I just can't erase CD&DVD-RWs anymore!

I just don't know what to do anymore to make this work!

I have an LG GSA-4167B super multi drive which can no longer erase CD-RWs or +-DVD-RWs because it does not identify them as re-writable anymore but just as CD-ROMs or DVD-ROMs. It can write to them again but I have to erase them first on my notebook computer, which also has an LG drive and it does not have any problem in either identifying or erasing them. Therefore, this is not a media problem and I only use TDK, Verbatim, Sony, etc. quality media. When I insert an erased disc on my desktop it is correctly identified as re-writable, but once I have written to it, it no longer is. I sent the drive in twice for repair but it came back unchanged, a firmware update did nothing at all either.

I also used ForceASPI 1.7 and it did "apparently" remove one of my old drivers but it could not install any new ones, everytime I rebooted I was back to the old situation. I eventually used KILLASPI and I ended up with no Adaptec ASPI drivers at all (according to ASPICheck) but the installation routine still failed completely, there were no new drivers copied to Win/System32/. Even when I copied them manually, they just disappeared again after a reboot. I also tried ForceASPI 1.8 but it did not work either. I also googled for hours but could not find a solution to my problem.

I then bought a new drive a couple of days ago, an ASUS DRW 1608-3PS, but is has exactly the same problem! No matter whether I use Nero or Alcohol 120% or even Win XP, I just cannot erase those freaking discs anymore. I have uninstalled and reinstalled every piece of hardware and software that could be causing this behaviour, but nothing works. It therefore appears to be a f****ing Windows problem!

I now think it may once again be time for a complete XP re-installation, as much as I hate this; but the problem seems to lie within bloody XP.

Or does anybody have any other suggestions before I take that step?

Regards
George

Hi George & welcome to the forum.

Alcohol 120% is often the problem here.

In Alcohol settings, go to Emulation, and make sure Ignore Media Type is unchecked. That's been the cause & resolution of many such problems reported here.

Edit:
I've closed your other thread in the General Hardware forum for the reasons that it's not a hardware problem & it's a cross (double) posting which is against the forum rules.

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Last edited by TimC; 16-03-2007 at 19:10. Reason: Added fact that I'd closed the cross posting.

May be you should consider restoring your system windows registry to pretime of this problem.

Thanks a million, TimC!
You were right about the Alcohol setting, that's something that just did not occur to me before. I think that Alcohol should actually give some indication about this setting when it is being used to try and erase RW discs.

I absolutely agree with you. I don't use Alcohol 120% but get the impression that this is a default setting as this problem crops up regularly.