CD/DVD/BD/M-Disc drives not writing
 

I started a thread CD/DVD/BD/M-Disc drives not writing, but it turned out to be a specifically Slackware 14 problem (or one of the kernel it uses.)

I built a new PC a few weeks ago and two LG CD/DVD/BD-DL/M-Disc drives. I have been using Slackware since 1997 (and continuously since about 2005) and have known how to set up the basics, like adding a user in the proper groups, for years. The drive I tried to make a DVD with in k3b just starts to write something before the data, says it cannot write for some reason, ruins the disc, and stops (I may have written the exact error message in that other thread.) The commands 'cdrecord -scanbus,' 'cdrecord dev=help' show no information about my new drives. However, when I used a Live DVD of another distribution, it detected the drives and was able to complete writing a DVD with the one that Slackware could not.

I never thought I would live to see a day like this, when I could not do something in Slackware that I could on a distribution mainly for new users.

Actually, I just tried an idea someone gave me on the other thread, and it made the drives visible in cdrecord... I still have to see if they will write properly, but I will leave this here anyway, because Slackware people should be aware of it.

I was answering edorig and do not really see what jefro is saying. Since this is a Slackware problem, I made a thread in its forum: CD/DVD/BD/M-Disc drives not writing.

Maybe business_kid's idea will work. I will try that.

Business_kid's idea worked, though I am not sure it was the sg or pg that did it. I still have to see if the drives will write properly.

Hi dchmelik,

I have suffered from the exact same problem trying to burn dvds using k3b in various releases of slackware (although not all, or on all machines, for some reason). There are a few possibly relevant points in CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT:

and

You may have seen these already.

I found it is easiest to burn dvds using commands similar to those quoted in the isolinux/README.TXT from the command line, e.g.

at worst, as root.

I don't know if this helps, by your own description you sound like you probably know this already.

Cheers,

Michael

A current problem with cdrecord :-

Before you run cdrecord you must first "modprobe sg" as the SCSI generic module is used by cdrecord's functions but for some reason is not loading automatically anymore.

I recently got myself a blu-ray burner (~2 weeks ago) and swapped it out for my dvd burner. It's an LG WH14NS40 and has worked fantastically on my slackware 14. Once in a great while I have a problem with burning something to a dvd, but I've contributed that to the dvd's being really old (>6 years with max write speed 4x) and used an awful lot. They will do the 'can't write thing' on me but usually after I've formatted or erased them.

I see in the output of cdrecord -dummy that you have the warnings:

This indicates that you don't have the permissions to raise the priority of the cdrecord process
nor prevent it from being swapped (with the mlockall system call). Since Linux is multitasking,
in these conditions the cdrecord may get interrupted while writing to the optical disk. If the interruption is long
enough, that can ruin the CD. So if your attempts to burn CDs fail, you should try to run cdrecord as root.
In a previous thread, I mentioned that if that worked, you could make cdrecord setuid root provided there is no security risk.

Please post your thread once and in only one forum. Posting a single thread in the most relevant forum will make it easier for members to help you and will keep the discussion in one place. This thread is being closed because it is a duplicate.

I guess I marked this as solved because I got it working, but I forgot how now. I know I had quit trying to use k3b and used cdrecord or growisofs (and maybe making the device links mentioned above, though cdrecord seems to be detecting my drives now) and that worked, but lately I am trying k3b again, and even if I set it at 1x, it says that is not supported and increases it to 8x. K3b has made me four coasters today, and I do not want to try for a fifth... but if I try 2x or 4x will that work, or does this mean 8x is the slowest. It is also strange, because the discs from the package I am using all worked up to about 12x, but not 16x (as they are labelled)--I was writing them fine at 12x or maybe 8x in Slackware 13.37. What k3b says now is that there is an i/o error of code 254.

+1 to wildwizard's advice

modprobe sg

(Just had to do it today)

What does that even mean? It seems 'modprobe sg' (which I have had in rc.local since wildwizard mentioned that) helps with cdrecord, but not k3b, which was part of my original question.

k3b is not in the habit of making coasters.

But, the latest version is a pain if you don't have kde installed. There's a thread a year ago(?) where I had that problem, so you could add 'business_kid' as a search term. K3b also used automatically convert mp3 files to .wav when adding files to audio cds and I got coasters because of that.

Your original problem was drive access. That's sorted. Making duds is another one. Give us the full story on that one if you are trying for a fix on that

I quote from my original post, 'I tried to write a plain OS DVD in K3B, and it says I do not have 'permission,' after it starts to write anyway and ruins the disc (though my user is in the cdrom group.)'

Apparently 'modprobe sg' and following the instructions in CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT, as well as perhaps some other stuff (not officially documented), usually solves the problem every time I upgrade or reinstall (which I did several times recently, maybe in August, but now again for 14.1, and maybe had forgotten what to do)... sometimes there may be other problems, but I think I have to try what business_kid said, again. Anyway, I will mark it as solved again, because that is probably it, and I did get it working on 14.0 a couple times.