hi guys , was wondering if someone could give me a hand i have a problem with nero, i used to be able to burn 48x but now it wil only write 7% then stall the only way i can burn a cd is at 4x

at one stage i had a problem with my recorder buffer dropping in and out but reinstalling windows fixed that.

when i do a maximum speed test the results vary from 16x to 23x saying source data is too slow my sorce is my hard drive, it is partionioned c: windows/programs drive d: data i have tried burning from both

my system is an amd athlonxp 1800+
with 512 mb or ram
80gb hard drive (partioned)
my burner is liteon ltr48125w 48x12x48

i have formatted c: and reinstalled nero to no avail

can someone please help
ps sorry if this has been mentioned before i did try to search

I am having the same issue.

System is:

MSI-6315
PIII 1GHz coppermine
512MB RAM
ATI Radeon 9000 Pro 128MB
Intel Application Accelerator installed
Maxtor Diamondmax 80GB ATA-100 (drive running at UDMA5)
MSI CR52 (52/32/52) (drive running at MW-DMA2)
Windows XP HE
Nero Express 6.3.0.3
Memorex CD-R 80Min 48X Multi speed

Shows that 30.4X is the maximum, then says the source data is too slow and burns at 24X
Under the Cache tab the tested drive speed is 57MB/s
I have the disk cache set at the maximum of 80MB
Also ... the FAQs on Nero site said to uncheck Buffer underrun protection, but I don't have the option of disabling it. Maybe MSI has a program for tweaking that?

I had faced similar problem and after reading your post I decided to ask Sony people who sold me the burner.

First they tried to clean and to convince me that everything is ok but when the same thing happened on their maschine (burning 16x instead of 48x because source data is too slow) they addmited that this is because sometimes lens are becoming weak.

With some extra cash I exchanged my burner and now it says
Source data 142 x......

I did not believe myself but new burner works on sam maschine with same settings.

Good luck

Forgive me, but this sounds nonsensical. The source data speed check is absolutely nothing to do with the writer used.

I suspect that you're using very different source data for your second test and/or you defragmented your hard disk(s).


In any case, lenses don't become weak - they may become dirty, but that tends to stop the writer from working. Lasers can become weak - that manifests itself as poor quality writing and/or a failure to power calibrate.



David

DavidW ... in my specific situation, I don't understand why the program insists that the source data speed is too slow. The transfer rate test shows over 50MB/s (the test in Nero).
Also, I have the latest Intel drivers for IDE and the drive has been defragmented.
I sent a request to Nero for advice and they suggested that I update to the newest version of the program. I have done that, and now I can burn at 32X. But still can't do 48X like the discs I am using should be able to. It is very frustrating.
Running at UDMA5 I can't believe that the source data (in other words the hard drive) is too slow, this must be a issue with Nero.

I did not say that it makes any sense, but it worked.

I tooked my CD burner to service center. They pluged it in their maschine with their version of Nero and same drive was burning only 16x.
When they gave me new CD drive and I tested it on my maschine the data too slow

It is possible that person in service centre does not know the real cause of problem so he told me the story about lens.
Generaly idea is that there is some hardware problem.

The best way to test it is to take your CD to friends computer and try there what is maximal speed of burning.

By the way: Defrag and other stuff I did before and nothing helped.

I know that it might sound a little odd but are you sure u were writing at 48%. I say that because if you were, the cd should be written in one minute or less. If you were burning in 2 min then u were writing at 40 or 32 or even less. So there is no problem. The thing that changed is that nero now shows the actual writing speed. otherwise check your ide configuration or an older version of nero. good luck

High speed CD writers only reach the given speed towards the end of the write - those high speeds are not CLV speeds. 48x writing takes rather longer than 1 minute.


When considering transfer speeds from hard disk, the UDMA mode doesn't matter so long as it's high enough not to restrict data transfer from the hard disk.

My computer has a couple of Seagate ST336753LW hard disks (U320 SCSI 36GB Seagate Cheetah 15K.3), which are some of the fastest hard disks available. Those expensive 15000rpm hard disks max out at around 86MBytes per second internal speed. A more conventional 7200rpm UDMA (or SATA) hard disk actually has a similar internal speed, as the data on the platters is packed more densely.

However, where the Cheetah wins over more conventional drives is in seek time (and, for that matter, rotational latency). The maximum internal speed is reached when the drive doesn't have to seek - that is, to move to another spot on the disk to start reading or writing there. Unless you're writing image files from a perfectly defragmented hard disk that isn't otherwise in use (including for the Windows swap file), your hard disk will be seeking.

Programs like Nero use various buffering strategies to get round the limitations on the speed of source data. Even they're imperfect, though. (My machine has just enough RAM, 1GByte, to allow Nero to buffer an entire CD-R in memory, though I don't believe it actually does so).


I don't believe any hard disk commercially available today can exceed the speed of UDMA mode 5, even in a contrived and deliberately extreme case.



VadersHeir - so far as 48x discs only being burnt at 32x - is that all that the Nero burn dialog shows when you insert a blank disc? If so, then that's the burner saying that it will only burn the disc at 32x, rather than it being a source speed issue. Not every burner will burn every disc at its rated speed.

Meanwhile, the Intel Application Accelerator drivers can actually make things worse for CD burning than the stock Microsoft IDE drivers - though if you're not actually seeing any problems, you're probably OK to leave them in place.


gy2004 - it sounds as if the issue at the service centre could be media. That said, do you happen to know the make and model number of your hard disk (Nero InfoTool will probably give you sufficient information)?



David

Sorry that it took so long to post an answer, but I have changed a comp. Now it is P4 2.8 HT.
Plus job and ....

David- the media used in service centre was the same on my writer and on their writer. On my writer max speed was 16 and on their max speed was 52x on same media. I still think there was something wrong with writer.
HDD was Seagate 40 Gb ST 340810A. Same error was on this one 80 Gb Seagate ST 380021 A.

But that I would not be bored Nero does not allow this one to burn faster than 40x although it is 52x.
Full data CD burning takes little bit more than 3 min.

All the best ,

Gy

This is just reply on my last posting about speed of Sony 52x.

I got this answer from Tech support here.

Sony is purposely locking CD Drives (at least here in India) to burn max 40x. The reason behind it is the use of cheap CD medias which tends to blow in drive and in this case Sony is not giving warranty.

To unlock it one needs to put blank media in drive. Press and hold eject button for 10 seconds (the drive led will blink 2). Start Nero and burn 52x.
It works.

Simple isn't it.

Gy

Well you could check your IDE channels in Device Manager and make sure DMA is enabled. If it's not it could mean that XP (if that's what you are using) has had trouble with the drive and has set it back.

You could also try Burnatonce (free) and see what kind of burn speeds you are getting to determine if it's a system or Nero problem.

http://www.burnatonce.com/