Template:Optical Media Testing

We test the basic ability of an optical drive to boot a live disk, read data, and write data. Start by confirming which functions you need to test for the optical drive installed.

• All drives should have CD read and CD write functions (CD-R/W).
• Check the drive faceplate or Keeper label to see if your drive has DVD read and write capabilities (DVD-R/W), or just DVD read (DVD-ROM).

☐ You will need three testing disks:

• Live bootable disk (all optical drives)
• CD-RW for CD read and write functions (all optical drives)
• DVD-RW for DVD read and write functions (DVD-RW drives), or
• DVD-ROM for drives without DVD write functions (DVD-ROM drives)

Live boot test (all optical drives)

Booting a live disk tests the optical drive firmware (the little bit of software installed on the drive itself). The goal of testing the live boot first is to eliminate hardware problems before testing read and write functions in the operating system.
☐ Insert a live disk and reboot.
☐ You should end up on a screen from the disk, rather than the Xubuntu login screen. Remove the disk and reboot back to Xubuntu.
Troubleshooting steps

• Make sure your BIOS boot order is set correctly.
• Try a few different live disks.
• If the drive still fails to boot a live disk, it's probably time to try a different optical drive.

Tip
Live disks are often very slow to load.

CD read and write test (all optical drives)

Write
☐ Insert a CD-RW disk.
☐ Open the burning program Xfburn from Menu >> Multimedia.
☐ Create a new data project:

• Select New Data Composition from the Xfburn main menu.

☐ Select a file to burn:

• In the Xfburn file browser window select Desktop >> freegeek-manual-desktop.
• Add the file by selecting the green plus.

☐ Start the burning process:

• Hit the Proceed to Burn button.

☐ Eject the disk once the burning process has completed.

• The disk will autoeject in some systems.
• Eject by right clicking on the disk Desktop icon >> Eject.
• Open a terminal and type eject.

Read
☐ Reinsert the disk, and wait a few moments. Confirm that the file you burned is on the disk.

• A file manager window should pop up, with the file you burned.
• If the window does not appear, check Places for the disk.

☐ Blank the disk from Xfburn >> Blank CD-RW to prepare the disk for the next tester.

DVD read test (for DVD-ROM drives only)

☐ Insert a DVD-ROM disk. Confirm that the operating system can read the files on the disk.

• A file manager window should pop up, with the file you burned.
• If the window does not appear, check Places for the disk.

Tip

• Copywritten software is required to play DVD movies. We do not install this software, but verify instead that the files on the DVD are readable by the operating system.

DVD read and write test (DVD-RW drives)

☐ Follow the instructions for CD-RW testing, with a DVD-RW disk. Troubleshooting steps for -/+RW media
Optical disk media is finicky, and disks in the build room are used frequently.

• Try several different -/+RW disks.
• Try a read-only disk (CD or DVD-ROM), and see if the drive can read the disk.
• If the drive can read a CD or DVD-ROM disk, ask your instructor for a brand new CD/DVD-RW disk or CD/DVD-R. Some media formats don't play nice with specific optical drives when running Ubuntu.