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Can't mount _BLANK_ optical media

Hi!
My Slackware 11.0 box can't mount optical devices when the inserted medium is _BLANK_. I have three IDE such optical devices as: hdb (an IDE CD recorder) hdc (an IDE DVD recorder) and hdd (an IDE CD-RW/DVD-ROM combo). All these devices can be mounted and do work very well with written media inside but they can't be mounted when the inserted media are blank. Here is the mount dialog:

Code:

# mount -t iso9660 /dev/hdc /mnt/dvdrecorder

mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/hdc,

missing codepage, or other error

(could this be the IDE device where you in fact use

ide-scsi so that sr0 or sda or so is needed?)

In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try

dmesg | tail or so

FURTHER DETAILS:
(1) The previous Slackware 10.x did work very well with all of those optical devices.
(2) Debian 3.1 and Knoppix 4.x, 5.x do also work very well.
(3) Certainly Slackware 11.0 detects those optical drives as IDE devices. For instance, the last system message when shutting down is

Code:

flushing ide devices: hda, hdb, hdc, hdd

(4) The mount version is mount-2.12r.
(5) Here is the code error issued when trying to mount /dev/hdc, at booting time, with a blank medium inside:

Code:

Linux version 2.4.33.3 (root@tree) (gcc version 3.4.6) #6 Fri Sep 1 04:15:45 CDT 2006

...

...

hdc: ASUS DRW-1604P, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive

...

...

hdc: attached ide-cdrom driver.

hdc: ATAPI 63X DVD-ROM DVD-R CD-R/RW drive, 2000kB Cache, UDMA(33)

...

...

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

hdc: DMA disabled

hdc: ATAPI reset complete

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

hdc: ATAPI reset complete

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: status=0x51 { DriveReady SeekComplete Error }

hdc: cdrom_decode_status: error=0x80LastFailedSense 0x08 

end_request: I/O error, dev 16:00 (hdc), sector 64

isofs_read_super: bread failed, dev=16:00, iso_blknum=16, block=32

As a result, my Slackware box is of no help when needing to burn any CD or DVD medium. Any idea of how to deal with?
Grateful thanks in advance!

:D :D :D Sorry, cant' help laughing with this..

Seriously, how do you want to mount a medium that has no partition on it?

One does not mount empty optical discs, one makes an image (iso), and then one burns that iso to the optical medium in a single session.

To create the iso, for instance of another optical disc (provided there is no copy protection), just do

Code:

dd if=/dev/hda of=ripped.iso

, assuming that hda contains the source disc

Then use another program, like k3b (very cool) to burn your disk. K3B also allows you to create an image from scratch by letting you select which files to put in the image, and also supports multi-session discs.

Hope this helps!

Thanks a lot!
1. Yes, I've just now learned that it doesn't make sense to mount a blank CD/DVD. I kindly appreciate your help in that matter.
2. Well I did try to burn a .iso image with K3b, under Debian (it did work) under Knoppix (it did work) under Slackware 10.2 (it did work too) and under Slackware 11.0. The matter was that the Slackware 11.0 box was the single one under which k3b failed to work, simply because the drive with the medium inside was not seen by K3b. This is why I tried to force seeing the medium, and the only solution I've imagined was to mount that medium. Now, thanks to you, I do know that's not the solution but I'm still mind bogging about why K3b fails to see the medium.
3. However, since so kind to answer, could you please further explain me what's the difference (from the mounting point of view) between a blank CD and a USB memory stick? Is it true that a memory stick has never any partition on it (as a vendor have told me)? If false (that is, if a partition must exist on any memory stick) what would be the filesystem, after a single Linux editing session (on that memory stick) and what about if the editing session runs under Windows (instead of Linux)? How to explain the fact that Windows does see the content of a memory stick which was inscripted by Linux?
I would kindly appreciate your answer!
Thanks!

usb sticks are seen by the Linux operating system as scsci drives and do contain partitions and filesystems.

Most comercial usb sticks I've seen come with a fat partition, but you can put any kind of partition on there that your operating system supports.

Yes, USB storage devices have partitions on them and are (a bit like floppy disks were) usually fat 32 (pre)formatted. Since both Linux and Windows can use this filesystem, there are no differences regarding which OS you use.

Regarding your drive, is k3b configured properly? Which kernel do you use?

Thanks, I was confuse.
My Slack 11.0 runs with a 2.4.33 kernel (namely the bare.i in Slackware terminology); see my first post, with the dmesg excerpt from there. Indeed, it could be a wrong configuration. For instance, after installing K3b (under the last Slackare box) I have not obtained the usual iconed link in the KDE desktop menu and can only run K3b from the "Run" prompt. Now I do consider to reinstall K3b or something like that.

2.4 kernels require scsi emulation to burn CDs with ATAPI devices.
You will need to add hdc=ide-scsi as a kernel boot option in your boot loader.
Lots of information can be found on the web for both grub and lilo.
Once you reboot the computer your burner device ID will now be /dev/scd0.

Additionally, you could just install a 2.6 kernel and modules (like test26.s or huge26.s and modules from testing/ or extra/ dirs, respectively). Unless you have older hardware and don't mind crowded /dev, you can profit a lot from 2.6 kernel and udev... ;)