and led was constantly on.

I closed ImgBurn process in task manager but my drive was still locked/unusable. I tried to reboot but i didnt managed cause system major instability so i cold restarted.

Even after hardware reset dvd burner was locked (he also disappeared from device manager) until i turned power off and psychically removed dvd from drive...

Disc was unusable (as u can suppose ) I cant post log because i didnt found any, related to this burn (maybe because i killed process?)

 

Any with similar issue/explanation?

 

2. In situations when we got heavy load on network (50-80mbps download/upload) during burn process we got several "Waiting for buffers to recover... " and "Waiting for hard disk activity to reach threshold level..." messages in log. I posted one of the logs in attachment.

 

I am interested in influence of this 'buffer issues' on burning quality. Can someone explain further?

 

3. Also, one of my friends got problem about locking drive before burning once, but he just ignored this and disc was burnt ok. No, i dont have log for this one #092;

 

Can someone explain role of 'lock drive' step, and how safe potentially ignoring errormessage is (if you got this error ofc)

 

Best regards and sorry for long post/bad english

log.txt

Edited February 27, 2008 by Mare911

[LIGHTNING UK!]

1. That's all down to the drive. If it hangs, it's out of ImgBurn's hands. As you noticed, when I/O hangs, it REALLY hangs. The OS can't really recover from it (without some 3rd party tool to force a bus reset) and you have to press the 'reset' button or power down.

 

2. Every time the buffer runs out the drive has to 'pause' and that means it has to perform relinking. That normally results in some sort of PIF spike - how bad it is varies from drive to drive (based on write speed and media used I guess).

 

3. Locking is covered in the FAQ.

[Mare911]

woot, instant answer LUK

 

You answered to all my questions

 

Thanks again mate

[weisborg]

I use Nod32 for AV too...good AV, but I hate the new licensing they went to with the 3.x switch (Win2003 users have to spend a fortune now and they made a new version with Firewall, but don't include it in updates from 2.x when the yearly license plans clearly stated that any improvements were included with the license...2 years of a license that can't be renewed as well since they no longer offer the multi-user home license model. They were jerks on phone and email too and just wanted to sell me $1000 worth of licenses that I already paid for. They should have kept it where it worked with any Windows like 2.x did.).

 

There is a lot of lag in it, especially during boot when for some reason they feel the need to do an update (Really dumb updating when the most activity is going on). They really need a check for Sys Activity or something. The new version 3.0.642 fixes some lag. I notice it boots and updates faster, but still does it whenever it feels like it. There is also Major Lag if you turn on checking for Runtime Packers...not sure what they do, but it almost seems like they run it in a hidden sandbox or something while realtime scanning to get it in memory and check it for viruses??? Whenever I have that enabled my Start Menu goes nuts like it is scanning every exe that the shortcuts point to.

 

Like LUK said though, it is all a matter of if the system can handle it. Core 2 helps as does drive type and cache. I myself had been holding back on SATA for a while until my latest PC which is all SATA. I never noticed much difference in SATA burners. Hard Drives are a little faster. With PATA you always had the 2 channels and Master/Slave you could adjust placement so other drive activity didn't cause lag. SATA from what I read still sounds like it has a 2 channel grouping setup still, so perhaps putting the drives on a different SATA channel grouping will help.

 

Lately I disable AV and Firewall while burning and even cut the burn speed down to 24x for CD and 6-8x for DVD just because I don't like the fainter rings when the drive speed ramps up. Kind of a toss up lately for when the buffers go low. Its better than Buffer Underrun and a coaster like it used to be, but it sounds like it still creates possible issues. I never get that deep in my analysis though, although it does sound interesting when read about- Is there a Thread/FAQ somewhere on the types of spikes and what all the line charts mean somewhere?

Edited February 28, 2008 by weisborg

[Mare911]

There is also Major Lag if you turn on checking for Runtime Packers...not sure what they do, but it almost seems like they run it in a hidden sandbox or something while realtime scanning to get it in memory and check it for viruses??? Whenever I have that enabled my Start Menu goes nuts like it is scanning every exe that the shortcuts point to.

 

Yeah, any archived executable content (e.g. installers, program archives) take ages to copy around under nod32... Ill probably replace him

 

Btw, interesting point on sata configuration, ill try to find something more about this