DVD drive problem

[Quincannon]

About 8 to 10 years ago I bought a VHS/DVD recorder and transferred many of my old VHS videos onto DVD (programs I recorded from the TV) and the other day I started to transfer them to my iMac then yesterday the drive wouldn't recognise the disc and wouldn't eject either and the PC froze and the only way to shut down was to press the off button at the back but it too several attempts before it went right again. I tried another disc and the same thing happened. Then I bought an external drive and the same thing was happening so I tried it on my Macbook Air and for two discs it worked perfectly and now it doesn't. The external drive won't work at all, not even on a new DVD movie I bought last week.

Do you think the old discs could be damaging the drives? I am watching one of the discs on my Toshiba VHS/Video recorder (not the same one I copied the discs on originally) and dubbing it onto the HDD the same time and will burn it onto a new DVD-R disc in the hope that will solve the problem.

I've recently downloaded Wondershare Video Converter Ultimate.

My iMac is working fine at the moment as long as I don't use the DVD drive.

I would appreciate some advice please?

Peter

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hello,

-Which model iMac?
-Which model MacBook Air?
-Which version of OS X on the iMac and the MacBook Air?
-Which brand/model external DVD drive?

I doubt the discs could be damaging the DVD drive(s), unless they are physically damaged.

C

 

[Quincannon]

Hi Cory

The iMac was new in May 2012, the Macbook Air was new last October and both have OS X El Capitan, and the External HDD is the ASUS ZenDrive which no longer works.

 

[Quincannon]

Correction. I just connected the External drive to the iMac and put a new DVD in and it worked, and the same on the Macbook Air.
So it appears to be the old discs causing the problem.

 

[Cory Cooper]

OK, thanks for the additional info. Strange that i happens in the iMac's optical and the ASUS. It cold be related to the age of the discs I guess, especially since it is happening with to different drives and Macs. Maybe the discs are physically deteriorating, cause=ing the freezes.

You said even new commercials DVD discs are now exhibiting the same behavior? How about CDs?

C

 

[Quincannon]

The new commercial DVD didn't work once but is working fine now and a CD I just tried is ok too. I will try one of the old discs again but I don't hold out much hope.

I put one of the old discs into my DVD recorder and am dubbing it to the HDD and then I will copy it to a new DVD-R disc to see if that will make a difference. I will let you know.

Thanks

Peter

 

[Cory Cooper]

No worries.

Good luck and definitely let us know.

C

 

[Quincannon]

I inserted a disc that was causing the problem into the DVD player, which had two recorded TV programs on it, and the first would only play so far and it stopped and the 2nd wouldn't play at all so it must be corrupted. I played another three discs (fast forwarding) and they were ok so I tried them on the Mac and they were fine. So it seems some of the old discs are corrupted which was causing the problem, but why would it cause the PC to freeze?

So far so good. Hopefully this will be useful to others on this forum who may at some point experience the same problem.

I will give you an update soon.

Peter

 

[Cory Cooper]

Peter,

It does seem like those discs are deteriorating, since a similar issue occurs when you use them in a standard DVD player. It would cause the computer to freeze, because the OS/drive are trying to read the disc and there are too many errors.

Many things can cause the failure over time - storage environment, original media manufacturing specs, etc.

Keep us in the loop,

C