CD burning and the linux kernel....

[CTho9305]

When will we see a kernel module that lets you treat CD-R/RW drives as block devices? I want to boot read/write from a CDRW 😉

 

[Nothinman]

Might be possible with DVD-RAM or DVD+RW drives, I had one for a short time (discs wouldn't read in my notebook DVD drive so I returned it) and IIRC there was a patch (I got my info from the dvdplusrw Debian package docs) that let you work directly on the block device. The problem is I don't think it's Random Access like DVD-RAM so you can't treat it like a hard disk.

 

[CTho9305]

Hmmm... how non-random is it? by block? sector? "track"? I dont think you have to rewrite the whole CD at once...

 

[MGMorden]

I'm still waiting on them to implement burners that can be used without SCSI emulation 🙂. The CD burning scene is just a bit of a hassle in Linux (It works ok w/ XCD-Roast once you get up and running but half the time I just don't feel like it 🙂). My Linux machine does have a burner but as of right now all my burning is done on the Windows machine (the burner in the Linux box hasn't burnt a CD since it was in the Windows box). Linux sure has it's uses, but CD burning isn't one of them when my Windows machine is always 3 keystrokes away (scroll lock x2 + the arrow key. dang I love keyboard shortcuts).

 

[Nothinman]

I'm still waiting on them to implement burners that can be used without SCSI emulation

Might happen in 2.5, but then there's a lot on the list of things to do with IDE in 2.5. I personally don't find it too much of a hassle, I compile my own kernels and since my only IDE device is the DVD-RW I just make the whole IDE subsystem modular and always use ide-scsi since it works for reading and writing. And distros like Mandrake set it up out of the box for you, so I don't see why it even makes a difference.

 

[MGMorden]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

I'm still waiting on them to implement burners that can be used without SCSI emulation

Might happen in 2.5, but then there's a lot on the list of things to do with IDE in 2.5. I personally don't find it too much of a hassle, I compile my own kernels and since my only IDE device is the DVD-RW I just make the whole IDE subsystem modular and always use ide-scsi since it works for reading and writing. And distros like Mandrake set it up out of the box for you, so I don't see why it even makes a difference.

I can't stand Mandrake. I used it for probably 2 years but after I found Slackware I have grown to hate it (the automatic stuff works great if you want to use it exclusively, but manual changes are much more of a hassle). I don't have a problem with knowing how to set it up (I've done it numerous times), but I just find it tedious.