Got some TDK dual layers -- fake? good quality? media ID?

[ldrancer]

yea so i was reading they dont make anything anymore. so these are fake? they probably been sitting around office depot for 2 years. i dont know. paid 25 dollars for 25 discs. got 130 gigs of stuff, and im tired of splitting dvd9's into 2 dvd5's. so i bought some dl dvds to get the stuff quickly off my hardrive. now my lite-on lh20a1h i think is how it is, drive, doesn't read them.
these discs said imation on the packaging, cause i looked. they had some memorex too, but im tired of them, and think they probably wouldnt be any good. they said imation on the back too, like imation 1 drive. on the back.
these discs are 8x and grey on the front. look pretty clear. can anyone tell me why my drive dont read them, and can i edit my firmware, maybe someone can give me the media code of these discs, if anyone knows. to add it to my firmware? 200 gig hardrive needs cleaned off. heh.
so getting any tdk, unless they been on the shelf for a year or more, isn't a good idea?
ive never thought memorex was too good. ok, thought they where good at a time. just they pump this place fulll of them. memorex this, memorex that, 2 places had big sales on them, them just sitting around everywhere, no other brands. i usually try to get some sonys.
so theres no way for me to get the disc id off this disc, cause my drive wont read them.
is there away for my drive to read them? it juust does a reading routine and then makes some old computer sounds, like an old printer. not the moving thing, but the writing sounds. get it?

[admin]

Quote:

yea so i was reading they dont make anything anymore. so these are fake?

TDK no longer manufacturers media -- not since 2006 (last produced media was 8x-16x DVD-R and DVD+R). But the brand still exists; TDK is owned by Imation now, and re-brands media from other manufacturers (mostly CMC and Ritek, with some FTI).

A TDK-branded DVD+R DL blank is usually going to be a CMC DVD+R DL. (MBI and Falcon/FTI are two other options, but I've not seen any to date.) So let's assume it's CMC. Memorex also uses CMC, as do quite a few other budget-quality brands.

Quote:

paid 25 dollars for 25 discs

The price is expensive, based on what you have. A 20-pack of 2.4x-6x Verbatim DVD+R DL is $25 from Amazon.
Link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...SIN=B000GHWRIK

While some may argue that the CMC discs were a "$5 savings," the fact that so many of the CMC discs will usually be bad negates this. You'll likely pay more per disc, in the end, when you throw away several CMC, versus being able to use 100% of the Verbatim discs without flaw (which is typical).

Another argument is "Well, the 8x were faster," which is also misleading. Yes, 8x is technically faster, but quite a few drives do NOT support 8x writing, and you're generally best to burn those 8x discs at 4x anyway. The 2.4x discs can be burned safely up to 6x (a reason that is too technical and complicated to touch on right now), with many of them working best at 4x. Sadly, however, a few drives will refuse to burn 2.4x rated media any faster than 2.4x, but that's a drive issue -- not a media issue.

Quote:

these discs said imation on the packaging, cause i looked. they had some memorex too, but im tired of them, and think they probably wouldnt be any good. they said imation on the back too, like imation 1 drive. on the back.

Imation owns TDK.
Memorex and TDK both tend to use CMC for DVD+R DL media.
Different "brand" but same disc!

Quote:

can anyone tell me why my drive dont read them, and can i edit my firmware, maybe someone can give me the media code of these discs, if anyone knows. to add it to my firmware?

I would update the firmware. You can find it here: http://codeguys.rpc1.org/firmwares.html
Try "LiteOn LH-20A1H (Lightscribe) -- LL0D - stock" and see how that works for you.
Or are you already using the latest stock firmware?

Quote:

ive never thought memorex was too good. ok, thought they where good at a time. just they pump this place fulll of them. memorex this, memorex that, 2 places had big sales on them, them just sitting around everywhere, no other brands. i usually try to get some sonys.

It's a cheap and crappy brand, the stores probably make a lot of profit from those, versus something better like Verbatim or Sony. Memorex has been, after all, using cheaply made media from CMC, Ritek, Umedisc and others through the years.

Sony used to manufacture their own media, via Daxon, but Daxon shut down in January 2010 and went out of business. Sony has apparently abandoned their own manufacturing specs, as new Sony media is re-branded Ritek. So watch what you get.

Quote:

is there away for my drive to read them? it juust does a reading routine and then makes some old computer sounds, like an old printer. not the moving thing, but the writing sounds. get it?

That's a classic sign of a drive that has aged and may be going out in the near future. How many years have you had it? It's at least 3-4 years old, I'm betting, as the model is from 2006-2007 timeframe. It was never a top-tier drives anyway. LiteOn tends to make moderate-quality drives, and has for most of it's DVD lifetime. Pioneer, Samsung/Sony, Optiarc/NEC, and TSST/Toshiba are better. There are a number of worse drives, too, like LG.

Really nothing unusual here. So that's good!

Remember to read and buy from the Blank DVD Media Review: http://www.digitalFAQ.com/reviews/dvd-media.htm
Follow the advice there, and you'll almost never have trouble burning CD/DVD blanks.

[ldrancer]

reason i didnt run out and get a samsung is i seen they where rip locked. this is just like regular old computer sounds. but it does a reading routine, and doesn't pick up the disc. is this a firmware incompatible? or the drive can't read. i have no problems with any of my other discs.
i have had original imation discs before, and they mess up.
i have some phillips right now too, imation, or cmc.
but, i just want to use these.

[kpmedia]

Most Philips media uses their own Oxonol dyes, with CMC or Ritek as usual manufacturer.
More on oxonol dyes here: http://www.digitalFAQ.com/forum/show...-dvd-2540.html
Fuji discs with alt-ID "F" codes (i.e. RitekF16 or RitekF1) in modern burners are pretty decent, although still not really what I'd call "archival" grade media. They're one of the better second-class types of discs, right below Prodisc and FTI. Earlier FUJIFILM-ID media did rather poorly, and some of this was likely related to firmware support.

Even if a drive doesn't recognize a disc, it should still be able to see that it's a recordable blank, and be able to apply default write strategies. Yes, it's possible that the drive is simply really outdated firmware-wise, but I think it's less likely than a scenario where the drive is simply going bad (as already described in previous posts).

Consider a good Pioneer drive, when it comes time to replace it.

[ldrancer]

you talk about drive, but theirs different kinds of drives.
old computer sounds, doesn't mean it's old. the sounds old printers make, isthe sound it makes.
so don't talk crap about my drive.
wondering if it should be able to read the drive. it does a reading routine, but doesn't pick it up. what should the drive do? is there someway to tell? thats kind of why i was wondering. if i could edit my firmware.
and this is tdk dual layer. so it could be new, its dual layer, which is new, or newer. does anyone have the media code? is there a site i can get it from? theres no way i can add it to my firmware, if i can edit it, without the media code.

[admin]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ldrancer

you talk about drive, but theirs different kinds of drives.

Clearly there are different types of drives (CD-ROM, CD-RW, DVD-ROM, DVD-RW/DVD+RW, BD-ROM, BD-RE, etc), and from different manufacturers, with different models and series lines --- but all optical drives operate with the same basic set of instructions and methodology. We don't have to specifically use your exact drive to know what's going on, or to at very least troubleshoot the issue.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ldrancer

old computer sounds, doesn't mean it's old. the sounds old printers make, isthe sound it makes.
so don't talk crap about my drive.

There have been several key changes in optical media in recent years that will affect DVD+R DL and DVD-R DL burning. These were mostly silent to the consumer, and manufacturers were (to be quite blunt about it) bastards for not making it more apparent to consumers. I've never seen big warnings on 8x DVD+R DL media stating how the new discs may not work with older DVD+R DL capable drives.

The key difference is the 2P (photo polymer) vs IS (inverse stack) method of manufacturing DVD+R DL media. All drives will read/write traditional 2P manufactured DVD's, but only newer drives with proper firmware can write the second layer of an IS disc (or possibly see the disc at all).

Falcon Tech (FTI) has an excellent white paper on 2P vs IS. I've attached it to the bottom of this post, for your convenience.
Here's a couple of pertinent excerpts:

Quote:

The manufacturing process of DVD Dual layer discs requires additional production steps compared to single layer DVD+/-R discs. There are two different methods of manufacturing DL discs in use today: the 2P process and the inverse stack process (IS). The names are derived from the process used to define the second layer structure. 2P is an abbreviation for Photo Polymerization, the step where the groove of the second layer is defined in a UV-curable resin. The inverse stack process refers to the manufacturing of a disc where the substrate and the dummy are bonded together as in a single layer DVD disc, but where the dummy contains the second recording layer in which the sequence of applying the reflector and the dye material is inverted compared to the first recording layer. In this white paper we describe the manufacturing steps of these two processes and a comparison between the two in terms of manufacturing and efficiencies.

Quote:

Drive compatibility of 2P and IS: Both layers of 2P are similar in groove shape and dye coverage. Each of these layers behaves very similar to standard DVDR SL and thus the drive tuning is more or less straightforward. In IS discs, the shallow groove and the difference in dye coverage at L1 require special tuning for write strategy and groove tracking. Due to this difference between 2P and IS, any default write strategy designed for 2P discs will not work on IS disc in drives where a particular inverse stack MID code is not supported. Note that FTI IS discs have passed format verification which ensures that our discs can be written correctly with any drive that meets the format specification requirements.

What this all means in basic terms is that your drive must be physically capable of burning the newer DVD+R DL IS media, with firmware to support the media IDs. You cannot simply add a new media ID to a 2P-only drive.

Verbatim (Mitsubishi Kagaku Media aka MKM/MCC) still uses the far more reliable 2P method on all of their blank DVD+R DL media -- which is one reason it's so highly regarded. It simply works, the end. Other manufacturers are not only variable in quality, but they're silently providing you with media that may or may not work in your drive.

Since the 2P/IS issue is relatively new, a drive designed and manufactured in 2006/2007, as yours is, simply may not work with these discs -- ever. This is why you'll need to apply new factory stock firmware, or a hacked firmware based on stock -- and this assumes IS support was added.

Or ....

The final option is that the DVD burner laser has simply worn itself out. DVD+R DL media carries an ~18% reflectivity, as does DVD-RW/DVD+RW media, and it's one of the first discs to start giving you problems on an aging drive. DVD-R/DVD+R goes next, with its ~45-55% reflectivity, followed finally by pressed DVD-ROM with it's 70-85% reflectivity. Drive thrashing "noises" are a common indicator of such a failure (or impending failure) of a CD/DVD drive.

That should explain things a bit better for you.

[ldrancer]

just tell me, i could be one of them. silent, more like lie.
im not talking about thrashing, im talking about old computer noises, just i haven't heard them, in a while, beeping.
is there any way to know if these discs where made like that, and my drive support them, and are you crapping?
im talking about there where 2 ways for drives to read discs.
im not for sure if it was cds or what. but drives either, and one is crappy, one is good. Have to have the media code, to write the disc, or, guesses at the routine, and uses it. a 3 year old drive isn't old, and thats bullcrap. what are you doing, selling them? a drive should last you a long time, like my 3 times sheep burner hp drive. 16x cd writer. better than anything else ive seen at writing clones. while everybody else waits for a way to copy something, im running it, no problem.
my drive is the i think, routine guess drive. i think, and it used the best chipset at the time, and could write the best dual layers. most would quit at the second layer, or be hard to read, while mine smoothly wrote the layer. i read a review on it. just ive never tried writing a dual layer until now. 3 year old drive isn't old. and is there any information on this new dual layer, of drives doing fine until that layer? how new is it? must be newer than my drive, and they where making firmwares, and if they were leaving discs out cause they couldnt write it in the firmware, thats crap. there should of been a statement by the writers, and im sure there were tons, that said they couldnt write certain discs, if either explain what they couldnt' write, or a list of disc makers and brands they couldnt write. so this sounds like crap. my last firmware update was a little over a year ago. or maybe 1 1/2 years ago. i would of heard something and i believe this scenario is made up.
i mean for my drive to of never heard of it, and it recently come about, ive heard of problems in dual layers before. look up my drive i think its fine. i was reading where all kinds of drives where having trouble in the dual layer, i think it was fine after, just at it, some wouldnt read past the middle, but mine was fine.
does my drive with the chipset, i can't rmember what it was, but it was the best, work with this? and would the media code not being in the firmware work? how can i tell.

[kpmedia]

Any unusual noises -- whines, whizzing, crunching, beeping, whistling, humming, buzzing -- they all count as "thrashing" of the drive. The drive is spinning, the mechanical parts are moving, yet nothing is being read or acknowledged. It's become a noise maker.

If the computer itself is beeping, then some sort of error is being thrown by the system itself, and it could theoretically be caused by a bad optical drive -- any number of things can set off the computer's internal warning speaker.

For DVD+R DL media, the drive is a bit "old" in terms of the inverse-stack issue and being up to date on modern media IDs. A lot of the DVD+R DL media out there is rather new -- at least the budget stuff (CMC, FTI, MAM-A, etc). I have several drives in the same situation, so you're not alone here. My BenQ 1620, for example.

The NEC chipset is generally regarded as the best DVD burner chipset -- and that was almost exclusively used by NEC and Pioneer. NEC doesn't make drives anymore, and Pioneer switched to the Mediatek chipset as of the "18" models (218, S18, 118, etc).

The IS media mostly started to show up in Q1 2007, and you're drive may have been designed/manufactured before that date. According to Amazon, your LiteOn drive was first available in Q4 2006. It's really close. The question we have is, how close was it? Did LiteOn include IS and 2P both into the firmware, or was it not yet available on that model? Remember that products come to market several months (minimum) after R&D and production goes into effect. So that drive could be an early 2006 technology. Then again, IS was known about as far back as 2005, although I don't know that much media was readily available.

Media manufacturers often do their own thing, independent of drive manufacturers. And therein lies the main problem.

DVD burners are heavily dependent on both usage and environmental variables, to say nothing of manufacturing quality. So how long a drive lasts can be as short as 12-18 months, or maybe as long as 3-5 years at best. People often worry about DVD media lasting, but they fail to recognize the bigger problem -- will we have CD/DVD equipment in 50-100 years? Will it be like owning a box of punch cards? I don't know that punch card readers even exist, aside from some Cold War cave owned by a government somewhere, because that was the tech of the time.

My advice is to try the stock firmware from several posts up. If you just want to learn the media ID of the disc, take it to another drive and see if it works there -- friends, family, office, etc. Surely there's another drive within easy reach for you to use.

Most of my dead drives have been LiteOn and LG models to date.

[ldrancer]

no just an old printer sound i haven't heard in a while. Like old.
yea thats the chipset it used, not many used, and it was used by nec, which was hard to get, or sony, stuff like that i think. thats the chipset of this drive. so maybe its dirty. or maybe, the firmware doesn't have the media code. maybe its just off and it can't find it. would this be what it would do if it cant find the media code?
how can i edit my media code? and can i flash old firmware on? would it work better?

[Reading Bug]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kpmedia

DVD burners are heavily dependent on both usage and environmental variables, to say nothing of manufacturing quality. So how long a drive lasts can be as short as 12-18 months, or maybe as long as 3-5 years at best.

KP, Admin had just mentioned on a thread I started the other day that burner longevity is measured in hours of usage. Could you elaborate a bit more on your 3-5 years measurement? How do "years" stack up to "hours of use." Thanks!

[Reading Bug]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kpmedia

DVD burners are heavily dependent on both usage and environmental variables, to say nothing of manufacturing quality. So how long a drive lasts can be as short as 12-18 months, or maybe as long as 3-5 years at best.

Also, I know you're planning several guides for the site. Do you think it might be a good idea to create a guide on burner longevity as well as perhaps history?

This technology changes so quickly. With such differences among manufacturers, along with production timetables, different brand/quality chipsets and different lifespans based on usage in hours or lifetime in years, it might be tremendously helpful both now and down the line. Perhaps it could incorporate Blu-ray burning too.

Just a thought.

[ldrancer]

im not much worried abut all that.

[admin]

The 2-5 years is another way of stating the average of 2,000-5,000 hours of use, but it also includes suspected environmental impact. Instead of saying "x hours" minus "these environmental variables", you can just give an easy timeframe.

People intrinsically have a hard time understanding large numbers. For most, 2,000 hours sounds like a million years -- something that would never apply to them. That, of course, it entirely a false belief. There have been similar studies on how people understand federal debt; the number is so big as to be meaningless to us average poor slobs.

Quote:

This technology changes so quickly.

Not really. Optical technology all has to go through committees and organizations before it can be ratified and turned into widespread tech. There is some straying from time to time (DVD+R vs DVD-R, HD-DVD vs BD, IS vs 2P, obscure/fake media IDs), but most things are decided by committee. For anybody that's ever worked in the corporate or government sector, you know committee decisions take forever-minus-a-day.

But I do really like your guide idea, and I'll add that to the list.

[ldrancer]

goverment crap is kinda like lets see people dont like this, lets do this. bunch of crap.
and corporations, businesses and stuff, do like stuff good. usually. so i like them better. add that to the list.

[ldrancer]

I'm still wanting to know how to tell if my drive can't read, or can't identify my disc.

[kpmedia]

If it spins and spins and spins -- and nothing is read -- it doesn't understand anything about the disc.

[ldrancer]

yea, but the drive is torn up? or i need to edit my firmware? i mean crap, easy question, first thing i asked. and look at this, everyone had to take it off topic, and this, and that. like i care. took each of my sayings, and i was leading to where i wanted the question to go, and explained everything, like they had something to be selling. i dont know. i led the question, i asked the question, then tried to ask other stuff to get the question, to go wherei wanted it to go, so i would know what to do, and they go on and on, like who cares? answer the question. thanks, your the only person who helped. everyone else talked about nonsense stff.

[kpmedia]

I can't give any more suggestions beyond what's already been typed here.
- Try newer stock firmware.
- See if the discs can be read in another drive. If you can read them in another drive, and can get the media ID, and have the desire/knowledge to customize your firmware, then go for it.

Personally, I'd just buy better Verbatim discs. Problem solved.

This is a lot of effort for the ability to use crappy CMC DVD+R DL media.

[ldrancer]

Isnt it cool how you know all about that chipset, until i say i have it, usless *** information, until i can be helped. A waste of a website. I'M UNAB LE TO BE HELPED. WTV, *** YOU. USELESS *** UTNIL I SAY I HAVE THAT CHIPSET, YOU HWERE LIKE WELL THERES THAT GOOD CHIPSET, uh i dont think he has it. I HAVE IT! then your ****. lets do this agenda, who *** cares. then you come back, 3 days later, with a finally responding to me, i can't help you, yes you perfectly can, your a liar. go buy good discs. i tell you what, you go *** yourself. there, im done here, and about every other *** company websiite, lying to peopel about everything. at least im useful.

[admin]

Banned.
This site is for intelligent, mature people seeking quality advice.
Ignorant immature morons will be banned.

Bye-bye, now.