Memorex DVD-recorder: skipping problem

[defective.hamster]

I took advantage of the after-XMas sale, and bought myself an external
Memorex DVD dual-format recorder/CD-RW drive (hey, it was a great
deal). Once I got it hooked up and installed the provided software
(Nero 6), I started to play with it. This is what happened:

1. Playing an audio CD works great.
2. I tried burning a new DVD (copying an old kiddie DVD), and that
worked fine. Same with burning a new CD.
3. Playing a movie DVD (a new one purchased this week, so no scratches
anywhere) caused the video and the audio to skip every couple of
seconds, making it impossible to watch the movie on my PC (but the same
DVD works fine on my TV's DVD player).
4. I tried playing a PC-DVD game included in the movie DVD and again,
the same video & audio skipping happened.

Basically, this Memorex drive is great at burning DVDs and CDs, and
also plays CDs. It just won't play DVDs--not without constant
skipping.

First off, I upgraded to the latest firmware (downloaded from Memorex
support website). It helped a tiny bit, but the skipping continues. I
also checked DMA status, and yes, it *is* set for DMA and not PIO.

So--I'm lost. What else can I do? Below is my computer's spec:
HP Pavilion 7935, AMD Athlon 1.3GHz
1GB RAM memory
NVidia GeForce2 MX with 64MB
internal Asus CD-RW drive (CRW-5232AS)
WinXP Professional

Is it my old video card? Your advice would be much appreciated!

 

[Bob Knowlden]

You say this is an external DVD burner. USB?

I presume that the Pavilion only includes USB 1.1 ports. (Look at the USB
controllers in Device Manager. If any are USB 2.0, there will be an
"enhanced" controller present.)

USB 1.1 is limited to 12 Mb/s, equals 1.5 MB/s. The 1X DVD rate is 1.32
MB/s, so there's not a lot of margin there. (The 1X CD ROM data rate is 150
kB/s, so there's no problem there.)

Another verification: you say that you copied a DVD. If you burned 4+ GB of
data on a single-layer DVD, the burn should have been complete in less than
10 minutes. (If you burned at 16X, maybe 5 or 6 minutes.) If you were
limited to USB 1.1 speeds, it would have been more like 50 minutes, and only
the buffer overrun protection in the burner would have prevented you from
making a coaster.

A simple fix for this would be to install a PCI USB 2.0 adapter card. If
your XP is SP1 or later, I believe that it might already include drivers for
it.

I hesitated to suggest the above, because I'd expect someone who knew to
update the drive's firmware would know all about USB 1.1 vs. 2.0. On the
other hand, you neglected to mention the interface to the drive, and you
seemed to think that the DMA/PIO issue would be relevant to an external USB
drive. (I'm fairly sure that it does not apply, although I haven't tried the
experiment.) If what I write is insultingly obvious (and false), I apologize
in advance.


Address scrambled. Replace nkbob with bobkn.

 

[Cari \(MS-MVP\)]

Both the CPU and the graphics card are low spec for today's standards. What
else are you running at the same time as playing the DVD?

 

[defective.hamster]

Thanks for your suggestion--I did upgrade my PC, so the Memorex is
using USB 2.0, not 1.1. So at least, it's not the USB's fault.

As for what other program I was running at the same time as
Nero/Windows Media Player/Real Player--well, Norton antivirus and Zone
Alarm.

Finally--yes, my PC *is* a 3+ years old dinosaur...but I've spent so
much on it over the years (increased memory, replaced graphics card,
replaced CD-RW drive, added HDs, got new speakers, etc.) that I would
like to squeeze as much out of it as possible (and I'm not a gamer).

Because I just *know* whatever PC I buy now will not meet the *real*
(not minimal) required specifications to run Longhorn (or was it
Bullhorn?) promised by Microsoft (you know, like the BS about how WinXP
only "needs" 64MB memory to run--ha!).