External CD-RW drive

[BTox]

Just got a TEAC CD-RW drive (USB) to backup files. The drive works, but a first few shots at burning a disk failed. It came with Nero 6 burning software. After reading through pages and pages of FAQ and try this, this, this, this, etc, etc, before contacting us, am I better off just getting better software? I have low tolerance for this crap...

[scribble]

Nero 6 is generally considered kickass burning software.

How do the attempts at burning fail? Does it actually begint he process and then suffer a buffer underrun or other failure, or does it fail to recognize the drive as a device which can burn disks in the first place?

[Brian]

Are you using cheapo CD's?
Are they the right speed for the CD-R?
Do you have 256 RAM or better?
Do you have any other programs running when you're burning a disk?

Just a few suggestions. I've had much better luck with internals.
I also have had problems with Windows 98 1st edition and USB devices.

[LFTKBS]

I also owned a TEAC CD-RW drive. 4x, USB. In my experience, they're a bit buggy sometimes, and I'd made quite a few toasters before I gave it away. CDs are cheap, though, so . . .

If you could post an log of a couple attempts, that would help w/ the troubleshooting.

[LTC8K6]

USB 1, 1.1, or 2.0? Is your board the same? A 2.0 drive on a 1.1 port would be slow.

Make sure "buffer under run protection" is turned on. Sometimes called by other names.

[thrombus29]

Nero is the best, but they might have packed a "Lite" version with the drive. What Build is it, the newest is 6.0.23 I think.
It might be worth investing in the retail copy one way or another as it has a bunch of drive utilities packed with it.

Do you have USB 2.0 supported?. You have to have Service pack 1 installed to have Hi-speed USB 2.0 if you have Win XP.

There is an option to "Test and Burn" in nero before you burn, you could try that and see what it says.

What are you running? CPU, OS, Memory etc.

[Brian]

I'd hawk the external for the price of an internal. 30 bucks or so. They seem to work better and burn much faster.

[BTox]

Thanks for the suggestions. I increased RAM from 128 to 384 MB and updated to latest version and it appears to work. Will fool more with it over the weekend.

[Scoobmaster]

We had several of these at the school district where I work. TEAC drives are generally first-rate, but we also had many burn failures. After much trial and error, gnashing of teeth, and finally getting our hands on a USB 2.0 equipped machine we discovered the the combination of Windows 98 and USB 1.1 was the cause of failures (98 for being unstable and flaky and USB 1.1 for being too slow)