[twothousandand1]

Hi,

I just bought an external DVD writer (Asus DRW-1608P2S-D) for my G3 500MHz iBook running on Mac OS X 10.3.9.

It reads and burns DVDs fine by USB but since this works a bit slow, I tried using the Firewire connection. It reads/burns much faster by Firewire but I've not yet been able to burn a DVD successfully. After writing a certain percentage of data on the disc, the writing stops altogether, even though the writer is still making a noise as if it's doing something.

Anyone else experienced the same problem with either the same DVD writer or with Firewire in general? Any solution?

Thanks in Advance.

[clairejr]

I've had problems with CD and DVD burning when I've used cheaper quality media. What kind of DVDs are you using? Also, what speed are you trying to use for burning the DVDs? On a slower Mac, you probably should set the DVD burning to a slow speed (2x or 4x). Again, the media you use will make a big difference. The cable can also make a difference - sometimes the cable that comes with the DVD burner isn't the best quality. I had to switch from the cable that came with an old CD burner to a Belkin cable to get reliable results. So, check the media you're using (TDK are very reliable), the speed at which you're burning and the firewire cable you're using.

Claire

[Kenneth]

Are you using Toast? Burning data off the hard drive or other source?

[rjt1000]

I would try burning via Firewire at a slower speed. If that works, then your iBooks Firewire system and cable are probably not able to deliver the data fast enough to burn at higher speeds. You could try a higher grade Firewire cable. If you want to verify that the burner is working as advertised, you could try to test the DVD writer on a newer system, if you have access to one.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by rjt1000 

I would try burning via Firewire at a slower speed. If that works, then your iBooks Firewire system and cable are probably not able to deliver the data fast enough to burn at higher speeds. You could try a higher grade Firewire cable. If you want to verify that the burner is working as advertised, you could try to test the DVD writer on a newer system, if you have access to one.

That's not true. If you can burn via Firewire at a slower speed, the inability to burn a faster speed is probably due to crappy media.

[rjt1000]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker 

That's not true. If you can burn via Firewire at a slower speed, the inability to burn a faster speed is probably due to crappy media.

The early firewire buses were slower than the modern ones. The original poster has a 500 mhz iBook.

[Kenneth]

I also found out that those Apple thin FireWire cable isn't good enough for anything but syncing the iPod or charging it.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by rjt1000 

The early firewire buses were slower than the modern ones. The original poster has a 500 mhz iBook.

I burned DVD by Firewire all the time with 600 MHz iBook. Mind you I never burned at 18X or anything, but the Firewire cable and port were never the issue. Furthermore, I had confirmed faster than 20 MB/s transfer rates (using an external hard drive) on my iBook 600. Even 8X DVD is a very slow transfer rate, only 10.6 MB/s. The slowest Firewire chipsets in optical drive enclosures were more than 15 MB/s real-world back then, and current ones are well over 30 MB/s.

One thing to note though is that the early iBooks have very slow built-in hard drives. Thus, if the data is all over the place on the drive and you're trying to burn at 8X, that could be an issue. However, more often than not it's actually the quality of the media.

[twothousandand1]

Thanks for everyone's suggestions. Next time I will try a different brand of DVD-Rs. I was using Verbatim discs. Are they no-good??!

[Kenneth]

Originally Posted by twothousandand1 

I was using Verbatim discs. Are they no-good??!

I like it.

[twothousandand1]

Tried burning a DVD using a TDK disc and it burned perfectly and fast using Firewire. Brilliant!