Burned vs pressed CDs

[Fraser Campbell]

On Sunday 05 December 2004 09:18, David J Patrick wrote:

> In attempts to install ubuntu, on my thinkpad, I failed several times
> using a freshly burned CD, even though the md5 sums were good. Then,
> using an official ubuntu CD, it worked like a charm. I have also read
> about other folks whose CDrom drives would only worked with "pressed"
> CDs, not "burned" CDs. What's the difference ?

Recently I was doing a lot of Debian installs with modified versions of the 
installer CD.  Instead of thowing out dozens of discs I wanted to use 
rewriteables.  I had Maxell 1x-4x CDRWs.

The Maxells burned just fine, the md5sums checked out, and the disks even 
booted and worked properly on most systems that I tried.  However when it 
came to an IBM xseries server (brand new) it would not boot.  By accident I 
discovered that the CDs might actually be able to boot ... after a little 
more than 30 minutes the Debian Installer splash screen appeared, and 
pressing enter the kernel did start to load but the progress was painfully 
slow (4 dots after 20 minutes).  Some of the Maxells had never been burned, 
some of those that I tried were reburns.  I tried reducing the burn rate to 
1x but that made no difference.

I went out and purchased some alternate 4x-10x CDRW media (5 verbatim, 1 
fujifilm) and the IBM booted those absolutely fine ... verbatim burned at 10x 
and I believe fujifilm had burned at 4x.

So I don't know what the difference really is but I'd be willing to bet that 
there is media out there that will work for you.

-- 
Fraser Campbell <fraser-Txk5XLRqZ6CsTnJN9+BGXg at public.gmane.org>                 http://www.wehave.net/
Georgetown, Ontario, Canada                               Debian GNU/Linux
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