Problems with burning discs in Win98

[youxia]

So, a long story short, I found myself in a situation where I need some CDs burned pronto, but only have a Win98 PC with CDRW drive to use.

At first I was elated to remember that this machine has a CDRW drive, so I don't have to buy a new laptop/separate burner, but, predictably, I hit a snag instantly: ImgBurn does not see the drive as a write-capable machine, only as a "generic DVD ROM".

 

The PC is P4 based, I have used it for some time as my DOS / older Win gaming machine. Works pretty much ok. The only question mark in Device Manager is some
"PC Communication Device".

 

The CDRW is Samsung SW-252F, have used it before to read CD roms no problem, it shows oks in Device Manager. I looked for drivers but their site says none are needed and that Windows one should be enough.

 

I have installed the ASPI 4.7.1.2 driver and tried it with latest ImgBurn, also tried the 1.3.0 version of ImgBurn and Nero 6 Ultra - no dice.

 

Posting here hoping somebody might have an idea on what I might be the problem...

[+Gemintronic]

A P4 machine should have USB ports.  You could install USB storage support and copy those files off to a better machine

https://www.philscomputerlab.com/windows-98-usb-storage-driver.html

 

Or, you could use a Linux based livecd and copy the files off that way

https://www.system-rescue.org/Screenshots/

[youxia]

Thanks, but this is not about moving files, I do it with USB already. I've jut bought a 3DO console and would like to burn some games for it. And this PC is the only one I have with a working CDRW, seeing as my laptop just up and died few days ago.

 

Of course, I know I can eventually do something else, like buy another burner or try to move this one to my other PC and see if it works, was just hoping there is some simple fix for the current situation. There is no reason why it shouldn't work in theory.

[MrMaddog]

Sounds like you may have to install a 32-bit driver for your Samsung SW-252F drive.  Windows 98 doesn't have a lot of built-in drivers and probably thinks your CD-RW drive is just a plain CD-ROM one.

 

You should be able to find the driver from a web search...

[youxia]

There are no Windows drivers for it, only DOS. The manual says they're not needed for Windows and that the generic one should do. I did look anyway and couldn't find any, only a firmware update. 

 

Anyway, the case is closed since my laptop somehow resurrected itself and I was able to burn some discs today. I suppose getting that CDRW burner  working in my old comp is doable, but it could be one of these rabbit holes where you spend 2 days looking for answers, and seeing as I don't really need it working now I'll leave it alone.

Edited June 26, 2022 by youxia