Hi all,

I bought an Emprex 1004IM 4x DVD Writer just after the 1st of this year. I am a newbie here so don't flame me if I don't exactly do things as they should be. Anyway, the problem I am having is writing to DVD-Rs. I am using DVD Xpress Copy to create backups of my DVDs. I am using Ritek 1x/2x DVD-Rs (RITEKG03). I constantly make coasters with this media when my drive is set to DMA mode. However, when I put the drive in PIO mode I can use this media and I don't create any coasters using the Ritek DVD-Rs (RITEKG03). So I thought that perhaps this drive has a problem with the Ritek media so I bought some cheapo 4x DVD-Rs made by Fornex (FORNEX4X002). Exactly the same results as the Ritek DVD-Rs. Writes good (but slow!) in PIO mode and coasters galore in DMA mode but faster. I then decided to buy some DVD+RW (INFODISCA01) from Maxell. These always work regardless if the drive is in PIO or DMA mode. I then bought someCompUSA brand 2.4X DVD+Rs (OPTODISCOP1) and these work in both PIO and DMA mode. I then decided to buy some Princo 1x/2x DVD-RW (PRINCO) and this works in either mode. HOWEVER, they are useable up to about 5-7 times and then after around the 8th time or so the DVD writer can never write to it again even though programs such as DVDinfo, Roxio Disc Backup can erase/format the media. I do have the latest 048 firmware for the drive.

Here is an update. I moved the drive firmware back to 047 and same results. I also removed the Nvidia IDE driver and replace with the stock Microsoft one in Windows XP. I decided to buy and Emprex 8X Dual Drive (BTC 1008IM) and it has the exact same issue my 1004IM drive has.

Maybe its my machine or BIOS settings. Everything in my BIOS looks normal.

My machine specs are:

AMD Athlon XP 3200+
1 GB DDR 3200
WD 120 GB HDD 7200rpm (master IDE channel 1)
Emprex 1004IM/1008IM (master IDE channel 2)
Biostar Ideq 200N (Nforce2 chipset) Small Form Factor
Logitech Wireless Keyboard and Mouse
Windows XP with latest NForce chipset drivers

Any help/ideas would be appreciated.

Thanks
_________________
Happy Computing

Most likely solution: uninstall the Nforce IDE drivers and use only the M$ ones included with your operating system. Uninstall may not always be enough.

Try with driver cleaner from www.driverheaven.net to fully get rid of the nforce drivers.

It may be the media as well, tried quality media like Taiyo Yuden, TDK, mitsubishi or maxell DVD-R?

Thanks OC Freak for the suggestion but I did try that. In fact my system is running this way right now. Exact same behaviour on both drives 1004IM and 1008IM.

spmrebel,

flash your 1004 back to 0043, i had a similar prob with ritek g04, the write was always good but speed was lower than 2x. flashing back to 0043 solved this problem for me.

i also e-mailed marco and i hope this prob will be solved in 49.
you can also take a look here

cheers

Do you know when the final vers. of 049 gets ready?

Anyone knows if there will be fw support in the future after ver. 049 for the 1004?

Thank Herbie,

Where can I get the o43 FW for the 1004IM? I am not sure this will solve my problem. My main problem is that my 1004IM and 1008IM can only write to DVD-Rs if I put the drives in PIO mode. If they are in DMA mode then I will create a coaster. It looks like it writes only the first visible (to my eye) inner track (I believe this is the title for the movie) and then it stops burning at this point. I shouldn't have to do put the drive in PIO mode to burn DVD-Rs.

Thanks

You can get a number of binary rpc1 firmware files including a flashing utility at the Dangerous Brothers' site.

Regards, Martin A

I'm having the same problem. I cannot burn DVD-r's. I'm getting a good coaster collection!!! My Emprex 4X drive had 0043 firmware when I bought it and I flashed to 0048 and had the exact result-coasters. I tried both Memorex 4X DVD-r's and CompUSA DVD-r's. I did burn a TDK 2X DVD-rw and it worked great!! PLEASE HELP!!!

sjh,

Try setting the DVD drive in PIO mode (don't use DMA), reboot and then try burning the DVD-R. Let me know if this works. This works for me. However, this is what I am complaining about is because it should work in DMA mode and the drive shouldn't have to be PIO mode. When I use DVD+R/RW they always burn when the drive is in DMA mode.

Happy computing

funny i have exactly the same problem with dvd+r medias!! with
dvd-r my btc works correctly in dma mode

I did change to PIO mode and the DVD-r's did burn. I picked up some CompUSA DVD+r's and they burned in DMA mode. This whole thing is bothering me. Why won't the -r's burn in DMA??
I'm seriously thinking about taking the Emprex drive back.

sjh,

This is very interesting that you and I have the exact same behaviour. Another has the exact opposite of us (DVD+R will not burn but DVD-R will). I am wondering what are your system specs? Here is mine below:

AMD Athlon XP 3200+ (400Mhz FSB)
Biostar Small Form Factor Ideq 200N (nForce2 chipset)
1 GB 3200 DDR Ram (running at 333mhz)
Emprex 1004IM DVD +-R/RW (IDE2 Master)
WD 120 GB 7200rpm HDD (IDE1 Master)
Nvidia 5200 AGP Video Card with 128MB
Floppy
Everything built in
Windows XP (no SP1)
Latest NForce2 device drivers

Do you have an nVidia based Athlon system? I was running the nVidia IDE drives but I have removed them. This weekend if I have time I may format my hard drive and reinstall everything.

Let me know.

Happy Computing.

I haven't had any success writing to -R's either using firmware
43 or 49 or 48. I believe my case is a bad back of disks. I've
tried for three weeks and can tell you I have tried the DMA/PIO
switching...master slaving the DVD Emprex Writer...Silencing
everything in msconfig...different burn and write software. It's
a no show for the EMPREX with -R media. Hey...wait a minute...
it does good with -RW's from Memorex. I also had the original
ridata rw disk that came with the machine and that works too.
I've tried burning then using Roxio to copy the rw to -r but wow...
still a diaster.

I need a miracle to fix this thing! I believe it's the disk but I'm
really afraid to buy another -R disk.

Help!

All smiles here. Either I have finally found some decent disks
in my bad batch of Great Quality -R disks...or removing my SIS
IDE driver and replacing with Microsoft branded driver worked.
In two successful burns on my computer (ASUS P4S8X, 1 GB
Memory, 1.8GHZ Intel CPU, Emprex Dual 4X burner, Lite-on Cd-Writer, DVDXcopy) I have had perfect movie burns. I'm
currently running FW48 and from my last posts have tried everything but wiping out the drive and starting over. I guess
the question remains...does replacing the SIS IDE driver with
Microsoft IDE driver have anything to do with the problem going away or was it luck or possibly a few good disk in the poor GQ spindle?

Hi Spunky,

Thanks for the reply.

Removing the SIS device driver is most likely the root cause of the problem you were experiencing. This is what solved it for me also though I am using the Nvidia chipset. What I did to solve my problems was to do a clean format and reinstall everything on my system. Now my system is running like a champ. I can burn both +R and -R media and my drive is always in DMA mode. The one thing that is tricky with Nvidia IDE drivers is that they seem to have a SW IDE caching driver. This was the main problem of my issues.

Anyway happy burning!

I concur.

Proprietary chipset drivers have been known to cause endless problems with this drive, problems which completely disappeared when the drivers were finally discarded. I've found that the drive works best with the IDE drivers which come with Windows.

Regards, Martin A

I agree with Centurio on this one. Make sure your chipset drivers are the ones that came with windows, if not, you are going to have problems burning. I found this the hard way with VIA KT400 chipset.


I have a microadvantage drive, only burns at 2x with any 4x certified media. made worse when i updated with via 4in1 driver ( coasters like crazy). so i uninstalled via 4in1 and replaced FW with 043. now it works like a CHAMP!! no probs whatsoever.


-rukness

Well,

I'm still getting dumb grief with this Emprex 1004 drive. I ordered
some cheap Matrix DVD -R disks that I now regret. The shop4tech
site sells the Longten 001 disk which are not supported by 49
firmware. I was informed by the site that Firmware 43 is
compatible. Still freaking more question than answers. Anyway,
I wanted to know if anybody could forware me a link to the
firmware 43 that actually works. I tried to run the FW43 off the
dangerous brothers site and I get some kind of error like
"file update not found" when I run it. Anybody know what I'm doing wrong?

I wish sometimes that I didn't ever come across this dvd recorder.



Honestly, the only successful media I have in my arsnal is
TDK +R and Memorex -RW. Everything else I've tried including
GQ and Matrix disk are bad!

Well,

I'm still getting dumb grief with this Emprex 1004 drive. I ordered
some cheap Matrix DVD -R disks that I now regret. The shop4tech
site sells the Longten 001 disk which are not supported by 49
firmware. I was informed by the site that Firmware 43 is
compatible. Still freaking more question than answers. Anyway,
I wanted to know if anybody could forware me a link to the
firmware 43 that actually works. I tried to run the FW43 off the
dangerous brothers site and I get some kind of error like
"file update not found" when I run it. Anybody know what I'm doing wrong?

I wish sometimes that I didn't ever come across this dvd recorder.



Honestly, the only successful media I have in my arsnal is
TDK +R and Memorex -RW. Everything else I've tried including
GQ and Matrix disk are bad!

The error is " File update is not assigned". What does it mean
when I get this response when trying to load FW43?

Oh, well.

Why don't you use the DOS version of MTKFLASH and flash your drive under plain DOS?

If you make a mistake here, it could kill your drive, it's true, but then there's a very good chance you could bring it back to life.

At least this would do away with all those cryptic error messages.

Regards, Martin A

make sure you click on browse, and choose DUAL43.BIN as the file, otherwise it will give you this message..

Thanks, I'll try it when I get my drive back from BTC in
California. I was about to take a hammer to it but decided
it would be best to send it back to BTC. Honestly, I know there
are a few good Emprex burners out there...unfortunately...I
didn't get one of them.

Don't feel a bit sorry for me though...I learned so much over the
past month. I enjoyed bending over backwards until I cried
uncle. Maybe BTC can rive this puppy or send me another.

>>I ordered some cheap Matrix DVD -R disks that I now regret. The shop4tech site sells the Longten 001 disk which are not supported by 49 firmware.<<

This I do not understand.

I have used the Matrix media with FW 43, 47, 49 and now 50 with EXCELLENT results.

My BTC is the Fry's Emprex rebadge. With FW 50 I can now burn DVD+R with -R booktype. Again, with excellent results using Fry's GQ media.

I am puzzled as to the difference in experiences.

FWIW, I have my BTC cabled as Secondary Master, my Liteon 163 DVD-R as Secondary Slave.