Cannot burn a CD with DVD Writer

Question

I have a Inspiron 6400 and am unable to burn a CD.  I opted for the DVD burner because I assumed it would be backward compatable and be able to burn a CD.  When I place a CD in the drive and use either Roxio Easy CD creator or the Sonic which came on the system it tells me there is no device available.  When I check the system (using the control panel) it shows it is there.  I can also play CD but not burn them.  Am I right in assuming this should work to burn a CD?  If not I am very angry that I purchased this unit.

skmerrow · Answer

Yes, it shows up and it plays Cd's.  Just will not burn them.

Seekerbeta · Answer

my inspiron 6400 burns CD's just fine. the only thing i can think of, right click my computer, and then click manage, and under removable storage, does your drive show up?

Workindood · Answer

I just bought a E1705 and my frind just bought a E1705. both are identical machines. I dropped my off at his house so he could reinstall Vista and remove Dell Bloatwear. He is highly qualified for this BTW.

However, he is telling me the drivers for Sonic just do not work. I do not know the details for we just spoke on the phone briefly this morning.

This is annoying that Dell sent out machines that are not fully operational. I "thought" they run checks on them before they box them up...guess not.

To me your problem looks to be a driver issue more then anything. I guess I am going to purchase another HD and put XP on that so I can run whatever I need too.

Message Edited by Workindood on 03-07-2007 01:27 PM

turkeey · Answer

Hey, I am having the same problem... (no burning capability after installing windows vista)   It is really wierd - when I start my computer the DVD-RW drive appears to work fine, then when I insert a CD-RW and try to burn, I get error messages, and the entire drive disappears from the 'computer' list and I have to restart to get it back - it's like my computer forgets it has a DVD-RW alltogether.  This is a frustrating problem.  FYI - I was using windows media player 11 to burn.   What the problem is not/Solutions I have already tried   1) It is not the upperfilters/lowerfilters problem some other people are having 2) It is not an improper setting in the recording menu 3) I don't believe it is a hardware problem...  The drive works fine for reading, and it worked fine prior to the vista installation   Any ideas would be appreciated.

dusty635 · Answer

I don't know if this will help you or not and it is so basic, but it worked for my computer. I bought a used dell GX260 off of ebay that included a CDW/DVDR. I checked it out and it played cds fine. Thought all was well. After the "warranty" ran out finally got around to trying to burn an audio cd. Wouldn't work no matter what. Took the drive out and installed a Sony CDR that I had. Worked like a champ! Bad drive I figured. Well here it is about a month later and thought I would check on driver/firmware updates. Updated and still no joy. Was pulling it out of the computer and about to install the Sony back in when I noticed that the jumper on the back was set to: cable select. Hmmm I thought, wonder if that would make any difference? Well, I set it to master, put it back in and guess what? As I am typing this, I am listening to music that I successfully burned! Nothing else was on the ide cable, just this burner alone, and it was installed at the end of the cable as before. Check it and change it, it might work. Just trying to help. This was on Windows XP-Pro though.

Message Edited by dusty635 on 05-12-2007 05:55 PM

Storage, Drives & Media

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