Using a DVD disc in a CD-RW drive?

[K1JJ]

Hola,

This is my first try at using CD read/write media.

I'm having trouble getting my CD-RW drive to recognize some new discs.

I bought some DVD 120 min/4 ghz discs and the drive keeps axing for me to insert the disc. Should I have gotten plain CD-RW discs?  I take it these are two different media, or is there a way to get DVD discs to work with the CD-RW drive?  Maybe I blew $20 for nothing.

I understand they need to be formated too, but I can't do that either.  I called Dell and they said my "warranty" was up, so I can't axe any questions.. [sigh]

Thanks.

T

[Vinnie/N2TAI]

Somehow the drives know what kind of disk is in it. So ypu probably will have to get the correct CD disks. The bright side is that the CD disks are much cheaper than the DVD disks.

[WA3VJB]

Hey Tom welcome to the whorl of zeros and ones.

Nah, no can use DVD dits as the blank mediia for a CD writer. They are the same size, but the ink is different. These recorders "burn" a disc by heating up the ink with a laser head as the disc revolves. The result is a digital stream of telemetry. The track width of a DVD is a lot narrower than that of a CD.

So, "what ya need ta do" is getcha some CD-R in the stack housing and slip one in there. NO formatting needed. Most writers will lecha break sessions too, so that you could put a 20 min old buzzard transmission on the CD and throw it in a drawer. If you later want to add to the disc you can put it back in the writer and continue, up to the capacity of the dits.

[K1JJ]

Thanks, Pauil.

Gee, I didn't realize there was a diff between the DVD and  CD R/W drives. I even tried to write on top of some old music CD's. What a digital miscreant I am.

Are these CD R/W discs reusable?    I thought they were, but if they burn off ink, maybe not.  And, there's a diff between CD-R and CD R/W?

BTW, I found a great piece of software for doing a full mirror image HD drive backup with disaster recovery for say, drive C main to E-backup.  It's called  "Acronis True Image" software.  The CD is used for the recovery boot, just in case.

73,
T

[W1RKW]

Tom,
CD-RW and DVD-RW discs are reusable.  CD-R's and DVD-R's are not.   You should be able to use a CD-RW disc in a DVD burner.  However,  the DVD won't work in a CD burner/player.  And then there's the issue of DVD types for certain DVD writers but that's a whole utter story.

[Pete, WA2CWA]

Here's another pain Tom. As far as I can tell, once you add a file to the CD-RW, you can't   delete  it. You can over write it with another file with the same name but you can't just remove one file or files if you no longer want it or them on the CD. You can erase the entire CD-RW and start over or copy them to a blank directory on the hard drive; delete the file or files you don't want; erase the entire CD-RW; and then copy the modified directory of files back to the CD-RW.

[W1RKW]

Here's another pain Tom. As far as I can tell, once you add a file to the CD-RW, you can't   delete  it. You can over write it with another file with the same name but you can't just remove one file or files if you no longer want it or them on the CD. You can erase the entire CD-RW and start over or copy them to a blank directory on the hard drive; delete the file or files you don't want; erase the entire CD-RW; and then copy the modified directory of files back to the CD-RW.

Hi Pete,
Actually you should be able to delete files on a CD-RW just like you were using a floppy disc. This might be software specific however.   I have that abilty with my CD-RW's and CD-RW burner.  A CD-RW (at least on this machine) can be used two different ways.  It can be used like a CD-R where you just write to it but you can only erase the entire CD-RW to free up the free space.  The other way is to be able to use it like a floppy disc but that requires a formatting utility.  Once it is formatted one can simply drag and drop files onto the CD-RW or remove them from the CD-RW.  My Yamaha CD-RW burner uses Roxio software and has this formatting utility for allowing drag and drop so maybe this feature is unique to this software, FWIW.

[John Holotko]

These days DVD burner drives are getting so relatively cheap that I don't even bother with CD or CDRW drives anymore. Anytime one goes bad I just replace it with a DVD RW drive which will do both CD's and DVD's. I guess  they'll be getting cheaper and cheaper as they get ready to dump the new Blu Ray or HD DVD technology on us.. ready to replace all those pre-recorded movie DVD's with Blu-Ray or HD DVD versions ??  Hell No !!  I ain't. Besides, most of the movies I like date back to the 50's and earlier.HD ain'tgonna do much in the way of enhancing that old stuff.

[Jim, W5JO]

Too bad you gave in T.  You will find that from now on computers are like most addictive substances.  The more you get the more you need/want.

[WA1LGQ]

Hey Tom, there is a DVD burner at Sam's club in Manchester. It is only 70 bucks and it does dual layer dvd's and it even can burn a label with a laser to the top of the platter. I checked it out on the web for reviews and it comes up as a very good drive. Wanted to look around before buying it. I might pick one up this week and check it out. The unit is by "LG" and off the top of my noodle I think the model number is LG-4166a........Larry

[K1JJ]

Thanks for the info, guys.

Yes, it looks like getting a DVD burner is what I should have done instead of the CD/RW when I bought this pair of Dells.  I'll see if Comp-USA will swap the opened DVD discs back. If not, maybe I'll offer them here as an even swap for CD/RW's.

Jim:

It's hard to believe from my questions at times, but I caved into computers back in 1978 with my first full blown TRS-80 system using quad floppies, etc. I've had computers here continuosly.  I can program Basic and did 20 years of programing in Turbo Pascal. I still program every day for my trading models. But, the problem is that as technology changes, I hold onto my stuff until the bitter end and become out of touch. Then I play catch up and have to play the dummy role for awhile, like now...     I wish it was like ham gear where you can keep a radio for 20 years and no one knows the difference on the air.  But six months ago I tried to check into the video net on this site and I was the slowest guy - I felt like a retard.  Then I couldn't log into the new trading platform that came out cuz of an older processor.  So I HAD to upgrade. [sigh]    I'm almost finished now - for a few years anyway.

T

[Pete, WA2CWA]

Here's another pain Tom. As far as I can tell, once you add a file to the CD-RW, you can't   delete  it. You can over write it with another file with the same name but you can't just remove one file or files if you no longer want it or them on the CD. You can erase the entire CD-RW and start over or copy them to a blank directory on the hard drive; delete the file or files you don't want; erase the entire CD-RW; and then copy the modified directory of files back to the CD-RW.

Hi Pete,
Actually you should be able to delete files on a CD-RW just like you were using a floppy disc. This might be software specific however.   I have that abilty with my CD-RW's and CD-RW burner.  A CD-RW (at least on this machine) can be used two different ways.  It can be used like a CD-R where you just write to it but you can only erase the entire CD-RW to free up the free space.  The other way is to be able to use it like a floppy disc but that requires a formatting utility.  Once it is formatted one can simply drag and drop files onto the CD-RW or remove them from the CD-RW.  My Yamaha CD-RW burner uses Roxio software and has this formatting utility for allowing drag and drop so maybe this feature is unique to this software, FWIW.

Hey Bob, you're absolutely correct on this one. I just formatted the entire CD-RW (Roxio is on this machine) disk (but, boy is it slow to format) and then copied some files over to it, i.e. copy and paste; then tried to delete the files on the disk and was successful. My original "duh" thought was that the CD-RW's were already formatted right out of the box. It's good to learn something new.

Tom, you said, " I'm almost finished now - for a few years anyway".
Remember computer advances are now generally measured in months, not years. But, like you, I seem to be playing computer catchup too.

[Jim, W5JO]

Thanks for the info, guys.


Jim:

It's hard to believe from my questions at times, but I caved into computers back in 1978 with my first full blown TRS-80 system using quad floppies, etc. I've had computers here continuosly. 

My first foray was in 1979 looking for software and a machine to track inventory.  The sales guy who looked about 19 when I was in my early 30's, kept telling me how much fun the games were.  I kept asking about inventory tracking and he reverted to games.  I did not get a warm and fuzzy feeling until 1984 when I directed the first customer tracking program for a very large electronic repair shop.

In 1992 the fire really started and I have been behind since then.  I moved from Win 286 to win 95 A release to Win XP.  I move much slower than the market.  My machine is a Celeron at 1.4 gig with dual CD drives.  The added one is a DVD R/W.  The machine does all I want for now so I will run it until the wheels fall off as I do with cars.

If you move up, as you know, be prepared to buy all kinds of software to work on the new systems.  The latest thing seems to be dual core processors.  An idea taken from RISC in Apple.  Oh Well.

73  JPW

[Mike/W8BAC]

Hi Tom,

Well, your DVD, CD/RW experiance didn't turn out the way you wanted but on the other hand you did make a wise desision on the Acronis software. It IS the bomb!

Acronis is the number one rated backup, imiging and cloning software for hard drive data recovery today and it delivers. I have used it for the past two years and it's not only easy to use but your recoveries are flawless. All of your settings on windows, all the data, everything is saved including the operating system! Who could ask for more. 73

Mike