HELP! SH-W08A wont read writeable media DVD+R

I'll be honest, I dont know all that much about the internal workings of my computer... all I know is I'm getting a new one in a few weeks and I have some things to back-up. So i bought some DVD+R media and my drive wont recognize it! I really need someone's help.

I have done some of my own troubleshooting to see if I could fix it. I've used Nero, and 2 other programs I downloaded to see if they would work, and they didn't.

I have updated the firmware to no avail

I have spent countless hours searching online to try and find some sort of driver or something that will solve the problem

I have tried the DVD's on my sisters computer, and a few friends from work, and it worked just fine with no problems. So I know it isn't the disc's fault, it's something to do with my computer.

I'm kind of a dummy and a few months ago I was running out of hard drive space so I uninstalled a bunch of programs I didn't think I needed, I dont know if I uninstalled something that may have messed up the burner. I have reinstalled some things like AnyDVD and WinDVD and stuff, but still nothing is working.

Can anybody help me? Any ideas on what I should do?

I'm also not up on a lot of the crazy computer lingo either so be gentle

What do you mean by wont read writeable media?

Sorry, I guess that was a little vague. What I mean is that when I try to burn a disc, I put the disc into the drive, and then it doesn't realize that it's there, it just keeps telling me to put blank media in there, when it already is.

Please post what the software tells you EXACTLY.

Having a similar problem using Nero 7.

Message is as follows:

"DVD R/RW SH-WO8A: Waiting for Disc

This disc is not writable.
Please insert a writable disc...

Disc required for the compilation: DVD R/RW
Disc type in recorder: DVD+R"

Thanks in advance,
Lauren

Anyone had a chance to look at this yet?

Hi Lauren, welcome to CDF

A few questions: do you have Alcohol 120%, Daemon Tools, or any other virtual drive/emulation software on your PC, perhaps to enable you to play a game without the disc?

Also, is it happening with all blank discs (CD, DVD), regardless of brand?

Does it play commercial DVDs (store-bought movies etc) OK?

Edit: Another thing - what is the rated speed of the DVD+Rs you bought (should say on the packaging/discs)?

What is the exact drive model you are using?

_Chef_,

It's a Samsung DVD R/RW SH-W08A according to my computer.
Hope this helps.

Arachne,

This is strange to me, I've never had any problems burning CDs or DVDs in the past.

I have Daemon Tools running in the background. I used to use Alcohol, but one of my friends insisted that it was crap and that this was a change I had to make. No idea if that's the culprit or not...

Not sure what the rate is, there's a really limited amount of info on this DVD R spindle, but I'll give you what info I can find:

Imation
DVD+R
16x
2hr

It seems to read burnt DVDs just fine.

I wonder if it's a problem with Nero? I'm using version 7.

Thanks,
Lauren

Any idea what might be the cause of the problem?

Thanks in advance,
Lauren

Thanks in advance

Does Nero 7 list your drive as a recorder?

Could you try to burn with Imgburn?

either way, post a logfile here, remove serials before.

Your writer is only capable burning at 8x. Maybe the firmware doesnt like 16x media!