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DVD-R burning fails - "medium write error"

I

igglepuff

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 27, 2007
163
0
Hey,

i was wondering if anyone had any idea's what was goign on.. all of a sudden a little while ago (after some apple update, don't remember which tbo) i cannot burn any media, well, 98% of the time.. It starts up and then instnaly goes to finishing burn, and spits it out with a "fail burn because of a medium write error". This happens with 2 brans of media i have, both of which worked flawlessly before, and popcorn, toast as well as trying disc utility. I was wondering if ANYONE has any ideas what can be causing this - i need to burn dvds for work and so on, but can no longer.

Any help woudl be greatly appriciated.

Oh, forgot, it burns once every 20 tries or so... ist redicilous!
 
Same problem, here, I tried to repair authorizations, rebuild the disk and done a PRAM reset, but nothing is working, it is really annoying and whan you type the phrase "the burn failed because of a medium write error" you have like 2,5 Millions pages on google :eek:

What the f+++k :apple: is doing? :mad:
 
I was up unitl 4am last night trying to deal with this problem, and no one seems to have the answers. I'm dealing with it in Toast 9 (tried 8 too), and it's apparently been around for evar.

Some say it's faulty media. Most say "your discs are too cheap, go get some memorex", and the rest say "It's because you're using memorex, go get something else".

Some one else suggested that it's a pref. problem in toast, and to delete all .plist files with toast and roxio in them, then delete the apple.finder pref list. It apparently worked for the poster, but not for me.

It's not updates. My drive can do it.

Stumped. Pissed. Time for Brainsturm!
 
captaincarrot said:
I was up unitl 4am last night trying to deal with this problem, and no one seems to have the answers. I'm dealing with it in Toast 9 (tried 8 too), and it's apparently been around for evar.

Some say it's faulty media. Most say "your discs are too cheap, go get some memorex", and the rest say "It's because you're using memorex, go get something else".

Some one else suggested that it's a pref. problem in toast, and to delete all .plist files with toast and roxio in them, then delete the apple.finder pref list. It apparently worked for the poster, but not for me.

It's not updates. My drive can do it.

Stumped. Pissed. Time for Brainsturm!
Click to expand...


Yep, too bad, I might be going to an Apple Store next week and try to figure that out, I will post here if I have any news.
 
I ended up having to replace my Superdrive when this happened to me. First it stopped burning DVD DLs, and then it stopped burning regular DVD-Rs. A lot of people seem to run into problems with the Matshita drives in these computers. I replaced mine with a Superdrive made by Hitachi.

This was a Macbook Pro, by the way.
 
Andrew275 said:
I ended up having to replace my Superdrive when this happened to me. First it stopped burning DVD DLs, and then it stopped burning regular DVD-Rs. A lot of people seem to run into problems with the Matshita drives in these computers. I replaced mine with a Superdrive made by Hitachi.

This was a Macbook Pro, by the way.
Click to expand...

Yep, I am on my 3rd drive right now, they wear out eventually... First DVD's, then CD's... :(
 
I had the same issue but it was only with Verbatim DVD-R's. It burned DVD DL's and CD's fine.

I took it to the Apple store because I was convinced it was a bad optical drive. The lady blew some compressed air into the drive and what do you know, it burns Verbatim DVD-R's perfect now (and I've burned a good 20-30 since then which was about 5 months ago).

I never put a disc into my MBP unless it's perfectly clean and I keep the computer itself extremely clean. It's just weird that it was burning everything fine but my Verbatim DVD-R's but after she cleaned it out with compressed air it works flawlessly now. *shrug*
 
Ok, Thanks for the report, I might be trying that.

I should receive DVD+R DL Verbatims and DVD-R Verbatims also tomorrow in addition to my Memorex DVD+R DL.

Plus I might be trying with nero on windows, I'll post the results here.
 
Brainsturm is where it's at.

Thanks for the advice. Not that I have an Applestore in my backwater, but I might try bring it into it's equivalent. As for replacing my optical - might give that a try too. Humph. Effort. About to try it on a different MBW - will be back.
 
So I just tried burning a Verbatim DVD-R with some data files and received this error again.

Tried three difference discs and even restarted the computer. Same error. I figured what the hell, might as well try what the lady did at the Apple store. So I got a can of compressed air and fed my optical drive some air (about half strength or half squeeze on the trigger) from left to right. Insert same DVD-R that was giving me issues and I'm trying to burn the same files/burn folder. Lo and behold, it works.

Amazing how these Apple computers work. ;)
 
Clean your drives!

Guys, there's another forum on this:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/294362/

And the moral of the story is ... try to clean your drives. Maybe it will work. It worked for me. Was burning lots of coasters yesterday, read the forums, bought a $10.95 Staples brand CD/DVD drive cleaner, ran it twice, and now no problems burning (with my MacBook Pro purchased summer 2007, factory-installed SuperDrive).

Hope this helps ...:)
 
If you actually search, you would know that REPLACING the drive is the solution. Had to do it with my MBP couple of months ago.
 
There's all sorts of possibilities actually. Sometimes it's a dirty drive lens, sometimes its the media, sometimes it's a software issues, and sometimes the drive has simply gone bad.
 
and some times it is because of some VERY SPECIFIC preference files sitting on your computer that Apple considers no-no's. I will not tell you what they are but I'll give you some hints: do you ever torrent? Have you ever DL'ed software you do not own and added serials you found on the web?

I actually think all this talk about having specific types of DVD's (Verbatim) is so much hot-air. What the heck, does Apple have some sort of deal with Verbatim, or something?
 
doug in albq said:
and some times it is because of some VERY SPECIFIC preference files sitting on your computer that Apple considers no-no's. I will not tell you what they are but I'll give you some hints: do you ever torrent? Have you ever DL'ed software you do not own and added serials you found on the web?

I actually think all this talk about having specific types of DVD's (Verbatim) is so much hot-air. What the heck, does Apple have some sort of deal with Verbatim, or something?
Click to expand...
You are so hilariously ignorant that my sides are aching. First of all, your claim about torrents and things like that is utter BS and completely unsubstantiated. On a side note, bittorrent is not illegal, and neither are bittorrent clients. It's just a protocol for transmitting data. For example, Blizzard uses bittorrent to distribute updates for World of Warcraft.

Second, recordable media (both CD and DVD) is not all created equal. Even certain brands use different factories to source their discs, so one day your Verbatim discs may be one brand, and the next batch may be completely different. The only way to tell is by looking at the discs media code. I only know of a way to do this in Windows, but there are probably utilities for Macs as well.

Take a look at this guide for information on different types of media and why some give errors when burning (pay special attention to the section labeled "Dye types and disc reflectivity"). For more information, check out the other media guides.
For example, I'm looking at a spindle of TDK branded discs, however the media code tells me this disc was made by CMC Magnetics (these discs are not very good quality).
Discs branded "TDK" may be manufactured by any of the following companies:
  • TDK
  • CMC
  • Moser Baer
  • Philips
  • Taiyo Yuden
  • Ritek
  • Ricoh
  • Maxell
It's mostly a lottery
 
octelcogopod said:
You are so hilariously ignorant that my sides are aching. First of all, your claim about torrents and things like that is utter BS and completely unsubstantiated. On a side note, bittorrent is not illegal, and neither are bittorrent clients. It's just a protocol for transmitting data. For example, Blizzard uses bittorrent to distribute updates for World of Warcraft.

Second, recordable media (both CD and DVD) is not all created equal. Even certain brands use different factories to source their discs, so one day your Verbatim discs may be one brand, and the next batch may be completely different. The only way to tell is by looking at the discs media code. I only know of a way to do this in Windows, but there are probably utilities for Macs as well.

Take a look at this guide for information on different types of media and why some give errors when burning (pay special attention to the section labeled "Dye types and disc reflectivity"). For more information, check out the other media guides.
For example, I'm looking at a spindle of TDK branded discs, however the media code tells me this disc was made by CMC Magnetics (these discs are not very good quality).
Discs branded "TDK" may be manufactured by any of the following companies:
  • TDK
  • CMC
  • Moser Baer
  • Philips
  • Taiyo Yuden
  • Ritek
  • Ricoh
  • Maxell
It's mostly a lottery
Click to expand...

Total nonsense!

I have the answer to this problem, and it is not DVD quality, or dust. I never said torrenting was illegal, even though most use it to DL copyrighted material. It is an issue with certain preference files. I have fixed the issue on my own machine after I foolishly downloaded and tried a couple of "things" from the torrent community that maybe I should not have done.

I will even give you a hint, the one preference file I found to be the main bad-guy is from an app starts with an "i" (no, it is not an Apple app)

IT IS PREFERENCE FILES, PEOPLE! There is your answer. I bet anyone who does a total fresh, clean re-install of the OS, without all the preference files you have accumulated from "you know where" will fix your issue!
 
doug in albq said:
Total nonsense!
Click to expand...
Nonsense? Really? Which part is nonsense and why? Differences in recordable media manufacturing are incredibly well proven, right down to the chemistry of the dye itself. Certain drives simply do not work well with certain media due to specifics about drive construction, whether it's how the tracking mechanism is designed or how good the optics are. I'd like to see you actually refute that information rather than just stupidly dismissing it.
doug in albq said:
I have the answer to this problem, and it is not DVD quality, or dust
Click to expand...
Prove it
(Dust is a big part of the problem due to the stupid construction of the MBP. There is no dedicated intake for airflow, so it gets sucked in from every possible place on the laptop. If you look at the heatsink of, for example, Dell/Toshiba/Lenovo laptops (which have a dedicated fan intake) you will see how much dust collects there. With an MBP, there is a lot of airflow going on inside the optical drive which leads to dust settling everywhere. This is why compressed air or a cleaning disc is a temporary solution. Eventually there's just too much dust and the drive has to be replaced. I guess you could also give it a thorough cleaning but that is beside the point.
doug in albq said:
I never said torrenting was illegal, even though most use it to DL copyrighted material.
Click to expand...
You said "do you ever torrent?". The second part is complete bullshit.
doug in albq said:
It is an issue with certain preference files
Click to expand...
Prove it
(which files, exactly?)
doug in albq said:
I will even give you a hint, the one preference file I found to be the main bad-guy is from an app starts with an "i" (no, it is not an Apple app)

IT IS PREFERENCE FILES, PEOPLE! There is your answer. I bet anyone who does a total fresh, clean re-install of the OS, without all the preference files you have accumulated from "you know where" will fix your issue!
Click to expand...
Why not just say what app it is rather than being secretive about it (answer: you're full of crap because your issue was a coincidence)
doug in albq said:
IT IS PREFERENCE FILES, PEOPLE!
Click to expand...
Prove it
(which files, exactly?)

How can a preference file for a program not related to DVD burning or function affect DVD burning and function? Hey, do you have Adium installed? Well then you won't be able to use GarageBand! See? I can spout crap I just concocted too!
I think it's pretty cute how you think that Apple is this big brotherly corporation and will police your computer and disable certain functions if you do "naughty" things.
Hey, what about other countries where pirating software isn't a crime? Think Apple still "cripples" DVD burning? If this were true, it would've been discovered long ago.
Pretty typical for a clueless self-proclaimed "expert" :rolleyes:
 
trolling all up in this club.

Riiiiiiiight.

@ doug Unless the compressed air in the above posts also refreshed the preference lists, .torr pref's are not our only concern.
Though for the record, I do torrent somewhat. But that could be easily investigated if we just moved all the pref files out of the pref folder, and attempted to burn though, right? And, yeah, just Say what program you mean.

The quality of the media does seem to be pretty important. There's a pretty believable guide here at the astutely named ww.nomorecoasters.com. If i could find some other DVD-DL's, I'd try them out, but..
Also, i tried this same thing, witht the same pack of discs on two 10.4 13'' white MB's, and a new 10.5 15'' MBP: same thing on the WMB's; diff but comparable error on the (new) MBP.

So I'm thinking media. /=\

==
(And on the need to buy a new drive, I don't think I've ever burned more than 6~7 discs.. It does have a little clunk in it though, should prob try getting it serviced anyway)
 
I have said all I am going to say. If you cannot figure it out from my hints, maybe you are not qualified to use a computing system!

(The last two trolls above this post have a total of 15 posts ever written on MacRumors.)

BTW, I successfully burn DVD's (in the few times I actually do burn a disk) on some of the crappiest media around. I never have failures any more–the disk always burns fine, just like the old days.
 
doug in albq said:
I have said all I am going to say. If you cannot figure it out from my hints, maybe you are not qualified to use a computing system!

(The last two trolls above this post have a total of 15 posts ever written on MacRumors.)

BTW, I successfully burn DVD's (in the few times I actually do burn a disk) on some of the crappiest media around. I never have failures any more–the disk always burns fine, just like the old days.
Click to expand...

Why the whole "Cloak and Dagger" routine? Why not just tell us, instead of all these meaningless hints? Why are you being so secretive? If you know something that would help the mac community why wouldn't you want to share it? :confused:
 
TwinCities Dan said:
Why the whole "Cloak and Dagger" routine? Why not just tell us, instead of all these meaningless hints? Why are you being so secretive? If you know something that would help the mac community why wouldn't you want to share it? :confused:
Click to expand...

He doesn't know anything and everything he has said is pretty much BS.

If you are having issues burning DVD-R, this is what I would advise based on my own experience and what others have reported.

1. Try a different brand of DVD-R.
2. Get a can of compressed air and clean out the optical drive. Don't use full pressure, just about half a squeeze of the trigger should be enough.
3. Take it to an Apple store and have them test it. If they can duplicate it and you're under warranty, they will replace it.
4. If you don't have a warranty, the only choice is to purchase the drive online and have it installed. You do have to take the computer apart but it's not that difficult if you have decent monkey-skills. Make sure to use the correct screw driver (Phillips #00) because the screws are extremely easy to strip.
 
My MBP wouldnt recognize DVD-DL for the longest time. So I bought a DVD/CD lens cleaner and voila, works perfectly now.

I was worried that it'll happen again with CDs/DVDs, but it's been about 4-6 months and so far so good.

I'm just hoping I don't need to replace my Super Drive any time soon.
 
doug in albq said:
...or just delete the correct preference files, I find my method is much easier...
Click to expand...

I think you're full of it! :rolleyes: We've asked you many times, and you just give B.S. "clues" and get all secretive. Why didn't you respond to my post above? Then you come back and inject little quips to people having problems. If you know something we don't, SPIT IT OUT! Otherwise why even post in this thread! :mad:

"clues" :rolleyes:
 
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