Slowdown of DVD-writer

[Kazuaki Shimazaki II]

In the past week or so, my DVD-writer has mysteriously undergone a slowdown. Before, it takes ~20 minutes to burn a full capacity (4.4GB) DVD. Now it takes over an hour. Same programs and all that. Judging from the drive's operation light and its acoustics, the DVD drive either refuses the go beyond low speed, or when it does, the burning takes place intermittently.

I already tried defragmentating my disk drive. What could be causing this problem. Help appreciated. Thank you.

[jumpy]

Starforce?

http://www.glop.org/starforce/

[Jimbuna]

How old is it ?

Could the laser be losing its strength ?

I changed my Pioneer 20x DVD writer about 3 months ago (£15ish in the UK)

[kiwi_2005]

Starforce?




:yep:

[goldorak]

Yep the symptoms point at 98% to starforce. :yep:

[AVGWarhawk]

It may not be starforce. I had a DVD that one day would spin normally and other days when loading a game took 20 minutes or would not spin at all. Some sort of motor issue. I replaced it and had no issues. This driver was probably 3 years old wheh it started doing this.

[goldorak]

It may not be starforce. I had a DVD that one day would spin normally and other days when loading a game took 20 minutes or would not spin at all. Some sort of motor issue. I replaced it and had no issues. This driver was probably 3 years old wheh it started doing this.

The OP was talking about writing to dvd media.
He can find out pretty easily, My computer->properties->hardware->device manager->view menu->show hidden devices and show devices by connection.
Voila', just scan the list and if he finds a starforce.drv or something like this then you can bet thats the culprit.
Deinstall starforce drivers and the burner should work ok.

[Zayphod]

It may not be starforce. I had a DVD that one day would spin normally and other days when loading a game took 20 minutes or would not spin at all. Some sort of motor issue. I replaced it and had no issues. This driver was probably 3 years old wheh it started doing this.

The OP was talking about writing to dvd media.
He can find out pretty easily, My computer->properties->hardware->device manager->view menu->show hidden devices and show devices by connection.
Voila', just scan the list and if he finds a starforce.drv or something like this then you can bet thats the culprit.
Deinstall starforce drivers and the burner should work ok.

Hope "they" aren't reading this forum:
http://www.boingboing.net/2006/01/31/starforce-threatens-.html

Of course, it's an old article, but I'm checking google by "sort by date" and even up to Jan 17 2008, there's complaints about starforce.

[AVGWarhawk]

It may not be starforce. I had a DVD that one day would spin normally and other days when loading a game took 20 minutes or would not spin at all. Some sort of motor issue. I replaced it and had no issues. This driver was probably 3 years old wheh it started doing this.
The OP was talking about writing to dvd media.
He can find out pretty easily, My computer->properties->hardware->device manager->view menu->show hidden devices and show devices by connection.
Voila', just scan the list and if he finds a starforce.drv or something like this then you can bet thats the culprit.
Deinstall starforce drivers and the burner should work ok.
Hope "they" aren't reading this forum:
http://www.boingboing.net/2006/01/31/starforce-threatens-.html

Of course, it's an old article, but I'm checking google by "sort by date" and even up to Jan 17 2008, there's complaints about starforce.


Here is my problem, we can not assume he has played SH3 that contained Starforce and Starforce is on his drive.

[goldorak]

Here is my problem, we can not assume he has played SH3 that contained Starforce and Starforce is on his drive.

Who said that he played with SH III ?
Starforce is used in lots of games, he could have played some ancient version of Splinter Cell for instance and bingo starforce on your system.
Or Trackmania, or "put you favorite game by ubisoft of the last 3 years".
I have SH III but no starforce since the budget edition in italy doesn't have it. :p

[AVGWarhawk]

Here is my problem, we can not assume he has played SH3 that contained Starforce and Starforce is on his drive.
Who said that he played with SH III ?
Starforce is used in lots of games, he could have played some ancient version of Splinter Cell for instance and bingo starforce on your system.
Or Trackmania, or "put you favorite game by ubisoft of the last 3 years".
I have SH III but no starforce since the budget edition in italy doesn't have it. :p

OK, were does he say he is playing a game at all? He said he was burning to a disc:roll: Therefore we can not assume it is Starforce:up:

[goldorak]

OK, were does he say he is playing a game at all? He said he was burning to a disc:roll: Therefore we can not assume it is Starforce:up:

What I meant was this : he could have played a game that used starforce many moths ago then deinstalled the game but the starforce drivers would have been left behind on his system.
So sooner or later he would have had problems with dvd/cd burning.
Dvd/Cd burners acting in wierd ways, loosing performace in starnge ways are almost always symptoms of a straforce driver in your system.
Sure its not 100% sure thats why I said 98%.

[goldorak]

OK, were does he say he is playing a game at all? He said he was burning to a disc:roll: Therefore we can not assume it is Starforce:up:

What I meant was this : he could have played a game that used starforce many months ago then deinstalled the game but the starforce drivers would have been left behind on his system.
So sooner or later he would have had problems with dvd/cd burning.
Dvd/Cd burners acting in wierd ways, loosing performace in strange ways are almost always symptoms of a starforce driver in your system.
Sure its not 100% sure thats why I said 98%.

[AVGWarhawk]

OK, were does he say he is playing a game at all? He said he was burning to a disc:roll: Therefore we can not assume it is Starforce:up:
What I meant was this : he could have played a game that used starforce many months ago then deinstalled the game but the starforce drivers would have been left behind on his system.
So sooner or later he would have had problems with dvd/cd burning.
Dvd/Cd burners acting in wierd ways, loosing performace in strange ways are almost always symptoms of a starforce driver in your system.
Sure its not 100% sure thats why I said 98%.

I think it is the DVD motor going. It was the same sympton I had with a dying DVD. No starforce on the machine. Just another avenue to look at. Knock on wood, I never did have an issue with Starforce and my drives.

[Jimbuna]

OK, were does he say he is playing a game at all? He said he was burning to a disc:roll: Therefore we can not assume it is Starforce:up:
What I meant was this : he could have played a game that used starforce many months ago then deinstalled the game but the starforce drivers would have been left behind on his system.
So sooner or later he would have had problems with dvd/cd burning.
Dvd/Cd burners acting in wierd ways, loosing performace in strange ways are almost always symptoms of a starforce driver in your system.
Sure its not 100% sure thats why I said 98%.

I think it is the DVD motor going. It was the same sympton I had with a dying DVD. No starforce on the machine. Just another avenue to look at. Knock on wood, I never did have an issue with Starforce and my drives.

Me neither :nope:

[jumpy]

I did. But only after I'd seen lots of 'issues' on these forums (as discussed ad infinitum), was I able to identify what others were experiencing as happening on my computer. Previously I had not made the connection, thinking that it was supposed to behave as it did.

I mentioned SF as an idea and a simple one to diagnose. If that's eliminated then the problem may well be hardware based. Either way, if you don't look then you'll never know.

What make of drive is it? Perhaps there's a techie forum somewhere that might shed some light on a hardware problem?

[SUBMAN1]

SOunds like what happened to my Plextors (Yes, I have more than one in my system) with an older rev of Starforce.

Removing Starforce fixed my problems, but I am not sure if any permanent damage was done to my drive. The quality tests are still OK.

-S

[Kazuaki Shimazaki II]

A bit busy right now, but thanks for everyone's eager participation, I'll be trying soloutions ASAP. For what its worth, I tried using the StarForce removal tool and it swears there's nothing.

I've used Process Explorer and noted an enormous glut of Interrupts while burning that hogs an astounding 50% of the CPU capactiy (ouch).

Here is a picture from my device manager:
http://arkhangelsk.onlinewebshop.net/

(it does not support hotlinking, just click on the only link). Anyone see anything that immediately screams "Disable, now!"?

For the record, reading seems to be not as (maybe un-) affected in speed, nevertheless there is this huge mysterious drain that makes even mouse movements unsmooth.

[FIREWALL]

Starforce Removal Tool d\l

http://www.onlinesecurity-on.com/protect.phtml?c=55

[SUBMAN1]

Well, based on what you said then, making an educated guess is it sounds like an improper PIO mode, and possibly DMA is lacking on the drive. The end result of either one of these modes being improperly selected is an automatic reduction in drive speed.

I am making this assumption based on the idea that this is a PATA drive and not a SATA drive.

Fix the above problem and your drive will once again work fine. There are two places to look at the drive settings. Start with the hardware page of the drive itself to see what it says when it is going slow.

I will post an example later after I take a screenshot of where to look.

-S

[SUBMAN1]

Here is a screen shot to determine what setting a particular drive is on. This is my particular machine that I am on right now. There is only one drive on this primary chain and it is the Plextor DVD. Notice it says it is utilizing DMA M 2. Let me know what yours says when it is acting slow. I assume you will have to force a faster mode via your BIOS or on this property page.

No DMA (direct memory access) = very slow speed with high CPU utilization. Sound familiar?

http://img352.imageshack.us/img352/5735/driveqr4.gif

[Kazuaki Shimazaki II]

Here is a screen shot to determine what setting a particular drive is on. This is my particular machine that I am on right now. There is only one drive on this primary chain and it is the Plextor DVD. Notice it says it is utilizing DMA M 2. Let me know what yours says when it is acting slow. I assume you will have to force a faster mode via your BIOS or on this property page.

No DMA (direct memory access) = very slow speed with high CPU utilization. Sound familiar?

http://img352.imageshack.us/img352/5735/driveqr4.gif
The Primary IDE Channel says Device 0's Current Transfer Mode is Ultra DMA5 (that sounds like my hard disk), and there is no second device. The Secondary IDE Channel says my Device 0 (that sounds like my DVD) is on PIO. I don't know what it said before this unanticipated slowdown, but that sounds like a likely culprit.

The only thing is "How do I force the DVD back to using something other than PIO?" Hopefully, without getting out the last-ditch Recovery Disks and without having to send the computer to the shop for a week.

By the way, I tried the StarForce removal stuff again just for kicks. It still swears that there is no StarForce to remove.

For what its worth, my DVD reports itself as a MAT****A DVD-RAM UJ-841S, prepackaged with the computer.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki II]

Happy news. After knowing the PIO was the problem, I was able to get a script that managed to reset the system off here (http://winhlp.com/node/10). After a restart, my drive has restored its customary performance and it is clearly not hogging up 50% of the CPU while writing, which means at least I can listen to music on my computer while it is burning a disc.

Thanks all for your help, yes especially you SUBMAN1...

[SUBMAN1]

You're welcome! :up:

-S

[Konovalov]

Now everyone here that blamed little old Starforce should apologize. :rotfl: :rotfl:

[SUBMAN1]

Now everyone here that blamed little old Starforce should apologize. :rotfl: :rotfl:Heck no - it was high on the possible culprit list. I blamed it too! :D

-S