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Hi. I replaced my internal TDK CD burner with a Mad Dog Dual Layer 8x +/-R and I have problems. With the TDK, if I placed a blank CD in the drive, Windows used to ask me how I wanted to burn it. I don't get any such popup with the DVD burner. However, it does play audio CDs and DVDs. It came with a Nero which I installed. Nero only lists my hardrive as a possible destination. It does however list the DVD drive as a possible source. Nothing changed after updating Nero with the latest posted patch. I think the problem lies in the driver but the Mad Dog website says that Windows driver is all I need. Any help would be much appreciated.

The following output from Belarc describes my system. One thing that surprised me is that under the hood, my Mad Dog is a Lite On and when I tried to install the latest firmware from Mad Dog, the flash utility failed with the message that it could not find a NEC ND2510A.

Thanks

Erwin

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Belarc Output
Operating System System Model
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (build 2600) VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82C693/A
Processor a Main Circuit Board b
800 megahertz Intel Pentium III
32 kilobyte primary memory cache
256 kilobyte secondary memory cache Board: Giga-Byte Technology Co., LTD 693A-596B-8671
Bus Clock: 133 megahertz
BIOS: Award Software International, Inc. 4.51 PG 03/21/01
Drives Memory Modules c,d
61.48 Gigabytes Usable Hard Drive Capacity
1.19 Gigabytes Hard Drive Free Space

JLMS XJ-HD166S [CD-ROM drive]
LITEON DVD-ROM LTD163 [CD-ROM drive]
3.5" format removeable media [Floppy drive]

Disk drive -- drive 1
eUSB SD-MS-SM USB Device [Hard drive] -- drive 2
IC35L060AVV207-0 [Hard drive] (61.49 GB) -- drive 0, s/n VNVB01G2R92DVG, rev V22OA63A, SMART Status: Healthy 512 Megabytes Installed Memory

Slot 'BANK_0' has 256 MB
Slot 'BANK_1' has 256 MB
Slot 'BANK_2' is Empty
Local Drive Volumes

c: (on drive 0) 61.48 GB 1.19 GB free


Controllers Display
Standard floppy disk controller
Primary IDE Channel [Controller]
Secondary IDE Channel [Controller]
VIA Bus Master IDE Controller RADEON 7000 SERIES [Display adapter]
ViewSonic GS790 [Monitor] (17.7"vis, s/n MO01715414, April 2000)
Bus Adapters Multimedia
NEC PCI to USB Enhanced Host Controller (B1)
NEC PCI to USB Open Host Controller
NEC PCI to USB Open Host Controller
VIA Rev 5 or later USB Universal Host Controller ESS 1969 PCI AudioDrive (WDM)
Standard Game Port

Welcome to CDRLabs, ErwinArgyle

are you sure your Mad Dog drive is really a Lite-On, not really a NEC?
some drives sold by Mad Dog are made by NEC.
maybe you downloaded the wrong firmware, one meant for a NEC drive?

as for Windows not asking you how you want to burn the disc, this has to do with the AutoPlay feature of WinXP. it can be configured, i don't remember how right now (and not at home so can't check), but maybe My Computer -> Right click the drive -> Properties -> AutoPlay tab? or something similar to this.

Thanks for a prompt response.

Really a Lite-On?
Yes I am sure the drive is a Lite-On. There is a Lite-On LTD 133 sticker on the drive and this is confirmed by my device manager. I was as surprised as you are that the Mad Dog firmware utility complained about the lack of a NEC drive. Right now though, I am not worried about upgrading the firmware. I would be really happy just to have the computer recognize the drive as a burner.

AutoPlay
I checked and I have autoplay enabled. If I insert an audio of movie, Autoplay asks me what application I would like to use to play it. If I insert a blank CD, I get nothing.

Other evidence that Windows does not see the drive as a burner is that when there is a blank CD in the drive and I right click on a file, the drive does not appear as a possible "SendTo" destination.

Any help anyone can give me is much appreciated.

Cheers

Erwin

I hate to tell you this but, that model number is to a DVD-ROM which can read CD's and DVD's but can burn to neither.

Check the store that you bought it from to make sure it wasn't a return. That or a screw up at the plant (not likely since they probably are packaged at the drive manufacturer) would seem to be the only likely causes for this.

Thank you to those who replied. My problem has been solved!

Even though the box from the shop was sealed, it contained the wrong drive. I have no idea how that could have happened. I went back to the shop and they gave me the correct drive. It worked first time, I was able to upgrade the firmware and I am now happily burning.

I feel that I have wasted the resources of this forum and I am sorry for that. Maybe my next post will be more of a technical challenge.

I have never used this forum before and so do not know how to close the thread. Perhaps the moderator could do this for me?

Thanks again.

Erwin