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TheGrowler

Bought a VGN-FS115Z earlier in the year, not tried the DVD burner until recently and whilst no error messages have come up, it doesn't appear to burn anything - have tried using the pre-installed RecordNow and also Nero, also using TDK CD-R and Packard Bell DVD-R.

It goes through the motions, but doesn't actually produce anything. Any ideas what could be the problem?

Cheers

Silu

Dear Growler

I was plagued with optical Drive problems and so have many other people. However, having written to the President of Sony I had the brains of Sony Tech Support looking after my issue and after, replacing the drive twice, and the notebook once they came up with the following fix! Nero is not supported by Sony and therefore there is no fix if it doesn't work. Instead they recommend a thing called Sonic (by Roxio I believe).

In addition the only DVD's supported are Sony (suprise suprise), TDK and one other (can't remember the name).

Having done what they say I can now burn DVD's without errors! I am still very annoyed as they do not say this on the box! Had they done so, I may have had second thoughts - and not bought it. This is why they don't do it.

Hope this helps!

Regards

TheGrowler

Thanks Silu, that explains a lot - I'll give the Roxio software a go, if no luck, I guess I'll have to send it back for repair/replacement.

Just out of interest, how long did it take to turn around?

TheGrowler

Nope. Still no luck.

I've tried the pre-installed software that came on the machine (RecordNow!) with TDK and Sony branded discs. It's making all the 'gestures' that it's burning, but it returns the disc blank (0 bytes used).

I am using Sony CD-R 700 (CDQ-80CN), TDK CD-R80 and Packard Bell DVD-R 4.7GB, have tried RecordNow and Nero, but to no avail.

The software seems to think everything has gone to plan, but it hasn't. Does anyone have any more ideas, or is my optical drive screwed?

zina

most of the dw-d56a drives have problems my has,i doesnt burn anything no more with any program!
almost anyone who has this drive has all sorts of problems.
take it back to sony.
hope ill find time to take it back soon

AsqSteve

This may be a bit late but.

I have a FS115S with same problem. So did an experiment.

1) Open windows explorer then put "lesser" DVD+R (Philips) into drive. Explorer now identifies drive as CD-ROM.

2) Open Sonic RecordNow goto Drive/Disc Information. Identifies drive as DVD-RW, put "lesser" DVD+R (Philips) into drive. Indentifies Drive as DVD+/-RW and DVD as DVD+R (unsure as to whether SL or DL thought was DL (will check tonight), so suprised it worked).
Now open Explorer shows DVD+/-RW.
Can then go on to write data to disc.

Can anyone explain?

I feel that the excuse that the incorrect DVD make is inexcusable after all the DVD writer should be able to recognise and write to any disc perporting to be a specific dvd format with which it is compatible. I appreciate that the standard of materials may be less/greater but it's a risk you take (in any make of DVD)
.

irishpureblood

got the same drive .i have my laptop for 4 months and it worked fine at the start......over the last couple months it been having problems like playing some dvd movies but not others but now it wont play any dvd moives it ..it just doesnt see my dvd in the drive it start up but nothing happens ..i watch them before on it and even new one wont play install new dvd software..play a couple of time now wont play at all....it read dvd data and cd and burns ok but wont play any moives now .......uninstall all my programs i photoshop ect........still didnt work did a complete system restore ....update all the drivers ...stilll dam wont work...

just give up smoking thinking about starting again ...thanks sony.....should i just send it back
..

AsqSteve

Had the similar problems my self. My problem seems to be with DVD+R s at present. Cannot burn them although I could previously. Funnily enough this has only started happening since the last firmware release. Anyway it's going back next week. We'll see what happens?