Power calibration issues with CD-RW drives?

[Rogue]

Anyone have any information on this subject?

 

[Mark R]

What exactly do you mean?

Failed power calibration can really only mean 2 things:
The media isn't recordable in the way expected by the recorder - e.g. due to an unusuaual dye formulation, a defective dye batch, or the media is damaged in the power calibration area.

The recorder laser has failed and cannot reliably record, despite the best attempts of the electronics/firmware to compensate

 

[3615buck]

I got the same message with my previous CD RW (Philips CDR3610) and I guessed the lens was dead. I couldn't burn any more CD...
I hope I was right or I threw it away for nothing !

Time to buy a new one...

 

[WiseOne]

for all practical purposes it is dead, i had the same problem. i had a successfull burn 1 out of 5 times, that's a lot of wasted cds. philips tech won't be able to help you, if your warrenty is expired, they'll only refer you to a company that'll fix it for you. but that'll cost you around 70-100 dollars so its not really worth it. i just bought a new plextor 12x and its great i would recommend it.

 

[Rogue]

I managed to find some more information on it and the majority of people seem to say it's related to the recording media or possibly that the drive lens is dirty. In nearly all instances, when people simply cleaned their drive and/or change to a different type of recording media, the problem went away. I don't believe that the drives are necessarily bad, especially considering that the problems being reported are on computers in their first 3-6 months of life.

 

[cmv]

What do you use to clean the lens?

 

[Rogue]

I am not the one having the problems actually. I work somewhere that does tech support for a major OEM and we have had a call or two concerning this and never really did any research into it. However, as I was looking on the 'net for info, I did come across this site that may help you clean your drive:

Clean your CD-R(W) Drive

Hope that helps.

 

[Mark R]

I cleaned my CDRW with an extra-soft lens cloth (Pentax supaclean), having moistened the lens by breathing gently on it.

Some people suggest not using those cleaning discs with the brushes on the bottom - I think they're concerned that they may damage the laser module - but in all fairness having looked at my recorder and several CD-ROM drives and audio players, the laser isn't much more delicate.

 

[MWink]

I would also recommend cleaning the drive. That worked for me once. Phillips drives are just plain junk. I had one that was dead out of the box. Not 1 successful burn. It's very strange but CD-RW drives seem to have VERY short lifetimes. Of my 2 CD-RW drives (not counting the Phillips) neither has lasted much more than 6 months. Interestingly enough my first CD-R drive (Sony CDU-928E 8X/2X) is still in operation to this day and works perfectly.