DVD R/RW+- Drive not recognized by some software

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This is a rather odd problem that has developed...some software that has
always recognized my DVD R/RW+- drive now does not, while some other software
still does. In addittion some aspects of Window XP SP2 recognizes the drive,
but other functions cannot now be performed.

Specifically, on the Windows side, the Device Manager says it is working
properly (Microsoft Drive ver 5.1.2535.0 dated 07/01/2001, and when searched
for, no "better" driver found) and when I open Explore i can see the drive,
the contents of a disc on the drive, and open files from it. However, if I
right-click on the drive in My Computer when I have a blank DVD+RW disc in
it, the format option has dissapeared from the options. This is important to
me b/c I need to format new blank media for my DVD Player/Recorder and it
will not recognize an unformatted disc. The XP format function also does not
change the book type, which every ohter format option I have found does.
Also, If i try to format a disc from a command prompt window, I get an
"Invalid Drive Specificatation" error.

On the Program side. Roxio DVD Info Pro recognizes the drive, can read a
disc and can format it (it changes the book type to DVD-ROM). Also, Sonic
Record Now can write to the disc and the write is good. However two programs
that used to be able to see the drive now can't: Iomega Hotburn Pro and
Iomega Automatic Backup Pro. It maynot be a coincidence that they are both
progs from the same company, but I am not sure what it means.

Any help would be appreciated.
 
SteelWheel said:
This is a rather odd problem that has developed...some software that has
always recognized my DVD R/RW+- drive now does not, while some other
software
still does. In addittion some aspects of Window XP SP2 recognizes the
drive,
but other functions cannot now be performed.

Specifically, on the Windows side, the Device Manager says it is working
properly (Microsoft Drive ver 5.1.2535.0 dated 07/01/2001, and when
searched
for, no "better" driver found) and when I open Explore i can see the
drive,
the contents of a disc on the drive, and open files from it. However, if
I
right-click on the drive in My Computer when I have a blank DVD+RW disc in
it, the format option has dissapeared from the options. This is important
to
me b/c I need to format new blank media for my DVD Player/Recorder and it
will not recognize an unformatted disc. The XP format function also does
not
change the book type, which every ohter format option I have found does.
Also, If i try to format a disc from a command prompt window, I get an
"Invalid Drive Specificatation" error.

On the Program side. Roxio DVD Info Pro recognizes the drive, can read a
disc and can format it (it changes the book type to DVD-ROM). Also, Sonic
Record Now can write to the disc and the write is good. However two
programs
that used to be able to see the drive now can't: Iomega Hotburn Pro and
Iomega Automatic Backup Pro. It maynot be a coincidence that they are
both
progs from the same company, but I am not sure what it means.
Click to expand...

Windows XP does not support formatting of DVD-RW disks, or indeed writing of
such disks. Also the majority of third party DVD writing utilities do not
require the disk to be formatted before being able to write to it. There
are only 2 scenarios where the disk requires to be formatted before use.
The first is where the disk is being used in a 'packet incremental format'
writing mode. Generally, these utilities add a 'format' option to the right
click menu for the drive. The second is where the disk is being used in a
video recorder in 'VR' mode (though many recorders will also perform a basic
format for 'Video' mode recording).

I am not familiar with the Iomega products that you mention but their blurb
refers to drag and drop functionality which suggest that they operate in
packet incremental format. If this is the case then the disk must be
formatted before these utilities will recognise the disk. Formatting should
always be carried out using the format option in the utility of your choice
because there have been several versions of formats which not every utility
fully supports (and indeed every DVD drive). If the disk is in an
unrecognised format then the utility generally won't see it, and sometimes
won't even allow you to reformat it.

The same is true of formatting for VR mode (in a video recorder). All VR
disks are not created equal. In general DVD+VR seems to be more universal
than DVD-VR.
 
First off TYVM for your response.

I may not have been clear in my intial post, but I am using DVD RW+ discs,
not DVD RW- discs. Also, the software I mentioned from Iomega doesnt
recognize that the DRIVE is there, not that there is no disc, or an
improperly formatted disc. The programs dont get that far. When I try and
open Hot Burn Pro i get the error message stating there are no RW capable
drives on my computer. That is very different from a disc issue. Also, I
have used both programs sucessfully in the past, so this is some kind of
problem that has developed, not one of a software incompatibility issue.

While the DVD Recorder i have, the LG DR1F9H, will take a RW disc and
initialize it into VR+ mode, it requires a low level formatting first. It
will not recognize a blank DVD RW+ disc. Unfortunately the only utilities I
have that currently recognize my drive change the book type to DVD-ROM during
format and the recorder wont recognize the discs at all. I used Hot Burn Pro
to perform the initial format, or the format found on the right-click of the
drive (which I mentioned befroe is now missing). If you know of any
utitillities that do formating and allow control of the book type, please let
me know. Also I am stiill confused as to why the DRIVE isnt being recognized
by certain software anymore.

Thx again.
 
SteelWheel said:
First off TYVM for your response.

I may not have been clear in my intial post, but I am using DVD RW+ discs,
not DVD RW- discs. Also, the software I mentioned from Iomega doesnt
recognize that the DRIVE is there, not that there is no disc, or an
improperly formatted disc. The programs dont get that far. When I try
and
open Hot Burn Pro i get the error message stating there are no RW capable
drives on my computer. That is very different from a disc issue. Also, I
have used both programs sucessfully in the past, so this is some kind of
problem that has developed, not one of a software incompatibility issue.

While the DVD Recorder i have, the LG DR1F9H, will take a RW disc and
initialize it into VR+ mode, it requires a low level formatting first. It
will not recognize a blank DVD RW+ disc. Unfortunately the only utilities
I
have that currently recognize my drive change the book type to DVD-ROM
during
format and the recorder wont recognize the discs at all. I used Hot Burn
Pro
to perform the initial format, or the format found on the right-click of
the
drive (which I mentioned befroe is now missing). If you know of any
utitillities that do formating and allow control of the book type, please
let
me know. Also I am stiill confused as to why the DRIVE isnt being
recognized
by certain software anymore.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the explanation.

Now that I know the recorder in question, I have some questions. Are you
trying to record your DVD+RW disks in 'VR' mode or in 'Video' mode? The
former should be playable in any video player without finalisation (if it
uses the correct version of the '+VR' format). The latter require
finalisation.

Why do you wish to format the disk using a PC based utility? As I said in
my last post, not all video recorders format disks the same way. They rely
on putting the video information (the .vob) files in the right place, but
squirrel the supporting data away on another part of the disk (not always
the same place between different recorders - I wish it was). It is not
until finalisation that this squirrelled away data is used to build the
table of contents. There is a note at the bottom of page 6 of the
operator's manual to this effect.

I have 2 utilities on my PC that record DVD-RW disks in 'VR' mode.
Formatting the disk on one produces a disk that is not recognised by the
other (and vice versa). Neither is readable on my video DVD recorder (and
vice versa). In practice, I prefer to use DVD-RAM for this sort of
operation, because the format seems much more universal (at least between my
PC uility and the DVD recorder), and I can easily convert the edited disks
onto a normal DVD disk.
 
First off, TYVM for responding.

I use the recorder mentioned below for time-shifting shows - I work during
Prime time, so I record shows to watch when I get home.

The recorder will not read a blank DVD+RW disc fresh out of the box. I get
an error from the player saying the disc is unreadable. The discs I have
been using are burning out from the constant rewrites on them and so I am
trying to repeat what I did on those discs on some new ones: format them
through the right-click on the drive or the software I mentioned earlier.
The player will then recognize the disc and initialize it in +VR mode for
recording. Since neither are functioning, the only other software I have,
Roxio DVD Info Pro, formats but it changes the book type to DVD-ROM and the
player wont recognize the disc.

I swear I am not really stupid; I have done searches on the net and on
software sites, and I have not been able to find any utilities that allow me
to control the book type, etc while formatting a disc. In lieu of fixing the
big problem, if you know of any software I could use to accomplish this, I
would love to know the name of it.

Again, TY for your assistance
 
SteelWheel said:
First off, TYVM for responding.

I use the recorder mentioned below for time-shifting shows - I work during
Prime time, so I record shows to watch when I get home.

The recorder will not read a blank DVD+RW disc fresh out of the box. I
get
an error from the player saying the disc is unreadable. The discs I have
been using are burning out from the constant rewrites on them and so I am
trying to repeat what I did on those discs on some new ones: format them
through the right-click on the drive or the software I mentioned earlier.
The player will then recognize the disc and initialize it in +VR mode for
recording. Since neither are functioning, the only other software I have,
Roxio DVD Info Pro, formats but it changes the book type to DVD-ROM and
the
player wont recognize the disc.
Click to expand...

I have to be honest and say that I cannot visualise why your recorder won't
recognise a fresh blank disk but is quite happy to initialise a disk once it
has been written to elsewhere. All I can think of is that either the disks
you are using are not 100% compatible with the recorder (but that doesn't
explain why it works on a disk written elsewhere), or the recorder has some
obscure fault (that I can't visualise). I assume that you have tried other
makes of disk.
I swear I am not really stupid; I have done searches on the net and on
software sites, and I have not been able to find any utilities that allow
me
to control the book type, etc while formatting a disc. In lieu of fixing
the
big problem, if you know of any software I could use to accomplish this, I
would love to know the name of it.
Click to expand...

Are you sure it is the book code that is being changed? I can't think why
your utility would change it, as it would effectively produce a formatted
but otherwise blank read only disk. The only software that I know of to
change this is called 'bitsetter', however it seems to be unavailable at
present - but keep googling (Note: it only works with DVD+RW disks). The
other thing that controls this is the compatibility ID byte on the disk
(which for a DVD+RW disk is normally set to '2'). Setting it to '0' flags
the disk as read only (though many, but not all, video DVD recorders ignore
it). This was what was used by Toshiba to deliberately cause their video
DVD players to refuse to play DVD+RW disks.

STOP PRESS

I have just been informed that the latest versions of Nero supports
bitsetting, but only on DVD drives that have firmware support. Apparently
these include drives from Lite-on, BTC, NU-Tech, Ricoh and BenQ. NEC
requires a firmware hack. LG and Philips have announced future support, and
Plextor have stated that they will not be supporting it. (It says here).

I should point out that as I don't use Nero, if I can possibly avoid it, nor
have a need to perform bitsetting, I can neither confirm nor deny.
 
I too have been having a very similar problem. The problem seems to appeared
sometime after I installed Norton Internet Security 2008. I used to be able
to insert a new (blank) or used Sony DVD+RW disc, then do a right click and a
format menu item would appear in the list. I could select the format menu
item and then do a quick format or a full format. Now this format menu item
has disappeared. I have Windows XP Professional SP2. The drive is a Philips
DVD+-RW DVD8701. Windows says this device is working properly. When I do a
properties on a new disc, it shows that the free space is 0 bytes. I have
Roxio Creator MyDVD Combo LE installed. I have deleted the upper and lower
filters in the appropriate registers as others have done, but to no avail. I
have been successful with the Advanced Troubleshooting Method 1: Test the
disc by copying files (see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/321641/). How do I
write to the DVD+RW disc? How can I format the disc? How can I get the format
menu to appear?
 
Frankie said:
I too have been having a very similar problem. The problem seems to appeared
sometime after I installed Norton Internet Security 2008. I used to be able
to insert a new (blank) or used Sony DVD+RW disc, then do a right click and a
format menu item would appear in the list. I could select the format menu
item and then do a quick format or a full format. Now this format menu item
has disappeared. I have Windows XP Professional SP2. The drive is a Philips
DVD+-RW DVD8701. Windows says this device is working properly. When I do a
properties on a new disc, it shows that the free space is 0 bytes. I have
Roxio Creator MyDVD Combo LE installed. I have deleted the upper and lower
filters in the appropriate registers as others have done, but to no avail. I
have been successful with the Advanced Troubleshooting Method 1: Test the
disc by copying files (see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/321641/). How do I
write to the DVD+RW disc? How can I format the disc? How can I get the format
menu to appear?
Click to expand...
 
Sorry haven't posted here before, but i am having the same trouble cant do
anything with DVD+ or - RW disks two burning programs dont recognise them and
Adobe Premiere Elemnts falls over when it tries to write to disk.

I also use NAV2007 an Asus 1814BL ide drive and thought as it also failed in
safe mode I installed a SATA Asus 2014L1T drive same problem.

Maybe I should uninstall NAV - this is a major issue and someone needs to
help solve it. There are heaps of peoeple probably suffering and think their
DVD drive is faulty and just use DVD R disks which work fine.

I look forward to feedback.
Bunter
 
Did you get an answer or solution to this problem? The Roxio driver that came
with the computer stopped recognizing my DVD-R/RW drive.
 
I have the same problem. My drive is no longer recognized by Adobe Premier
elements. My Roxio software stopped seeing my Plextor a long time ago and I
bought a new Sony external dvd r/w which worked for a while. Now it is not
seen and when I write dvd's sometimes they take and sometimes they come up
with error message.

I have Norton suite 2006. I have no clue why this is happening. I came
here to find answer or new ms driver, but as above ms has nothing to do with
dvd's. I am about to buy a new box. Maybe Apple cares about dvd's.

If anyone has a clue....HELP!!
 
Your inability to recognize hardware failures won't be corrected by
using Apple hardware, it will just cost more to correct.
 
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