Around Christmas time I did a clean install of Windows XP on my Toshiba
laptop. Everything worked more or less fine. In particular I could burn
CD-Rs and CD-RW using my external HP cd-writer together with the RecordNow
and DLA software. I say more or less fine because some of the CD-RW created
using the older MyCD software running under Windows 98 were unreadable --
which I understand from reading here and elsewhere isn't unusual.
Last month I wiped the hard drive and did another clean install. I sometimes
test new gear using the computer and basically the sheer number of hardware
drivers tends to affect performance after a while. Incidentally this is a
major endorsement of XP, under 98 and ME I generally needed to clean install
every two to three months -- eight months is a big improvement.
Since the clean install, I haven't been able to burn a CD or use any of my
CD-RW discs. I can still read some of the CD-RW discs (but fewer than before
and not those created in the last eight months). I'm pretty certain the
applications haven't changed since I first moved to XP, so the only
explanation I can come up with is that something in the recent XP updates or
one of the newer drivers is causeing the problem.
Also, I can read some CD-RW in my laptop's CD-R driver, but not in the
CD-RW. I suspect this is a pointer to the problem, but can't figure out the
next step.
There's something else too. In the past I've used a program called UDFRead
to look at some of my old discs, last week I downloaded the latest version
of this program, 5.1.1.213 but it no longer installs -- I get an error
message if I try.
I've tried a second clean install, but ... no success.