Troubleshooting poor/bad media

[Bullitt]

I'm seeking some opinions...

I have a spindle of some blank CD's, Memorex 52x that I received as a gift. I'm about 12 cd's into this spindle.

I use these for "throwaway" (not because they're gifts, but because they are blank cd's in general) applications. By throwaways, I mean taking my ripped music for my car's use so I dont get my originals scratched to hell, Knoppix burns for troubleshooting, etc etc.

Yesterday, my gf was attempting to burn some music for the same purpose, and she complained of failures to burn in the cheap-o LiteOn 5238s. Knowing I only paid $19 shipped for the thing a year ago, I chalked it up to a failing drive. I'm not so sure now. I have taken a random blank sample from the middle of the spindle and mounted it on my plextor and it mounted properly. I take the top disk of the spindle and attempt to mount it, it fails to mount. Right now I'm working my way down the spindle to see where the "good" ones start again.

Am I just experiencing a bad spindle of blanks or am I looking at 2 failing drives?

edit: Here's a sample c1/c2 error check of the disk I pulled in the middle to burn knoppix live.

I cannot get the "successful" burn of the ubuntu image from her drive I just made to even mount on my plexi to scan for errors.

 

[Bullitt]

Going down 13 more disks in the spindle, I found where they started to mount properly on my plexi.

I think I'm leaning towards a bad spindle..

c1/c2 error check from a burn from the LiteOn

So, what does everyone do? Complain to the manufacturer of the blanks? I've got a quarter of a spindle of blanks that are totally unusable. They have been kept inside, dust-free, no direct sunlight.

Edit: Screw it, I'm gonna complain to Memorex. I'll see how that goes

 

[benamaster]

I think I have the same problem with a bad batch of HP CD-R's, the Staples brand and Imation burn on the first crack but the HP's I'm always having to burn 2 or 3 or 4 times just to get a working disc. I think I'll probably call up HP or try and return them to Staples as defective.

 

[Bullitt]

I'm pretty certain its bad media in my case. My scans were crummy because I compared apples to oranges. I'll do a scan of an audio CD I made right before I noticed the bad media.

The LiteOn has a pretty crummy scan because of either bad media or because its a cheap burner. The first scan is from my plexwriter.

 

[Bullitt]

Not trying to bump an old thread or anything, but I forgot about this.

I did, in fact, complain to Memorex. On their website they have a section for Support and Warranty replacement. I simply went to the site, filled out the info. Approximately three weeks after I filled out the web-form, a box showed up in the mailbox with replacement CD's. Incidentally, they gave me exactly the number of replacement CD's as I claimed (nothing more, nothing less).

The good news, it was hassle-free, I encourage anyone with the same problem to complain to the media manufacturer.

The bad news, the replacements were as much a POS as the ones I had complained about. Now instead of not working on two seperate drives, they will not mount/burn on three drives including a new lite-on cd-burner, my new benq 1655 or my plexi or my gf's old lite-on, or several standalone car cd-players.

Lesson learned, squeaky wheel gets the grease, but doesnt mean the grease works all the time.

In my case, I've got a bad taste for their CD media in my mouth, so I switched to another equally inexpensive media.

 

[TechHead]

Not trying to bump an old thread or anything, but I forgot about this.

I did, in fact, complain to Memorex. On their website they have a section for Support and Warranty replacement. I simply went to the site, filled out the info. Approximately three weeks after I filled out the web-form, a box showed up in the mailbox with replacement CD's. Incidentally, they gave me exactly the number of replacement CD's as I claimed (nothing more, nothing less).

The good news, it was hassle-free, I encourage anyone with the same problem to complain to the media manufacturer.

The bad news, the replacements were as much a POS as the ones I had complained about. Now instead of not working on two seperate drives, they will not mount/burn on three drives including a new lite-on cd-burner, my new benq 1655 or my plexi or my gf's old lite-on, or several standalone car cd-players.

Lesson learned, squeaky wheel gets the grease, but doesnt mean the grease works all the time.

In my case, I've got a bad taste for their CD media in my mouth, so I switched to another equally inexpensive media.

A) L-O CDRWs are among the best out there. Stick with 'em

B)Go to rima.com, pick up the 100 pack of TY CDRs for 20$ or so. Nirvana!

 

[Bullitt]

A) L-O CDRWs are among the best out there. Stick with 'em

B)Go to rima.com, pick up the 100 pack of TY CDRs for 20$ or so. Nirvana!

Without a doubt, mail-order is the way to go. Unfortunately, I was under some time constraints to get some CDR's (the gf could not/would not wait for UPS).

Prodisc suxxors (the memorex's I returned were CMC Mag's and I got prodisc in return). I can't believe I found a media that my plexwriter wouldn't play with. The LiteOn's would burn them but they were not readable after the fact. the BenQ, same way.