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adamberti · May 9, 2003, 06:48 PM

Originally posted by inRed:
I have been seeing reports of this problem w/ 12" and 15" Powerbooks but I do not recall any with 17" Powerbooks.

Is anyone having this problem (burn failures) who has a 17" Powerbook?

Perhaps they have a slightly newer model - I know they have different firmware that allows some to burn DVD-RW. I recall looking at Matshita's site on the specs and they listed a B version, before it used to list an A version. So maybe there is a new model that works a little better? Would it be worth opening up a book to see if there are any differences?

I'm wondering if Apple wanted the slot-loading DVD-R so bad, it put them in to the Tibook a little prematurly. That still doesnt account for why the 12's have problems (maybe to keep the workers busy while Apple fixed the problem with the 17's they put newer SuperDrives in all of them?

)

I havent burned a DVD in a while, but will try again soon as I backup my new AAC audio collection. I think I'll try the permissions and/or root methods.

inRed · May 10, 2003, 04:18 PM

I am still going round and round with Apple on this. Since I have called so many times they have switched me to an account "specialist".

He immediately informed me that he would not support Toast or Disk Copy problems because of the possibility of pirating movies! This is ridiculous. I understand that Toast would not be supported but Disk Copy is an Apple product. He said that they would only support problems burning from the finder or from iDVD.

Before he would talk to me further about it he insisted I do some test burns from the finder. Of course those burns failed too but he was gone for the weekend before I could get back to him.

I am waiting to see whath they are going to do with all of these coaster that are being made by the tests that they are asking me to make...

I will post more about this on Monday.

inRed · May 10, 2003, 04:24 PM

One more thing to ask...

It seems like all of my coasters are failing toward the end of the burn. Looking at the disc itself they look like about 75% - 80% was burned. It is not in the same place everytime but it is in the same general area.

It this the same as you guys are seeing? I am wondering if there is an alignment issue as the laser travels further out on the disc.

I know I am grasping for any possibilities but there has to be something that the people with this problem have in common.

shaiwon · May 10, 2003, 04:35 PM

Red,

I'm having that same exact problem. I've tried burning with DiskCopy and Toast and in all 4 times, only a little more than half of the media has been burned. What kind of mac are you using? I got a 12" PB.. Let me know if you discover the problem. I hope it's not the superdrive - I'd hate to have to bring it in for repair. Thanks..

inRed · May 10, 2003, 06:38 PM

I am using a 15" TiBook w/ Superdrive.

I expect that I will be having to send it in.

AppleCello · May 10, 2003, 08:19 PM

I sent mine in on Friday may 9. I am having these exact same porblems. I will let people know when i get mine back. cant burn data or video to any brand of dvd. getting mostly "sense key = hardware error" in toast.

I think that is the lamest crock of **** ever that they wont support disk copy due to movie pirating. How about fair use and the perfectly legal procedure of backing up your own purchased content? I know people say that it is unnecessary, but there are many other uses as well that involve burning dvd content to disk. These "pro" machines may also be working with DVD studio pro. how about that?

TheBum · May 11, 2003, 05:09 PM

Originally posted by inRed:
It seems like all of my coasters are failing toward the end of the burn. Looking at the disc itself they look like about 75% - 80% was burned. It is not in the same place everytime but it is in the same general area.

It this the same as you guys are seeing?

Sounds about right. My coasters all had close to 1/2" radial distance unburned when the burns failed. I still haven't had a chance to try my TDK media because I've been battling the upgrade of my PowerCenter to Yellow Dog Linux 3.0. I plan to try them sometime this week and post back with my findings.

all2ofme · May 12, 2003, 07:18 AM

Yes, exactly the same here.

Pain in TheBum

I haven't tried burning recently (no time) but would like to give it a go sometime this week. I'll post back how I get on.

Originally posted by inRed:
One more thing to ask...

It seems like all of my coasters are failing toward the end of the burn. Looking at the disc itself they look like about 75% - 80% was burned. It is not in the same place everytime but it is in the same general area.

inRed · May 13, 2003, 12:08 AM

Hmmm. I was informed today by Apple that this is not a known issue. That seems a little strange since a previous support person said that he had received quite a few calls about this.

I have decided to send my TiBook back for repair tomorrow and will post the results as soon as it returns. I am not holding my breath though.

Has anyone who has this problem solved it with a superdrive replacement?

AppleCello · May 13, 2003, 06:41 PM

just got my pb15 back after drive replacement. no good. same issue.

inRed · May 14, 2003, 01:57 PM

What is Apple saying about it?

Mine is in for repair right now and I do not expect it to be fixed either.

I suspect that many people have this problem and do not know it because they are not burning full DVD discs.

AppleCello · May 14, 2003, 09:51 PM

Well, I did get mine back and it still doesnt work, but theres more.

There is a piece of orange tape exposed through the Superdrive slot that is occasionally obstructing discs from being ejectd. its going back in tomorrow.

if this keeps up, theres going to be some big trouble. Ive wasted so much money on DVDs if nothing else. besides taht, my real work isnt easily getting done wiht this computer constantly in the shop.

Hozie · May 15, 2003, 06:12 AM

Well, Apple should REALLY start getting off their ass and do something about this problem. This is not the only message board where I've seen the sense key error. In fact, there's a thread on the Apple discussions board about this whole issue.

I had the same problem and successfully completed a burn on Apple-branded media, but I haven't been able to test more than two Apple discs until now, so it could very well be that the first successes were flukes...

In any case, please continue to report back!

AppleCello · May 15, 2003, 10:15 AM

now that i have coastered all of my discs from apple, its time to spend more on media. i still have some generic, but i dont think its fair to only test with them, as they're cheapo.

Im sending in my computer today. I will write when it comes back.

inRed · May 15, 2003, 07:32 PM

Well mine came back today and still does not work.

I called Apple and they said it needed to be escalated to an engineer. They sent me a script that would package my system info and logs to be sent to them. Unfortunately this does not work either.

I was told that I should get a call from someone next week. Not particularily appealing since I am still without the use of this computer.

Eug · May 16, 2003, 12:01 AM

Have any of you tried clean installs?

inRed · May 16, 2003, 04:00 AM

Have any of you tried clean installs?

Many times...

It fails with error code -2147352480 using Disk Copy and/or Finder burns in 9.2.2, 10.2.1, 10.2.5, and 10.2.6. I have done finder burns in 10 including burns in safe mode. I have tried as the root user. I have tried with and without partitions. You name it and I have tried it.

Here is the strange part. Not all discs fail. Riteks seem to burn fine but Apple discs are at almost 100% failure rate. If I burn a movie to a Ritek disc it burns and verifies OK. BUT when I play the movie on my standalone it starts to show errors at the part of the movie near the outer edge of the disc and will eventually fail and stop playing.

It seems that this is the part of the disc where the burn is failing for other people also. Burns in the first 2 - 3GB always seem to be fine.

Also, I have yet to see any reports of this problem with 17" Powerbooks. I really think that the 17" firmware is the fix for this. BTW mine came back with D04C

I also suspect that this problem is much larger that Apple thinks. There are probably a lot of people who do not know that they have this problem. Most users do not burn DVDs and of those that do many do not burn full or almost full discs. Can you even burn a full disk in iDVD?

Apple has asked me to try every test you can imagine and I will be expecting replacements of these piles of coasters...

Enough ranting for the night.

Eug · May 16, 2003, 08:19 AM

Riteks seem to burn fine but Apple discs are at almost 100% failure rate. If I burn a movie to a Ritek disc it burns and verifies OK. BUT when I play the movie on my standalone it starts to show errors at the part of the movie near the outer edge of the disc and will eventually fail and stop playing.

Low end Riteks don't work for me either (same results as you), but then again the same is true with my desktop burners. The low end Riteks are simply poor quality. Apple media works fine though.

It's very odd that a cheap disc would at least burn fully while Apple media does not. Are all the Apple discs you've tried from the same batch? Have you tried Mitsui?

Can you even burn a full disk in iDVD?

Yes. If the disc isn't full, you can just tack data on to the end. Indeed, for very short videos I've sometimes put some of the raw project source files right on the DVD sort of as an internal backup.

all2ofme · May 16, 2003, 11:07 AM

I've tried three different batches of Apple media. None of them have worked without problems.

I've tried a clean install too, but to the same effect.

It's *really* odd that no-one with a 17" machine has reported these problems (at least that I know of). If it's the firmware which is the only difference then surely there can't be a reason why Apple won't release DWDB for these other drives. I can't see why the 17" burning at increased speeds would lead to a higher percentage of successful burns.

Originally posted by Eug:
It's very odd that a cheap disc would at least burn fully while Apple media does not. Are all the Apple discs you've tried from the same batch? Have you tried Mitsui?

Eug · May 16, 2003, 11:27 AM

Originally posted by all2ofme:
I can't see why the 17" burning at increased speeds would lead to a higher percentage of successful burns.

The 17" burns DVD-R at the same speed as the 15" and 12". 1X

all2ofme · May 16, 2003, 11:50 AM

Sorry, that wasn't very clear of me. I meant increased CD-R speeds (16x vs. 8x).

Originally posted by Eug:
The 17" burns DVD-R at the same speed as the 15" and 12". 1X

adamberti · May 16, 2003, 06:07 PM

Originally posted by all2ofme:

It's *really* odd that no-one with a 17" machine has reported these problems (at least that I know of). If it's the firmware which is the only difference then surely there can't be a reason why Apple won't release DWDB for these other drives. I can't see why the 17" burning at increased speeds would lead to a higher percentage of successful burns.

Do we know for sure that it is the exact same drive? Could it be a slight revision as they realized there were problems with the initial ones in the 15"? Anyone have both machines and care to open them up?

urrl5201 · 07:52 AM

I am so pleased with my burned DVD's on my 17"...I edit in Final cut express, put the chapter markers in and export to iDVD3. I use the cheapest blanks available, Verbatim; 3 for $10. I just bought some Memorex; a pack of 10 for $23 and am about to try them. Trying to make a copy of a DVD I made a disk image of a burned DVD and made a coaster. But then I checked Article ID 42724 on Apple's Knowledge base and found the right way to do it. The 2nd DVD copy I burned was perfect. Now I can free up project space from iDVD3 and Final Cut Express from the HD for other things and keep DVD-R or RW copies of my video work; way cool.

I also ordered an external HD enclosure from transntl.com since I had the stock 20 GIG HD from my old 667 Ti and another 48 GIG HD I thought Norton Disk Doctor had utterly destroyed; it would not work at all in the 667 DVI. I put the 48 GIG in the firewire enclosure and it works great. Glad I didn't throw it out!

Now I have about a possible 90 GIG free space for my 17".

Somebody pinch me; I must be dreaming. Does not run hot, runs quiet, with an exterior finish that looks like it could last forever with the proper care. I couldn't be more pleased with my choice. Keep the new 15" aluminum. I am only an occasional interstate traveler and slip it in a backpack to work every day. The weight is a blessing compared to my old Sager 15" black plastic notebrick which weighed twice as much.
One more thing:

WOOHOO!

1 hour later: The Memorex DVD burned fine. The handrest is only comfortably warm. I just wish it could burn 2x instead of just 1x. Or has anyone figured out how to go 2x?

Apparently the Norton Disk Doctor 48 GIG HD is messing up again. Replaced it with the 20 Gig stock. I see transintl.com has their 80 GIG HD's out for the 17"

http://www.transintl.com/store/categ...estTimeOut=500

urrl5201 · May 17, 2003, 07:56 AM

Check out

http://www.transintl.com/store/categ...estTimeOut=500

I know installation of such a beast voids warranty, but putting one in an exterior firewire HD case like what they sell ain't a bad idea for video editors and such. Don't need an AC outlet with those.

inRed · May 17, 2003, 01:48 PM

Check out
http://www.transintl.com/store/cate...uestTimeOut=500

Your link does not make any sense. It is for 19 different products.

Also, maybe I am a little confused but what does this have to do with this thread? This thread is about discussing problems with burning DVDs in powerbooks.

TheBum · 09:57 PM

Originally posted by TheBum:
Sounds about right. My coasters all had close to 1/2" radial distance unburned when the burns failed. I still haven't had a chance to try my TDK media because I've been battling the upgrade of my PowerCenter to Yellow Dog Linux 3.0. I plan to try them sometime this week and post back with my findings.

I finally got to try one of the TDKs on my 4.1 GB iTunes4 music collection. Result? Success!! I'm cautiously optimistic, but at least now it appears my SuperDrive is functional. Now I just have to figure out what to do with the other 10 Apple discs I have. I may just try using them whenever I'm burning <3 GB.

AppleCello · May 18, 2003, 06:43 PM

I will be receiving my powerbook back from apple tomorrow. I bought some Verbatim disks for a change. I dont have anymore apple disks to test with-> they were all coastered. so i will try to burn by tomorrow evening.

It better be all in order now...

adamberti · May 19, 2003, 01:53 AM

Originally posted by AppleCello:
I will be receiving my powerbook back from apple tomorrow. I bought some Verbatim disks for a change. I dont have anymore apple disks to test with-> they were all coastered. so i will try to burn by tomorrow evening.

It better be all in order now...

Good Luck AppleCello, I hope everything works great. I am going to burn a full DVD of AAC's tonight and hope for the best - that or I'm giving Apple a friendly phone call.

AppleCello · May 19, 2003, 12:02 PM

well i got my powerbook back this morning. i slide a blank dvd into the now repaired slot, and it spits it right back out. I figure its a piece of bad media, so i try another and ge the same result. I do it again with a different brand of media, same again.

I slide in a data cd, no problem.

System profiler reports to me now that apple replaced my SuperDrive with a CD-RW. not even a f*cking combo drive...

So im on the phone as i type this to get to the bottom of my superDrive disappearance.

Edit: my mistake, it is a combodrive...

all2ofme · May 19, 2003, 12:50 PM

I'm not sure I get it. They sent your Superdrive machine back with a combo drive? Nice one! You'll see your ratio of coasters to decent burns skyrocket now

Seriously, though - that really, REALLY sucks.

It bothers me that we've coughed up extra for these Superdrives. Apple really needs to fix this soon. Without using combo drives!

Originally posted by AppleCello:
System profiler reports to me now that apple replaced my SuperDrive with a CD-RW. not even a f*cking combo drive...

inRed · May 19, 2003, 01:44 PM

Originally posted by AppleCello:
I will be receiving my powerbook back from apple tomorrow. I bought some Verbatim disks for a change. I dont have anymore apple disks to test with-> they were all coastered. so i will try to burn by tomorrow evening.

Keep an eye on the integrity of the data near the edge of the disc. I have some other brands such as Ritek that burn and verify OK but when playing movies on these discs on a standalone the movie fails once it gets to the outer portions of the disc. This seems to be a good test for the problem.

Hozie · May 19, 2003, 06:27 PM

This is turning into a gigantic joke played by Apple on all 12" SD owners. FFS, they need to get their act together! What the hell are they playing at? By now, we would 've expected that the techs would at least know what the problem is.

I think it's a damn shame that Apple consumers have to find a fix for every problem out there or have to pinpoint each conflict before Apple does something... Totally unacceptable corporate behavior.

/rant

all2ofme · May 20, 2003, 06:27 AM

It's not just 12" owners. My TiSD has the same problem. Apart from that, agreed!

Originally posted by Hozie:
This is turning into a gigantic joke played by Apple on all 12" SD owners.

ghost_flash · Feb 10, 2004, 12:03 PM

I'm having problems burning DVD's on my 17" Powerbook

This is a revision A machine, got it when they just came out.
Just had the need to burn a dvd for the first time, and I did the following:

Media:
Apple DVD-R

Used built in burning and downloaded a proggie named Yu-burn (Freeware)

What happens is, it copys over, then burns and gets stuck in the "checking" stage,
where it confirms the burn. It goes on and on and on.

I'm only burning 145 megs at this point to test, and previously I made a 2.5 gig
coaster.

Neither work. I have wasted 5 DVDs thus far. Any solutions?

macgyvr64 · Feb 10, 2004, 01:18 PM

Try Toast...it almost never fails for me. I'm using a 1.25 15" PB.

all2ofme · Feb 10, 2004, 07:55 PM

Wow, thread resurrection

I agree with the above poster. Try some other software and then call Apple. Use their own media so that they don't have that as a possible reason.

Another thing to try is creating another user account and then burn from that.

macgyvr64 · Feb 10, 2004, 08:05 PM

I know the problem isn't the media. Apple's media quality is up there with Pioneer discs. I've never heard of that app, though, lol

workerbee · Mar 11, 2004, 08:37 AM

Originally posted by macgyvr64:
I know the problem isn't the media. Apple's media quality is up there with Pioneer discs. I've never heard of that app, though, lol

We'll see about that.

I bought a 17" AIBook two days ago, went to the store today and got 10 Apple 4x DVD-R, tried to backup a 4 GB folder of work, and have produced 2 coasters out of 2 so far, with Toast stopping to burn after maybe 1/3 is done.

10.3.2, Toast 6.0.3, Apple DVD-R media.

"Sense key = Illegal request" and "Cannot write medium - incompatible format" sounds very dissappointing to say the least.

macgyvr64 · Mar 11, 2004, 10:48 AM

Whoa...

Cadaver · Mar 11, 2004, 01:14 PM

Originally posted by workerbee:
We'll see about that.

I bought a 17" AIBook two days ago, went to the store today and got 10 Apple 4x DVD-R, tried to backup a 4 GB folder of work, and have produced 2 coasters out of 2 so far, with Toast stopping to burn after maybe 1/3 is done.

10.3.2, Toast 6.0.3, Apple DVD-R media.

"Sense key = Illegal request" and "Cannot write medium - incompatible format" sounds very dissappointing to say the least.

Try 2x media.

workerbee · 01:56 PM

Originally posted by Cadaver:
Try 2x media.

Hmmm... Apple doesn't think so ("How do I know if my SuperDrive needs this update?
That�s easy: If you have a 17-inch flat-panel iMac, an eMac with SuperDrive, a Power Mac G4 (introduced on or after August 2002) with SuperDrive, or a new PowerBook G4 with SuperDrive, your system is already compatible with the new media.").
2x media are a bit hard to find nowadays, anyway. I've been shopping this afternoon, and haven't found any yet.

TDK DVD-R 4x fails exactly like the Apple media do.

EMTEC (ex german BASF) is being tested as I write�

Next up: Sony DVD-R 4x compatible.

(edit: Apple comment + link)

workerbee · Mar 11, 2004, 03:23 PM

OK, short recap of what we learned today:

Brand-new 17" 1.33GHz PowerBook (has iLife 4 CDs in 2 languages including books inside the package, so it's been manufactured after SJ Jan. 04 keynote) miserably fails to write data DVD-R with

Apple 4x DVD-R
Sony 4x DVD-R
TDK 4x DVD-R

EMTEC DVD-R (no speed marking) works, but is written at 1x speed -- about 1 hour for 4.3 GB of data.

Somehow I almost wish I'd bought 2 Dell Inspiron 8600's for the same price.

all2ofme · Mar 11, 2004, 05:05 PM

Create a new user and try burning from there. If that doesn't work then call Apple. There's almost certainly something wrong with your drive.

I had this problem with my TiSD and a similar problem with a 17" PB I bought later.

Once the Mac is working the way it's supposed to you won't look back.

buffalolee · Mar 11, 2004, 06:51 PM

I think I had a similar problem too. I believe I resolved it by burning <4.0 GB worth of data.

So try burning a 2 GB disc and see what happens. I think the total available data for burning is 4.37, but you have to close the disc which takes up data too..

It sounds like you have problems closing the disc when the data is near full.

workerbee · Mar 11, 2004, 07:22 PM

Originally posted by buffalolee:
It sounds like you have problems closing the disc when the data is near full.

I don't know... Toast stops burning after a few minutes; the way to know it'll happen is when the countdown stops at around � remaining : 26:21 � -- that's when the darn "Illegal request" window pops up.
The coasters all look like about 1/3 written.

workerbee · Mar 11, 2004, 07:30 PM

Originally posted by all2ofme:
Create a new user and try burning from there. If that doesn't work then call Apple. There's almost certainly something wrong with your drive.

I had this problem with my TiSD and a similar problem with a 17" PB I bought later.

Once the Mac is working the way it's supposed to you won't look back.

OK, thanks for the suggestion, I'll try that.
It's ironic though that I bought the 17" PowerBook so a) I didn't have to have a second user (my GF now uses my trusty old TiBook 800) and b) so that I could burn DVDs to backup my work.

Re: not looking back: I've not "looked back" for the last 15 years or so, since my first Mac LC -- no SGI workstation has been able to make me think again about using Macs, and certainly no stinking Windows box... but the price difference between a Dell 8600 that is significantly faster, has longer battery life, better video, etc, and a AIBook is shocking: the Dell is a touch more than half the PowerBooks price.

(edit: spelling)

all2ofme · Mar 15, 2004, 05:52 AM

If burning works from another user account then you have can be certain that you don't have a hardware problem. So you will be able to have your 17" do everything you got it for

And a working Superdrive should burn full discs. I've burned many full ones on mine, so if yours will only burn discs which aren't full you should call Apple and have it replaced.

workerbee · Mar 15, 2004, 07:24 AM

Originally posted by all2ofme:
If burning works from another user account then you have can be certain that you don't have a hardware problem. So you will be able to have your 17" do everything you got it for

And a working Superdrive should burn full discs. I've burned many full ones on mine, so if yours will only burn discs which aren't full you should call Apple and have it replaced.

I've been able to burn a few more or less full DVDs now, on my account as well as on a new DVD-burn-only-account.

However, I'd be really interested to know what it is that possibly prevents burning from one account and not the other.

Also, one odd thing I've noticed and haven't read about yet is that Toast 6.0.3 recognizes the drive as 2x capable, but shows 4x timing in its "time remaining" bar -- at half speed. (I.e. a 4 GB disc has "29 minutes remaining", but with seconds moving slooo-ooowly, it takes 1 hour after all.

I'll try out the OS X built-in variants later, see what they have to say

AppleCello · Mar 15, 2004, 09:26 AM

Well many months later, heres an update on my situation. they finally straightened it all out, got my superdrive back in the machine, and I have been successfully burning dvds from iDVD, toast, and the finder with Some Verbatim media. i dont recall the exact specs on it, i think its rated 2x. i wil have to verify.

I have dealt with Apple tech support a ton in the past, having worked in tech support for an office of Macs, and this was by far the worst ever experience with them. it was a series of careless mistakes though, which will happen. at least the people treated me well thru the whole process.

Patrick

all2ofme · Mar 15, 2004, 06:28 PM

Originally posted by workerbee:
However, I'd be really interested to know what it is that possibly prevents burning from one account and not the other.

My understanding of this (both from these boards and from Apple techs I've spoken to) is that you're eliminating the possibility of prefs being corrupted or any such install problems. I'm by no means an expert, though! I've used this method to try and diagnose problems in the past and it is definitely of some use.

Glad to hear you're burning discs now!