hi, im new here, and i have a problem. my cdrw drive works... but when i burn cds, some of the tracks will work fine when listening to them in an audio cd player, while others will skip, or not even play. it just recently started doing this. how can i fix it? thanks.

Here is the complete CD-R FAQ:

http://www.cdrfaq.org/

If your burner is old, it may not be burning correctly. The good news is that you can frequently find a new 52-56X burner for practically nothing ($10-15 after rebates).

do you have any idea where i could find a new cd burner for that price? i mean, have you seen any good deals around lately? since now i guess im looking...

BestBuy, OfficeMax, OfficeDepot, Comp USA all run weekly specials featured in their weekly ads which come out on every Sunday. You can view their weekly ads at their web sites.

You haven't said where you live, so I don't know if this applies to you.

The cheapest prices are always after rebates. If you don't want to fool with rebates, go to NewEgg. CD-RW's there start at $31 including shipping:

http://www.newegg.com/

Click on Shop by Category, then on CD/DVD burners.

i was talking to my friend, and she says the same thing happened to her cd burner, but she fixed it somehow by turning off processes or something. the first few tracks of the cds are fine, but the last ones always skip. she said something about having too much stuff running at the same time... and that its fixed. does anyone have any insight into this?

Old CD burners had many problems when data was not constantly fed to them during the burning process (this happens when doing other things on the computer while burning). The problem was that they could not stop in the middle so the data wouldn't align on the disk properly.

Modern CD burners have something called "buffer underrun protection" that fixes this almost entirely. I have no problems playing 3D games, downloading a file, and burning a CD all at once. If you are trying to do this with an old CD burner, that would be your problem! :cool:

I type faster! :D ;)

Concurrent processes usually cause buffer underruns which ruin the burn completely.

Ask her if you can try it on her PC. It's pretty easy to switch out drives.

You haven't said what happens when you burn data disks. This would be a good test for integrity of a burner. Also you could check the source of tracks you are trying to burn - are they being read correctly?

If this is an older drive, I wouldn't waste too much time. The new drives are better and much faster, making upgrading desirable even if the old drive is working.

Yeah, if you have too much stuff running in the background, it can make it harder for the CDs to play properly. You can use Task Manager to turn off a couple of unnecessary processes or simply don't load as many memory resident programs.

Also, it can be worthwhile to run a cleaner in case it is simply too dusty in there...

This week, OfficeMax has a CDRW that is free after rebates when you buy tax prep software... They also have one for $10 after rebates...

And Welcome to http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/pcgubb.gif

Edit: they said the first part more clearly than me... I am just slow in posting sometimes...

the cd burner is a 52x24x52 from io magic. i got it not too long ago. should i mess with the processes of windows xp? i have no idea how to fix this problem, and it is very annoying.

my cdrw drive works... but when i burn cds, some of the tracks will work fine when listening to them in an audio cd player, while others will skip, or not even play

Did you try an alternate cd-burning software ?


should i mess with the processes of windows xp?

Ya ! (http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm)
but i tell you, its worth all the effort.