What's wrong with my CD-R drive?

[Keregioz]

Hi...

I have a plextor 52X cd-r drive and i use nero6

I think something is wrong when i try to copy a CD with the quickcopy option. During the burning the "Used read buffer" bar never exceeds 50% and the "buffer level" bar constantly increases and decreases from 0% to 100%.
When the burning it's done a message appears saying "Buffer underrun error avoided "X" times" (X= usually around 20)

The copied CD always works OK however all those things i mentioned don't seem right. I know it's not nero's problem cause i have a second cd-r which works fine with the quickcopy option.

Anyone have a solution?...

[sgtgto]

Hi:

I believe that is normal. It's just telling you that it corrected some errors that could have occured during the process. Mine does the same thing.


Gary

[freedon]

Be sure to close all programs when you are burning

[I4one]

Here's Some Text
though older info in general - there' a wealth of info on this page including tshooting procedures.
What you describe is normal behavior AFAIK.....same happens here, cause if the "used read buffer" ran out / exceeded 100 % then the recording would fail. The pulsing from 0-100 "buffer level" is appropriate.
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Subject: [4-1] What does "buffer underrun" mean?
(2002/06/09)

It means you have an attractive new coaster for your table.

The CD recording process can't be interrupted in mid-session. Once the
laser starts writing, any interruption would create a physical gap on the
disc that could confuse CD readers. The recorder must always have data
to write, from the moment the recording starts until the session ends.
To avoid a situation where a temporary slowdown in the computer causes
the write process to fail, the makers of CD recorders put a write buffer
in the drive, usually between 512K and 4MB in size. Data read from the
hard drive, tape, or another CD is stored in the buffer, and pulled out
as needed by the recorder.

If the recorder requests data from the write buffer, but there's none there,
it's called a buffer underrun. The disc is still spinning, but there's no
data to write, so the recording process aborts.

You can still use the disc with multisession CD-ROM drives by closing the
session and starting another, assuming there's enough space left on the CD,
and assuming your pre-mastering software didn't choose to finalize the disc
for you. If you were using disc-at-once recording, you're probably out
of luck.

Advice for preventing buffer underruns is scattered throughout this FAQ.
A brief summary:

- If your hardware and software support it, enable buffer underrun
protection. Usually this is just a checkbox.
- Use a fast, AV-friendly hard drive (i.e. one that doesn't do slow
thermal recalibrations). Pretty much all drives sold in the last few
years fall into this category.
- Record at a slow speed - it takes longer to empty the buffer when
recording at 1x.
- Don't do anything else with the computer while recording. Don't record
from a file server.
- Defragment your HD, especially if you're doing on-the-fly recording.
- Record from a disc image file rather than on-the-fly.
- Depending on your setup, putting the recorder and your hard drive on
separate SCSI controllers may be necessary.
- Keep your CD-R cool. Sometimes the drives fail when they overheat,
with a buffer underrun or an inability to finalize a session.

Also watch out for things like anti-virus programs that wake up, virtual
memory settings that cause swapping, screen savers that activate during the
CD creation process, unusual network activity, and background downloads of
data or faxes. One way to check is to run the HD defragmenter in Win9X.
If it restarts every few seconds, it's because something is hitting the
drive.
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