English Amiga Board - View Single Post - My cd/dvd drive can read CDR but not original CD?

Cubemon · 21 January 2022, 06:34

CD drives degrade over time and typically the laser gets weaker or the lense goes out of whack. I'd guess the laser is at the point of its senility where it just barely reads the CD-Rs until it gives up entirely.

It's typical for old CD-consoles like the Playstation to stop reading discs and a stop gap measure is to adjust the intensity of the laser. This can have the unfortunate side effect of the laser starting to carve visible grooves on the discs, if it's turned up too high.

I'm not sure if regular CD/DVD-ROM drives have laser adjustment pots, but the drives are pretty easy to replace.

All my old 5,25" optical drives have failed over time, and for some reason the usually flaky laptop drives are the only ones that read my old CD-R and DVD-R discs anymore.

Edit: Wikipedia says that CD-Rs have lower reflectivity than pressed discs, so it just could be, that the drive's laser is running too intense for the read sensor.

21 January 2022, 06:34	#10
Cubemon Recovering Amiga user Join Date: Aug 2015 Location: Underground Posts: 52	CD drives degrade over time and typically the laser gets weaker or the lense goes out of whack. I'd guess the laser is at the point of its senility where it just barely reads the CD-Rs until it gives up entirely. It's typical for old CD-consoles like the Playstation to stop reading discs and a stop gap measure is to adjust the intensity of the laser. This can have the unfortunate side effect of the laser starting to carve visible grooves on the discs, if it's turned up too high. I'm not sure if regular CD/DVD-ROM drives have laser adjustment pots, but the drives are pretty easy to replace. All my old 5,25" optical drives have failed over time, and for some reason the usually flaky laptop drives are the only ones that read my old CD-R and DVD-R discs anymore. Edit: Wikipedia says that CD-Rs have lower reflectivity than pressed discs, so it just could be, that the drive's laser is running too intense for the read sensor. Last edited by Cubemon; 21 January 2022 at 06:54.