CD-R erratically detected

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

On an elderly PC I help a friend with, where he's copying a lot of his
old LPs to CD, we use burn4free (though I think the problem is not with
burn4free itself).

More often than not, when hitting the "burn" button, it says "please
insert a disc" - even if there's one in. When, by fiddling, ejecting,
closing and reopening b4f, and so on, it finally decides that there _is_
a blank disc in, it does the burn fine.

While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the writer
(from within b4f, that is).

It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up in
explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that is so
often missed.

Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

[glee]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
On an elderly PC I help a friend with, where he's copying a lot of his
old LPs to CD, we use burn4free (though I think the problem is not
with burn4free itself).
More often than not, when hitting the "burn" button, it says "please
insert a disc" - even if there's one in. When, by fiddling, ejecting,
closing and reopening b4f, and so on, it finally decides that there
_is_ a blank disc in, it does the burn fine.
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the
writer (from within b4f, that is).
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Did you try cleaning the lens with an audio cleaning disc?

[thanatoid]

Post by glee

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
On an elderly PC I help a friend with, where he's copying
a lot of his old LPs to CD, we use burn4free (though I
think the problem is not with burn4free itself).
More often than not, when hitting the "burn" button, it
says "please insert a disc" - even if there's one in.
When, by fiddling, ejecting, closing and reopening b4f,
and so on, it finally decides that there _is_ a blank disc
in, it does the burn fine.
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it
"finds" the writer (from within b4f, that is).
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that
always shows up in explorer; it's only the fact that
there's a blank disc in it that is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Did you try cleaning the lens with an audio cleaning disc?

You can not be serious.

[RobertVA]

Post by thanatoid

Post by glee

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
On an elderly PC I help a friend with, where he's copying
a lot of his old LPs to CD, we use burn4free (though I
think the problem is not with burn4free itself).
More often than not, when hitting the "burn" button, it
says "please insert a disc" - even if there's one in.
When, by fiddling, ejecting, closing and reopening b4f,
and so on, it finally decides that there _is_ a blank disc
in, it does the burn fine.
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it
"finds" the writer (from within b4f, that is).
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that
always shows up in explorer; it's only the fact that
there's a blank disc in it that is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Did you try cleaning the lens with an audio cleaning disc?

You can not be serious.

With all the air that cooling fans draw through tower systems? There
might even be contaminates in the air from cooking or tobacco smoking.

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

[]

Post by RobertVA

Post by thanatoid

Post by glee

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that
always shows up in explorer; it's only the fact that
there's a blank disc in it that is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Did you try cleaning the lens with an audio cleaning disc?

You can not be serious.

With all the air that cooling fans draw through tower systems? There
might even be contaminates in the air from cooking or tobacco smoking.

(The PC's in the spare bedroom, and I don't think John or his wife
smoke.) It's not a daft suggestion, which I may try, though I don't
_think_ it is likely to be the problem; if I put a data CD in, Explorer
usually sees it.

[glee]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by RobertVA

Post by thanatoid

Post by glee

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that
always shows up in explorer; it's only the fact that
there's a blank disc in it that is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Did you try cleaning the lens with an audio cleaning disc?

You can not be serious.

With all the air that cooling fans draw through tower systems? There
might even be contaminates in the air from cooking or tobacco smoking.

(The PC's in the spare bedroom, and I don't think John or his wife
smoke.) It's not a daft suggestion, which I may try, though I don't
_think_ it is likely to be the problem; if I put a data CD in,
Explorer usually sees it.

@than: Yes, I was serious....a cleaning disc has helped in almost
identical situations for me in the past, a number of times.

@J.P.: If you really do mean "Explorer usually sees it" rather than
"Explorer always sees it", then a cleaning disc may help.

The suggestion elsewhere in this thread about trying a different brand
of disc is also a good idea, especially if the issue is *only* with
burning discs, not reading them.

It's also possible the drive is just getting old and taking too long to
recognize the blank disc.

Have you tried another burning program?

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <***@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl>, glee
<***@spamindspring.com> writes:
[]

Post by glee
@than: Yes, I was serious....a cleaning disc has helped in almost
identical situations for me in the past, a number of times.

I'll certainly try it, then.

Post by glee
@J.P.: If you really do mean "Explorer usually sees it" rather than
"Explorer always sees it", then a cleaning disc may help.

I think it always sees the drive as present, just not always with
anything in it. Your line of reasoning makes sense.

Post by glee
The suggestion elsewhere in this thread about trying a different brand
of disc is also a good idea, especially if the issue is *only* with
burning discs, not reading them.

The first few we did were with cheap unlabelled ones, which were mostly
fine (we had a couple of part-burned ones, but that was I think more a
buffer problem - it is a BURN-proof drive, and the software knows that,
but still; and moving the "temporary files" space for the .mp3-to-wav
conversion to a different partition, combined with reducing the burning
speed, seemed to solve that). I've still got plenty of those, so will
try.

Post by glee
It's also possible the drive is just getting old and taking too long to
recognize the blank disc.

Possibly. Until he started burning (he's done less than a dozen albums,
I think) he hardly ever used CDs, even for reading (in which case he'd
have probably used the older drive anyway).

Post by glee
Have you tried another burning program?

Initially I used Easy CD Creator - I know a lot of people don't think
much of it, but I was used to it, and it seemed to work fine. (I used
updates, which were necessary for it to recognise the new drive.) After
a complete system rebuild - I forget what prompted that, but it was, I'm
pretty sure, necessary (no point in discussing it, anyway - 'tis done) -
I couldn't get ECDC to recognise the drive, whatever I did, hence the
installation of burn4free. Until the recent problems, _that_ has been
working fine too. I've downloaded burnaware_free, deep_burner, and
microburner, and will try one or all next time I visit John; the trouble
is, I don't know if they allow the temp. files location to be specified
as burn4free does, and there's not really enough space on the C drive.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G.5AL-IS-P--Ch++(p)***@T0H+Sh0!:`)DNAf
** http://www.soft255.demon.co.uk/G6JPG-PC/JPGminPC.htm for ludicrously
outdated thoughts on PCs. **

"We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will
eventually reproduce the entire Works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the
Internet, we know this is not true." Robert Wilensky, computer science
division,
University of California Digital Library Project, 1996 (Computing 1999-12-16)

[dadiOH]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by glee
The suggestion elsewhere in this thread about trying a different
brand of disc is also a good idea, especially if the issue is *only*
with burning discs, not reading them.

The first few we did were with cheap unlabelled ones, which were
mostly fine (we had a couple of part-burned ones, but that was I
think more a buffer problem - it is a BURN-proof drive, and the
software knows that, but still; and moving the "temporary files"
space for the .mp3-to-wav conversion to a different partition,
combined with reducing the burning speed, seemed to solve that).

A fail-safe method is to just decode the MP3s to wave yourself then burn the
waves. Many programs to do decoding/encoding, CDex is good, easy and free.
http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by glee
The suggestion elsewhere in this thread about trying a different
brand of disc is also a good idea, especially if the issue is *only*
with burning discs, not reading them.

The first few we did were with cheap unlabelled ones, which were
mostly fine (we had a couple of part-burned ones, but that was I
think more a buffer problem - it is a BURN-proof drive, and the
software knows that, but still; and moving the "temporary files"
space for the .mp3-to-wav conversion to a different partition,
combined with reducing the burning speed, seemed to solve that).

A fail-safe method is to just decode the MP3s to wave yourself then burn the
waves. Many programs to do decoding/encoding, CDex is good, easy and free.
http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/

GoldWave (with Lame) too. But (a) that part of Burn4Free seems to have
worked fine anyway, (b) I suspect it (burnfree) would still
intermittently fail to detect there was a blank in the drive, when we
tried to burn the .wavs.

[dadiOH]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by glee
The suggestion elsewhere in this thread about trying a different
brand of disc is also a good idea, especially if the issue is
*only* with burning discs, not reading them.

The first few we did were with cheap unlabelled ones, which were
mostly fine (we had a couple of part-burned ones, but that was I
think more a buffer problem - it is a BURN-proof drive, and the
software knows that, but still; and moving the "temporary files"
space for the .mp3-to-wav conversion to a different partition,
combined with reducing the burning speed, seemed to solve that).

A fail-safe method is to just decode the MP3s to wave yourself then
burn the waves. Many programs to do decoding/encoding, CDex is
good, easy and free. http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/

GoldWave (with Lame) too. But (a) that part of Burn4Free seems to have
worked fine anyway, (b) I suspect it (burnfree) would still
intermittently fail to detect there was a blank in the drive, when we
tried to burn the .wavs.

Right. I was suggesting it as an alternative to your previous buffer
problem.

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

[]

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by dadiOH
A fail-safe method is to just decode the MP3s to wave yourself then
burn the waves. Many programs to do decoding/encoding, CDex is
good, easy and free. http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/

GoldWave (with Lame) too. But (a) that part of Burn4Free seems to have
worked fine anyway, (b) I suspect it (burnfree) would still
intermittently fail to detect there was a blank in the drive, when we
tried to burn the .wavs.

Right. I was suggesting it as an alternative to your previous buffer
problem.

Ah, understood, thanks.

[glee]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
snip
Initially I used Easy CD Creator - I know a lot of people don't think
much of it, but I was used to it, and it seemed to work fine. (I used
updates, which were necessary for it to recognise the new drive.)
After a complete system rebuild - I forget what prompted that, but it
was, I'm pretty sure, necessary (no point in discussing it, anyway -
'tis done) - I couldn't get ECDC to recognise the drive, whatever I
did, hence the installation of burn4free. Until the recent problems,
_that_ has been working fine too. I've downloaded burnaware_free,
deep_burner, and microburner, and will try one or all next time I
visit John; the trouble is, I don't know if they allow the temp. files
location to be specified as burn4free does, and there's not really
enough space on the C drive.

Which version of Microburner? I have versions 4.x and 5.x here.
Silentnight Microburner 5.x has a place in its "burner settings" to
choose the temp location. I don't see any way to do it with version
4.x, though.

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

[]

Post by glee

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
visit John; the trouble is, I don't know if they allow the temp. files
location to be specified as burn4free does, and there's not really
enough space on the C drive.

Which version of Microburner? I have versions 4.x and 5.x here.
Silentnight Microburner 5.x has a place in its "burner settings" to
choose the temp location. I don't see any way to do it with version
4.x, though.

5.0. Under burner settings, I see something called "Temporary ISO folder
placement" under "Direct Copy/Clone Settings", which I presume is
something to do with copying one CD to another. I have wondered whether
it also uses the folder specified for temporary .wav files, but have yet
to find out; if you know that it does, I'll be pleased to try - it looks
a nice piece of software. (And the speech is fun.)

[glee]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by glee

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
visit John; the trouble is, I don't know if they allow the temp.
files location to be specified as burn4free does, and there's not
really enough space on the C drive.

Which version of Microburner? I have versions 4.x and 5.x here.
Silentnight Microburner 5.x has a place in its "burner settings" to
choose the temp location. I don't see any way to do it with version
4.x, though.

5.0. Under burner settings, I see something called "Temporary ISO
folder placement" under "Direct Copy/Clone Settings", which I presume
is something to do with copying one CD to another. I have wondered
whether it also uses the folder specified for temporary .wav files,
but have yet to find out; if you know that it does, I'll be pleased to
try - it looks a nice piece of software. (And the speech is fun.)

I haven't used it for music ripping/conversion/etc., so I can't say if
that setting applies to it also. Why not try and find out? It can't
hurt (too much) <eg>

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Post by glee

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by glee

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
visit John; the trouble is, I don't know if they allow the temp.
files location to be specified as burn4free does, and there's not
really enough space on the C drive.

Which version of Microburner? I have versions 4.x and 5.x here.
Silentnight Microburner 5.x has a place in its "burner settings" to
choose the temp location. I don't see any way to do it with version
4.x, though.

5.0. Under burner settings, I see something called "Temporary ISO
folder placement" under "Direct Copy/Clone Settings", which I presume
is something to do with copying one CD to another. I have wondered
whether it also uses the folder specified for temporary .wav files,
but have yet to find out; if you know that it does, I'll be pleased to
try - it looks a nice piece of software. (And the speech is fun.)

I haven't used it for music ripping/conversion/etc., so I can't say if
that setting applies to it also. Why not try and find out? It can't
hurt (too much) <eg>

I intend to!

[dadiOH]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
On an elderly PC I help a friend with, where he's copying a lot of his
old LPs to CD, we use burn4free (though I think the problem is not
with burn4free itself).
More often than not, when hitting the "burn" button, it says "please
insert a disc" - even if there's one in. When, by fiddling, ejecting,
closing and reopening b4f, and so on, it finally decides that there
_is_ a blank disc in, it does the burn fine.
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the
writer (from within b4f, that is).
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Try a different brand of CD blanks...Taiyo Yuden are among the best.

[unknown]

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
On an elderly PC I help a friend with, where he's copying a lot of his
old LPs to CD, we use burn4free (though I think the problem is not
with burn4free itself).
More often than not, when hitting the "burn" button, it says "please
insert a disc" - even if there's one in. When, by fiddling, ejecting,
closing and reopening b4f, and so on, it finally decides that there
_is_ a blank disc in, it does the burn fine.
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the
writer (from within b4f, that is).
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Try a different brand of CD blanks...Taiyo Yuden are among the best.

And once you've wasted a couple of quality blank CDs, throw the drive
away and spend $20-$30 to replace it.

It's fucked. They don't last forever.

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <B-udnTmqu4a-***@westnet.com.au>, Andy
<no@?.?.invalid> writes:
[]

Post by unknown

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Try a different brand of CD blanks...Taiyo Yuden are among the best.

And once you've wasted a couple of quality blank CDs, throw the drive
away and spend $20-$30 to replace it.
It's fucked. They don't last forever.

I think if it was the blanks, it wouldn't have been burning faultlessly
for the last few times we did manage to make it realise there was a disc
present. (And with cheap blanks, too.)

It's not that old - only a year or two; the elderly PC had a non-writing
drive (still there). It's actually a CD and DVD writer, as I couldn't
even find a CD-only one. It's not been used much.

I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a system
configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free is told to
do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting to the writer.

[unknown]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by unknown

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Try a different brand of CD blanks...Taiyo Yuden are among the best.

And once you've wasted a couple of quality blank CDs, throw the drive
away and spend $20-$30 to replace it.
It's fucked. They don't last forever.

I think if it was the blanks, it wouldn't have been burning faultlessly
for the last few times we did manage to make it realise there was a disc
present. (And with cheap blanks, too.)
It's not that old - only a year or two;

That's more than old enough to start failing, sadly. Eventually it'll
stop recognising discs when you just want to *read* them.

[§ñühw¤£f]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by unknown

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Try a different brand of CD blanks...Taiyo Yuden are among the best.

And once you've wasted a couple of quality blank CDs, throw the drive
away and spend $20-$30 to replace it.
It's fucked. They don't last forever.

I think if it was the blanks, it wouldn't have been burning faultlessly
for the last few times we did manage to make it realise there was a disc
present. (And with cheap blanks, too.)

Will it recongnise if theres a disc in the drive that has data on it?
If so then its probably the media itself.
CD/RW discs are a problem sometimes.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It's not that old - only a year or two; the elderly PC had a non-writing
drive (still there). It's actually a CD and DVD writer, as I couldn't
even find a CD-only one. It's not been used much.

Did you ever drop it?
:)

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a system
configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free is told to
do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for a support
section, mate.

[Meat Plow]

On Sat, 17 Oct 2009 09:02:14 -0600, ???hw??f

Post by §ñühw¤£f

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by unknown

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Try a different brand of CD blanks...Taiyo Yuden are among the best.

And once you've wasted a couple of quality blank CDs, throw the drive
away and spend $20-$30 to replace it.
It's fucked. They don't last forever.

I think if it was the blanks, it wouldn't have been burning faultlessly
for the last few times we did manage to make it realise there was a disc
present. (And with cheap blanks, too.)

Will it recongnise if theres a disc in the drive that has data on it?
If so then its probably the media itself.
CD/RW discs are a problem sometimes.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It's not that old - only a year or two; the elderly PC had a non-writing
drive (still there). It's actually a CD and DVD writer, as I couldn't
even find a CD-only one. It's not been used much.

Did you ever drop it?
:)

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a system
configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free is told to
do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for a support
section, mate.

Appears he's got some corruption in his system part of the registry.

[S??hW0?ƒ]

Post by Meat Plow
On Sat, 17 Oct 2009 09:02:14 -0600, ???hw??f

Post by §ñühw¤£f

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by unknown

Post by dadiOH

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

Try a different brand of CD blanks...Taiyo Yuden are among the best.

And once you've wasted a couple of quality blank CDs, throw the drive
away and spend $20-$30 to replace it.
It's fucked. They don't last forever.

I think if it was the blanks, it wouldn't have been burning faultlessly
for the last few times we did manage to make it realise there was a disc
present. (And with cheap blanks, too.)

Will it recongnise if theres a disc in the drive that has data on it?
If so then its probably the media itself.
CD/RW discs are a problem sometimes.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It's not that old - only a year or two; the elderly PC had a non-writing
drive (still there). It's actually a CD and DVD writer, as I couldn't
even find a CD-only one. It's not been used much.

Did you ever drop it?
:)

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a system
configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free is told to
do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for a support
section, mate.

Appears he's got some corruption in his system part of the registry.

If so tehn he s gotta uninstall it and do surgery on the registyryry to
remove all the diseased bits.

^_^

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

[]

Post by S??hW0?ƒ

Post by Meat Plow

Post by §ñühw¤£f

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a
system configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free
is told to do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting
to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for a support
section, mate.

Appears he's got some corruption in his system part of the registry.

That is (the sort of thing I) fear, but wouldn't know how ...

Post by S??hW0?ƒ
If so tehn he s gotta uninstall it and do surgery on the registyryry to
remove all the diseased bits.

... to do that. (The surgery I mean.)

Post by S??hW0?ƒ
^_^

[S∩∪hw0ζƒ]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by S??hW0?ƒ

Post by Meat Plow

Post by §ñühw¤£f

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a
system configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free
is told to do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting
to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for a support
section, mate.

Appears he's got some corruption in his system part of the registry.

That is (the sort of thing I) fear, but wouldn't know how ...

You're not willing to break things then.
^_^

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by S??hW0?ƒ
If so tehn he s gotta uninstall it and do surgery on the registyryry
to remove all the diseased bits.

... to do that. (The surgery I mean.)

You'd be better off looking at their webpage for a FAQ or support.
Or live with it. Nero did poll the flo0py drive like that...no
biggie...minor annoyance.

[Meat Plow]

On Mon, 19 Oct 2009 08:39:31 -0600, S??hw0??

Post by S∩∪hw0ζƒ

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by S??hW0?ƒ

Post by Meat Plow

Post by §ñühw¤£f

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a
system configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free
is told to do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting
to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for a support
section, mate.

Appears he's got some corruption in his system part of the registry.

That is (the sort of thing I) fear, but wouldn't know how ...

You're not willing to break things then.
^_^

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by S??hW0?ƒ
If so tehn he s gotta uninstall it and do surgery on the registyryry
to remove all the diseased bits.

... to do that. (The surgery I mean.)

You'd be better off looking at their webpage for a FAQ or support.
Or live with it. Nero did poll the flo0py drive like that...no
biggie...minor annoyance.

Nero polled the floppy? I don't think I ever noticed that and it
doesn't seem logical unless Nero had a backup to floppy feature.

[glee]

Post by Meat Plow
On Mon, 19 Oct 2009 08:39:31 -0600, S??hw0??

Post by S∩∪hw0ζƒ

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by S??hW0?ƒ

Post by Meat Plow

Post by §ñühw¤£f

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a
system configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free
is told to do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting
to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for
a
support
section, mate.

Appears he's got some corruption in his system part of the registry.

That is (the sort of thing I) fear, but wouldn't know how ...

You're not willing to break things then.
^_^

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by S??hW0?ƒ
If so tehn he s gotta uninstall it and do surgery on the
registyryry
to remove all the diseased bits.

... to do that. (The surgery I mean.)

You'd be better off looking at their webpage for a FAQ or support.
Or live with it. Nero did poll the flo0py drive like that...no
biggie...minor annoyance.

Nero polled the floppy? I don't think I ever noticed that and it
doesn't seem logical unless Nero had a backup to floppy feature.

I've never seen Nero do it, in 10 years, but I have seen it with some
other apps....can't recall which anymore.

[§nühw€£f]

Post by glee

Post by Meat Plow
On Mon, 19 Oct 2009 08:39:31 -0600, S??hw0??

Post by S∩∪hw0ζƒ

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by S??hW0?ƒ

Post by Meat Plow

Post by §ñühw¤£f

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a
system configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free
is told to do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting
to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for
a
support
section, mate.

Appears he's got some corruption in his system part of the registry.

That is (the sort of thing I) fear, but wouldn't know how ...

You're not willing to break things then.
^_^

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by S??hW0?ƒ
If so tehn he s gotta uninstall it and do surgery on the
registyryry
to remove all the diseased bits.

... to do that. (The surgery I mean.)

You'd be better off looking at their webpage for a FAQ or support.
Or live with it. Nero did poll the flo0py drive like that...no
biggie...minor annoyance.

Nero polled the floppy? I don't think I ever noticed that and it
doesn't seem logical unless Nero had a backup to floppy feature.

I've never seen Nero do it, in 10 years, but I have seen it with some
other apps....can't recall which anymore.

The version I had did. Came bundeled with an external CD/RW drive.
w98 to Win2000

[Meat Plow]

On Mon, 19 Oct 2009 14:21:08 -0400, "glee"

Post by glee

Post by Meat Plow
On Mon, 19 Oct 2009 08:39:31 -0600, S??hw0??

Post by S∩∪hw0ζƒ

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by S??hW0?ƒ

Post by Meat Plow

Post by §ñühw¤£f

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
I will try the cleaning disc suggestion, but I do think it's a
system configuration funny: as I mentioned earlier, when burn4free
is told to do a burn, it accesses the floppy drive before getting
to the writer.

Then you need to g00gle up the website for that app and look for
a
support
section, mate.

Appears he's got some corruption in his system part of the registry.

That is (the sort of thing I) fear, but wouldn't know how ...

You're not willing to break things then.
^_^

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by S??hW0?ƒ
If so tehn he s gotta uninstall it and do surgery on the
registyryry
to remove all the diseased bits.

... to do that. (The surgery I mean.)

You'd be better off looking at their webpage for a FAQ or support.
Or live with it. Nero did poll the flo0py drive like that...no
biggie...minor annoyance.

Nero polled the floppy? I don't think I ever noticed that and it
doesn't seem logical unless Nero had a backup to floppy feature.

I've never seen Nero do it, in 10 years, but I have seen it with some
other apps....can't recall which anymore.

Can you at least recall if they were cd recording apps? It just
doesn't make sense for an app that records in ISO9660 to bother
polling a floppy controller.

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Post by Meat Plow
On Mon, 19 Oct 2009 14:21:08 -0400, "glee"

[]

Post by Meat Plow

Post by glee

Post by Meat Plow
Nero polled the floppy? I don't think I ever noticed that and it
doesn't seem logical unless Nero had a backup to floppy feature.

I've never seen Nero do it, in 10 years, but I have seen it with some
other apps....can't recall which anymore.

Can you at least recall if they were cd recording apps? It just
doesn't make sense for an app that records in ISO9660 to bother
polling a floppy controller.

Depends at what level it is written; I could imagine a prog. written at
a higher level just going through all drive letters and mapping the ones
that respond as a writer.

[Meat Plow]

On Wed, 21 Oct 2009 07:01:00 +0100, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by Meat Plow
On Mon, 19 Oct 2009 14:21:08 -0400, "glee"

[]

Post by Meat Plow

Post by glee

Post by Meat Plow
Nero polled the floppy? I don't think I ever noticed that and it
doesn't seem logical unless Nero had a backup to floppy feature.

I've never seen Nero do it, in 10 years, but I have seen it with some
other apps....can't recall which anymore.

Can you at least recall if they were cd recording apps? It just
doesn't make sense for an app that records in ISO9660 to bother
polling a floppy controller.

Depends at what level it is written; I could imagine a prog. written at
a higher level just going through all drive letters and mapping the ones
that respond as a writer.

Yeh that's what I was getting at in the first place. A well written
program should not (what's it technically called?) have a procedure
call to poll any old recordable device that replies but just to those
who have at least a CDFS/UDF. But alas it's probably easier just to
poll everything and see what replies.

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <hbhtn3$ak$***@news.eternal-september.org>,
=?UTF-8?B?U+KIqeKIqmh3MM62xpI=?= <***@yahoo.com> writes:
[]

Post by S∩∪hw0ζƒ
You'd be better off looking at their webpage for a FAQ or support.

I fear there isn't much support; fair enough, it's free software.

Post by S∩∪hw0ζƒ
Or live with it. Nero did poll the flo0py drive like that...no
biggie...minor annoyance.

Interesting! No, the floppy access is indeed only a minor annoyance: I
just wasn't sure it had been doing it before, and wondered if it might
be related.

[philo]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
On an elderly PC I help a friend with, where he's copying a lot of his
old LPs to CD, we use burn4free (though I think the problem is not with
burn4free itself).
More often than not, when hitting the "burn" button, it says "please
insert a disc" - even if there's one in. When, by fiddling, ejecting,
closing and reopening b4f, and so on, it finally decides that there _is_
a blank disc in, it does the burn fine.
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the writer
(from within b4f, that is).
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up in
explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that is so
often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

You said it's an elderly PC so I'm guess the cdrom is also elderly...
probably time for a new one

[Greg]

Here a suggestion if he trying to burn cds. Lower the speed down to
12x (Yes, you have to wait longer, but it is more reliable to have
the data stored correctly). I notice when my burners are going bad,
you can use lower speed for a few months till it quits. My lasted
for about a year.


Greg

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Post by Greg
Here a suggestion if he trying to burn cds. Lower the speed down to
12x (Yes, you have to wait longer, but it is more reliable to have
the data stored correctly). I notice when my burners are going bad,
you can use lower speed for a few months till it quits. My lasted
for about a year.
Greg

We're already using 8x, not because we think there's anything wrong with
the burner, but to reduce the chance of a buffer problem.

[PCR]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
On an elderly PC I help a friend with, where he's copying a lot of his
old LPs to CD, we use burn4free (though I think the problem is not
with burn4free itself).
More often than not, when hitting the "burn" button, it says "please
insert a disc" - even if there's one in. When, by fiddling, ejecting,
closing and reopening b4f, and so on, it finally decides that there
_is_ a blank disc in, it does the burn fine.
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the
writer (from within b4f, that is).

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=216752
Floppy Disk Drive Is Active When Opening or Saving Files
............Quote..................
To resolve this issue, change the command line reference in the
Properties of the shortcut, or delete the shortcut:

(1) Click Start, point to Find, and then click Files Or Folders.
(2) In the Named box, type *.lnk, click the location you want
to search in the Look In box, and then click Find Now.
(3) Right-click a shortcut on the list of found files, click Properties,
and then click the Program tab.
(4) Delete any reference to drive A or drive B on the Command
box or Working section, and then click OK. For example,
if the command line reads a:\edit.com, change the line to read
edit.com.
(5) Repeat steps 3-4, performing these steps on the next shortcut
on the list of found files until you have corrected all the
shortcuts,
and then quit the Find tool.
.........EOQ.................

Sort the Find box by folder. Look especially at .lnk's & .pif's in
folder(s) that pertain to burn4free & any in "C:\Windows\Recent". You
may add a search for .pif's by adding ".pif" in the Named box, separated
by a comma from ".lnk".. Look in their Program tab. Delete any .pif's in
"C:\Windows\PIF".

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

[]

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the
writer (from within b4f, that is).

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=216752
Floppy Disk Drive Is Active When Opening or Saving Files
............Quote..................
To resolve this issue, change the command line reference in the
(1) Click Start, point to Find, and then click Files Or Folders.

Assuming this means the shortcut via which we start Burn4free, I know
where that is, as it's on the desktop.
[]

Post by PCR
(4) Delete any reference to drive A or drive B on the Command
box or Working section, and then click OK. For example,
if the command line reads a:\edit.com, change the line to read
edit.com.

[]

Post by PCR
Sort the Find box by folder. Look especially at .lnk's & .pif's in
folder(s) that pertain to burn4free & any in "C:\Windows\Recent". You

I don't think there will be any such reference, but I will certainly
look; thanks for the tip.

Post by PCR
may add a search for .pif's by adding ".pif" in the Named box, separated
by a comma from ".lnk".. Look in their Program tab. Delete any .pif's in
"C:\Windows\PIF".

I hadn't thought of .pifs either. (Aren't they just for DOS prog.s?) Why
delete the ones in ..\PIF; sounds like a good place for them!

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows up
in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it that
is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

[PCR]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the
writer (from within b4f, that is).

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=216752
Floppy Disk Drive Is Active When Opening or Saving Files
............Quote..................
To resolve this issue, change the command line reference in the
(1) Click Start, point to Find, and then click Files Or Folders.

Assuming this means the shortcut via which we start Burn4free, I know
where that is, as it's on the desktop.

Yea, look in that one & also in any in the folder(s) mentioned in its
Target field or any folders to do with the app..

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by PCR
(4) Delete any reference to drive A or drive B on the Command
box or Working section, and then click OK. For example,
if the command line reads a:\edit.com, change the line to read
edit.com.

[]

Post by PCR
Sort the Find box by folder. Look especially at .lnk's & .pif's in
folder(s) that pertain to burn4free & any in "C:\Windows\Recent". You

I don't think there will be any such reference, but I will certainly
look; thanks for the tip.

You are welcome.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by PCR
may add a search for .pif's by adding ".pif" in the Named box,
separated by a comma from ".lnk".. Look in their Program tab. Delete
any .pif's in "C:\Windows\PIF".

I hadn't thought of .pifs either. (Aren't they just for DOS prog.s?)
Why delete the ones in ..\PIF; sounds like a good place for them!

All right. Maybe don't delete them all, just any mentioning A:\ or
B:\ -- & inform us of any others. (I have none in there.)

A complex Windows app may have DOS commands & .pif's in its folder(s).
(I don't have or know Burn4Free.)

C:\Windows\PIF\ is used to hold .pif's that Windows creates when they
cannot be put anywhere else. A .pif (shortcut to a DOS command) is
created when a DOS command is clicked to execute. Normally, the .pif
will be put into the folder of the command that is clicked. I suppose if
one is clicked on a write-protected A:\drive, Windows might put the .pif
into
C:\Windows\PIF\.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
It isn't the _drive_ that's not being detected - that always shows
up in explorer; it's only the fact that there's a blank disc in it
that is so often missed.
Any ideas what's causing it, and what will improve it?

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the
writer (from within b4f, that is).

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=216752
Floppy Disk Drive Is Active When Opening or Saving Files
............Quote..................
To resolve this issue, change the command line reference in the
(1) Click Start, point to Find, and then click Files Or Folders.

Assuming this means the shortcut via which we start Burn4free, I know
where that is, as it's on the desktop.

Yea, look in that one & also in any in the folder(s) mentioned in its
Target field or any folders to do with the app..

Followup for general interest: There was no mention of A: or B: in the
properties of the desktop shortcut we used to get to burn4free ...
[]

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by PCR
may add a search for .pif's by adding ".pif" in the Named box,
separated by a comma from ".lnk".. Look in their Program tab. Delete
any .pif's in "C:\Windows\PIF".

... and Windows\PIF existed, but was completely empty.
[]
However, we've decided to upgrade to a different PC (still '98SElite);
the one this was on has had intermittent and infuriatingly untraceable
problems for a year or two. I already rebuilt it once (formatting the
HD) sometime in (I think) the last year. Could be software (though a
format and reinstall suggests not!), or hardware, but if so it's a rare
fault: could be PSU not up to it for brief instants, or HD throwing
brief funnies, or RAM, or mobo - basically it's too much to try
replacing on an investigative basis, and it's not as if I'm exactly
short of '98 systems! The only reason I've held out this long is that I
didn't want to make such a big change for the elderly chap who uses it;
however, this evening he agreed with me (after burn4free had shown its
decidedly erratic behaviour again actually detecting the presence of the
CD-R blank, despite actually writing two perfectly OK audio discs when
fiddling did actually make it accept there was a disc there, the first
one done at maximum speed).

[PCR]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
While looking, it rattles the floppy drive before it "finds" the
writer (from within b4f, that is).

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=216752
Floppy Disk Drive Is Active When Opening or Saving Files
............Quote..................
To resolve this issue, change the command line reference in the
(1) Click Start, point to Find, and then click Files Or Folders.

Assuming this means the shortcut via which we start Burn4free, I
know where that is, as it's on the desktop.

Yea, look in that one & also in any in the folder(s) mentioned in its
Target field or any folders to do with the app..

Followup for general interest: There was no mention of A: or B: in the
properties of the desktop shortcut we used to get to burn4free ...

OK. I presume you've looked through Burn4Free's docs & FAQs & menus for
any mention of an option to use the floppy. I guess it's possible the
product is looking for something to burn to, since it has trouble
finding the CD. But I really have nothing left to recommend. Maybe post
the machine's Config.sys & Autoexec.bat from "START, Run, SysEdit" to
see whether any shenanigan is going on their that could cause a
confusion between the floppy & CD-ROM.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by PCR

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)

Post by PCR
may add a search for .pif's by adding ".pif" in the Named box,
separated by a comma from ".lnk".. Look in their Program tab. Delete
any .pif's in "C:\Windows\PIF".

... and Windows\PIF existed, but was completely empty.

OK. That's normal.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]
However, we've decided to upgrade to a different PC (still '98SElite);
the one this was on has had intermittent and infuriatingly untraceable
problems for a year or two. I already rebuilt it once (formatting the
HD) sometime in (I think) the last year. Could be software (though a
format and reinstall suggests not!), or hardware, but if so it's a
rare fault: could be PSU not up to it for brief instants, or HD
throwing brief funnies, or RAM, or mobo - basically it's too much to
try replacing on an investigative basis, and it's not as if I'm
exactly short of '98 systems! The only reason I've held out this long
is that I didn't want to make such a big change for the elderly chap
who uses it; however, this evening he agreed with me (after burn4free
had shown its decidedly erratic behaviour again actually detecting
the presence of the CD-R blank, despite actually writing two
perfectly OK audio discs when fiddling did actually make it accept
there was a disc there, the first one done at maximum speed).

That may be best, if there are a lot of intermittent problems that a
fresh install hasn't cured. You could test the hard drive with its
manufacturer's utility first, if you suspect that. Get it from the WEB
site. To test RAM...

http://www.simmtester.com/PAGE/products/doc/docinfo.asp RAM tester
http://www.memtest86.com/ RAM tester
http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp RAM tester

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <***@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl>, PCR
<***@netzero.net> writes:
[]

Post by PCR
OK. I presume you've looked through Burn4Free's docs & FAQs & menus for
any mention of an option to use the floppy. I guess it's possible the

I don't _think_ it had such an option - it's a CD-writer prog., really.

Post by PCR
product is looking for something to burn to, since it has trouble
finding the CD. But I really have nothing left to recommend. Maybe post
the machine's Config.sys & Autoexec.bat from "START, Run, SysEdit" to
see whether any shenanigan is going on their that could cause a
confusion between the floppy & CD-ROM.

I'm half-way through transferring the user to another PC ATM ... (-:
[]

Post by PCR
That may be best, if there are a lot of intermittent problems that a
fresh install hasn't cured. You could test the hard drive with its
manufacturer's utility first, if you suspect that. Get it from the WEB
site. To test RAM...
http://www.simmtester.com/PAGE/products/doc/docinfo.asp RAM tester
http://www.memtest86.com/ RAM tester
http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp RAM tester

Thanks, I knew about simmtester and memtest86 at least, not sure about
the last one. But probably not going to bother - as I said, this PC had
been a little grumpy for some years, and I'm part way through
transferring to another machine anyway.

[PCR]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by PCR
OK. I presume you've looked through Burn4Free's docs & FAQs & menus
for any mention of an option to use the floppy. I guess it's possible
the

I don't _think_ it had such an option - it's a CD-writer prog., really.

Post by PCR
product is looking for something to burn to, since it has trouble
finding the CD. But I really have nothing left to recommend. Maybe
post the machine's Config.sys & Autoexec.bat from "START, Run,
SysEdit" to see whether any shenanigan is going on their that could
cause a confusion between the floppy & CD-ROM.

All right. Chances are the solution wasn't there, anyhow.

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
[]

Post by PCR
That may be best, if there are a lot of intermittent problems that a
fresh install hasn't cured. You could test the hard drive with its
manufacturer's utility first, if you suspect that. Get it from the WEB
site. To test RAM...
http://www.simmtester.com/PAGE/products/doc/docinfo.asp RAM tester
http://www.memtest86.com/ RAM tester
http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp RAM tester

Thanks, I knew about simmtester and memtest86 at least, not sure about
the last one. But probably not going to bother - as I said, this PC
had been a little grumpy for some years, and I'm part way through
transferring to another machine anyway.

OK. Maybe that's best. Keep us informed.