DVD-R issues

[bake2]

ok, well im having some really unusual issues with my toshiba DVD burner. first off, its a toshiba DVD-ROM SD-R6012 in my toshiba satellite laptop. nero InfoTool is reporting it as supporting DVD-R/RW at 1X, thus, i purchased some TDK 4X DVD-R media. now the problem is i was burning a video DVD, everything was going fine, and after an hour, nero said the burn was a success. ok, so i decide to test it out, and try to play it on my laptop first, so i pop it in, and windows says its a blank CD. not having a regular dvd player, i put it in my xbox, and get the 'not recognized file type' jib jab, so i assume it was just a coaster. so just for laughs, i put it back in my laptop, and nero InfoTool reports it as a blank DVD-R. interesting....so i try to burn the dvd again, and NERO LETS ME BURN IT AGAIN, and, once again, it said burn was successful, but it really wasn’t. so now im really confused, and have come to the conclusion that even though nero claims its burning the DVD, and it takes as long as it should to burn the DVD, no actual burning is going on. i have looked everywhere for a solution, or even just anyone having a similar problem, and i got nothing. ive done everything i could think of, firmware update, i deleted it in device manager, reinstalled, nothing seems to be working. could it possibly be nero? would another burning program work? does anyone really have any clue???(I really hope so....its really frustrating me i cant get this to work) sorry for the somewhat lengthy post, any help will be greatly appreciated.

[Thrax]

It's nero. 10/1 says the recorder Nero is set to use is the "Image burner" which means you have 2 x 4GB images sitting on your computer, clogging up 8GB of space.

[bake2]

im pretty sure thats not the case, both times it showed the toshiba as the destination drive, not the image burner. on the burn screen it showed the drive as ready in the status column, and i dont really remember if that is different when the burner is in use. if it did just burn images, where would they be located, i dont remeber setting a destination folder, and i checked the nero directory and didnt find anything. anyone know of any other good burning programs i could try instead of nero?

[primesuspect]

perhaps it's burning it in "test mode"--- do you have the latest firmware for your drive?

[bake2]

yea, downloaded the lates firmware. the only thing i could find about a test mode was something called simulation in the new dvd dialog. is this what your talking about? if not, how do i tell if its in test mode?

[primesuspect]

It seems like it's stuck in simulation or test mode. All burners support a mode that acts exactly like a real burn, but with a low powered (read only) laser instead of the full power write laser. Somehow, somewhere, you are stuck in test mode.

[bake2]

well....in the nero dialog, there is a checkbox for simulation and one for write. the write checkbox is, checked. the simulation is not. however, that definalty sounds like what is going on. i looked through nero's menus, couldnt find anything. anyone familar with the program have any idea?? (maybe now you guys see why im so frustrated over this. haha)

[bake2]

nobody has any ideas?? alright, well how about another burning program that i could try out? i really have no clue here. any help would be appreciated

[profdlp]

You could try this free program (http://www.majorgeeks.com/download4242.html). If it works at least you'll know it's not the drive.

[bake2]

You could try this free program (http://www.majorgeeks.com/download4242.html). If it works at least you'll know it's not the drive.

thanks, gave it a try, and no dice :( . although, after burning, windows dosent even recognize it, but nerotool still says its a blank dvd-r. so i guess its a hardware issue. sigh. im at a lost. i dont know what to do about it, the drive came with my laptop, which is almost 2 years old, and surely out of warrenty. oh well, thanks everyone for your help

*****UPDATE!!*****

so i broke down and called tech support, and the guy suggested maybe it was a media problem. i really had a hard time believeing him, but i figured id give it a try, and sure enough, worked like a charm. 2 out of 3 burned sucessfully with the new media. i figured out whenever a coaster was burned, windows showed the disk as a regular cd without any data on it. im sure you guys dont really care about all this, but i just hope maybe it could help someone else out. (by the way, tdk was the faulty media, memorex worked)