Does anyone know how to take an image of a directCD disc such that when subsequently burned (according to correct settings) produces a functional directCD disc? If anyone knows simply how to copy a directCD disc, this would be helpful. I have tried various programs over numerous settings, and the best I can get is a disc to which directCD responds but cannot write (an error appears 10sec or so after dragging a file). I would also appreciate anyone's experience copying InCD or Mount Rainier discs.

CloneCD should be able to do this. just make sure that the backup disc is not closed when writing

Discs burnt under the data and game templates (in CloneCD) still raise the same write error (in DirectCD 5). I have tried various settings with UltraIso and Alcohol including finalization (finalized discs raise this error too). Is it possible that relevant sectors are designated written when an image is burnt, thus creating empty, but unwritable space? Also, the following attributes are true of my source disc:

Illegal TOC
Overburn
Dummy Files
Tracks < 4 secs.
Bad Sectors

Does this help?

CloneCD will reproduce an unprotected CD in a 1:1 format.

Illegal TOC
Overburn
Dummy Files
Tracks < 4 secs.
Bad Sectors

Why would a packet writing CD have these attributes? Surely it's just data that you've written to the CD-R?

Yes they (attributes) do seem strange! It turns out I was misreading the results of the scanner (yes, I'm a beginner, or an idiot). After a little experimentation, it seems the disc is merely overburned (this is confirmed because nero rom will not write a full image and complains of a space requirement), which thankfully does not constitute a protection. And yet if the disc were entirely unprotected, you would expect an easier time copying.
By the way, I'm using a cdrw. At your implicit suggestion I burned a directCD cdr, but found the data to be of a different structure (you probably knew this), and unrecognizable within any copying program (with the exception of ultraiso, which produced errors). Running this disc through a scanner shows it to have at least bad sectors. Its difficult to believe roxio would implement protection here.
Have any ideas? Its still possible I've missed a settings combination in one of the five programs I'm trying (some still on trial, better hurry!). I'm thinking the next step would be a bit-by-bit comparison of a source disc and a copied one. Do you know of any utilities that do this (it seems an obvious tool in copy-making)? More useful would be some kind of clue as to the dysfunctionality of the copy. I'm suprised I haven't found some reference on the web to an attempt already made.

Hi again. I'm stumped for the moment. I have an InCD CD-RW that I copied with CloneCD! It contains just data as well. I don't have and have never used DirectCD and so I can't reproduce the problem - sorry.

All I can say is to make sure that is just a plain vanilla data packet writing disc and that you simply use the "Data" profile in CloneCD or Alcohol 120%

One thing, if you're using the burner to image: leave the tray open and double-click your way through CloneCD. Let CCD close the tray for the image and the write. Maybe DirectCD is interfering somehow? Not sure myself.

Hello,

This might sound silly but you might have to format the blank CD-RW disc before you burn the image onto it?

Cheers.

No, because any 'formatting' is contained within the image

At least we know in can be done. However my attempts with InCD still ended in failure. It seems both with DirectCD and InCD discs a certain block of sectors at the end of the session cannot be read. This may be a hardware limitation (I would be pleased if it were this simple); but if this were the case why would source discs be usable within their respective programs? Incidentally, I tried writing discs in win98 in the absence of directCD: here CloneCD and Alcohol failed to capture the UDF component of the disc (the volume label, normally something like 'DCD...', was consistently 'UDFReader'). I also tried using disk editor and winHex editor, and neither could successfully read from the physical disc.
What were the exact settings you used with CloneCD? Did you finalize the session? What write method did you use (raw, SAO etc)? Did you enable the intelligent bad sector scanner? What was the skip interval?
The only next step I can think of is to direct the InCD or DirectCD formatting utility to write to a virtual burner, but I haven't been able to find anything like this on the net. Any ideas?