TEAC DV-W516GA DVD+/-RW problem

Living Room Bargain Basement
#1

Hi everyone,

I’ve just bought a DVD burner - TEAC DV-W516GA. The problem is, that it absolutely refuses to burn on a specific DVD-R 4x discs. The manufacturer (Optical Storage) is local. The discs are cheap, but they’re quite OK in quality - I’ve burnt many CDs from OP and very few of them failed at burning.

A friend of mine has a Plextor DVDRW PX-712A and has absolutely no problem so far. We’ve tried several different DVDs, changed Windowses, Nero’s version, I even brought the TEAC to my friend and tested it if it will work on his system. It didn’t.

I’ve found that TEAC DVD burners are actually made by Liteon, and I’ve found out that some new Liteon DVD burners have the same problem with DVD-R 4x discs.

What will you advice me to do? I am considering swapping it for an LG GSA-4163B, which additionally supports DVD-RAM. It is faster and it is the editor’s choice at CDRInfo.com.

10x

#2

Mods, Please move this to the appropriate forum.

@TBsBG:

Holla and welcome to CD-Freaks! I have a few questions for you that I need to know the answers to to help you further.

A.) Where in the world are you?

B.) What firmware version is currently on the drive?

Here is a link to the english translation of the media list on Teac Germany’s website:

http://www.teac.de/dspd/index.php

I strongly suspect that the media you’re attempting to use is NOT going to appear in that compatability chart. Use a program such as DVDIdentifier, available from the following link free of charge, to fully identify this media.:

http://dvdidentifier.cdfreaks.com/

Given the fact that the media you are wanting to use is only 4X, I’d personaly advise AGAINST purchasing a different drive to write to it as 4X certainly will NOT be in production for very much longer if it is in fact in production at ALL at this point in time. This, of course, is unless you’ve actualy got access to TONS of this stuff at little to NO cost.

Let us know how you make out, and for future referance, this is a thread that probably would have been more appropriate to the newbie forum.

JD

#3

Hi, sorry for posting in the wrong section, I’ve had several open windows, and I must have chosen the incorrect one. :slight_smile:

Any way, to the point. I live in Bulgaria, that’s just above Greece.
I didn’t have any DVDs to write on, as the burner was delivered on Saturday, and I wasn’t able to buy any. I just took 2 discs from my friend and tried to burn them, unsuccesfully.

B: The Firmwere is C4S2. There isn’t any newer, as the drive was released on the 2nd of March.

The problematic disc was indentified by the program you suggested as DVD-R from Interaxia AG, with total capacity of 4.38GB.

http://www.mediamatch.de/mediainfo.php?UDI=[DVD-R%3AVDSPMSAB+01] ->Info about Interaxia. I susspect that if this DVD doesn’t work, nor will any other made by the same standart, so Creation DVDs are useless.

Here’s what was in the “Drive Capabilities” section:

** INFO : Drive = TEAC DV-W516GA [FW C4S2]
** INFO : Write Capabilities = DVD+RW DVD+R DVD+R-DL
** INFO : Write Capabilities = DVD-RW DVD-R
** INFO : Disc = [DVD-R:VDSPMSAB 01]

** INFO : An Empty Writable Disc Is Recommended For Accurate Results
** INFO : Write Speeds (Supported By This Drive On This Disc) Listed Below

** INFO : GET PERFORMANCE Write Speed Descriptor(s)
Descriptor #1 = 5540 KBPS ( 4.00x) - [CLV/Non-Pure CAV]

** INFO : MODE SENSE Write Speed Descriptor(s) [Legacy Command]
** INFO : MODE SENSE Is Obsolete And Not Properly Supported By Some Drives
Descriptor #1 = 5540 KBPS ( 4.00x) - [CLV/Non-Pure CAV]

Hope you have what you need to help :slight_smile:

#4

The Interaxia AG site doesn’t list Optical Storage as one of the companies they’ve sold to, but that doesn’t mean they haven’t. It only means that they’ve not been added to the list.

Here’s the deal, and what I strongly recomend:

First off, “bargain,” media is usualy anything BUT a bargain. Even if the media appears to have written well, you will more than likely see the quality of the copy fall off rapidly in a very short time. When you consider the time taken to write these disks on top of the cost of the media itself, be it fairly low, and the data that is potentialy lost for GOOD, you will probably quickly draw the same conclusions I have. QUALITY MEDIA is the ONLY REAL BARGAIN! :wink:

I got burned really badly on a 50 piece spindle of Ritek media that was VERY poor indeed. I could have got a refund or replacement, but all the disks contain delicate information that I am simply NOT willing to send someone, so I had to eat that. Needless to say, for MY purposes, I will NOT be purchaseing ANY Ritek product in the future. I’m not singleing out Ritek here actualy. So, on to my next point…

What is quality media you ask? I’m so glad you did! :slight_smile: The ONLY media I use now is Taiyo Yuden, and NOT T/Y that’s re-branded by Fuji, for example, but straight T/Y stock from America’s only AUTHORIZED distributer of T/Y stock that I’m aware of, adn that’s www.rima.com (I know, this does you NO GOOD, but since I’m a nice guy, I’m looking for someone who is authorized in western europe for you.) I’ll get back tou you in just a few minutes.

JD

#5

Ok, Microboards is one seller of REAL T/Y A grade stock, and if you look in the thread here:

http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=111644

You will see a couple other sources named in Germany and in France. I’d tend to lean toward the German outfit as Taiyo Yuden Europe is based right there in Germany. If you’d like to contact T/Y Europe directly, you can do so via post at:
Taiyo Yuden Europe GmbH
Nordring 23
D-90765 Fürth
Germany
Or by phone, fax or e-mail at:
Tel. 0049 911 93640
Fax. 0044 911 9364111
E-Mail: info@taiyo-yuden.com

Hope this helps get you pointed in the right direction, and helps you avoid some of the, “Crappy media pitfalls,” so many have to endure.

JD

#6

Cheap media = Crap media. Spend more $ on DVD media and you will get better burns. Some drives are better at handling bad media. In the end, you will still have CRAPS. Cheap media tend to go bad within a year. They are also more prone to playback issues.

#7

I have also teac dv-w516ga and it doesn’t read any dvd medium. I am unable to burn my data on it, because it doesn’t recognize any dvd medium I entered… and I have bought like 10 different kinds of dvd mediums… and it doesn’t work. And I don’t know what to do… sigh.
I have FW C452 one